The Bank of International Settlements has appointed Chang Yong Rhee, current governor of the Bank of Korea, as chair of the Global Financial System committee for a three-year term. Rhee succeeds Governor of the Reserve Bank of Australia Philip Lowe, who served since June 2018. Rhee has served as Governor of the Bank of Korea since April 2022, and previously held senior positions at the International Monetary Fund and the Asian Development Bank.
Bim Afolami, a Conservative Member of the UK Parliament, has been appointed Economic Secretary to the Treasury, succeeding Andrew Griffith. Afolami will be responsible for financial services policy, reform, and regulation. He also serves as chair of the Industry Advisory Group of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Financial Services. Since 2017, Afolami has served as an MP for the constituency of Hitchin and Harpenden in the House of Commons. He also spent two years as a senior executive of group corporate strategy and restructuring at HSBC.
Citi has promoted Max Layton to global head of commodities research, based in London. Since joining the bank in 2017, he has been the head of commodities research for Europe, Middle East and Africa, with a particular focus on industrial and precious metals. Earlier in his career he served in similar commodities research roles at Goldman Sachs and Macquarie. Layton has replaced Ed Morse, one of the industry’s most experienced commodities analysts, who left after 12 years as the head of the bank’s commodity research. Morse, best known for his analyses of energy markets, served in the US government as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for International Energy Policy from 1979 to 1981 and subsequently worked at Phillips Petroleum, Lehman Brothers and Credit Suisse.
The London Metal Exchange Group has appointed Alistair Baldwin as its new chief technology officer, succeeding Mario Quonils. Baldwin will begin on 15 January and will report to LME CEO Matthew Chamberlain, LME Clear CEO Michael Carty, and HKEX Group CIO Richard Leung. Previously, Baldwin was chief information officer at NatWest Markets and a member of the NatWest Markets executive committee. Before NatWest Markets, he was global head of IT equities at HSBC for seven years, where he spearheaded the transformation of its equities technology platform.
Bank of America has appointed Matt Lewin as head of futures and options, APAC regionally as managing director, a role previously held by Shiau-Ling Chong, who now serves as managing director of senior relationship management for global markets. Lewin has spent 19 years at Bank of America Merrill Lynch in Hong Kong, most notably as head of prime brokerage relationship management for the Asia-Pacific region.
Bank of America also has appointed Wei-jay Andy Hwang as director of business risk and futures and options treasury. Hwang has been with Bank of America since 2013 and most recently was the director of futures, options and OTC clearing operations. Prior to that, he served as global head of clearing infrastructural solutions and data management and spent four years in Singapore in leadership roles for the bank.
Trading Technologies has appointed Justin Llewellyn-Jones as chief operating officer, Christopher Heffernan as executive vice president of fixed income and Alun Green as executive vice president of futures and options. As chief operating officer based in New York, Llewellyn-Jones will lead all of the firm’s market-facing fixed business line. He joins Trading Technologies from Broadridge where he was most recently chief product officer of capital markets. He also served as global head of derivatives at ION from 2018 to 2019.
Heffernan will be responsible for building the company’s global fixed income business and will also be based in New York. Previously, Heffernan was head of fixed income sales at Flow Traders. He was also a director of institutional sales at SumRidge Partners and vice president of debt capital markets at Morgan Stanley.
Green will lead the expansion of the core futures and options franchise and will be based in London. Previously, he was managing director of the derivatives utility business at FIS, which managed clearing services for several leading brokerage firms. He also served as the company's head of strategy for post-trade derivatives and securities. He previously held the same role at SunGard before its acquisition by FIS in late 2015.
Euronext has appointed Anthony Attia as global head of derivatives and post-trade. His previous position was as global head of primary markets and post trade. Over Attia’s 10 years at Euronext, he has also held positions including CEO of Euronext Paris, global head of listing and post trade, global head of Primary markets and post trade, and has also served as Euronext Clearing’s chairman of the board since 2022.
Euronext has promoted Simon Gallagher as CEO of Euronext London and head of global sales after the departure of Chris Topple who previously held the role since 2018. Prior to taking on this role, Gallagher spent 20 years in Euronext Paris, most recently as head of cash and derivatives since 2018.
Cboe Global Markets has appointed Natan Tiefenbrun as president of North American and European equities, based in London. This new role expands on his previous position as president of Cboe Europe. Tiefenbrun has held various roles across the industry, including leading the agency equities trading services for EMEA at Bank of America Merril Lynch before moving to Cboe in 2021 as head of European equities.
Nasdaq European Markets has appointed Matteo Balladori to the role of senior director of European equities and derivatives sales, based in London. Balladori joins from Citadel where he was head of European business development. Before Citadel, he worked at the London Stock Exchange Group as a business analyst and associate.
Barclays appointed Jean-Baptiste Patois as head of equity derivatives ex-strategic derivatives for the Asia-Pacific region, based in Hong Kong. Patois will be responsible for leading exotics and flow derivatives and will report to head of APAC markets Hossein Zaimi and to global head of structured derivatives and non-US flow Ashish Prabhudesai. Prior to joining Barclays, Patois led the Asia equity derivatives trading team at Nomura. He previously spent six years at Credit Suisse and eight years at Société Générale in equity derivatives trading roles.
BNP Paribas has promoted Julien Romand as head of derivatives clearing for institutional clients in Asia-Pacific, filling a gap left when Bertrand D’Anselme, head of clearing for APAC, left the bank to join an investor services company. Romand currently works in institutional sales and derivatives execution and clearing, Germany and Austria. Prior to his time at BNPP, Romand spent seven years at Société Générale in prime brokerage and clearing sales for EMEA and then for Germany and Austria.
SIFMA has announced newly elected officers to its board of directors including chair-elect Laura Peters Chepucavage, head of global financing and futures at Bank of America, and Thomas Pluta, president of Tradeweb Markets.
Chepucavage has been with Bank of America Merrill Lynch since 2002. She spent 10 years in interest rates sales before moving to FICC trading in 2013. She spent over seven years in global short-rate trading before being named head of global financing and futures.
Pluta is president of Tradeweb Markets where he has served on the board of directors since 2017. He joined the company in 2022 from JP Morgan, where he was most recently global head of linear rates trading and co-head of North America rates trading. During his 27 years with the bank, he traded and managed a variety of global trading teams across the global rates, emerging markets, and FX businesses.
Dan Childs has joined Balyasny Asset Management as its new head of cash and liquidity management. He brings over two decades of financial industry experience. Previous roles include international chief operating officer and head of international treasury operations at Citadel, hedge fund group director at Société Générale, and securities finance trade at the Royal Bank of Canada.
Optiver, a trading firm based in the Netherlands that is active as a market maker in a wide range of exchange-traded markets, has appointed Matt Mackenzie as head of US advocacy and regulatory affairs based in Washington DC. This is a new position as Mackenzie will be the first person in this role. Prior to joining Optiver, Mackenzie spent four years at CME, first as manager and then as director of government relations. He brings experience from his time on Capitol Hill where he served as counsel for the House Agriculture Committee Democratic office.
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission has appointed Melanie Devoe as director of the Office of Customer Education and Outreach where she will lead efforts to provide customers with fraud and abuse prevention resources. Devoe has been with the CFTC for nine years, previously serving as an attorney in the agency's whistleblower office. She also brings experience working as an enforcement attorney at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission from 2002 to 2005.
It was announced via social media that VP and head of financial markets group for the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago Alessandro Cocco is currently on detail for the US Department of Treasury’s Financial Stability Oversight Council. He will work on the Financial Market Utilities and Payment, Clearing and Settlement Activities Committee in safeguarding the stability of the financial system through regulation and risk monitoring. He previously served as VP of Deutsche Bank and managing director and associate general counsel at JP Morgan.
Argo Blockchain, a cryptocurrency mining company, has appointed Thomas Chippas as chief executive officer and director based in New York. Most recently, Chippas was the CEO of Cboe Digital, the exchange formerly known as ErisX that was bought by Cboe in 2022. Other previous experience includes roles at Citadel Technology, Axoni, Citigroup, Barclays, and Deutsche Bank. He also sits on the board of directors at TS Imagine, a company specialising in trading, portfolio, and real-time risk solution software.
RQD Clearing, a technology company that provides clearing, custody, and execution for US equity markets, has appointed Tom Miglis, an investment partner at venture capital firm Nyca Partners, to its board of directors. Miglis served as chief information officer at Citadel for 14 years and sits on the boards of several other technology companies.
