Morning Coffee: Secretive employer taps female banker for top job. 40-year-old man returns to banking, again
It's not every putative employer in the financial sector that has its own 18th century Georgian mansion balanced on Britain's 'Cotswold Escarpment.' Nor do most multistrategy hedge funds allow individual portfolio managers to invest across the gamut of farming, financial and commercial property investments and residential property.
Both things are features of the Weybourne Group, the secretive family office managing circa $5.6bn of funds belonging to James Dyson, the British vacuum cleaner mogul. Which might explain its allure to one of the top female bankers in Singapore.
Weybourne is hiring. Last November, the Straits Times said it had 70 people, with its investment arm run out of Singapore and computer systems and protection of the Dyson family at their escarpment mansion happening in the UK. Now it employs 75, and has added Tan Su Shan, who is group head of institutional banking at DBS in Singapore, as a board director.
For anyone unfamiliar with the intricacies of Singaporean banking, DBS is the most important local bank for investment banking fees, making Su Shan one of the island's most important bankers. As befits a secretive organization, Weybourne isn't commenting. Su Shan remains at DBS, but her side-gig at Weybourne is a reminder of the allure of family offices in a world where multistrategy hedge funds make most of the headlines. It probably helps that the Weybourne fortune belongs to a British vacuum cleaner billionaire rather than a Chinese tech banking billionaire trying to shift his money out of China.
Separately, Davide V. Russo has left banking twice and returned both times. Russo, who has two MBA degrees and is in his early 40s, first left Morgan Stanley after a few years as an associate in London in the late 2010s. That time, he set up 'Westwing Home and Country Living,' which appears to be an interiors shop. Less than one year later, he was back as a VP at Arma Partners, the UK boutique bank that works with tech firms. He then skipped to Morgan Stanley for a year before leaving banking again for corporate development - a role that some say is more pleasant and easy-going than M&A in a bank. But after six years in corporate development for Amazon and Bytedance and a brief foray into SPACs, Russo is back. - He's just joined Citi's EMEA technology deals team as an MD and declares himself "delighted." It's a reminder that M&A jobs are always there as a back-up when needed.
Meanwhile...
Wall Street banks' fintech investments have declined in value. Stripe, for example, is currently in funding talks that would value it at $55bn before the new capital, versus a valuation of $95bn in 2021 (Bloomberg)
Goldman Sachs is setting up a vehicle to allow its richest clients to invest in Stripe's new fundraising round. (Bloomberg)
Evercore cut its analyst training program from three years to two. (Financial News)
In the past four years, BNP Paribas' European advisory team has grown from 95 people to more than 230. "From a pure M&A perspective, we have consistently grown over the last three years by more than 20% every year.” (Financial News)
Citi consolidated its eFX trading platforms into a new single platform that's a lot faster. It's not clear whether this needs fewer people to maintain it. (Trade)
Crypto firms have cut 2,000 jobs since January. (Bloomberg)
New charges against Sam Bankman Fried that are seemingly based on the testimonies of Caroline Ellison and Gary Wang, accuse SBF of making misleading Tweets, disguising political campaign donations and sending a falsely labelled balance sheet to investors. (Financial Times)
Wealthy British people in their 50s who own their houses outright are deciding they don't want to work any more. (Bloomberg)
JPMorgan says Jes Staley's personal travel to Epstein's island and alleged inappropriate emails were not part of his job, and that even assuming Staley helped "direct" Epstein's sex trafficking "his conduct would be far beyond his remit as a JPMC employee." (Reuters)
Senior Credit Suisse staff have been posting on LinkedIn about their away day with clients in St Moritz and this is felt to be inappropriate. (FiNews)
Hedge fund hiring principles: “It’s easy to explain. Basically, we give the top jobs to other posh people who are our mates.” (The Conversation)
It helps to be a celebrity if you want to work in private equity. (Substack)
Have a confidential story, tip, or comment you’d like to share? Contact: sbutcher@efinancialcareers.com in the first instance. Whatsapp/Signal/Telegram also available (Telegram: @SarahButcher)
Bear with us if you leave a comment at the bottom of this article: all our comments are moderated by human beings. Sometimes these humans might be asleep, or away from their desks, so it may take a while for your comment to appear. Eventually it will – unless it’s offensive or libelous (in which case it won’t.)
