Private bank Lombard Odier scrambled to reassign management roles after the departure of one of its seven partners. The sudden exit also strengthens the hand of a new partner, finews.asia reports.
The abrupt departure of partner Hugo Baenziger at Lombard Odier on Thursday sets into motion a merry-go-round to hoover up his responsibilities. The former risk boss at Deutsche Bank is responsible for Lombard Odier’s technology, risk, marketing, communications, and a new Herzog & de Meuron-designed headquarters in a prestigious Geneva district.
The bulk of his tasks will go to Annika Falkengren, the former CEO of SEB who moved Geneva last year as a Lombard Odier partner. At first blush, Baenziger’s exit at year-end strengthens the hand of Falkengren.
Exiting the Limelight
The Swedish banker also provides a study in contrasts to Baenziger on how to adapt from the hurly-burly of a listed firm to the discreet, consensus-based world of Genevan private banking, where time seems to move glacially.
Despite being one of the few women in top roles at a Swiss bank, Falkengren keeps a very low profile. Far from glowing Monday interviews in the «Financial Times» about a CEO with a trader’s instinct or in the spotlight as a director of battered automaker Volkswagen, Lombard Odier have carefully guarded her public and media appearances.
This has done little to dim her star power: bankers including UBS’ Axel Weber and Credit Suisse’s Urs Rohner swarmed around the diminutive blond economist at her «entrée» at an annual industry confab last year. Lombard Odier’s lead partner, 63-year-old Patrick Odier, beamed with pride, but never left her side.
Clumsy Fit
Odier will snap up the technology and operations part of Baenziger’s job, which includes a lucrative business for smaller banks to use Lombard Odier’s tech platform, to his remit. Falkengren, who oversees finances, will take the rest.
The remaining partners keep their roles: Christophe Hentsch, a descendent of the founding family, oversees compliance and human resources; Hubert Keller runs asset management; Frédéric Rochat runs private banking, together with Denis Pittet, who also oversees third-party asset managers and philanthropy.
Baenziger’s exit isn’t a complete surprise: he was a clumsy fit for Lombard Odier from the beginning. Officially, he is leaving by mutual agreement. The unofficial version is more complex: the former investment banker’s brash, alpha-male, impatient manner rubbed partners and employees the wrong way, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter.
Pole Position
The bank says merely that Baenziger will remain tied to Lombard Odier – including with at least part of the capital he put in when he joined in 2014.
Falkengren, for her hard-charging, crisis-tested ways in 12 years as CEO of SEB, has proven far more adept at fitting in when she became Lombard Odier 106th partner – and done so faster. She shed the CEO and director role last year, succumbing instead to what amounts to a schooling in Swiss private banking by her peers.
If deferring to her elders for tutoring and hand-holding bothered the 56-year-old, she didn’t show it. Her perspicacity may be shrewd: with one of its six partners – Christophe Hentsch – approaching his 60th birthday, and «first among equals» partner Odier nearing Swiss retirement age, Falkengren is in a prime position to cement her power.
