Following the departure of two veteran bankers, Credit Suisse is experiencing a «brain drain», and has lots of internal talent to draw on, according to a person familiar with the matter. 

The news that two senior bankers departed Credit Suisse was making the rounds in the media yesterday and today and was taken as yet another sign of further trouble at the beleaguered bank. 

To be sure, the bank is undergoing a significant restructuring which it recently said is «well on track», without offering more specifics. This has led to speculation about what the bank is doing until it releases the results of the review on October 27, including up to 5,000 job cuts and splitting up the investment bank. 

As a result, each departure or announcement results in a reading of the tea leaves for indications about the direction of the bank. The recent departures of Jens Welter and Daniel McCarthy have once again brought out the crystal balls to interpret what that means for Credit Suisse.

A Deep Talent Bench

For its part «Despite the so-called brain drain, Credit Suisse has a deep bench of talent,» a person familiar with the matter told finews.com.

In announcing the departure of Welter in an internal memo also made available to finews.com, David Miller global head of investment banking and capital markets (IBCM) announced the promotion of Cathal Deasy and Giuseppe Monarchi. The two experienced dealmakers will be co-heads of IBCM for the EMEA region based in London, and will report to David Wah who was appointed sole Global Head of banking. 

Miller said that Deasy advised clients on «several landmark transactions», including Rio Tinto's $3 billion offer to acquire a minority interest in Turquoise Hill. In addition, there was a $45 billion merger deal involving DuPont and IFF, and a 32 billion euro acquisition of Abertis by Atlantia and ACS.

Monarchi was also involved in billion-dollar-plus deals, including the $7 billion acquisition by Pincus Warburg and Apax of TM BL from Deutsche Telekom.

League Tables

When looking at deals through the first half of the year, Credit Suisse was in the top 10 in terms of fees, raking in $1.21 billion, placing seventh behind Barclays which took in $1.34 billion, according to the «Financial Times» (behind paywall) ranking.

The question is: will Credit Suisse need to draw on that deep bench once again in the near future?