Banking News

Credit Suisse Announces MD Mark Davis

(20 August 2018 - Australia) Mark Davis has been announced as managing director and head of equities for Credit Suisse Australia. With over two decades of experience in senior roles at Bankers Trust, Citibank, JPMorgan, Deutsche Bank and Western Union across domestic and international financial services including equities, FX, fixed income, derivatives, financial technology and transaction banking, Mr Davis will lead the growth of the equities franchise across sales, execution and research.

Equity capital markets are undergoing significant change globally as brokers rush to comply with the EU’s MIFID 11 markets in financial instruments directive regulations that requires investment banks to ‘unbundle’ their research and execution services to offer them separately. Credit Suisse Australia’s prime balances have increased 30 per cent in the past year and revenues are up 40 per cent. Its dominance in the hard-to-borrow space for short selling has been one of the most-commented-on strengths from new private banking mandate wins joining the platform.

Credit Suisse retains top share of the stock borrow market in Australia, with 33 percent of all HTB equities. The investment bank’s stock borrow book is the third largest across Australia and New Zealand with a 12.5 percent market share. As technology becomes more important than ever, Credit Suisse will soon roll out its AES 2.0 Low Touch Platform as part of its suite of electronic trading algorithms, headed by Eugene Budovsky, and its prime broking business that services hedge funds continues to grow rapidly. Australian prime brokerage balances have more than doubled in the past year. Domestic fund managers offering new long-short funds, both Australian and globally focused, have been a significant driver of prime balance growth. Credit Suisse is continuing to see traditional long-only managers opening long-short products to broaden investment capacity.

“We are demonstrating the commitment of Credit Suisse to staying at or near the top of the pile in Australia. We’ve always viewed research as a big key part of the success of our business, so we’ve always invested heavily in research and that will continue. The challenge for all of us is to work out how to monetise that great research product, and in regard to that Mark is a very strategic thinker. So there are challenges from the environment that we are in, but there also opportunities. If you get the right people in the right places, you can pick up market share and add a lot of value for clients. We know Mark very well and he’s perfectly placed to help drive the business. His experience, knowledge and leadership skills will play a key role in helping us leverage our strong advisory position, increase our market share and grow our equities business in Australia” said Credit Suisse Australia CEO John Knox.