By Nisha Gopalan
Citic Securities Co., China's biggest brokerage firm, launched
its global investment-banking platform Monday, combining its
bankers with those from CLSA, the Asian firm it acquired two years
ago.
The new venture, Citic CLSA Securities, also established offices
in London and Sydney.
Citic CLSA integrates investment-banking operations at both
firms and has more than 100 people on staff across 10 cities
globally. It was set up "to capitalize on increasing outbound
Chinese investment and foreign investors seeking access to China,"
the two firms said in a statement.
Last year, Citic Securities moved its equities underwriting
business outside China into CLSA, but the Citic CLSA outfit will
hold all investment-banking operations outside China at the two
firms.
Citic Securities, China's biggest brokerage by revenue, bought
CLSA from France's Crédit Agricole SA in July 2013.
Monday's launch creates a footprint that is likely one of the
biggest overseas ones by a Chinese investment bank. Citic CLSA has
operations in banking and underwriting bond and share sales, as
well as advising on mergers, in Hong Kong, Bangkok, Manila, Mumbai
and Singapore as well as Colombo, Sri Lanka; Jakarta, Indonesia;
and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; in addition to the new staff members in
Sydney and London. While CLSA has always had traders in Sydney,
Citic CLSA will have investment bankers in the Australian city as
well as in London, focused mainly on M&A.
Andrew Low, who was appointed to lead Citic CLSA, was formerly
chief operating officer of Macquarie Capital, the Australian bank's
investment-banking arm.
"With this new business, we are better positioned for the rising
amount of Chinese investment into Europe, which reached US$18
billion this year alone and continues to grow," said Mr. Low, who
joined CLSA as head of international investment banking late last
year.
"We're seeing a lot of our clients in China interested in Europe
and are also getting approaches by European companies looking for a
buyer or investor and believing that the natural buyer may be a
Chinese one," he said.
Citic Securities' acquisition of Asia-focused CLSA was one of
the biggest overseas purchases by a Chinese securities firm. A more
ambitious attempt by Citic Securities and Bear Stearns to buy
stakes in each other in 2007 was never completed because the Wall
Street bank collapsed the following year during the global
financial crisis, before Chinese regulators had the opportunity to
approve the deal.
Citic Securities is listed in Hong Kong and Shanghai but is
around 17% owned by Chinese conglomerate Citic Ltd., which in turn
is owned by the Chinese government.
Write to Nisha Gopalan at nisha.gopalan@wsj.com
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