JPMorgan weighs naming new China chiefs in reshuffle

JPMORGAN Chase & Co is considering appointing its Asia-Pacific chief financial officer and a key Hong Kong dealmaker to run its China business, sources familiar with the matter said.

The bank is mulling Alan Ho as its new chief executive officer for China and Rita Chan, who joined the United States firm in late 2020 from Goldman Sachs Group, is set to become senior country officer, the sources said, asking not to be identified before an internal announcement. The two would fill the vacancy to be left by Mark Leung, who resigned as China CEO last month after a 25-year stint at the firm. Final decisions on the candidates and remits have not been made.

A media representative at JPMorgan declined to comment.

JPMorgan is changing the guard in China at a time when the country is facing increasing economic woes with global firms de-risking and scaling down operations in the world’s second-biggest economy. The bank is also making leadership reshuffles in the region, with Asia-Pacific CEO Filippo Gori departing for a global role in London.

Unlike rivals including Goldman Sachs, UBS Group and Morgan Stanley that have mainland Chinese running their onshore investment banking operations, JPMorgan is the only global bank that put Hong Kong executives in charge after appointing Leung for the CEO role in 2018.

Leung, based in Shanghai and the most senior executive to step away among global banks in years in China, will stay on until the end of 2024 to help with the succession.

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JPMorgan started building its China securities and investment bank in 2016. The US bank also gained full control of a mutual fund joint venture in 2023, after adding ownerships of a futures unit in 2020 and a securities business in 2021.

Ho is also currently the Asia-Pacific chief administration officer. Chan was made head of consumer and retail investment banking for the region last year, after joining from Goldman in late 2020 as head of real estate investment banking for Asia. She is the wife of Christopher Hui, Hong Kong’s Financial Services and Treasury secretary. BLOOMBERG