Nomura expands equity research desk (Amended)

Singapore

NOMURA has expanded its equity research team in Singapore and Malaysia, beefing up its coverage of the banking, utilities and plantations sectors.

The biggest brokerage in Japan has appointed Jaj Singh as head of Asean banks research, and June Ng as analyst for Asean utilities and plantations, according to an internal memo on Tuesday seen by BT.

BT understands that the team is now about 17-strong.

Before Nomura, Mr Singh was previously at Standard Chartered, where he also headed research coverage on Asean banks and covered Singapore and Indonesia lenders. Prior to that, he had experience in UBS covering banks, SGX, healthcare and media stocks as a research analyst, and at JP Morgan Investment Management covering telecommunications and utilities.

Ms Ng had earlier covered regional utility and coal stocks at DBS Vickers. She also worked at various brokerages in Malaysia covering property and construction and oil and gas.

The new hires in Singapore and Malaysia come even as Nomura trims equity staff in Hong Kong.

Its Hong Kong-based Asia ex-Japan head of equities Yasuhiro Fujiwara, and a managing director of equity derivatives in the region, Vincent Yam, were leaving the bank, Bloomberg reported last month.