Bank of America has appointed Emma West as global head of futures and options, OTC clearing, FX PB and FI PB. West, who is based in London, previously was head of the European business for futures and options and OTC clearing. She joined the bank in October 2007 as a director for the futures business in sales and was involved with the build-out of the OTC clearing business that began in 2009. She took on the role of head of the sales and marketing team in 2011 and was appointed head of sales and marketing for futures and options and OTC clearing in Europe in 2018. West, who also sits on FIA’s board of directors, previously worked at Goldman Sachs and Credit Suisse.
Russ Abramson has been promoted to Americas head of futures and options and OTC clearing at Bank of America, reporting to Emma West. He will also continue in his role as global head of client solutions at the bank. Abramson, who has been at the bank for 10 years, is a lead ambassador on the FIA Derivatives Market Institute for Standards (DMIST) committee and sits on FIA Tech’s board of directors.
Ben Green has joined Bank of America as managing director and head of base metals based in London. He was previously a managing director in the base metals group at Macquarie Group, where he worked for seven years. Before that he worked at energy trader Mercuria and Goldman Sachs.
Former Bank of England advisor Sam Riley has joined law firm Morrison Foerster in London as a partner in the transactions department. At the Bank of England, she advised Sir Jon Cunliffe while he served as chair of the Committee for Payments and Market Infrastructures and co-chair of CPMI-International Organization of Securities Commissions. Riley also recently advised on developing regulatory policy for financial markets, was involved in international work on the G20 cross-border payments roadmap, and led the Bank of England team analyzing the impact of Brexit on financial markets. At Morrison Foerster, Riley focuses on financial services, banking, digital payments and securities regulation, specializing in digital assets and emerging technology.
Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing has appointed Matthew Cheong as managing director, head of structured products and platform business development, reporting to Wilfred Yiu, HKEX’s co-chief operating officer and head of equities. Cheong joins HKEX from Goldman Sachs where he was managing director, global markets (equities) for the past five years. Prior to this he held various senior roles at JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley focused on developing trading systems and technology.
Financial technology company Pico has named Bo Zhou as head of Asia Pacific. Zhou was most recently partner and senior managing director at IHS Markit (now S&P Global) in the region. Prior to that, Zhou worked at Bloomberg as company director and regional business manager for its global fixed income and trading solutions in Hong Kong and New York. Zhou takes over from Roland Hamann who has been appointed global head of product innovation at Pico.
Imane Kabbaj has been appointed responsible investment director, portfolio oversight at active investment manager Man Group. Kabbaj joins from London’s Pinebridge Investments where she was a sustainable investing specialist, responsible for developing ESG frameworks across asset classes as well as the firm’s overall net zero strategy. Prior to Pinebridge, she worked at HSBC, London Stock Exchange Group and the World Gold Council.
Post-trade and blockchain technology provider Baton Systems has appointed Ravindra Madduri as its new global head of product. Madduri joins from fintech Paysend, where he served as head of enterprise B2B products. He previously held product functions at Citi, ABN AMRO, RBS and Barclays. Madduri is based in London and reports directly to Arjun Jayaram, chief executive of Baton.
Carlos Martin has started a new role as global lead electronic trading operational risk and compliance at JP Morgan covering electronic and algorithmic trading for all asset classes. Previously, he was the global lead for the bank’s fixed income, currencies and commodities operational risk management, covering electronic and voice trading.
The exchange councils of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange (FWB) and Eurex Deutschland have elected their chairman and deputy chairman. Both councils had been elected in rotation at the beginning of December 2022. The members of the FWB exchange council re-elected Matthias Zieschang as chairman and Georg Stocker was confirmed as deputy chairman. Zieschang is a member of the executive board and serves as executive director controlling and finance at Fraport. He has been chairman of the FWB exchange council since July 2020. Stocker is CEO of DekaBank Deutsche Girozentrale and has been deputy chairman of the exchange council since June 2021.
Tobias Vogel was elected as the new chairman of the exchange council of Eurex Deutschland. Vogel is a member of the management board of UBS. He succeeds Robbert Booij, CEO Europe at ABN Amro Clearing Bank. Christophe Adam, head of listed derivatives, EMEA & APAC, prime services and clearing at SG International, was elected as vice chairman. Adam has been a member of the exchange council since June 2014 and succeeds Lutz Johanning, holder of the chair of empirical capital market research at WHU – Otto Beisheim School of Management.
Futures industry veteran Ray Salvatore has joined Adalpha Asset Management as director of trading and operations. Adalpha is a Chicago-based hedge fund that specializes in systematic trading of futures. Salvatore previously worked at Eckhardt Trading Company, a managed futures fund based in Chicago, as a senior director in trading and operations.
FIA Tech, a technology provider to the futures industry, has announced that Michael Torretta has joined the firm in New York in the newly created role of head of strategic alliances, reporting to CEO Nick Solinger. Torretta joins from JP Morgan, where he worked for more than 20 years, most recently as executive director, product development in the global clearing and execution business. He also represented JP Morgan on the board of directors for FIA Tech and as the co-chair of the FIA Tech Product Advisory Committee.
