EFG International AG To Expand In Asia With Banque Pictet & Cie partner Boris Collardi

Chief Executive Officer Giorgio Pradelli stated that EFG International AG intends to expand in Asia with the assistance of former Banque Pictet & Cie partner Boris Collardi.

Collardi, a board member representing the Latsis family, the Swiss wealth manager's largest shareholder, advises on the bank's growth, according to Pradelli. Last year, the private banker, who abruptly left Pictet in 2021, purchased a roughly 3.5% stake in EFG from Spiro J. Latsis.

Pradelli said in an interview in Singapore that the Zurich-based firm has several hundred million Swiss francs in excess capital for deals. Target markets will include the city state of Hong Kong, as well as London and Europe, which are also among the areas where the bank intends to add staff, he said.

“If we could do acquisitions in Singapore or Hong Kong, we’d love to do that,” said Pradelli.

EFG, founded in 1995 by a Greek billionaire family, is one of the international wealth management firms vying for market share in Asia. According to an Asian Private Banker league table, it ranks 20th among wealth firms by assets in Asia excluding China, trailing the region's largest, UBS Group AG, and Credit Suisse Group AG.

Nonetheless, EFG has been expanding through acquisitions such as Swiss private bank BSI in 2016 and Australia's Shaw and Partners more recently.

Collardi visited Hong Kong this year. His contacts, which include Asian clients, have been beneficial to the bank, according to Albert Chiu, head of EFG's Asia-Pacific operations.

As CEO of Julius Baer, Collardi oversaw a period of rapid expansion that included nearly a dozen acquisitions and joint ventures. This sparked an investigation into how well the bank vetted and monitored its clients' business activities. In 2018, he became Pictet's first outside partner in nearly two decades.

Pradelli stated that EFG plans to hire 50 to 70 bankers per year globally under the current three-year plan that ends in 2025. The bank is looking for senior executives who handle large amounts of client assets.

Asia is a strategic priority for the bank, according to newly appointed Chairman Alex Classen, who previously led HSBC Holdings Plc's Swiss private banking operations until last year.

Classen and Collardi were elected to the board in October, marking a change in direction that adds experienced private bankers as the bank plans for growth, Pradelli said.