RBS Greenwich Capital has hired Sanjeev Gupta, former global head of credit derivatives at Credit Suisse First Boston in London, to build its U.S. credit trading business. The move is seen as a coup for RBS, with Gupta being one of the founding fathers of the credit derivatives market and a widely respected trader and manager.
The move comes hot on the heels of Romita Shetty, former head of structured credit at JPMorgan, joining the firm to co-head a new structuring effort. RBS has a cash-flow collateralized debt obligation team and wants to broaden its effort to include other forms of structured credit and equity products. Shetty, who starts at RBS later this month, will co-head the U.S. structured group along with Fred Matera, head of the CDO business. Matera and Shetty declined comment and Gupta could not be reached by press time.
Once the new structured business is up and running, RBS plans to offer exotics such as portfolio credit derivatives and contracts related to alternative investments such as hedge fund performance. It will also offer so-called structured solutions for corporates. "It's a really big build out," the firm official added.
Rivals and firm officials said the U.K. bank, which lacks a presence in the U.S., was able to hire such big guns because of the arrival of John Walsh, former head of investment-grade bonds at Credit Suisse First Boston, as head of North American capital markets this spring. "This was in the cards as part of John coming aboard," one official added. Walsh did not return calls.
For Shetty, the move is also a return to the working world. She left JPMorgan as head of global structured credit products in January of 2003 to take maternity leave and never returned. At JPMorgan she had a hand in creating several innovative transactions, including BISTRO, which was one of the first large credit derivative securitizations. Shetty also presided over the first CDO squared, ZING I, in 1999, and the first collateralized fund obligation in 2002. One rival said Shetty's hire brings RBS some instant clout.
The moves are seen as part of RBS' continued transformation into a major credit player. Earlier this year the firm snared Merrill Lynch's top dog, Vincent Dahinden, European head of structured credit in London, to be global head of structured credit products in March.
