Monday 21 October 2019
BUSINESS DAY
67
FINANCIAL TIMES
COMPANIES & MARKETS
@ FINANCIAL TIMES LIMITED
Matthieu Pigasse to leave Lazard to start own venture French political adviser turned star banker had been rumoured to be joining a rival firm SUJEET INDAP AND JAMES FONTANELLA-KHAN IN NEW YORK, AND HARRIET AGNEW IN PARIS
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atthieu Pigasse, the longstanding head of France for Lazard and co-owner of Le Monde newspaper, has resigned from the financial advisory and asset management company. Rumours had swirled for weeks that Mr Pigasse would join a rival boutique firm looking to start a Paris office. However, he said he would be starting his own venture. “Lazard in France has an unsurpassed franchise, with strong momentum. I am excited to begin my next chapter beyond investment banking in a new entrepreneurial project.” Mr Pigasse said. Mr Pigasse, 51, is a punk rock aficionado and self-styled enfant terrible of France’s close-knit financial world. He has advised some of the country’s largest companies, including Carrefour, Sanofi, L’Oréal and Danone, and carved out a reputation advising on sovereign debt restructuring for Iraq, Ecuador, Argentina, Cyprus and Greece. The departure of Mr Pigasse, perhaps Lazard’s best-known rainmaker, is a blow to the elite M&A advice firm whose fortunes have sagged this year as the deal market has slowed and competition has ramped up from upstart boutiques. He was elevated in May to global head of banking and deputy chief executive of Lazard’s global financial advisory unit. The firm has seen several leadership changes this year. Peter Orszag, the former Obama cabinet official, was named earlier this year as new CEO of Lazard’s financial advisory group, a step that appeared to indicate that he was being groomed to replace longtime chief executive and chairman Ken Jacobs.
“I admire and respect Matthieu Pigasse for all he has done for our clients and our global franchise,” said Mr Jacobs in a statement. Mr Pigasse’s resignation follows weeks of speculation that he was departing to start the France office for another boutique bank, either Evercore or Centerview Partners. However, Mr Pigasse said he was starting a new venture outside of investment banking. Bankers in the Lazard Paris office, while concerned about the loss of Pigasse’s deep client book, expressed relief that the uncertainty hanging over them had been ended. Senior bankers in Paris were summoned to the office for a meeting on Sunday night. Paris, with 135 bankers, has long been Lazard’s strongest office in Europe. The firm in September appointed a veteran of its London office, Cyrus Kapadia, as the new head of its UK unit replacing William Rucker who became chairman. A handful of more junior Lazard bankers recently left the Paris office and Mr Pigasse’s departure is certain to embolden rivals to challenge the market position of the firm whose operations in France trace back to the 19th century. Mr Pigasse studied at France’s Ecole Nationale d’Administration, the country’s training ground for the political elite, and then had a stint in politics serving two finance ministers. He was cabinet adviser to Dominique Strauss-Kahn between 1998 and 1999 and chief of staff to Laurent Fabius between 2000 and 2002. Mr Pigasse once harboured ambitions to be president of France, Alain Minc, an adviser, told Vanity Fair in a 2018 profile. Instead that path was taken by another of Mr Minc’s protégés: Emmanuel Macron, a former investment banker at Lazard’s arch rival Rothschild.
Goldman Sachs banker charged with insider trading Bryan Cohen accused of tipping off trader about bids involving Syngenta and Arby’s KADHIM SHUBBER AND LAURA NOONAN IN WASHINGTON AND ARASH MASSOUDI IN LONDON
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Goldman Sachs banker has been charged with insider trading in a scheme that allegedly generated $2.6m in illegal profits as he tipped off a trader about multibillion-dollar deals involving bank clients like Syngenta. Bryan Cohen, a vice-president at Goldman, was arrested Friday on federal criminal conspiracy charges in New York and released on bail, according to court records. The indictment was not immediately available, but parallel civil charges filed by the Securities and Exchange Commission detailed the alleged scheme. The SEC alleged Mr Cohen, 33, tipped off an unnamed trader about bids for Swiss agribusiness Syngenta
in 2015 by Monsanto and ChemChina, and about Arby’s 2017 takeover of Buffalo Wild Wings in 2017. “During the course of the scheme, Cohen in fact received substantial cash payments from Trader A in exchange for the inside information,” the SEC alleged. The securities regulator alleged the scheme generated at least $2.6m in illicit profits. An attorney for Mr Cohen did not immediately return a request for comment on Saturday. A spokesperson for Goldman said the firm was co-operating with the authorities. “Protecting client confidential information is our highest internal priority and we condemn this alleged behaviour,” the spokesperson said. A person familiar with the situation said Mr Cohen had been put on leave on Friday, adding there was no indication that the bank itself was being accused of any wrongdoing. www.businessday.ng
The US says Huawei telecommunications equipment can be used for spying by the Chinese government © Reuters
Huawei admits that US sanctions are hurting Chinese telecoms group struggles to replace Google apps on phones after export ban KIRAN STACEY IN WASHINGTON
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uawei is struggling to replace Google apps on its mobile phones after being hit by US sanctions, the company’s executives have admitted, saying it will be years before they can develop their own alternatives. The Chinese telecoms company, which is in the middle of a global technology war between Washington and Beijing, is being hurt by the US export ban, its executives told the Financial Times. Senior executives from Huawei US said they had been able to find replacements for much of the equipment they used to buy from the US, but not the computing services sold by Google. Joy Tan, vice-president of public affairs at Huawei US, said: “After the entity list, we were able to figure out some of the alternative solutions. The most chal-
lenging part is Google-managed services. We can continue to use the Android platform, since it is open-source, but we cannot use the services that help apps run on it.” Officials in the Trump administration say they believe Huawei poses a risk to national security since its equipment could be used by Beijing for spying. This year it imposed an export ban that prevents companies from selling it US-made parts. The move is part of a broader push to curb China’s economic and political power, including waging a trade war and sanctioning other technology companies that Washington says are involved in rights abuses. Huawei has continued to grow despite the US sanctions, however. Last week it announced that sales had surged 27 per cent over the past year. Customers with existing Huawei mobile phones are able to still access Google’s Play app
store, Google Maps and other products provided by Google Mobile Services, because of a temporary exemption that allows US suppliers to continue to service existing equipment. But these services are not available on new Huawei models, which the company worries will deter foreign customers. Google services are already banned from Chinese handsets. Huawei has been developing its own alternative operating system known as Harmony, but Ms Tan said it was a long way from being ready. Asked whether it could take years before Harmony was able to replace everything Google can do, she replied: “Yes. We have to find alternative solutions for that ecosystem, but it’s going to take some time to build. “There are so many Android users in Europe and south-east Asia, and they’re so used to these Google applications on top of Android phones.”
Policymakers’ fears of a global recession grow Chatter at IMF and World Bank meetings focused on trade and economic uncertainty CHRIS GILES AND JAMES POLITI IN WASHINGTON
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ublicly, finance ministers and central bank governors have held off on raising fears that a global recession is coming — but in private, international and national officials are not nearly so certain. The communiqué issued at the end of the IMF and the World Bank’s annual meetings in Washington this week agreed that the global economy is not slipping into recession. But as policymakers and economists gathered in the bustling corridors of the buildings surrounding 19th Street in Washington, the worry was that the forecast of an improving global
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outlook next year could, at any moment, be punctured by a tweet from the White House. That would turn the IMF’s relatively sober forecast that 3 per cent global growth this year will rise to 3.4 per cent in 2020 into something much uglier. Kristalina Georgieva, the IMF’s new managing director, captured the concerns when she said the chill in the Washington air reminded her of an “unfortunately appropriate” line from the Russian poet Alexander Pushkin. “The breath of autumn begins to ice the roadway,” she said. The IMF broadly defines a world recession as growth slipping below 2.5 per cent a year. This is still far from the fund’s base case. Although the global economy is experiencing @Businessdayng
its weakest performance since the financial crisis — because trade wars have knocked confidence, investment, trade and manufacturing — the IMF expects a pick-up next year. Highly stressed economies are unlikely to suffer the same fate in 2020 as they have this year, and the large emerging economies of Mexico, Brazil and Russia are likely to do a bit better, the IMF believes. But it did not forecast any improvement in the “big four” global economies — China, the US, the eurozone and Japan. On the sidelines of the meetings, the mood was gloomier. The IMF’s forecast could easily be knocked off course by further tit-for-tat trade disputes — perhaps quite soon if the Trump administration imposes tariffs on European automobiles.