BofA’s Asia-Pacific prime financing head resigns

BLOOMBERG

Bank of America Corp’s (BofA) Asia-Pacific prime financing head Graham Seaton has left the firm, according to people familiar, after more than 10 years overseeing teams dealing with hedge funds.
Seaton, who was based in Hong Kong, left the bank early March, the people said, requesting not to be named because the matter is private. He resigned for personal reasons and no replacement has been named so far, they added.
A Hong Kong-based spokeswoman for the bank declined to comment. Seaton did not respond to messages seeking comment. Prime teams at banks typically clear trades, lend securities and cash to hedge funds, link them with potential investors and advise them on business issues.
A regional financial hub, Hong Kong saw its population shrink 2.5% in the three years through 2022, hurt by the protests, Covid restrictions and Beijing’s tightening grip. Even after the recent lifting of social distancing rules, financial institutions are still seeing the lagged effect, as employees continue to leave based on decisions made months ago.
Seaton has spent his entire career at the bank, joining in 1999. He took over as Merrill Lynch’s Asia-Pacific prime brokerage head in 2012, when the Wall Street bank was a distant sixth-largest prime broker in the region, trailing the likes of Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley. Over the years, financial woes and shifting priorities at peers Credit Suisse and Deutsche Bank helped catapult BofA to fourth place and narrow the gap with third-placed UBS, according to the latest ranking by trade journal With Intelligence last year.