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Thiam could cut 150 billion Swiss francs
($149.34 billion) of assets from the bank's fixed income,
commodities and currencies (FICC) business under a plan to focus
more on private banking in Asia and less on investment banking,
analysts at JPMorgan said.
Thiam could cut the number of staff in the investment bank by
2,900 to about 16,500 to save costs, JPMorgan analyst Kian
Abouhossein said in note to clients on Wednesday.
Credit Suisse said on Tuesday Prudential boss Thiam would take
over as chief executive after current CEO Brady Dougan leaves in
June.
The news prompted an 8 percent rally in Credit Suisse shares on
Tuesday, and by 0500 ET they had added another 1.8 percent to
25.4 francs.
Abouhossein raised his rating on the stock to 'outperform' from
'underperform' and set a 28 franc price target.
"We believe the new CEO is RoE (return on equity) driven and in
our view could come with a mandate to grow Credit Suisse private
banking in Asia," Abouhossein said, saying shrinking the
investment bank's assets would also improve its leverage and
address concerns about the bank's capital strength.
On a risk-adjusted basis, assets in the investment bank could
drop by 50 billion to 100 billion francs, he estimated.
($1 = 1.0044 Swiss francs)
(Reporting by Steve Slater, editing by Louise Heavens)
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