Ayala poaches Credit Suisse Philippines head Uy for M&A, sources say

Credit Suisse Group AG’s head of the Philippines Mark Robert Uy is leaving the bank and joining Ayala Corp. in August.

Uy will help with mergers and acquisitions at the Philippine conglomerate, a person familiar with the matter said, asking not to be identified as the information isn’t public.

A spokesperson for Ayala confirmed Uy will join the company in August, and said the firm will disclose his role in due course. A representative for Credit Suisse declined to comment.

Uy has been with Credit Suisse for close to four years, according to his LinkedIn profile. The banker joined JPMorgan Chase & Co. after graduating from Ateneo de Manila University in 2007. He spent nearly 13 years with the US firm, of which more than nine were spent in Singapore, before leaving for Credit Suisse in 2019, the profile shows.

The Philippines has seen about $2.3 billion of deals announced so far this year, led by the $877 million Metro Pacific Investments Corp. acquisition by a consortium headed by Mitsui & Co., according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Numerous staffers have departed Credit Suisse after UBS Group AG acquired its Swiss rival in a $3.2 billion rescue orchestrated by the country’s central bank. In Asia, Credit Suisse’s former mergers and acquisitions head for Southeast Asia Lim Zi-Kuan, head of financial institutions group in the region Nick Thursby and managing director Rui Wang are also among those leaving the bank, Bloomberg News has reported.

Ayala, which traces its roots back to 1834 when its founding partners invested in a distillery in the Philippines, has interests in sectors such as real estate, banking, water and telecommunications, according to its website. The conglomerate is the largest shareholder in several listed companies including Ayala Land Inc., Bank of the Philippine Islands and renewable energy firm Acen Corp. It also has a 30.7% stake in Globe Telecom Inc.

Shares of Ayala have fallen about 2% this year, giving it a market value of about $7.5 billion.

The conglomerate last month said it’s allocating about half of P19 billion ($339 million) at the parent level to further scale up its emerging businesses: logistics and health care. It’s also setting aside P264 billion for capital spending this year, driven by sustained investment in its property, bank and telecom units. — Bloomberg