The Liechtenstein private bank unveiled a new CEO, shortly after a change in ownership and capital injection.
The Vaduz-based wealth manager is naming Antonio Ferrante (pictured below) as chief executive, effective immediately, it said in an emailed statement on Tuesday. He replaces Patrick Laeser, who spent the last two years mounting a recovery bid of the scandal-tarnished bank.
An ex-Credit Suisse banker who ran Saxo Bank in Switzerland for two years, Ferrante will rebuild the bank and design a new strategy together with the new owners, Alpinum said. After Austrian investor Guenther Walcher emerged as Alpinum’s new owner earlier this month, it said its strategy would remain wealth management, with a focus on entrepreneurs.
Compliance Veteran
The bank also said that Christian Schulthess will replace Stefan Demuth as operating chief, from December 1. Schulthess is a compliance veteran who stepped in to firefight at Falcon Bank in Singapore after the lender was snagged in the 1MDB scandal. He is currently a credit structurer in Geneva for First Abu Dhabi Bank, according to LinkedIn.
A financially potent savior for the bank, Walcher injected fresh capital into Alpinum last month. The bank, which last year narrowly escaped having its license yanked as a result of a fraud scandal, managed 685 million Swiss francs ($741 million) at the end of 2019.
