BANK of America (B A) has been accused of being slower off the mark than some of its compatriots in East Asia, but Richard Shrieve, executive vice-president, global capital markets group, Asia, says the bank's new team is out to build market share.
Standing in the new dealing room at Bank of America tower in Central, Mr Shrieve said the bank planned to do what it did best.
'We have decided that our key objective in Asia in our wholesale business is to underwrite, trade and distribute corporate and government [debt] securities,' Mr Shrieve said.
But he said the bank was not going to make the mistake of chasing market share just for the sake of market share, and some deals would be done for cosmetic reasons as much as business.
The bank would go for quality credits, and has recruited James Boice and David Walker-Smith to build up its book and push it back up the league tables that were dominated by HSBC Markets and Standard Chartered.
B A Asia was placed 13th in the first half of the year for fixed and floating-rate issues, with HK$750 million worth of deals, or a miniscule 2.7 per cent of the market, well behind Standard Chartered with about 18 per cent of the market, and HSBC Markets which had 16 per cent.
