The Monday Roundup: what we are watching this week | May 15th

By Puja Sharma

The Monday Roundup sets the scene for the week’s biggest news stories, industry deals, and upcoming events. For Prime subscribers only.

Leadership shake-up

Following the takeover by Credit Suisse, UBS announced a leadership shake-up: As a result of its recent acquisition of Credit Suisse, UBS has made several changes to its leadership team.

Credit Suisse CEO Ulrich Körner will join the group’s executive board following the completion of the takeover, which the firm anticipates will take place “in the coming weeks”. Körner spent 11 years at UBS before rejoining Credit Suisse in April 2021 to lead the Swiss bank’s asset management division. He was made CEO of the firm in July of last year.

Meanwhile, Todd Tuckner, who has been at UBS since 2004 and currently serves as CFO and head of business performance and risk management for global wealth management, has been appointed as the firm’s new group CFO and member of the executive board, with current CFO Sarah Youngwood deciding to leave the firm once the Credit Suisse deal is completed.

The Islamic Corporation for the Insurance of Investment and Export Credit (ICIEC), the Shariah-compliant multilateral insurer and member of the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB) Group, announced the signing of an additional €36 million uplift to the existing €146 million Non-Honouring Sovereign Financial Obligation (NHSFO) Insurance Policy with Standard Chartered Bank (UK) Ltd, Standard Chartered Bank (Hong Kong) Ltd, and Société Générale.

ICIEC’s intervention enabled the additional investment of €36 million by Standard Chartered Bank (Hong Kong) to finance government projects in several sectors. This provides comprehensive coverage to the financiers regarding the non-payment risks of the Republic of Uganda for the funding of infrastructure projects under the Development and Infrastructure Budget 2022 of Uganda.

Recordkeeping errors

❌HSBC and Scotia Capital fined for recordkeeping errors. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has charged HSBC Securities and Scotia Capital with “widespread and longstanding failures to maintain and preserve electronic communications”.

The SEC says both firms admitted their employees “often communicated off-channel” about securities business matters on personal devices and via messaging platforms such as WhatsApp, with neither firm maintaining a record of the “substantial majority” of those conversations.

HSBC and Scotia Capital have acknowledged the SEC’s action and agreed to pay penalties of $15 million and $7.5 million respectively. The SEC adds both firms self-reported the violations after gathering communications from the personal devices of a sample of their employees.

Everseen, a provider of AI-powered computer vision and hyper-automation solutions, has raised €65 million in a Series A follow-on funding round led by Crosspoint Capital Partners, a private equity firm focused on the cybersecurity, privacy, and infrastructure software markets.

The funding will be used to continue investment into Everseen’s computer vision AI technology and help the company scale. Crosspoint made its first investment in Everseen in June 2021 based on the company’s computer vision AI technology, customer relationships, and its approach to ethical AI.

Everseen’s technology brings patented AI-powered process-aware computer vision to core business challenges to improve business outcomes. The company uses its Visual AI platform to empower the retail sector with end-to-end visibility across processes such as checkout, inventory management, and supply chain.

“Crosspoint Capital has been a fantastic partner for the last two years, and we are excited to further our relationship as the Crosspoint team brings immense value in terms of operational excellence and sector expertise that will help us mature our business operations and deliver on our technology roadmap,” said Alan O’Herlihy, Everseen Founder and CEO.

What is the buzz

Silicon Valley Bank’s portfolio bids have been released by the FDIC. FinTech startup Brex stood out as being different on that list.

According to the interaction of TechCrunch with Brex co-CEO and co-founder Henrique Dubugras, who confirmed that the company did put its name in the hat for SVB but only for the early-stage and growth portfolios within its business.

The idea came from a customer, he said, who thought Brex “could handle those customers better than big banks.” The first week after the SVB meltdown, the FDIC was not going to accept any bids from entities other than banks. During that time, Brex worked to step up for SVB customers in other ways. Then the following week, the FDIC said it was open to selling it by parts — and also open to non-banks submitting bids.

“That’s when we submitted our bids,” Dubugras said. While the offer didn’t pan out, he doesn’t regret Brex taking a shot at it. “In the end, we think it was just easier for them to sell the whole thing in one piece,” he added.

Still, the startup continues to “keep seeing deposits materially increase,” as not every startup or early-stage that once banked at SVB wants to move their cash over to a big bank.