London-based Cousens previously served as head of platform sales for Citi for two and half years from February 2020, where he covered distribution and sales across its cash equities platform.   

He also brings extensive industry experience to the role, and prior to his stint at Citi, acted as head of EMEA execution sales at Barclays, as well as Credit Suisse’s co-head of AES sales for Europe from 2007 to 2020.  

Additionally, following his departure from Citi he worked at BestEx Research, where he served as head of EMEA equities, driving the firm’s equities execution algorithms for US and Canadian trading. 

He also pursued other opportunities, such as founding management consultancy firm, Milvus-I Consultancy. 

Read more – Former Citi platform sales head Cousens lands BestEx Research EMEA equities lead role 

Cousens confirmed his new position in a social media announcement.  

He said: “I’m delighted to share that I’m starting a new position as MD, Head of Electronic Execution EMEA at Clear Street! Lots to do here as we look to build on the success that Clear Street has already achieved. But with a great team coming together here in London, we have a very exciting future ahead…!” 

Read more – Clear Street appoints trading experts to senior positions as it bolsters UK operations 

Cousens’ new role follows a string of recent appointments for Clear Street, including new trading and execution hires in February 2025 in a push to expand UK operations. 

The new appointments saw Luke Holmes stepping into the position of managing director, sales trading, Matthew Cyzer as head of markets execution, Tarquin Orchard as global head of event-driven strategies and Phillip Hylander as managing director, execution.   

Read more – Clear Street names new head of prime brokerage 

Similarly, the firm announced in April 2025 that John Levene would be joining as head of institutional to oversee the firm’s prime brokerage business, following more than 25 years at Goldman Sachs. 

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The new solution supports real-time transparency and collaboration across the post-trade lifecycle by pairing data to improve pre-matching accuracy and reduce fail rates. It also aims to streamline workflows, deliver actionable insights, and resolve exceptions in real time. 

Settlement netting builds on Synergy’s data platform, which will enable the normalisation, visualisation, and aggregation of transaction data. It allows participants to net obligations across repos, TBAs, cash transactions and other asset classes, with the goal of improving operational efficiency and liquidity management. 

The platform enables automated communication between clients and custodians via API, reducing the need for manual intervention. 

JP Morgan contributed to the use case development and provided input and refinement during the design phase with Citi.  

“We have partnered very closely with AccessFintech on this collaboration solution as we believe it will transform the smooth operation of the repo market,” said Anthony Fraser, global head of prime financial services operations at JP Morgan. “Integrating JP Morgan’s best-in-class operating model and workflow tools with AccessFintech’s state-of-the-art technology enables us to establish a model of standardisation, transparency and seamless communication. We’re committed to delivering solutions which drive enhanced settlement efficiency and result in better outcomes for our clients.” 

The netting programme, initially piloted in the €15 trillion EMEA repo market, matches transaction details centrally across trading counterparties, replacing manual spreadsheet calculations for netting obligations.  

It also supports structured counterparty communication through APIs or user interfaces, aiming to improve fail rates, reduce asset movements, and lower transaction costs associated with repo settlements. 

Jaime Healy-Waters, global head of cash equity middle office and EMEA cash securities settlements at Citi, said: “We are pleased to bring this important collaboration solution to the repo market with AccessFintech. We remain intensely focused on creating solutions that enhance our clients’ investment performance and success.” 

Additionally, the Synergy network uses AI-based tools to generate settlement netting candidates in real time and draws on historical data to inform counterparty behaviours, such as settlement performance and amendment rates. 

The Synergy platform captures data across securities, derivatives, alternatives, and payments, supporting data transformation and collaboration among network participants. 

Tom Granelli, head of netting product, Synergy at AccessFintech said: “We are continuously driving industry transformation to prepare and strengthen market operations for the future. We remain intensely focused on creating solutions that enhance our clients’ investment performance and success.” 

Granelli added: “Settlement Netting is another example of our deployment of the transformative Synergy network, enabling the ecosystem to magnify their operational effectiveness and reduce unnecessary manual processes.” 

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John Levene has joined Clear Street as head of institutional, overseeing the firm’s prime brokerage business, following more than 25 years at Goldman Sachs. The move will see Levene using his experience in building and managing prime brokerage platforms across the capital markets to bring leadership to his new role at Clear Street.  

During his time at Goldman Sachs, Levene was partner for 14 years, acting as a leader in the client service space and serving as head of global banking and markets client experience, co-head of prime services client experience and head of prime brokerage client franchise, Americas.  

“We welcome John to his new role, where his industry expertise and strategic mindset will be instrumental in advancing our mission to provide best-in-class technology and client service,” said chief executive of Clear Street, Edward Tilly.  

Columbia Threadneedle  

Columbia Threadneedle Investments has welcomed Francesca Mace Wilson to the EMEA equity trading desk. The move sees her leaving her role as senior investment control analyst at Capital Group, which she had held since October 2022.  

Prior to this, Mace Wilson held previous positions at Titan Institutional Services, working across wealth management, prime brokerage and sales.  

Head of EMEA equity trading at Columbia Threadneedle, Michael Johnson said: “Francesca joins us having spent five years at Capital Group and, in addition to trading equities, will help us enhance our position across the capital markets structure.”  

TD Securities  

TD Securities has named Greg Levett, Neil McKay and David Abraham as the new managing directors of its event driven sales and trading team, with all three new hires transferring from BTIG. Levett had previously served at BTIG since 2010 and began his career in event driven sales at Pali International.   

Abraham’s recent roles include positions at FBR Capital Markets, Merebis Capital Management, Titanium Capital, ZAN Partners, Goldman Sachs, NatWest Markets and Credit Lyonnais Securities.   

New addition McKay also covered equity sales and trading as managing director at BTIG and brings extensive knowledge of the event driven sector. Prior to his stint at BTIG he held roles at Barclays, Abberton Capital, United First Partners, Arrowgrass Capital Partners, Stark Investments, Citadel and CSFB.  

Citi  

Citi has named Christopher Chang as its new head of markets solutions for financial institutions for Asia South and Asia North. Chang joins from Goldman Sachs, where he served as head of FICC and equity distribution for Southeast Asia and been a board member of Goldman Sachs Singapore for more than 10 years.  

Prior to Goldman Sachs, he held various senior banking, solutions and sales roles at Deutsche Bank and Nomura. The move will see him reporting to head of markets sales for Japan, Asia North and Australia and Asia South, Cecile Gambardella, who said: “He [Chang] will work closely with our product partners and across banking, wealth and international to bridge the best of Citi’s capabilities and deliver value to both our clients and Citi.”  

Broadridge  

Broadridge Financial Solutions has expanded its product management team with Ian Williams and Anand Chintala stepping into senior roles within Broadridge Trading and Connectivity Solutions.  

In his new role, Williams will assume the role of vice president of product management based in Toronto, leaving his previous position as chief executive of Virtu Canada.   

Similarly, Chintala will become the division’s senior director in New York, and joins from Barclays, where he acted as director of portfolio trading. Williams brings more than 30 years of trading and product leadership positions to the role, and he previously worked at TriAct Canada Marketplace – now Cboe Global Markets, Perimeter Financial Corp and TD.  

Chintala also has extensive industry experience and held director and vice president titles at Lehman Brothers and ITG.  

“With over three decades of trading and product leadership positions in both Canada and the US, Williams will be instrumental in expanding our global footprint in Canada,” said the firm in an update on social media.  

Liquidnet  

Chris Jackson has been promoted as Liquidnet’s new global head of equities, continuing his 10-year tenure with the firm. The move sees London-based Jackson departing from his role as global head of equity strategy and head of equities for EMEA. 

Prior to joining Liquidnet, he held the position of head of EMEA execution sales at Citi from 2009 to 2015. He has also worked in director positions with a focus on portfolio sales, analytics, and sales trading at SBC Warburg and Merrill Lynch.  

Speaking on the announcement, Liquidnet said: “His [Jackson’s] leadership will be instrumental as we continue to scale up our equities business globally and develop, together with our members, innovative solutions that combine deep liquidity access with intelligent execution.”   

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Chang will assume his role in July, and will be based out of Singapore, where he will contribute to driving forward the firm’s strategy to provide hedging, financing and investment solutions for Citi’s financial institutions clients across markets.

The move will see him reporting to head of markets sales for Japan, Asia North and Australia and Asia South, Cecile Gambardella, who said: “He [Chang] will work closely with our product partners and across banking, wealth and international to bridge the best of Citi’s capabilities and deliver value to both our clients and Citi.” 

 He will also matrix report to Sue Lee, head of markets for Asia South.  

Chang joins from Goldman Sachs, where he served as head of FICC and equity distribution for Southeast Asia and been a board member of Goldman Sachs Singapore for more than 10 years.  

He also brings more than 28 years of experience covering markets and debt capital markets (DCM) to his new role. Prior to Goldman Sachs, he held various senior banking, solutions and sales roles at Deutsche Bank and Nomura.  

Read more – Citi expands Asia FX markets team with JP Morgan hires 

The new role comes following a string of Citi hires in the past year. In October, the firm expanded its Asia FX markets team with hires from JP Morgan. Anand Goyal was appointed head of FX institutional sales for Japan, Asia North, Australia and Asia South, while Hooi Wan Ng was named head of markets for Malaysia.  

The post Goldman FICC and equity distribution exec joins Citi in new Asia markets solutions role appeared first on The TRADE.

Specifically, the cloud technology will migrate multiple workloads and applications to Google Cloud’s infrastructure, including the use of Google Cloud’s Vertex AI platform which will deliver Gen-AI capabilities across the firm. 

Tim Ryan, head of technology and business enablement at Citi, said: “Citi is on a mission to modernise our infrastructure and increase our safety and soundness so that our businesses can continue to serve our clients with speed and agility.

“Leveraging Google Cloud opens up a whole new frontier for us in how we can run applications with faster and more comprehensive outputs, and provide our

colleagues with the tools they need to deliver for our clients.”

Citi is set to benefit from high-performance computing (HPC) and analytics platforms, which in Citi’s Markets business means the execution of millions of computations daily.

Read more: As cloud adoption across the market continues to rise, is the shift of liquidity itself next to follow?

“Our strategic partnership with Citi to continue to modernise its technology infrastructure and drive enterprise-wide innovation underscores Google Cloud’s commitment to helping the financial services industry transform with cloud and AI technology,” said Thomas Kurian, chief executive of Google Cloud. 

“By combining Citi’s deep banking and customer experience expertise with Google Cloud’s leading cloud and AI capabilities, we can deliver significant benefits to Citi’s clients and employees.”

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Citi has expanded its FX markets team in Asia with the appointment of two new individuals, according to an internal memo seen by The TRADE. Anand Goyal was appointed head of FX institutional sales for Japan, Asia North, Australia and Asia South, based in Singapore. Goyal joins from JP Morgan where he had been serving as head of macro FX and real money sales for Asia Pacific. Alongside him, Hooi Wan Ng was appointed head of markets for Malaysia. She also joins from JP Morgan where she had been serving as head of local corporate sales and private side sales.

Hugh Whelan was named head of liquidity management and data strategy at SGX FX, having previously worked as head of CME Group owned EBS Direct. Specifically, London-based Whelan will be responsible for overseeing the strategic direction and growth of the liquidity provider client segment. He is also set to develop the data products within SGX FX. Whelan’s career has had a strong focus on FX markets, having previously led the launch of EBS Direct into a new bilateral FX trading venue – which is now owned by CME Group.  

Muzinich & Co appointed George Kierton as a trader based in London. He joined from Amundi, where he spent the last two and a half years, most recently as a senior fixed income trader. Elsewhere in his career, Kierton served as a fixed income trader at BMO Global Asset Management and MUFG.

The post People Moves Monday: Groupama AM, Citi, SGX FX and more… appeared first on The TRADE.

Anand Goyal has been appointed head of FX institutional sales for Japan, Asia North, Australia and Asia South, based in Singapore.

He will report to Cécile Gambardella, head of sales for markets for Japan, Asia North and Australia and Sam Hewson, global head of FX sales.

“As we look to build on our market leading position across the region, Anand’s appointment is a significant move that aligns with our strategy. His expertise will enhance our ability to deliver tailored FX Solutions and foster stronger partnerships with our institutional clients,” said Hewson.

Goyal joins from JP Morgan where he had been serving as head of macro FX and real money sales for Asia Pacific.

Alongside him, Hooi Wan Ng has been appointed head of markets for Malaysia. She will report to Sue Lee, head of markets for Asia South and Vikram Singh, Citi country officer and banking head for Malaysia.

She also joins from JP Morgan where she had been serving as head of local corporate sales and private side sales.

“With Hooi Wan’s extensive experience and deep understanding of the local market, we are well positioned to grow our Malaysian franchise further,” asserted Lee.

“She will lead the markets business in Malaysia with a client centric approach, leveraging our global footprint and solution structuring capabilities.”

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Vincent Hall joined Citi as an equity trader following two years at Citadel where he served in the same role. He returns to Citi after four years, having previously worked at the firm as associate vice president in emerging markets equity trading. Elsewhere in his career, Hall has also worked at BlackRock as an associate.

Edward Tilly is set to take over as chief executive of Clear Street at the end of this year. The announcement comes two months after Tilly’s appointment as president at the firm. He replaces CEO and co-founder Chris Pento. Upon his departure, Pento is set to assume an executive and partner role at White Bay, the family office of co-founder Uriel Cohen. He will remain on the board of directors at Clear Street. Since joining Clear Street Tilly has worked closely with Pento, jointly leading the firm through the next phase of growth.

Jack Boland joined Ilex Capital in a US equity trading and global equity capital markets role. He joins from Citadel where he had been serving for the last five years as an equity trader and senior associate. Prior to joining Citadel in 2019, Boland spent five years at BlackRock as an associate and later a trader and just under a year at HBK Capital Management as a trader before that. Previously in his career, he undertook several banking, capital markets, and portfolio management internships across PwC, KPMG UK, BlackRock, and Jefferies.

Elijah Ibrahim Diallo joined Magellan Capital as a multi-strategy trader, based in the UAE. He most recently served as an investment manager at ADQ and before that spent two and a half years as a senior trader and portfolio manager at Azimut. In his career, Diallo has also worked as an equity trader at Avalon Capital Markets. Previous experience also includes stints at EFG Hermes and Mubasher Financial Services.

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This is according to a new report from Citi, which tracked the impact of a shortened settlement cycle across the world.  

The survey found that the transition has been particularly strenuous for European participants – 60% of which reporting a significant impact to their operations as a result of T+1. This figure has more than doubled from 2023.   

For specific affected sectors, securities lending remains one of the most strongly impacted activities — jumping from 33% to 50% this year. Funding has also seen notable impact — albeit with an imbalance across the sell-side and buy-sides. For brokers and custodians, the single biggest impact of T+1 has been the 30% reduction in clearing margin, with 80% of the sell-side seeing this development as strongly impactful to their businesses. 

Additionally, over half (52%) of banks and brokers reported that the transition has had a significant impact on their headcounts and staffing levels. The whitepaper added that sell-side organisations have found themselves exposed to large volumes of manual processing and exception handling, triggered by clients.  

Okan Pekin, head of securities services at Citi, said: “The move to T+1 has taken centre stage in the post-trade industry over the last few years. Our latest whitepaper – the largest since its inception in 2021 – focuses on the next frontier for the industry which is the growing applicability of technologies. This includes distributed ledger technology and digital assets, and the significant potential for tokenisation to scale. These developments will continue to transform the securities landscape as we continue to move towards shorter settlement cycles across multiple markets worldwide.” 

The whitepaper polled close to 500 market participants across the buy- and sell-side, and incorporates insights from 14 financial market infrastructures (FMIs). The report also includes an regional view of the industry across Asia Pacific, Europe, North America, and Latin America. A full copy of the study can be found here.

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He returns to Citi after four years, having previously worked at the firm as associate vice president in emerging markets equity trading. 

Elsewhere in his career, Hall has also worked at BlackRock as an associate.

Read more: Fireside Friday with… Citi’s Chris Gooch

Earlier this year, Citi appointed Jamie Miller as new head of electronic equity sales trading for the EMEA region, as revealed by The TRADE. 

Miller has been with the firm eight and a half years as an employee of the bank, specialising in equity sales trading.

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