Mutual Funds Press Release

Press Release

Credit Suisse Appoints Aditi Velakacharla as Head of Capital Services for Asia Pacific

Credit Suisse announced today the appointment of Aditi Velakacharla as Head of Capital Services for Asia Pacific in the Prime Services Group.

Based in Hong Kong, Ms. Velakacharla reports to Myo Schollum, Head of Prime Services Coverage for Asia Pacific. She is responsible for connecting hedge funds with target investors, helping funds develop strategic positioning, implement capital raising solutions and provide support for new fund launches.

Commenting on today’s appointment, Myo Schollum said, “We are delighted to have Aditi joining us at Credit Suisse. With her deep expertise and excellent reputation in the market, she will be invaluable to the bank’s leading prime services franchise in the region” Mr Schollum continued, “As Asia Pacific’s second largest prime broker by share of assets, today’s appointment emphasises our desire to facilitate constructive dialogue between hedge fund managers and potential investors, especially at a time when there is strong renewed investor interest in Asia hedge funds. 2014 has been the most significant year for new hedge fund launches for a long time with many of them raising meaningful capital, Aditi will play a pivotal role in originating new mandates and help increase wallet share with our key clients.”

Ms. Velakacharla has close to 15 years’ experience in the finance industry having covered a broad range of roles within investment banking, traditional asset management and hedge funds. Prior to joining Credit Suisse, Ms. Velakacharla was the Regional Head of Capital Introductions at (Lehman Brothers) Nomura from 2006. Before that, she was based in the US in a business development role at Greenwich-Van Alternative Investments.

In 2014, Credit Suisse was named for the second year running as the second-largest Prime Broker in Asia pacific, according to AsiaHedge’s prime brokerage survey, the benchmark for the industry in Asia. The bank was ranked #2 prime broker by Assets under Management, with total hedge fund AuM of US$21.49 billion in Asia. The survey also named Credit Suisse as #1 prime broker in Hong Kong and China, the largest market according to the survey, #3 prime broker in Australia and #3 prime broker in the US.

In July 2014, Credit Suisse announced results of its mid-year Hedge Fund Investor Sentiment Survey which polled 284 institutional investors globally, representing US$544 billion in hedge fund assets. The findings showed the second half of 2014 looked set to be a strong period for capital allocations to hedge funds and the top three strategies by net demand in Asia Pacific were Event Driven (64%), Long/Short Equity – Fundamental (56%) and Equity Market Neutral – Fundamental (44%).