Top talent exits pose problems for CICC

Jin Liqun, former chairman of China International Capital Corp Ltd. [Provided to China Daily]

Jin Liqun, chairman of investment bank China International Capital Corp Ltd, has resigned from the post. He is the second top executive to leave the firm in less than two weeks, raising concerns about the direction of CICC.

Jin has been replaced by Ding Xuedong, chairman and chief executive of sovereign wealth fund China Investment Corp, the company announced in a press release on Thursday.

Jin's departure came just a week after the resignation of Zhu Yunlai, the son of former premier Zhu Rongji, as the chief executive officer of the investment bank.

The wave of high-level changes might mean that CICC is struggling to retain key executives while seeing declining performance in the underwriting business, industry experts said.

Consolidating the management team and retaining talent are now a major challenge for CICC, they said.

The company said that it will continue to provide "full-fledged professional financial services to clients" under the leadership of the board of directors headed by Ding.

The 65-year-old Jin, who speaks fluent English and is a veteran of the Chinese financial industry, will likely join the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, a new multilateral lender that has been proposed by China, domestic media reported.

The departure of the two senior executives comes ahead of CICC's planned initial public offering in Hong Kong with an estimated valuation of more than $3 billion, according to previous media reports. Zhu's resignation may delay CICC's offering, Bloomberg News reported earlier.

Jin was vice-president of the Asian Development Bank, the first Chinese national to hold such post at the ADB. Before that, he spent more than 20 years at the Ministry of Finance, ultimately becoming a vice-minister in 1998.

He was chairman of the supervisory board of CIC from 2008 to 2013.

Jin holds a master's degree in English literature from Beijing Foreign Studies University and was a Hubert Humphrey Fellow in the Economics Graduate Program at Boston University.

CICC, based in Beijing, was ranked fifth in terms of investment banking in 2013, losing its top position as an underwriter to domestic rivals including CITIC Securities Co Ltd and Haitong Securities Co Ltd, according to the China Securities Industry Association.