(Bloomberg) -- Former Deutsche Bank AG currency salesman Amedeo Ferri-Ricchi is leaving brokerage JB Drax Honore after five years for financial services platform Marex Group Plc.
Ferri-Ricchi will join Marex as global head of structured FX and interest rates in Dubai, according to people familiar with the matter who asked not to be named discussing personnel. He will report directly to Paolo Tonucci, chief executive officer of Marex’s capital-markets division, one of the people said.
He is winding down trades and client relationships at JB Drax and has a six-month notice period plus a six-month non-compete clause, two of the people said.
Marex, based in London, is perhaps best known for its commodities-trading business and is one of the largest dealers on the London Metal Exchange. The firm agreed to buy ED&F Man Holdings Ltd.’s brokerage business in 2022 and had a $292-million initial public offering in April.
Spokespeople for Marex and JB Drax declined to comment. Ferri-Ricchi declined to comment on the move.
For many years, Ferri-Ricchi was a top money maker at Deutsche Bank’s currency trading division who was said to generate more than €100 million ($116 million) in revenue a year.
After he left for JB Drax Honore in mid-2019 the German bank began investigating whether parts of the business had missold products to customers. The Palladium Hotel Group, an Ibiza-based hotel chain, subsequently sued Deutsche Bank, accusing the lender of selling it complex currency derivatives it didn’t understand that blew up and triggered substantial losses.
According to the hotel group, Deutsche Bank, through Ferri-Ricchi, owed them a duty of care. Palladium claimed he was their main point of contact at the bank, although they also frequently dealt with other unnamed employees.
Ferri-Ricchi — who wasn’t a defendant in the Palladium suit — has previously denied, via his lawyers, the allegations or that he was ever involved in any mis-selling. He has also said previously that he had not been involved in any internal Deutsche Bank investigation.
On Friday, Deutsche Bank confirmed it had settled the $500-million claim with Palladium. The bank did not disclose the charge related to the Palladium settlement, but indicated it is included in “net litigation charges” of about €200 million that it has put aside for a number of legacy cases.
--With assistance from Arno Schütze.
(Adds no comments, details throughout. An earlier version of the story corrected the date of the brokerage deal in the fourth paragraph.)
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