Standard Chartered hires Nomura's Southeast Asia M&A head : sources

Standard Chartered Plc has hired Nomura's head of mergers and acquisitions for Southeast Asia, Jason Morris, to join its regional M&A team as a managing director, two sources with direct knowledge of the matter said.

Nikhil Nath, Nomura's former head of M&A for Asia ex-Japan, has also joined Macquarie Group as a general industry banker, Hong Kong-based financial industry sources said.

Morris left Nomura after the bank cut costs at its equities and investment banking business as part of a restructuring that started last year, the sources said. Nath resigned from Nomura earlier this year to take up the Macquarie job.

Both bankers had joined Nomura in 2008 from the collapsed Lehman Brothers. Nath will move to Singapore from Hong Kong to focus on Southeast Asian and Indian clients.

All the banking sources declined to be identified as they were not authorized to speak to the media.

Standard Chartered and Nomura declined to comment on the move. Macquarie was not available for an immediate comment.

Morris joins Standard Chartered a few months after the bank hired Patrick Lee, the former head of Nomura's Southeast Asia investment banking, as head of its Singapore-based origination and coverage.

(This story is corrected in third paragraph to clarify Nath's departure was not part of Nomura restructuring)

(Reporting by Saeed Azhar and Denny Thomas in Hong Kong; editing by Miral Fahmy)