Tidjane Thiam, the Prudential boss, is to become the new chief executive of Credit Suisse, replacing Brady Dougan, the long-serving CEO who guided the lender through the financial crisis but was slow to overhaul its investment bank.
The insurance executive's appointment follows several years of growing pressure from shareholders on management at Switzerland's second-biggest bank to re-evaluate strategy and operations in the wake of the financial crisis.
Mr Thiam, who is 52 and has spent the past decade running insurance businesses, joins Credit Suisse in June and will be based in Switzerland. Here are some of the qualities he can bring to his new role.
1. He has a colourful early CV . . .
The man from the Pru's path to becoming one of the most respected figures in the City of London took several unconventional early turns in comparison with his contemporaries.
Born in Ivory Coast, Mr Thiam was raised and educated in France, first at Ecole Nationale Superieure des Mines de Paris before taking an MBA at INSEAD. After graduating in 1986 he joined McKinsey & Co, where he focused on insurers and banks. He also did a one year stint at the World Bank in Washington DC.
In 1994 he left the traditional route of a corporate high flyer, and chose to return to his home country where he had accepted a job as head of the National Bureau for Technical Studies and Development.
In 1998, in the midst of an economic crisis that had triggered a 50 per cent devaluation of the currency, Mr Thiam became minister of planning and development. He was not paid for six months, nor were his 4,000 staff.
Less than a year into his post as cabinet minister the government was overthrown in a military coup, and he was placed under house arrest before eventually fleeing the country.
It taught him a lot, he told BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs in 2012, about leadership and people, saying: "I lost absolutely everything. For six months, I had no job, no career, nothing at all. It taught me a lot about myself. If you've been in a situation where you have nothing, there's nothing much you're afraid of."
Mr Thiam rejoined McKinsey in Paris before moving to the British insurance company Aviva, then known as Norwich Union, in 2002.
2 . . . . that then took a more conventional turn . . .
After moving to London, Mr Thiam quickly rose through the Aviva ranks, first as group strategy and development director, then as managing director of Aviva International and chief executive of its European unit, then finally as executive director.
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The share price of the UK's largest insurer by market value has almost tripled since Mr Thiam took the helm. He carved a reputation as a savvy emerging markets specialist by successfully betting on Asia to drive up profit.
The Pru's latest earnings, released alongside news of Mr Thiam's impending departure, could be seen to illustrate the success of his Asian focus. Operating profits from Asian life insurance and asset management rose 17 per cent on the year before to £1.1bn, while IFRS operating profit jumped 14 per cent to £3.2bn in 2014. The insurer also raised its full-year dividend 10 per cent to 36.9p a share, a sweetener for shareholders as Mr Thiam bade them farewell.
3 . . . . although there have been some major bumps in the road.
Despite Pru's strong performance, it has not always been plain sailing when it came to the relationship between Mr Thiam and his investors.
He barely survived a shareholder revolt after a failed £23.5bn takeover bid for Asian insurer AIA in 2010. A successful takeover of AIA would have seen Mr Thiam presiding over Britain's biggest ever rights issue, a doubling of the Pru's business and an operational shift that would have placed almost 90 per cent of it in Asia.
However investors balked at the deal, concerned by the scale of the accompanying $21bn rights issue and the price Mr Thiam agreed to pay.
Mr Thiam did little to hide his irritation with the outcome, inflaming tensions with shareholders who then forced him into giving up a seat on the board of French bank Societe Generale to focus on his day job. The establishment was none too happy with the situation either, and in 2013 he was slapped on the wrist by the Financial Services Authority. The Pru was fined £30m for not telling the regulator soon enough that it had planned to buy AIA.
4. So what does this all spell in terms of his suitability as a banker?
He may have been lauded for his leadership skills as an insurance specialist, but Mr Thiam has never worked in banking before.
But as argued by the FT's Lex column after news of his move to Credit Suisse broke on Monday night, that may not be a bad thing.
For one thing, an outsider could be what the bank needs as it grapples with its increasingly urgent need for retrenchment. Mr Thiam is also familiar with many of the challenges Credit Suisse faces: growing regulation, the need to find growth outside Europe and the difficulties of helping people to secure their financial future.
His extensive Asia experience will be a boon to the bank, with the region becoming an increasingly important part of its wealth management operation.
5. And off-duty, what is he like?
Mr Thiam says as a "black African, francophone and six-foot four" he is used to standing out from the crowd. But this is also in part because of his life outside the boardroom, where he has attracted attention for mixing with pop stars and as an ardent Arsenal fan. He has two sons with his American wife Annette, a former lawyer who once worked for US vice-president Joe Biden.
In 2011 he was awarded a Legion d'honneur, the equivalent of a knighthood, from the French government. He is also a member of the prime minister's Business Advisory Group and is one of UK Trade & Investment's business ambassadors.
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