LONDON (Reuters) - Credit Suisse (S:CSGN) chief executive Tidjane Thiam said on Thursday that his bank is relatively well-placed to deal with the impact of Britain's vote to leave the European Union.
Credit Suisse's EU investment banking business is run out of London but Thiam said the Swiss lender had already been scaling back its presence in the city.
"We had since last year, announced a plan to reduce our footprint in London. We have around 2,000 people in London. Our strategy has always been to deemphasize London," he said at the Bloomberg Markets conference.
Many investment banks use their London hubs to run their EU operations, relying on the passporting system that allows them to operate across the bloc while being regulated just in Britain. The Brexit vote could threaten those arrangements, though Thiam said Credit Suisse should not face a severe hit to its business.
"We will not be very impacted by passporting. Around 15-20 pct of volumes will be impacted,".