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Deutsche Bank exits continue as Hooper leaves for funds firm

Just days after news of the departure of Deutsche Bank’s global legal strategy head Emma Slatter, it has emerged that the bank’s head of active asset management James Hooper is also departing.

Hooper will join boutique investment firm J O Hambro Capital Management as the fund’s second in-house lawyer.

Hooper has been at Deutsche Bank for a decade, serving as vice president and legal counsel from 2006 to 2010, then as a director and senior counsel. Since 2013 he has worked as head of active asset management where he was responsible for the team providing advice to active asset management, alternatives and private wealth management businesses in the UK and Channel Islands.

Trained as a solicitor at Ashurst, Hooper spent seven years at the LB 100 firm before then moving in-house.

J O Hambro confirmed that Hooper would be joining as legal counsel on June 6.

The move comes after an internal memo revealed on Tuesday (May 31) that Deutsche Bank’s Slatter was leaving to start her own consulting firm.

Slatter, who featured in the 2016 GC Power List, had headed a 150-strong legal team across London and Birmingham.

Other recent exits from the bank include supervisory board member Georg Thoma who stepped down in April this year, two years before his contract ended.

General counsel Richard Walker left last December after coming under fire from German financial regulator Bafin due to a report published by the Wall Street Journal that detailed the bank’s handling of the Libor manipulation saga.

Deutsche Bank was approached for comment.

matthew.field@legalease.co.uk