James Slater, CEO of BNY Mellon’s corporate trust business, is to retire at the end of September. Slater, who has run the corporate trust business since 2022, was one of the original CIBC executives to join the CIBC Mellon joint venture at its formation in 1996 before moving to BNY Mellon in 2010. He served in a number of securities finance and investment servicing roles, including global head of client coverage for the asset servicing business. Subject to regulatory and corporate governance approval, he will be replaced by Cécile Nagel, currently head of BNY Mellon’s Pershing EMEA business, who will report to Roman Regelman, global head of securities services & digital.
In 2014 BNY Mellon briefly considered selling the corporate trust business, having swapped its retail banking franchise in 2006 with JPMorgan Chase in return for the latter’s global corporate trust operations. Ultimately it did not receive any suitable offers and the franchise was retained and turned around, reporting a 23pct rise in non-interest revenue in H1 2023 compared to H1 2022.