Markets: Meeting NAB's new man

Craig Drummond, the former chief executive of Goldman Sachs JB Were and the Australian country head of Bank of America Merrill Lynch, has been hired by National Australia Bank as an executive in charge of the bank’s strategy and finance. He will start work at NAB later this year.

Drummond, who replaces Mark Joiner is a University of Melbourne graduate raised in rural Victoria, Drummond joined JB Were in 1984 and became an analyst of Australian banks. A protégé of former JB Were chief Terry Campbell, Drummond and Campbell both pushed the private partnership that was JB Were to merge with Goldman Sachs.

But for Drummond, his tenure at Goldman Sachs ended on a sour note after Stephen Fitzgerald was appointed co-head of the New York-based investment bank’s Australian business. Drummond resigned from Goldman Sachs in 2009 and was hired later that year by his former Goldman Sachs boss Tom Montag who was running Merrill’s Asian business out of Tokyo.

Drummond promised Merrill would become a top three investment bank in Australia after three yeas of him joining the firm.

As of June 7 this year, according to Dealogic, Merrill Lynch ranks third in Australian equity capital markets but is not ranked in the top 10 in M&A or debt capital markets in 2013.

At 1111 AEST NAB shares were up 5 cents, or 0.2 per cent, to $30.54.