Merrill Lynch Wealth Management appoints Peter Schmid as CEO of Merrill Lynch Bank (Suisse) S.A

In his new role, Mr. Schmid will work closely with the other regional managing directors in Europe, Asia Pacific and Emerging Markets excluding Asia. He will be responsible for the wealth management at MLB(S) and focus on Switzerland as a market. Additionally, he will deepen the relationship between MLB(S) and ML financial advisors globally.

Mr. Schmid has 22 years of experience within the financial sector. Prior to joining Merrill Lynch Wealth Management, he was the Head of the Business Unit for Germany responsible for German clients in Germany, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Hong Kong and Singapore at UBS. Other roles at the bank included Chief of Staff for Wealth Management and Business Banking, Global Head of Marketing and Sales Development and Head of Marketing and Communications for Personal Banking. Before UBS, Mr. Schmid was Head of Marketing and Sales at Unisys responsible for generating new business from financial services customers. He previously worked for PriceWaterhouseCoopers as a senior consultant on projects with international financial institutions and for the Swiss Bank Corporation as a client adviser.

Merrill Lynch Bank (Suisse) was acquired in 1984 and is an indirect wholly owned subsidiary of Merrill Lynch & Co. The bank provides a full range of highly personalised Swiss banking solutions to high and ultra high net worth individuals. Headquartered in Geneva, MLB(S) services clients worldwide (excluding the U.S.) with branches in Zurich and Dubai, and representative offices in Panama, Hong Kong, Singapore and Bahrain.

David Jervis, Head of Merrill Lynch Wealth Management EMEA, said, "Peter's leadership experience will be key to further building our offering to clients. The stable economic and fiscal environment in Switzerland is attracting High Net Worth Individuals and the MLB(S) platform allows us to deliver global markets and banking capabilities through a local, personalised service."

Merrill Lynch is one of the world's leading wealth management, capital markets and advisory companies, with offices in 37 countries and territories and total client assets of approximately $1.6 trillion. As an investment bank, it is a leading global trader and underwriter of securities and derivatives across a broad range of asset classes and serves as a strategic advisor to corporations, governments, institutions and individuals worldwide. Merrill Lynch owns just under half of BlackRock, one of the world's largest publicly traded investment management companies, with approximately $1 trillion in assets under management. For more information on Merrill Lynch, please visit www.ml.com and for Switzerland www.mlbs.ch