JPMorgan Chase on Tuesday named Jeff Urwin as its new chief executive Asia Pacific, taking over from Gaby Abdelnour who announced in March that he will be leaving the firm.

Urwin, who will move from New York to Hong Kong, will keep his current role as the firm's head of global investment banking coverage, capital markets and mergers & acquisitions and will continue to report to Jes Staley, CEO of the investment bank operations.

Urwin is a relative newcomer to JP Morgan, having come to the bank through its acquisition of Bear Stearns in March 2008. Urwin has no direct experience of running an Asia-based investment banking business, having been co-head of North American investment banking prior to his appointment in his current role last June.

He was, however, once global head of emerging markets for Lehman Brothers, in which role his coverage included Asia excluding Japan. Before joining Lehman Brothers in 1991, Urwin was head of business in the developing countries division at Midland Bank in Britain and he graduated from Birmingham University in 1978.

In his role as head of investment banking coverage, newly created for him, Urwin oversaw the deal origination efforts of JP Morgan's investment bank. He takes over at a time when JP Morgan's investment bank is riding high globally, but when the firm is pushing to build its Asia Pacific revenues.

Urwin will move to Hong Kong in May, according to JP Morgan. A New York based real estate blog reported on February 9th that Urwin's 8,800 square foot, $26 million Upper East Side townhouse in Manhattan was up for sale again, according to a Corcoran listing.

(Additional reporting by Sakthi Prasad and Sarah White; Editing by James Jukwey and Matt Driskill)

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