A Portuguese banker will succeed Urs Rohner as Chairman of Credit Suisse.

The Board of Directors of Credit Suisse proposes to the shareholders to elect António Horta-Osório as the new Chairman of the Board of Directors at the next Annual General Meeting on April 30, 2021, the Swiss bank said in a media release on Tuesday.

Horta-Osório shall succeed Urs Rohner who will step down in 2021 as previously announced upon reaching the statutory term of 12 years. At the Annual General Meeting in 2009, Rohner was elected to the Board of Directors and became its full-time Vice-Chairman. He became full-time Chairman of the Board of Directors in 2011.

Currently CEO

António Horta-Osório is 56 years old and a citizen of Portugal. He currently is the Group Chief Executive of Lloyds Banking Group, the largest retail and commercial bank in the U.K. He started his career in banking in 1987 at Citigroup in Portugal where he became Head of Capital Markets. From 1991 to 1993, he worked in corporate finance at Goldman Sachs in New York and London.

In 1993 he joined Grupo Santander, where he was responsible for several executive functions and developed and further expanded the business in various key countries: First as CEO of Banco Santander de Negócios Portugal until 1996, from 1997 to 2000 as CEO and Chairman of Banco Santander Brazil, from 2000 to 2006 as CEO of Banco Santander Totta (Portugal), as Executive Vice President of Banco Santander in Spain from 2000 to 2010, as well as from 2006 to 2010 as CEO of Santander U.K./Abbey.

Respected, Despite Blemishes

Finally, effective March 2011, Lloyds Banking appointed him to his current role. In addition, he served on the Court of Directors of the Bank of England from 2009 to 2011. Lloyds was hit hard by the financial crisis, and forced to accept a government bailout. It didn't fully return to private ownership until 2017, following several strategic reviews.

A widely-respected executive in the U.K., Horta-Osório's tenure was marred by a few blemishes: he was criticized for being the highest-paid CEO of an FTSE-listed company at a time when Lloyds was cutting jobs and closing branches. Four years ago, he apologized to the bank's employees over an extramarital affair.