ING Barings’ investment banking counsel is let go

The UK head of legal of ING Barings’ investment banking business Piers Roberts has been made redundant.

Roberts, who has been a lawyer at ING for approximately 10 years, left the Dutch bank last week. It is understood that he has yet to find a new position.

A well-placed source said that since investment banking is not one of ING’s core business areas, it was difficult to justify having a lawyer of Roberts’ seniority in the legal department.

During his time at ING, Roberts was also responsible for managing the bank’s relationship with external legal advisers. It is understood that this will now be overseen by UK legal head Adrian Marsh. However, it is unlikely that this will result in any changes to ING’s global or UK legal panels, which were set up last autumn by the bank’s group general counsel Jan Willem Vink.

A spokesman for
ING confirmed Roberts’ redundancy but declined to comment further.