The Chicago-headquartered banking group has stepped up its involvement in the China market by creating a new leadership role in the country.

US banking and financial services group Northern Trust has named Michael Wu, most recently country manager for its Beijing branch, as head of its Greater China region, a newly created position.

The new position means Wu has executive management responsibilities for the Hong Kong office, in addition to his current responsibilities for the Beijing branch. He will report to William Mak, head of Asia-Pacific, Northern Trust, the bank said in a statement yesterday.

"Northern Trust's business in the Asia-Pacific region has expanded dramatically over the past five years, with assets under custody growing at an annual rate of 13 per cent,” Mak said.

Wu was appointed as chief representative for the Northern Trust Beijing representative office in 2008. Under his leadership, Northern Trust successfully received approval for its branch licence from the China Banking Regulatory Commission in 2010, allowing Northern Trust to provide client services directly from the Beijing office.

Northern Trust has a network of nine locations across Asia-Pacific - in Australia, China, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and South Korea. It offers asset servicing and asset management solutions to sophisticated institutional investors and affluent individuals worldwide. 

Globally, Northern Trust oversees a total of $934.1 billion of assets under management (as at 31 December 2014).

In the US, the Chicago-based firm has offices in 19 states, as well as Washington, DC. It also operates in 20 international locations covering Canada, Europe, the Middle East and the Asia-Pacific region. As of 31 December 2014, Northern Trust had assets under custody of $6 trillion.