Under his leadership, JPMorgan repeatedly came top of the Latin American M&A league tables, paving the way to his promotion a year-and-a-half ago to head of Latin America investment banking.
Key milestones include last year’s $1bn sale of cement maker Loma Negra, one of Argentina’s largest private companies, to Brazilian construction giant Camargo Correa – a deal done before Argentina’s sovereign debt restructuring was complete and despite continuing foreign investor scepticism about the country.
Now aged 37, Mr Aguzín is not yet as well known as some of our other banking stars (or indeed his predecessor at JPMorgan, Latin America veteran Brian O’Neill), but give him another decade and he might be.
Born in Argentina, Mr Aguzín, who is known to most people by his family nickname Gucho, is a JPMorgan loyalist and emphasises teamwork and continuity as the keys to his success. “I joined the bank straight out of school in 1990,” he says. “Since then, the bank has changed a lot, but the Latin American team has stayed pretty much the same.”
A key measure of Mr Aguzín’s success will be how he manages to build up areas of the business in which the bank has traditionally been weaker, such as equities. “Since I’ve taken over responsibility for the region, I’ve been focusing on equities, and we have done four or five equity offerings this year. But I would have liked to have done 10,” he says. Developing JPMorgan’s local market capabilities as the action shifts away from Wall Street to burgeoning local equities and bond markets will also be important. Plans include opening an office in Colombia.
