Deutsche Bank Mideast M&A head to join StanChart

Deutsche Bank AG's head of mergers and acquisitions for the Middle East and North Africa has quit and will join Standard Chartered Plc, people familiar with the situation told Reuters on Tuesday. Apoorva Shah, one of Deutsche's most experienced bankers in the region, will join the Britain-based bank's M&A team in September, the sources said. Deutsche Bank and Standard Chartered declined comment. Shah most recently advised a unit of Kingdom Holding Co, the investment vehicle of Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, in a $375m offer to buy shares in the group's hotel division. Several top investment bankers based in Dubai since the beginning of this year have joined rival institutions. Barclays Capital (a unit of Barclays Plc ) poached a top Rothschild investment banker to head its regional financial institutions coverage, while the head of M&A for the Middle East at Credit Suisse Group AG joined the investment arm of Qatar's sovereign wealth fund. Merger and acquisition volumes in the Middle East rebounded in the first quarter of 2010, with $10.7bn in announced deals, making it the busiest quarter for M&A in the region since 2007, according to Thomson Reuters league tables for the period.