Nomura just lost a heavy-hitting executive in structured credit amid an overhaul that's hammered staff morale

• Nomura just lost Francesco Cuccovillo, European head of structuring and head of structured financing.
• He resigned this week, a source told Business Insider.
• It's a blow to a unit the bank was developing, and comes after a brutal round of job cuts earlier this year.

Nomura just lost a senior executive in structured financing - Francesco Cuccovillo, an MD in an area that bank was building out, resigned on Wednesday, a source told Business Insider.

"It's a pretty big deal," a source with knowledge of the move said to Business Insider. "The structured bit was supposed to be the focus," at the bank, the person said. Cuccovillo, known as Cucco, was a heavy hitter in the structured credit space "so won't be good for morale."

It's a blow to the bank's operations in the region, after shutting down the majority of its cash equities operations in Europe in 2016 and after a brutal round of job cuts earlier this year. In April, the bank cut more than 100 positions globally, with a bulk of that hitting senior MDs in London, as part of a strategy shift to more promising and better-performing units.

Cuccovillo's unit seemed to be one of those more promising ones. Nomura hired Matthieu Baudrand from RBS in August 2017 to work under Cuccovillo, handling solution and credit structuring. On LinkedIn, Baudrand says he is tasked with "development of new businesses including fund financing and primary CLO [collateralized loan obligation] issuance." (The structured credit market focuses on providing credit by turning debt into a tradeable asset, often through a securitization process.)

Nomura CEO Koji Nagai told Bloomberg in December that because the bank aimed to scrap London's status as a hub, its staff of 3,000 in the region was perhaps "a little large."

Nomura declined to comment.