Richard Johnston, the ex-Head of Prime Brokerage for UBS in Asia, is joining Albourne to establish its Hong Kong office and to head its activities in Asia.

Albourne's Managing Director Simon Ruddick said: "This is the culmination of 15 years of persuasion. Richard actually worked as the external auditor studying my books of derivative risk at Bankers Trust, before working at Baring Securities with fellow Albourne colleagues Sam Lewis, Bruce Johnson, Su Yin Mustier and Kate Bungey."

Ruddick added: "Albourne also had the chance to observe Richard's extremely successful years as a proprietary trader within UBS Singapore. Richard's latter day transition to prime broking in Hong Kong completes what we believe to be a unique skill set and knowledge base for evaluating not just Asian hedge funds, but also the wider hedge fund strategy universe."

Richard Johnston completes a round of hires at Albourne which include Jonathan Choslovsky, formerly with the hedge fund Tresckow Capital Management LLC and a lawyer at the SEC, who will be joining Albourne's San Francisco office; Claire Smith, a hedge fund analyst who will be based in Geneva; and Clare Cotton and Cathy Phillips who are both UK-based accountants.

Clare Smith, formerly of Deloitte & Touche Corporate Finance, will be responsible for Albourne's forensic accounting of hedge funds, while Cathy Phillips will serve as the group's Financial Controller. Cathy will also assist Bruce Johnson with his soon-to-be-released Fraud Analysis.