Adam Wallace, who headed up Asia Pacific hedge fund services at JP Morgan in Hong Kong has left the firm to join hedge fund Factorial Management as its chief operating officer reported AsianInvestor this week. The bank would not comment on his departure but it’s believed that Matthew Goldblatt, Asia Pacific regional product manager for private equity and real estate services, will assume Wallace’s role until a permanent replacement is found. Wallace previously worked at Citi and headed up data management in Asia for Fortis Prime Fund Solutions before joining JP Morgan in 2010. Hong Kong-based Factorial launched its multi-asset Factorial Master Fund earlier this year with USD25million and the decision for Factorial founder Barun Agarwal to appoint Wallace reflects a growing trend for Asian hedge funds to bring on board industry experts to serve as COO as they look to present themselves in a more institutional light to prospective investors. Kirtes Bharti, former director of equities in Credit Suisse’s prime services team, earlier this year also made a switch from the sell-side to buy-side when he joined Segantii Capital Management as head of financing. No doubt more high profile appointments will continue to be seen throughout the course of 2012 as Asia looks to augment the quality of its hedge fund industry.