We serve our clients through three regionally focused divisions: Swiss Universal Bank, International Wealth Management and Asia Pacific. These regional businesses are supported by two other divisions specializing in investment banking capabilities: Global Markets and Investment Banking & Capital Markets.
Our new strategy aims to strengthen our position as a leading private bank and wealth manager, with distinctive investment banking capabilities, to achieve our goal of profitable growth while generating significant capital through the cycle. We are accelerating the rebalancing of the Group towards our private banking businesses to optimize resource allocation and focus on the highest-returning, most scalable opportunities.
We are focused on growing in Asia Pacific and other emerging markets in order to capture the significant wealth management prospects in those markets, as we expect emerging markets to account for approximately 60% of the growth in global wealth in the coming years, with first generation entrepreneurs driving much of the wealth opportunity. In addition, we continue to focus on mature markets, which despite slower growth are still expected to remain important and account for more than half of wealth distribution by 2019.
Switzerland, as our home market, provides compelling opportunities for Credit Suisse. To further expand our position with Swiss private, corporate and institutional clients and take advantage of consolidation opportunities, we have created a dedicated Swiss Universal Bank. We provide a full range of services to private, corporate and institutional clients with a specific focus on becoming the "Bank for Entrepreneurs."
In line with our new strategic direction, we intend to focus on the investment banking businesses that support our wealth management clients, and businesses that deliver returns in excess of their cost of capital and have leading market positions. Within our Global Markets division, we continue to right-size our operations by exiting or downsizing selected businesses consistent with our lower risk profile and higher return on capital objectives. In Global Markets, we have reduced risk-weighted assets and leverage exposure to below the targets we had set for the end of 2015. We plan to further invest in our leading equities franchise and restructure our fixed income activities to generate more stable earnings through the cycle. In our Investment Banking & Capital Markets division, we are rebalancing our activities towards advisory and equity underwriting and towards investment grade corporates, which should help us to generate higher-quality earnings.
Within the Swiss Universal Bank division, we offer comprehensive advice and a broad range of financial solutions to private, corporate and institutional clients primarily domiciled in Switzerland. The division comprises the Private Banking and Corporate & Institutional Banking businesses.
In International Wealth Management, we cater to the needs of our private, corporate and institutional clients with expert advice and a broad range of financial solutions.
Our Private Banking business provides comprehensive advisory services and tailored investment and financing solutions to wealthy private clients and external asset managers in Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Latin America. We serve our clients through over 1,140 relationship managers in 36 locations across 25 countries, utilizing comprehensive access to the broad spectrum of Credit Suisse's global resources and capabilities as well as a wide range of proprietary and third-party products and services.
Our Asset Management business offers investment solutions and services globally to various types of clients, including pension funds, governments, foundations and endowments, corporations and individuals, along with our private banking businesses. Our asset management capabilities span a diversified range of asset classes, with a focus on traditional and alternative strategies.
Within the Asia Pacific division, we offer a wide range of financial products and services, focusing on our ultra-high-net-worth individuals (UHNWI), high-net-worth individuals (HNWI), entrepreneur, corporate, and institutional clients. We have an integrated approach to serving our clientele with our APAC Private Banking business, our APAC underwriting and advisory business, and our APAC financing group, which all work together closely. We deliver integrated client coverage to provide connectivity and access to broad financial markets, differentiated product offerings, and tailored financing solutions.
The Global Markets division offers a broad range of financial products and services to client-driven businesses and also supports Credit Suisse's global wealth management businesses and their clients. Our suite of equities, solutions and credit products and services includes global securities sales, trading and execution, prime brokerage and comprehensive investment research. Our clients include financial institutions, corporations, governments, institutional investors, such as pension funds and hedge funds and private individuals around the world.
The Investment Banking & Capital Markets division offers a broad range of investment banking products and services. Our clients include leading corporations, financial institutions, financial sponsors, ultra-high-net-worth individuals (UHNWI) and sovereign clients. A major pillar of our strategy for Investment Banking & Capital Markets is the rebalancing of our product mix towards M&A and equity underwriting, while maintaining our leading share in leveraged finance. We are investing in talent and capital across key product and industry areas in order to grow our market position in each of these areas. The division's globally coordinated approach enables us to bring together the combined expertise of our bankers in all regions to effectively deliver the best solutions for our clients.
Our operating businesses are supported by focused corporate functions that provide centralized corporate services and business support, as well as effective and independent control procedures in the following areas:
Finance
The Chief Financial Officer manages the Group's capital, funding, liquidity and expenses to ensure we are well capitalized and have a strong balance sheet.
Operations, Technology & Services
The Chief Operating Officer focuses on driving the transformation of Credit Suisse and oversees, among other things, global operations, information technology and security, sourcing and vendor management, the investment portfolio and our Business Delivery Centers.
Risk
The Chief Risk Officer governs the Group's risk management framework and provides independent risk oversight.
Compliance and Regulatory Affairs
Compliance and Regulatory Affairs monitors bank activities on all levels. It ensures transparency of all regulatory interactions of the bank, and assesses the potential impact and implementation of regulatory developments.
General Counsel
Provides legal, policy and regulatory advice in the context of potential or actual legal matters and investigations. It drives strategic legal risk management and manages our relationship with political stakeholders.
Human Resources, Communications & Branding
The Head of Human Resources, Communications & Branding is responsible for enabling divisions and functions to attract, retain and develop our employees, driving our global communications strategy and developing and strengthening the Credit Suisse brand.
