Nik Brunner

Nik completed three and a half years at school before starting a job at McSweeney and Neill Chemists in town where he worked developing photos.  Nik was very involved in sport at school.  He was a top athlete (sprinter) and swimmer and played rugby for the 2nd XV.  Nik says he looks back fondly on his days at school.  It prepared him well for the world though he now wishes he had made a little more effort in the classroom as he knows he could well have achieved much more – but, in his words, teenagers are all so clever!

His lack of school qualifications have not held Nik back.  His first move from Matamata was to Switzerland (his native country) where he worked for the Swiss Post Office at their main office in Zurich before moving into IT Recruitment in 2000.

In 2001 he moved into the finance sector working for the Exchange Traded Derivatives team at UBS (Swiss Bank) in Zurich.  After moving to London with UBS in 2003 he changed to a client facing role with Lehman Brothers which brought many challenges.  He was transferred to Hong Kong to set up the role in that region at the end of 2006 and remained there through the dark days of the Lehman bankruptcy.

The family returned to London in 2009 where he worked for Merrill Lynch and currently he is with the Deutsche Bank.

While in Switzerland he served as a Non Commissioned Officer in the Swiss Army (and he has the knife!)  Also Nik kept playing rugby and played for Switzerland although it only ended up being a one cap career in a win over Yugoslavia.

Nik’s wife Catherine is Welsh from Llanelli.  They have three daughters – Nia born in Switzerland, Rhiannon born in the UK and Alys was born in Hong Kong – an international trio.

Although Nik doesn’t spend much time in NZ he still has good friends from school who he keeps in touch with.  He says it is uncanny where you meet up with people around the world from school days.