Monday, February 8, 2010

Bank of America Merrill Lynch Appoints Rajesh Melwani and Romanos Daniels

BofA Merrill Lynch has expanded its Asia-Pacific derivatives sales and trading team by hiring two senior bankers.

The American bank has appointed former UBS banker Rajesh Melwani as its Asia-Pacific head of derivatives sales and Goldman Sachs Romanos Daniels as its Asia-Pacific head of exotics trading.


Nomura Holdings Hires Ronan Clarke

Nomura Holdings has hired Ronan Clarke as the new head of high yield credit research for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. He will be based in London.

Mr. Clarke has 10 years of experience in high yield research having held similar management roles at UBS and most recently at Royal Bank of Scotland. -Datamonitor NewsWire


Burroughs & Chapin Appoints Jim Apple

Burroughs & Chapin has named Jim Apple, a real estate developer from Charlotte, NC, as president and CEO.

Apple, 54, founded Trade Street Partners in Charlotte in 2000. He has worked in the real estate industry for almost 25 years after a six-year stint as a corporate banking officer at Bank of America. -The Myrtle Beach Sun-News (South Carolina)


Friday, February 5, 2010

Barnaby Grist Join Cetera Financial Group

Cetera Financial Group (Cetera), formerly ING Advisors Network, announced today that industry veteran Barnaby Grist will join the firm as executive vice president, wealth management, effective Feb. 10. He will report to the newly appointed Cetera CEO, Valerie G. Brown, former CEO of ING Advisors Network.

In his new role, Grist will be a member of the firm’s executive committee and lead the strategic expansion of Cetera’s comprehensive wealth management services, which include advisory platform expansion; product research and due diligence; field marketing support; strategic relationship management; and practice management.

Most recently, Grist has been senior managing director, strategic business development, at Charles Schwab Advisor Services where he has led the creation, development and execution of Schwab’s program to serve advisors turning independent and provide them with one of the industry’s first integrated platforms for fee-based advisors. He also has headed the firm’s advisory business development and distribution initiatives, platform expansion, product shelf management and strategic relationships, and extensive marketing efforts. Prior to employment with Schwab, he served as a consultant with the Boston Consulting Group’s financial services practice. His many years in the financial services field also included a position as an equity analyst in Lehman Brothers’ financial institutions group. -PRNewswire


Allan R. Toole Joins DoubleLine Capital

Allan R. Toole, former portfolio manager at TCW and head of the firm’s portfolio analytics group, has assumed the positions of chief risk officer of DoubleLine Capital and head of product development at the firm.

As chief risk officer, Mr. Toole is responsible for coordinating the firm’s programs for detection and measurement of material risks to investment portfolios, enabling the firm to maintain accounts in accordance with strategy guidelines and client risk profiles. He will play a key role in the development of internal risk systems and processes for the analysis of the firm’s workflows, operations and systems, and the establishment of mitigating controls for material operations risks. He also chairs the DoubleLine risk management committee, which meets to review account performance and performance attribution, yield, duration and other risk metrics.

Mr. Toole also heads product development and analytics at DoubleLine. In that capacity, he will review new products and structures to identify material market risks and establish effective risk-management controls over their life cycle. Other responsibilities include performance measurement/analytics and compliance with GIPS, and assistance in marketing/client relations.

Mr. Toole, 40, has a distinguished career in financial analytics, risk control and portfolio management. Before joining DoubleLine, he served 15 years at TCW until December 2009. At TCW, he was a managing director and served as head of the portfolio analytics group, chairman of the portfolio analytics committee and chairman of the market and product development committee. In addition, he was a portfolio manager of the TCW Asset Allocation Funds and the TCW Alpha Series market-neutral strategy. Previously, he was a manager of insurance finance for the risk management department of Tenet Healthcare Corporation. -PRNewswire


Aksia Appoints Bruce Ruehl and Jaeson Dubrovay

Aksia, one of the leaders in hedge fund research and advisory services, has announced the appointment of  Bruce Ruehl and Jaeson Dubrovay as partners in the Americas advisory team.

Mr. Ruehl is highly regarded in the alternatives industry and has 26 years of financial markets experience. His last 16 years were focused on hedge fund research, hedge fund portfolios, and the management of institutional client relationships. In 2001, he founded the boutique fund of hedge fund business, Gleacher Fund Advisors, in a joint venture with Gleacher Partners, serving as chairman and chief investment officer.

Mr. Dubrovay has deep experience in the alternatives industry and has over 20 years of investment experience. He comes from NEPC where he served as senior hedge fund strategist since 2006, working with institutional clients advising on hedge fund portfolios. He began his career as an auditor with Arthur Andersen & Co., and has had direct hedge fund investment experience since 1990. -Business Wire


LBC Credit Partners Hires John Capperella

LBC Credit Partners announced the addition of John Capperella as a portfolio manager in the firm’s Philadelphia office.

Prior to joining LBC, Capperella was a managing director at American Capital Strategies. His responsibilities there included sponsor coverage and portfolio management.


National Financial Partners Names Abbe F. Goldstein

National Financial Partners Corp. (NFP), a leading independent distributor of benefits, insurance and investment advisory services, today announced that Abbe F. Goldstein has joined NFP as senior vice president of investor relations, effective immediately. She will report directly to Donna Blank, NFP’s executive vice president and chief financial officer.

Ms. Goldstein joins NFP from Revlon where she served as senior vice president of investor relations and corporate communications. She brings nearly 20 years of experience in investor relations and financial services to the role, having held positions with increasing responsibility at J.P. Morgan, Chemical Bank, Palisade Capital Management, Thomson Financial and Willis Group Holdings. Prior to joining Revlon, she was associate director of investor relations for Willis Group Holdings, where she provided investor relations counsel to the executive management team and served as a company spokesperson with the investment community. -PRNewswire


Thursday, February 4, 2010

Goldman Sachs Appoints Christopher Barter, Hires Tav Morgan

Goldman Sachs has appointed Christopher Barter as the sole head of its Russian office.

The company has also hired former Norilsk Nickel deputy general director Tav Morgan, who will head a department specializing in commodity markets across the former USSR.

Morgan spent four years at Norilsk Nickel, until July 2009. -The Russian Business Monitor (Russia)


Wells Fargo Appoints John Carley

Wells Fargo named John Carley as head of its protein sector.

Based in Chicago, Carley will also be responsible for business development in Indiana, Ohio, the Southeast and parts of Illinois. He will report to John Weubbe, senior vice president and industry manager for Wells Fargo’s food and agribusiness industry specialty group.

Prior to joining Wells Fargo, Carley was vice president at BMO Capital Markets’ food and consumer group protein division in Chicago. -Business Wire


Jefferies Group Appoints David Zervos, Gary Hill and Sharif Anbar-Colas

Jefferies Group announced the appointment of David Zervos, Ph.D. as managing director and head of global fixed income strategy.

Zervos joins Jefferies from the Federal Reserve Board in Washington, DC, where he was a visiting advisor in the division of monetary affairs for most of 2009.

Jefferies Group further announced the appointment of Gary Hill as a managing director and senior international equity trader.

Hill is responsible for Latin American cash equity trading, developing both the ADR business and local market execution.

Hill has more than 17 years of industry experience, including seven years at Deutsche Bank, where he was most recently North American head of emerging markets cash equity trading.

Jefferies Group also announced the appointment of Sharif Anbar-Colas as a managing director and global head of collaterized loan obligation (CLO) and collaterized debt obligation (CDO) trading.

Anbar-Colas will be responsible for all CLO/CDO trading within the firm’s broader mortgage and asset-backed securities (MBS/ABS) group, part of the fixed income division at Jefferies.

Anbar-Colas joins Jefferies from Cohen & Company, where he was a managing director and head of European ABS and global CLO trading. -Business Wire


Eric Levy Joins Lincoln Financial Group

Lincoln National announced that Eric Levy has joined the company as head of defined contribution products, retirement solutions.

In this role, Levy is responsible for leading an experienced and dedicated product team, who manage Lincoln’s defined contribution suite of products and solutions. He joins Lincoln with more than 20 years of industry experience and reports to Rob Grubka, head of product for retirement solutions.

Levy comes to Lincoln from Mercer where he most recently served as a worldwide partner and defined contribution business leader for Mercer’s outsourcing business. In this role, he was responsible for successfully driving Mercer’s strategy, business development and product development for defined contribution, defined benefit and individual retirement rollover and brokerage businesses. -PR Newswire


SRS Real Estate Partners Adds Jason Samreny

SRS Real Estate Partners is pleased to announce the addition of Jason Samreny as vice president to the South Florida team.

Mr. Samreny specializes in landlord representation and disposition services for clients across South Florida.

Since 2004, Mr. Samreny has acted as principal for Gulfstream Development Group, and was vice president for Forum Development Group. Prior to that he worked in various capacities for Thomas Enterprises, The Gilmcher Group, National Development Group, and was also previously with Staubach Retail Services as a vice president in the Boca Raton office from 2001 through 2004. He has participated in the leasing and development of mixed-use developments and luxury, lifestyle, and power centers.


Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Deutsche Bank Hires Chris O’Hea and Robert Garofolo

Deutsche Bank Securities today announced two hires within its global markets division in Chicago.

Chris O’Hea and Robert Garofolo have joined as directors in the firm’s institutional client group, reporting to Greg Kiesel, managing director and head of Chicago equity sales.

O’Hea joins from Credit Suisse, where he spent nine years as an equity sales trader covering the Midwest.

Garofolo joins from Cantor Fitzgerald, where he was a director and Midwest equity sales trader. Prior to joining Cantor in 2006, he was an equity sales trader at Lehman Brothers for seven years. -Business Wire


Jefferies Hires Michael Brinkman

Jefferies announced today the hiring of Michael Brinkman in a further expansion of its global healthcare investment banking group. He joins as a managing director.

Mr. Brinkman will focus on biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies and will be based in San Francisco.

Mr. Brinkman joins Jefferies with 16 years of healthcare investment banking experience, predominately focused on the biotechnology and pharmaceutical sectors, including two years as a managing director with Piper Jaffray and 14 years at CIBC World Markets where he was a managing director. -Business Wire


AMI Research Appoints Peter J. D’agostino

Hawk Associates announced the appointment of Wall Street veteran Peter J. D’Agostino as president of AMI Research, a wholly-owed financial research division of Hawk.

In his new role at Hawk, D’Agostino will also open the company’s New York office.

D’Agostino started his career as an investment advisor with AXA Financial where, among other duties, he taught monthly investment classes to the firm’s 100 plus investment advisors and managers. He also created and ran a fixed income department and built a large book of business. He was subsequently hired as a senior equity research analyst in biotechnology by Sidoti. He was hired as director of research by Ethanol Capital Management in Tucson, AZ where he restructured the research department and co-launched and managed the firm’s Opportunistic Value Fund. Most recently, as a director at Sidoti, he organized the company’s highly successful and first ever microcap investor conference in New York. -Business Wire


Alcentra Apponts Paul Hatfield, Julian Colville and Ron Grobeck

Alcentra, a specialist asset manager focused on the sub-investment grade debt markets, has announced several senior management changes as part of its development plans for 2010.

Paul Hatfield, currently CIO and head of US operations, is to become global CIO, based in London. He will start this new role in April 2010.

Hatfield joined Alcentra in 2003 as a portfolio manager for Alcentra’s European CLO funds, and became head of US operations in 2008. During this time he has relocated Alcentra’s US business to New York and grown the assets under management, taking on management of BNY Mellon Capital Markets’ CLO and Mezzanine funds, as well as acquiring Rabobank’s CLO business in July of 2009.

Julian Colville (head of business development) and Ron Grobeck (senior US portfolio manager) have been appointed co-heads of the US business.

Colville will relocate to New York from London in March 2010 to focus principally on Alcentra’s North American, Japanese and Australian business development efforts.

Grobeck joined Alcentra as part of the Rabobank CLO acquisition. He was previously head of Rabobank’s CLO operations.

Hatfield and Colville will report to David Forbes-Nixon, chairman and CEO of Alcentra. -PRNewswire


Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Barclays Wealth Hires William Scott, Steve Pritsios and Donald Mahoney

Barclays Wealth, a leading global wealth manager, is pleased to announce that it has hired William Scott, Steve Pritsios and Donald Mahoney as investment representatives in Washington, D.C. and Philadelphia.

Mr. Scott and Mr. Pritsios, based in Washington, join Barclays Wealth from Oppenheimer. Previously, they worked at FBR Capital Markets Private Wealth Management and Morgan Stanley Private Wealth Management, serving ultra high net worth and small institutional clients. At FBR, the team helped build the third party asset management and corporate executive services platforms.

Mr. Mahoney, based in Philadelphia, brings more than 20 years of wealth management experience to his new role. He joins from Radnor Trust where he was responsible for building a bank and trust company. Prior to Radnor, he worked at Commerce Bank, Wachovia Bank and Mellon Private Asset Management, where he focused on delivering a broad range of services — including trust, global custody, lending, private banking, asset management and estate planning — to high net worth individuals and family offices. -PRNewswire


Bessemer Venture Partners Promotes Vishal Gupta, Alex Ferrara and Umesh Padval

Bessemer Venture Partners (BVP), a global investment firm, today announced that Vishal Gupta in the Mumbai office has been named a managing director.

Alex Ferrara of the Larchmont, NY office and Umesh Padval of the Menlo Park, CA office have been named partners.

Gupta joined BVP India in 2006 as an associate. He was promoted to vice president in 2007 and then to director in 2008. Prior to joining Bessemer, he worked at Reliance Group in the treasurer’s office. Previously, he worked for SBI Mutual Funds and for DSL Software, a joint venture between HCT Tech and Deutsche Bank.

Ferrara joined BVP in 2005 as an associate and was promoted to vice president in 2007. Prior to BVP, he worked at Goldman Sachs in technology, media and telecommunications investment banking. He started his career as a software engineer at Salomon Brothers and subsequently as a derivatives trader on the New York Board of Trade.

Ferrara focuses on investments in the areas of financial services and the internet.

Padval joined BVP in 2007 as an operating partner. Previously, he was executive vice president of the consumer products group at LSI Logic. He joined LSI Logic via its acquisition of C-Cube Microsystems, a public company where he was president & CEO. Previously, he held management positions at VLSI Technology, serving as executive vice president of both the consumer and computing products groups. He began his career at Advanced Micro Devices.

Padval  focuses on investments in the areas of information technology and cleantech. -PRNewswire


Rockefeller Appoints Michael R. Marsh

Rockefeller, a leading global wealth management firm serving high-net-worth individuals, families, trusts, foundations and endowments, today announced that Michael R. Marsh has been named a senior vice president of the company.

Mr. Marsh is based in Washington, D.C. where he will focus on business development activities. In this role, he will work closely with managing director Paul Veith and will collaborate with investment, client advisory and other professionals throughout the company to develop investment management and advisory opportunities with non-profit and other clients.

Previously, Mr. Marsh was a managing director in the strategic and business development division at Lynx Investment Advisory, where he was responsible for directing national sales and marketing, with a focus on non-profit institutional business growth. He was also a regional vice president and asset management advisor with Merrill Lynch Investment Management’s Private Investors and has held other senior level positions in the investment management industry since 1996. -PRNewswire


State Street Global Advisors Appoints Barry F. X. Smith

State Street Global Advisors (SSgA), the investment management business of State Street, today announced the appointment of Barry F. X. Smith as global head of its cash business.

In this new position, Smith, 44, will be responsible for all non-investment activities associated with SSgA’s global cash business, including distribution, pricing, product development, and client service. He reports to James Kase, executive vice president and head of global sales and marketing, and will work closely with the cash investment management team led by Steve Meier, executive vice president and global cash chief investment officer, to ensure a cohesive approach to building the business.

Smith joins SSgA from BlackRock, where he most recently served as managing director and head of the private label cash management business. There, he was a member of the global cash management executive group, responsible for all aspects of distributing, managing and servicing the company’s liquidity management products. He joined BlackRock via its acquisition of Merrill Lynch Investment Managers, where he served as head of institutional cash management and in various sales and marketing management roles over the course of 19 years. -Business Wire


Monday, February 1, 2010

Farmers Insurance Appoints Susan Bithell

Farmers Insurance Group announces the appointment of Susan Bithell to the position of vice president and chief underwriting officer.

In her new role, Bithell will oversee the continued alignment of the company’s underwriting strategy, processes and methodology across a number of business units.

Bithell began her career with Farmers in 1983 as an auto underwriter in the Pocatello regional office. In 1984 she moved to the regional marketing department where she held several positions including life representative, division agency manager, and regional marketing education manager. She was promoted in 1991 to zone life marketing manager in the home office. In 1993 she received a promotion to division marketing manager in Colorado and in 1996 she was promoted to regional marketing manager in Merced, CA. In 1997, she was promoted to director forecasting, research, and financial analysis where she oversaw catastrophe modeling, personal lines financial reports, and data reporting. In 2000 she moved to the newly-created position of director of customer advocacy. In 2001 she returned to field operations as the state executive director in Nevada. Her most recent assignment was as vice president and state executive director of Washington State. -PRNewswire


Newbridge Financial Promotes Robert Spitler and Thomas Casolaro

Newbridge Financial (NFI), parent company of Newbridge Securities Corporation (NSC), announces the promotion of Robert Spitler to president and Thomas Casolaro to director of sales, effective February 1, 2010.

Mr. Spitler has been serving as the chief financial officer for NFI for the past 8 years, as well as providing guidance to NSC and its management team regarding NSC’s overall operations.

Mr. Casolaro has been serving as NSC’s regional sales manager and has held various management positions at NSC for the past 6 years. -PRNewswire


PFM Group Appoints Maria Altomare, Nelson Bush, John Cape, Daniel Kozloff, and Scott Shearer

PFM Group announced today that five senior managing counsultants have been promoted to managing directors of the firm. PFM CEO F. John White announced the promotions of Maria Altomare, Nelson Bush, John Cape, Daniel Kozloff, and Scott Shearer.

Based at the firm’s St. Louis, Missouri office, Ms. Altomare has worked at PFM for four years as a senior managing counsultant in asset management after 20 years of banking experience. At PFM, she has major responsibilities as relationship manager for the Missouri Securities Investment Program (“”MOSIP”"), a comprehensive cash management program for school districts and municipalities and for other governmental entities. She delivers client services under the MOSIP program in Missouri as well as managing other PFM investment programs in Nebraska and Wyoming. Prior to joining PFM, she worked at US Bank.

Based in Arlington, VA, Mr. Bush has worked for PFM for 16 years, and currently provides clients with PFM investment services in Virginia. He is the day-to-day contact for participants in the SNAP Program, a bond proceeds management program started by PFM with the Virginia State Treasurer about 20 years ago. He has held a number of positions of increasing responsibility during his career at PFM, and has broad experience in operations as well as client service.

Based in the firm’s Albany, NY office, Mr. Cape joined PFM in 2007. As the former budget director for New York State, he oversaw one of the largest state budgets in the country and he brings that experience to every financial consulting assignment. Considered a national expert on state and local finances, he also serves as a senior fellow at the Rockefeller Institute. He co-leads the state government services in PFM’s strategic consulting practice. In particular, he is expanding PFM’s ability to help state governments use technology to control costs in human services and in the medical assistance delivery programs – large and complex areas that present great challenges to most state budgets.

Based in the firm’s Philadelphia office, Mr. Kozloff joined PFM in 1999 and has spent his entire career with the firm. He initially worked as a financial advisory consultant, and provided support for a variety of strategic consulting and financial advisory clients, before joining PFM’s quantitative strategies group (QSG) some five years ago. For the last several years, he has served as manager of the QSG, with lead responsibilities for business plan support, training programs, and firm wide model/technical infrastructure development and support (R&D). Additionally, he works in multiple capacities with several large municipal issuers throughout the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. His special ability to continually provide updates on new industry developments, new market trends and improved technical capabilities has been a key factor in PFM’s recent growth.

Based in Harrisburg, PA, Mr. Shearer joined PFM twelve years ago, working in the Pennsylvania local government practice since that time. His clients include a wide variety of Pennsylvania local governments, including school districts, cities, boroughs, townships, counties, and municipal authorities. In addition, he has developed special expertise in distressed swaps, troubled variable rate transactions, and bond pool projects. -PRNewswire


John W. Henry Appoints Larry Simms

John W. Henry & Company has named Larry Simms as managing director – business development.

Effective January 15, 2010, Mr. Simms is responsible for the strategic planning and implementation of all sales and marketing efforts for JWH and its affiliated entities. He will work closely with senior management and the firm’s board of directors chaired by John William Henry.

Larry joins JWH with over 25 years of sales experience. He spent more than 20 years focused on investment management sales mainly covering institutional clients for firms including Citigroup, Bankers Trust, UBS and Wells Fargo. For the past three years he has been focused on the alternative asset space representing a variety of products including managed futures. -PRNewswire


Encore Equities Appoints Scot Clevenger

Scot Clevenger has been named vice president of capital markets for Encore Equities, a subsidiary of Dallas based Encore Enterprises.

As vice president, Clevenger joins Encore Equities to raise funds through family offices, registered investment advisors, and high net-worth individuals for limited partnerships, joint ventures and the Encore Opportunity Fund II. With over 20 years experience in real estate, technology, and financial services, he will cultivate investor and partner relationships and identify projects that meet the company’s investment criteria.

Clevenger joins Encore Capital from Rainier Capital Management where, as vice president of sales, he raised investor capital through financial advisors to be deployed in debt and equity offerings including diversified funds, individual transactions and 1031/Tenant-In-Common projects. Prior to Rainier Capital Management, he was the managing principal of a transaction advisory firm that provided services for commercial projects including office, retail, medical, multifamily, development and residential investment programs. -PRNewswire


Friday, January 29, 2010

Farmers Insurance Appoints Daniel J. Schrock

Farmers Insurance announced the appointment of Daniel J. Schrock to vice president – expansion markets. He will report to senior vice president Scott Stice.

Mr. Schrock joined Farmers in May 1990 as an auto underwriter in the Overland Park regional Office. In January 1993 he transferred to the claims function as a claims representative. He moved quickly through the claims ranks as senior claims representative, claims management trainee, and branch claims supervisor. In June 2006, he was promoted to state executive director – Michigan. -PR Newswire


Atlantic-Pacific Capital Appoints Christian H. Voss

Atlantic-Pacific Capital announced the appointment of Christian H. Voss as partner in the direct private placements group to focus on sourcing, structuring and execution. He will work closely with founder and chairman, James Manley to head the group.

Prior to joining the company, Mr. Voss was managing director and head of private capital markets for Cantor Fitzgerald in New York and London. He has held senior positions within the capital markets for over 20 years and has sourced and structured transactions for issuers globally. -Company Website


Penserra Securities Hires Jason Valdez

Penserra Securities continued to expand its global program trading capabilities by hiring Jason Valdez.

Valdez will lead the effort to expand the firm’s program trading capabilities. He will initially be working on the New York City trading desk, but will transfer to the California trading desk later in 2010.

Valdez is former director of trading at Rosenblatt Securities. He brings a deep and diversified set of skills from both the buy-side and sell-side. Prior to his tenure with Rosenblatt, he traded transition management portfolios for Russell Investment Services. He also spent three years at Thomas Weisel Partners, where he helped launch program trading, and five years at Bear Stearns.


TA Associates Promotes Jennifer M. Mulloy, M. Roy Burns, Mark H. Carter, Hythem T. El-Nazer, William D. Christ, J. Morgan Seigler and Naveen Wadhera

TA Associates announced global promotions of seven staff members, effective January 1, 2010.

Jennifer M. Mulloy was promoted to managing director from director. She serves in TA’s Menlo Park office, focusing on investments in healthcare, business services and consumer companies.

M. Roy Burns was promoted to principal from senior vice president. He serves in TA’s Boston office, focusing on investments in financial services, business services and other growth services companies.

Mark H. Carter was promoted to principal from senior vice president. He serves in TA’s Boston office, focusing on investments in the healthcare, business services and retail sectors.

Hythem T. El-Nazer was promoted to principal from senior vice president. He serves in TA’s Boston office, focusing on investments in communications, media and technology companies.

William D. Christ was promoted to senior vice president from vice president. He serves in TA’s Boston office, focusing on investments in business services, education and consumer services and products companies.

J. Morgan Seigler was promoted to senior vice president at TA Associates Limited from vice president. He serves in the London office of TA Associates, focusing on investments in growth companies in Europe.

Naveen Wadhera heads the Indian operations and was appointed as director of TA Associates Advisory, focusing on investments in growth companies in India and other emerging markets. -Business Wire


Jason Santiago Joins Stipes Group

Stripes Group, a private investment firm located in New York, has announced that Jason Santiago has joined the company as vice president of business development.

Mr. Santiago will focus on sourcing investment opportunities from investment banking intermediaries, including private placement, M&A and industry coverage investment bankers, who represent high-growth companies across all sectors and geographies. In addition, he will manage lender relationships on behalf of the firm and its portfolio companies.  He will be based in New York and report to Stripes Group managing partners Ken Fox and Dan Marriott.

Prior to joining Stripes Group, Mr. Santiago spent five years as an investment banker within the private placements group at Cowen and Company in New York and San Francisco.  At Cowen, he was responsible for the execution of full-lifecycle equity and debt private placements.


New World Ventures Appoints Matt McCall and Adam Koopersmith

New World Ventures announced the addition of Matt McCall as a partner.

As a co-founder and managing director of DFJ Portage, McCall brings 14 years of venture experience across dozens of companies and several diverse industries. He has served on the advisory board to the Mayo’s Council of Technology Advisors in Chicago as well as on numerous other regional high technology advisory boards and is an executive board member of the Illinois Venture Capital Association. He also led the company’s most recent investment in a leading social game developer on Facebook and MySpace.

The company also announced that Adam Koopersmith has been promoted to partner.

Koopersmith joined the company in 2004 with a strong history of building successful early-stage technology companies. Currently, he represents the company’s holdings as a board member of Advantage Optics, Firm 58 and HyperQuest. He also serves on the Investment Committee for the Illinois Innovation Accelerator Fund (i2A) – a public-private seed-stage investment fund.


First American Appoints Craig J. Barberio, David Bigelow and Mark E. Seaton

First American announced that, in preparation for the separation of its financial services and information solutions businesses into two separate publicly traded companies, Craig J. Barberio has been named director of investor relations for the company’s financial services group and David Bigelow had been appointed to the position of vice president of investor relations for the information solutions group.

Barberio will manage the financial services group’s investor relations and investor communications activities.

Prior to joining First American, Barberio served as first vice president in strategic planning and investor relations at IndyMac Bank from 2006 to 2008.

Bigelow will manage the information solutions group’s investor relations, marketing and corporate communications activities.

Before joining First American, Bigelow most recently was a senior counselor with Financial Profiles.

Mark E. Seaton, who has successfully led the company’s investor relations efforts over the past three years, has also been promoted to the position of vice president of finance for First American’s financial services group.

Seaton will assume responsibility for overseeing budgeting, forecasting, financial analysis, and directing the development of strategic objectives and plans. He will also provide focused leadership to the company’s many initiatives to improve margins in its title business. -PR Newswire


Thursday, January 28, 2010

Michael S. Chadwick Joins Growth Capital Partners

Growth Capital Partners announced that Michael S. Chadwick has joined the firm as managing director.

Mr. Chadwick’s primary responsibility will be new business development for the firm’s investment and merchant banking practices.

Mr. Chadwick joined Growth Capital Partners in January 2010 as managing director in the firm’s Houston office. He has over 35 years of experience in corporate finance and investment banking covering companies in the energy, manufacturing, distribution and services sectors. He comes from SMH Capital where he served as senior vice president and managing director in the corporate finance group.

Mr. Chadwick presently serves on the boards of directors of: Landry’s Restaurants, Moody-Price and Harris County Hospital District Foundation. -Company Website


Capital Institutional Services Appoints Anne Barlow

Capital Institutional Services announced that Anne Barlow has joined the firm as vice president, director of corporate access.

Ms. Barlow will be responsible for managing Summit, the company’s agency corporate access service.

Ms. Barlow brings more than 19 years of capital markets experience to the company. Most recently, she served as a senior analyst at Austin Stock Research, where she specialized in short-sell equity research. She also worked at Southwest Securities, where she was senior vice president of equity research. -Business Wire


Genstar Capital Appoints Anthony J. Salewski and Robert S. Rutledge

Genstar Capital announced the promotions of two members of its investment team with the appointments of Anthony J. Salewski and Robert S. Rutledge as vice presidents.

Both had previously been senior associates of the firm.

Prior to joining Genstar in 2007, Mr. Salewski served as the chief of staff for operations at Barclays Global Investors.

Prior to re-joining Genstar as a senior associate in 2007, Rutledge spent two years as an associate at Genstar from 2003 to 2005 and also served as an associate in the investment banking division of Salomon Smith Barney in San Francisco where he advised on mergers and acquisitions and executed capital market offerings. -PR Newswire


Central Europe & Russia Fund, European Equity Fund and New Germany Fund Appoint Rainer Vermehren

Central Europe & Russia Fund, The European Equity Fund and New Germany Fund announced the appointment of Rainer Vermehren as vice president of the funds.

Vermehren will assume the oversight role of the funds’ investments during the second quarter 2010 as set by each fund’s investment management agreement with Deutsche Investment Management Americas. -Business Wire


Assured Guaranty Appoints John Trahan

Assured Guaranty, the holding company for Assured Guaranty (AGC) and Assured Guaranty Municipal (AGM), announced that John Trahan has been named managing director, Southern region for AGC and AGM. He reports to Bill Hogan, senior managing director, municipal finance of AGC and AGM.

Prior to joining AGC, Mr. Trahan was a director in the public finance group at BNP Paribas in New York City, where he was responsible for business development and underwriting for municipal transactions in the eastern region of the United States. Before that, he held similar positions at KBC Bank and CIBC World Markets in Los Angeles and Sumitomo Bank and Texas Commerce Bank in Houston. -Business Wire


Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Cantor Fitzgerald Annouces Management Appointments

Cantor Fitzgerald announced its entry into the municipal bond and public finance business with the hiring of William O’Keefe as senior managing director and department head of the muni desk.

Previously, Mr. O’Keefe was with Morgan Stanley where his leadership played a key role in that firm’s growth in the public finance and municipal bond markets.

Cantor Fitzgerald also announced that along with Bill O’Keefe, 7 other senior municipal bond professionals have joined as part of the new business effort. The new team consists of: David McMahon, Sandy Carrithers, Chris Grinnell, Elizabeth Andreev, Steve Kennedy, Kevin Steinhauer and Mike Allen.

David McMahon will be leading the sales effort. He joins Cantor from Morgan Stanley where he held a variety of sales and management roles over 22 years.

Chris Grinnell joins with 19 years of sales experience at Morgan Stanley.

Elizabeth Andreev joins from Susquehanna International Group where she was a municipal bond trader and market maker for municipal bond ETFs.

Steve Kennedy was previously with Sovereign Securities and Commerce Capital Markets.

Kevin Steinhauer has overseen Cantor Fitzgerald’s municipal trading activities since 2004 along with Mike Allen, who joined in Memphis after many years at FTN Securities.

Cantor Fitzgerald also announced that it is further strengthening its equities group by appointing William Nichols as head of U.S. trading and Salvatore Catrini as managing director, U.S. equity product manager to its growing equity capital markets team.

Mr. Nichols joins the firm to establish and build Cantor Fitzgerald’s trading business and will be responsible for trading across the U.S. He joins Cantor from Pali Capital where he was managing director and head of trading for the Developing Economies group. Previously he was with Bear Stearns and Credit Suisse First Boston in similar roles.

Mr. Catrini will develop the firm’s buy-side equities platform. He previously was a product manager at Cowen where he created ‘Tech Radar,’ an innovative daily report that highlighted tradable news in the technology space. -Business Wire


HSBC Appoints Peter Boyles

HSBC has named Peter Boyles as chief executive for continental Europe.

Boyles is the head of the bank’s French operations and would lead a new Paris-based team responsible for businesses in 26 countries across continental Europe, including France, Germany, Turkey and the central and eastern European states. He will to report to Stuart Gulliver, chairman of Europe and Middle East and global head of investment banking.


Next Page »