If you’re on the look out for new career opportunities in London’s financial services sector, it’s important to know of as yet unheralded companies. Senior bankers at big-name firms are often going it alone. Here’s the pick of the bunch that received Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) authorisation throughout August and September.
1. aPriori Capital Partners
The now independent private equity advisory firm that was spun out from Credit Suisse earlier this year, the renamed aPriori Capital Partners is run by Colin Taylor and Susan Schnabel, who headed up the bank’s buyout unit DLJ Merchant Banking Partners. Max Hofert heads up compliance, while Lina Chan and Karoline Partheni, both ex-Credit Suisse employees, are also FCA approved staff.
2. Balliol Capital
As we pointed to earlier this month, Vassilis Paschopoulos, who headed up Deutsche Bank’s European investment grade trading business in Europe, has teamed up with ex-colleague Nikos Kargadouris to launch credit-focused hedge fund Balliol Capital. So far, it’s a boutique operation, but more hires could follow.
3. Dymon Asia (UK) LLP (also known as Port Meadow Capital Management)
Led by Carl Vine, a former portfolio manager at SAC Advisor’s London office, who takes the role of chief investment officer, Dymon Asia (UK) LLP was reportedly supposed to be called Port Meadow, based out of Oxford. Michael Perrett and David Tuthill, who worked with Vine at SAC and UBS, have also signed up. Meanwhile, Krupesh Patel, who was formerly a managing director at JPMorgan’s securities services division, has joined as chief operating officer.
4. Foveal Research
Capitalising on the trend for senior investment banking equity researchers to launch their own independent boutiques, Andrew Pendrill, until late last year CEO of Oak Lane Inc and former healthcare sales director at Citigroup, and Amit Roy, head of healthcare equity research at Nomura, have teamed up to launch Foveal. It will initially be focused on pharma research
5. Hemley Wynne Furlonge
A new boutique M&A advisory operation named after its three founders, Will Hemley, who has spent the last four years as senior vice president in Marsh’s private equity and M&A division, Rebecca Wynne, who held a similar position at the firm for over nine years, and Adrian Furlonge, who was formerly at AIG. The firm specialises in the insurance sector, and so far these are the only registered employees.
6. Juniper Place
A joint venture between two Citigroup prime services veterans, Juniper Place LLP officially received FCA approval in August. Paul Harvey, who was head of sales and capital introduction at Citigroup, is the firm’s CEO, while Mark Bright, who was prime finance sales and head of emerging markets, is COO. So far, they are the only listed employees of the firm, which will assist hedge funds to raise assets.
7. Mole Valley Asset Management
Craig Harper, the former investment director at Edwards Securities and head of European equity process at Amundi, is managing director of Mole Valley Asset Management, a boutique fund manager based out of Dorking in Surrey, which already has five employees. Among them is Michael Hart, a former director in equity sales at SocGen.
8. Park Street Advisors
Pradeep Pattem, the former head of credit and mortgage markets for Europe and Asia at Royal Bank of Scotland, is a good man to know – particularly if you’re an RBS investment banker looking for work. During his eight years at RBS, around 120 traders reported into him, before he left to join Kildare Partners earlier this year to run its new fund. Park Street Advisors sees him reunited with a number of former RBS employees, including Christian Matthews, Krishna Prasad and Kunal Rajvanshi. Expect more hires to follow.
9. RS Platou Asset Management
Run by prop trading and hedge fund veterans, Alessandro Esposito, who is managing partner and CEO, and Elvis Pellumbi, who is managing parter and chief investment officer, RS Platou will focus on investments in the energy and shipping sectors. Esposito, who was formerly at JPMorgan, was most recently at Sothic Capital Management, while Pellumbi left Lombard Odier late last year. Robin Grant, latterly chief operating officer at Nectar Capital, takes the same role at RS Platou, which received FCA approval last month.
