Moelis & Co. Opens London Office
Firm has tapped former Deutsche Bank vice chairman to oversee its first international branch.
October 28, 2008
Moelis & Co., the investment bank established last year by UBS and Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette veteran Ken Moelis, is now operating on both sides of the Atlantic.
The firm opened an office in London last month and has begun recruiting personnel for its new outpost, a source familiar with the situation told IDD. The London branch is Moelis & Co.'s first outside the US; the bank's other offices are located in Los Angeles, Chicago, New York and Boston. Most of Moelis & Co.'s 160 professionals work in New York.
Moelis & Co. hired Kristian Bagger as a managing director to oversee the London branch, the source said. Bagger was most recently a managing director and vice chairman of investment banking at Deutsche Bank. Earlier in his Deutsche tenure, he was head of Nordic and Benelux investment banking and head of the healthcare, industrials and consumer industry groups. Bagger, who specializes in M&A and other corporate finance matters, was also a member of Deutsche's European investment banking management committee. He was an investment banker at Smith Barney before joining Deutsche.
Although Bagger's expertise is centered on countries in the Nordic and Benelux regions, he and his colleagues in London will work with clients all over Europe, said the source.
Bagger recruited Andrew Thomson and Jeff Fridberg as an executive director and analyst, respectively, the source confirmed, bringing the total number of Moelis & Co. professionals in London to four. Thomson joins Moelis & Co. from Morgan Stanley, where he was an executive director in the European M&A division. He was also part of the UK and continental European M&A groups at Merrill Lynch and Credit Suisse First Boston. Fridberg, meanwhile, was formerly a member of JPMorgan's M&A department, where he was an analyst focused on the Nordic countries.
Moelis & Co. would like to hire a few more London-based junior-level employees before the end of the year, the source said, but the firm likely will not announce any additional senior personnel until the second quarter, when bonus checks clear.
The source said Moelis & Co. may open more international offices in the future, but for now it is only focused on building out the London branch.
A recent IDD profile of Moelis & Co. is available here.
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