Bank of America Merrill Lynch is going full steam ahead on its plans to build out its global prime brokerage business and has added another top executive to the team, according to an internal memo obtained by FINS.
The firm has appointed Sam Tabar to head of Asia Pacific capital introduction in the prime brokerage business, which provides services and lends money to hedge funds.
Tabar joins from PMA Investment Advisors, a Hong-Kong based hedge-fund sponsor, where he spent three years. He was the co-head of the capital raising team and was in charge of capital-raising strategy and product development. He will be based in Hong Kong and will serve as a liaison to Asia's hedge fund industry. He will report to Dan McNicholas, head of Asia Pacific global markets financing and futures sales.
Tabar began his career as a lawyer and obtained a Master of Law from Columbia University in 2001 and a BA and MA in Jurisprudence from Oxford in 2000.
Banks have been focusing on expanding their capital introduction teams as well as the prime brokerage businesses more broadly. Deutsche Bank and Credit Suisse each have capital introduction teams with 40 people. As hedge funds multiply in the Asia-Pacific region, banks are fighting to get a piece of market share.
At the beginning of March, BofA Merrill Lynch hired Stuart Hendel from UBS to serve as head of global prime brokerage. Two of his colleagues, Charlotte Burkeman and Jonathan Yalmokas, resigned with him from UBS. Both will join him at BofA Merrill Lynch.
Burkeman will join as a managing director and co-head of Europe, Middle East and Africa brokerage, Financial News reports. She will work with Sean Capstick, the existing head of prime brokerage in Europe, the Middle East and Asia (EMEA), and will report to John Addis, head of EMEA global markets financing and futures.
Burkeman, 32, worked on the capital introduction team at Goldman Sachs before joining UBS in 2003. She served as the global head of capital introduction at Goldman in 2006.
Hendel's other former colleague, Jonathan Yalmokas, was hired by BofA to serve as head of the prime brokerage sales team in the U.S. He graduated from Boston College in 1995 and worked at Goldman Sachs in sales and trading roles in equity derivatives for almost five years before joining UBS.
Write to Julie Steinberg