Royal Bank of Canada's capital markets arm is building up its ability to work with private equity firms in the U.S., adding two bankers who specialize in leveraged buyouts.
The bank hired Mark Goldstein, a high-ranking banker from JP Morgan and Bear Stearns, to be a managing director in the financial sponsors group. (Investment banks call private equity firms financial sponsors.) Charles Smith joins from Loughlin Meghji. He will be a managing director in the leveraged finance group, which finances companies with higher levels of debt. Mr. Smith will focus on consumer, retail and industrial companies.
Both will be based in New York.
RBC has been steadily building its U.S. investment-banking capability, and picked up the pace considerably in the wake of the financial crisis as other firms were forced to cut back, leaving employees there for the taking. Of late, with talk of more downsizing on Wall Street, RBC may have another opportunity to grab senior bankers.
RBC said that Mr. Goldstein has 25 years of investment banking experience. At JP Morgan he most recently served as head of restructuring and liability management for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Before that, he was at Bear Stearns for almost 15 years where he was co-head of European investment banking and leveraged finance, and a member of the firm's international executive committee.
Mr. Smith is also a veteran of JP Morgan, where he spent 18 years. Prior to joining RBC, he was head of corporate finance at Loughlin Meghji.