BMO Capital Markets has hired
three senior investment bankers from Banc of America Securities LLC to join its food and consumer group. BMO Capital is the U.S. investment arm of the Bank of Montreal. One of the new employees is Greg Pearlman, who spoke to us recently from BMO's annual agricultural, protein and fertilizer conference happening in New York.
Before we get to the particulars of his new job and what BMO's expansion might say about the prospects for M&A, we had to ask Pearlman, a nearly 25-year veteran of the i-banking world, what the mood is like among his colleagues. "The general feeling is that things seem better. People in the industry are cautiously optimistic that there will continue to be measured improvement in the business atmosphere."
That includes the deal environment in the food and consumer sectors. BMO's food and consumer group runs the gamut from fertilizer, grains, proteins and branded foods to personal care, household and office products. Like every other sector, says Pearlman, deal volume is down and sellers are in short supply. "But there are signs of life."
On the valuation front, there hasn't been enough deal volume to indicate that the bid/ask spread has closed, says Pearlman. He continued:
"But I think people are starting to talk about when is a good time to go back to market again. People are starting to do the math and saying the outlook is a little more certain than this time last year, and there's maybe a willingness on the part of strategic buyers to take a little risk in terms of doing an M&A transaction. Is there a flood of deal activity? No. But there's the beginning signs of people talking about it."Joining Pearlman at BMO are former BofA bankers Michael Taylor as managing director and Alex Jacobs as director. The three will work over the next three to six months to help BMO clients raise capital and map strategy for when the deal market does return. That could include helping clients assess opportunities in emerging markets. In announcing the hires, BMO co-head of U.S. investment and corporate banking Dave Casper said, "In the coming months, continued globalization is expected to drive M&A activity [in the food and consumer sector] as companies seek access to new consumers and products as well as grow in large economies, including India and China,"
- Suzanne Stevens
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