Bank of America
| Dean Curnutt |
The firm has built on Dean Curnutt's institutional sales business this year, fine-tuning its hedge fund offering by bulking up research and trading ideas as well as making substantial efforts to educate more traditional investors. Known for innovation in the hedge fund space, it has also extended the range of its public structured investments this year.
Barclays Capital
| Philippe El-Asmar |
The U.S. arm of the U.K. house got into gear this year, taking rivals by surprise and winning some big-name clients. End users approved of its retail and high-net-worth investment structures, headed by Philippe El-Asmar: BarCap is now one of the most prolific issuers of public equity-linked deals, from next to nothing two years ago. It also won praise from the hedge fund community for the range of dividend swaps and variance instruments it offers.
Citigroup
Citi's hybrid investments group under Samir Mathur was cited by both competitors and investors for its structures, which can combine complex payoffs with a range of underlyings. The trading desk also has fans. "I can rely on them," summed up one New York portfolio manager, who said he is as equally impressed with Citi's flow pricing as with the execution of several bespoke index options it bought from the firm this year.
Goldman Sachs
Goldman gets the nod from some heavyweight equity portfolio managers for the reliability in pricing and execution of Sheila Patel's sales group. Options on dividends have been a key development for the firm this year, and volatility trading know-how is admired by rivals across the Street.
Morgan Stanley
This firm is cited as being strong across a gamut of equity derivative businesses: hedge fund sales, innovative retail investments, institutional flow sales and it also worked on some of the year's big corporate equity derivative deals. Kevin Woodruff has built up a structured investments group that is making the most of its home-grown sales network and starting to challenge the European firms in terms of innovation. It attracted attention this summer with a publicly registered equity-default swap portfolio.
