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| Hassan Houari |
BARCLAYS CAPITAL
Barclays Capital emerged as the top shop this year, with fans pointing to its accessibility to retail investors and its consistent innovation. Hassan Houari, head of structuring in London--in concert with Pierre Bes, head of private banking coverage Europe, and Richard Ager, director--has led the development of a string of novel retail products. The firm has the only online executable pricing platform for retail investors in the U.S. Additionally, it is one of the only shops where multiple asset classes are handled under one umbrella, giving it a globally coordinated effort when servicing clients that many said improves on the silo models used by rivals.
The bank is a frequent issuer of third-party distributed and structured products into the retail market, expanding notably in the U.S., where it is winning market share as the first house to launch investment products linked to strategies. One example was its Intelligent Carry Index, which launched in February giving investors long/short exposure to equities in the G-10.
Other innovative products include its Algorithmic AIM, the first long/short inflation strategy investment product in the U.S., the Global Emerging Market index, one of the first giving access to emerging markets currencies and its Global Carbon Index, the first index product in the U.S. linked to carbon emissions. Its Alpha-Supported Private Equity Note, or ASPEN, was the first-ever globally syndicated private equity fund-linked note. Also well received were its Investment Legends fund, which gives investors access to strategies used by Warren Buffett and Bill Gross, and its Target Alpha Platform, which aims to beat the Euro money market by 4% per year after fees and has so far exceeded this target by 0.5%.
Outside the U.S., Barclays recently broke into the Czech Republic and listing three new products in Poland.
Other Nominees:
* BNP Paribas * Lehman Brothers * Credit Suisse * SG Coporate & Investment Banking
