NEW YORK, July 10, 2018 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- KBW, a full-service, boutique investment bank and broker-dealer that specializes in the financial services sector, and a wholly owned subsidiary of Stifel Financial Corp. (NYSE: SF ), today announced a number of strategic appointments in New York, San Francisco, and London aimed at bolstering its capabilities in the rapidly growing area of financial technology.

KBW’s decision to move deeper into FinTech comes at a time when institutional interest in the sector is shifting from pure technology plays to more traditional financial services companies looking to evolve and compete in today’s increasingly digital world. Data from management consultancy Accenture shows the total global investment in FinTech ventures reached $97.7 billion between 2010 and 2017. The number of public and private market FinTech deals continues to rise dramatically, from just over 1,800 in 2016 to nearly 2,700 in 2017, a roughly 50 percent increase year-over-year.

“Further growing our FinTech presence is a major strategic initiative at KBW,” said Thomas Michaud, KBW CEO. “As the industry’s leading financial services-focused investment bank, we are in a unique position to advise our clients on the complexities of FinTech deals. We pride ourselves in having best-in-class research, including the highest-ranked analysts for payments and diversified finance, a specialized sales force, and frequent access to management teams across the sector.”

In order to best serve clients, KBW has established a network of global FinTech bankers, pulling resources from across the firm, tapping into expertise at parent company Stifel Financial Corp., and adding select new hires in key technology hubs across the United States and Europe.

Stifel has a long history of supporting innovative growth companies in the technology sector. In fact, Stifel has raised more than $150 billion in proceeds for technology companies since 1999 and advised on more than 300 M&A transactions in the sector during that same period.

San Francisco

John Katzenmeyer and Eric Varney, veteran Silicon Valley-based technology bankers at Stifel, will now focus their efforts exclusively on the KBW FinTech offering.

Mr. Katzenmeyer has more than 18 years of investment banking experience concentrated in payments and transaction processing, consumer finance, credit information and analytics, capital markets technology, and a variety of other online financial services sectors. His experience includes roles at UBS, Banc of America Securities, and Credit Suisse First Boston.

Mr. Varney has spent more than ten years in the financial services industry, primarily working with financial technology and specialty finance companies. He joined Stifel in 2013, following stints at UBS and Capital One.

New York

Paul Friday has joined KBW as a Managing Director, based in the New York office. Mr. Friday spent the last 15 years as a Partner at Marlin & Associates, a boutique FinTech investment bank based in New York’s Silicon Alley. Earlier in his career, Mr. Friday was a technology investment banker at both Robertson Stephens and PaineWebber.

Lou DeRose has also joined KBW’s New York office as Vice President. Mr. DeRose spent the last five years as a FinTech investment banker at Marlin & Associates and was previously a management consultant at Huron Consulting Group and Pöyry Management Consulting.

Messrs. Friday and DeRose will augment the New York-based efforts of Jonathan Hemmert, a Managing Director and 13-year veteran of KBW. He is primarily focused on services and technology catering to the securities industry.

London

KBW can now offer clients a truly global view of the FinTech space by leveraging the expertise of investment bankers who recently joined the firm’s London office . Managing Directors Garth Hackshall and Anurag Verma and Director Chris Reyniers, all previously at Deloitte LLP, bring extensive experience originating and executing transactions across the payment processing, insurtech, and capital markets infrastructure sectors.

“We believe these individuals will significantly enhance our FinTech capabilities and deliver added value to our clients,” said Peter Wirth, Head of Investment Banking at KBW. “Having an interconnected presence in global financial hubs puts us in an advantaged position to deliver investment funds and strategic advice to FinTech innovators, while also giving them an additional option to build their companies through introductions to more traditional firms, either as business partners or customers.”

KBW already has a robust offering in the FinTech space. In the past two years, the firm has been M&A advisor on FinTech transactions representing $2.8 billion in value and has been an underwriter on public offerings representing $2 billion in value.

In 2016, KBW launched the KBW Nasdaq Financial Technology Index (Ticker: KFTX), a unique index designed to precisely track the performance of those companies that leverage technology to deliver financial products and services.

Additionally, KBW equity research analyst Sanjay Sakhrani has been named the top-ranked consumer finance analyst by Institutional Investor for the past five years.

About KBW KBW (Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, Inc., operating in the U.S., and Stifel Nicolaus Europe Limited, also trading as Keefe, Bruyette & Woods Europe, operating in Europe) is a Stifel company. Over the years, KBW has established itself as a leading independent authority in the banking, insurance, brokerage, asset management, mortgage banking, and specialty finance sectors. Founded in 1962, the firm maintains industry‐leading positions in the areas of research, corporate finance, mergers and acquisitions, and sales and trading in equities securities of financial services companies.

Press Contact: Neil Shapiro +1 (212) 271-3447 shapiron@stifel.com