JIM FORESE IS no equities banker. He's never
worked in equities before, let alone traded a stock or managed
an IPO. And he probably never thought he would. But at the end
of May he was promoted from his role running Citigroup's
emerging markets local finance to become global head of the
bank's equities division.
"That's a real wake-up call for all of us," says a senior
equities banker at a rival firm. He's not referring to one of the
rumours about why Forese displaced former co-heads Robert DiFazio
and Arthur Hyde, both career-long equities bankers: that rumour
ponders whether it was the loss on the Nextel-Motoral exchangeable
earlier in the year that led to the change. Citigroup allegedly
lost around $50 million on the deal. Some reckon it was more than
that.
It probably didn't help, but one bad deal wouldn't have been
enough to prompt Citi to ask Robert...
