William O’Keefe was named senior managing director of municipal marketing for Assured Guaranty Ltd., the company said late last week. The announcement came just weeks after O’Keefe was appointed head of the municipal desk at Cantor Fitzgerald & Co.
“Cantor’s got a great dealer platform and I thought it was a really good opportunity, but this is just a much different opportunity for me ... so I just wanted to take advantage of it,” O’Keefe said in an interview. “Cantor’s going to be fine, and it’s going to be a great opportunity for someone to build the [muni] business over there.”
Assured Guaranty Ltd. — holding company for the bond insurance industry’s two main participants, Assured Guaranty Corp. and Assured Guaranty Municipal Corp. — said in a press release that O’Keefe will work to maintain and expand both entities’ working relationships with municipal sales, trading, and syndication desks.
“I’m going to be focused on relationships with dealers, both New York and regional dealers — people I’ve known in the business for some time with the goal of helping to ensure that Assured’s growth in the muni business continues,” O’Keefe said.
He joined the firm Thursday and reports directly to Sean McCarthy, chief operating officer of the parent company.
“As we further build the market leadership of our two bond insurance platforms — AGM, the municipal-only insurer, and AGC, the diversified provider — we are committed to providing issuers and investors with the most creative and responsive service in our industry,” McCarthy said in the release. “Bill is uniquely qualified to help us achieve that goal.”
O’Keefe will also lead Assured’s retail marketing and electronic platform strategy.
“Assured’s got a great place in the market and there’s going to be a continuing need for credit wrap going forward in the municipal business,” he said.
Prior to his brief stint at Cantor, O’Keefe was head of tax-exempt securities at Morgan Stanley from 1985 to 2005. In the interim he worked for a short time on the buy side at Williams Jones & Associates, an investment advisory firm in New York.
O’Keefe was vice chairman of The Bond Market Association’s municipal securities division in 2005.
He is also a former board member of the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board, and in 2000 he was a founding member of TheMuniCenter LLC — the first electronic marketplace for municipal securities.
Last year, Assured backed $34.8 billion of municipal bonds, representing 8.5% of total new issuance, according to Thomson Reuters. In the first six weeks of 2010 the company has wrapped $2.93 billion of munis, about 6.8% of new issuance. The company plans to issue its fourth-quarter financial results after the closing bell on Feb. 25.
