CHICAGO Morgan Stanley has cut three public finance bankers from its various offices, according to market participants.
The cuts include the firm’s sole Atlanta-based banker, Warren “Bo” Daniels Jr., who relocated from Chicago last year to open the new southeast office. Sources said Daniels was cut because the firm shuttered its public finance banking office there, but it retains a retail presence.
The firm declined to comment on the layoffs. Market sources said they occurred late last week and were limited to three. They could not provide the names of the other bankers or where they were located. The sources did say none were at the managing director level.
A source said staff was told the cuts were part of a regular review of resources and banking needs and no additional layoffs were expected.
Daniels joined Morgan Stanley in 2009. Market participants describe Daniels, an executive director, as a well-respected technical banker with strong client relationships. He has spent a good portion of his career in Chicago. The firm moved him to Atlanta to establish a physical banking presence there last year as it sought to capitalize on the growing region’s infrastructure needs.
Daniels spent six years as head of public finance banking at Chicago-based Loop Capital Markets LLC before resigning to join Morgan Stanley. Before that he spent 14 years at Goldman Sachs. Daniels joined Goldman in 1989 in New York City. He moved to Chicago in 1997 to lead the firm’s Midwestern effort.
New York City-based Morgan Stanley also has public finance offices in Chicago, Broward County, Fla., Houston, Denver, San Francisco and Los Angeles. The firm ranked fourth for the first nine months of the year as a senior manager on negotiated sales leading 102 deals valued at $13.8 billion. Morgan Stanley came in fourth last year with 259 issues, totaling $24.2 billion, according to Thomson Reuters.
