RBC Capital Markets has hired two former Hilltop Securities bankers for its expanding Houston office, the company said.
Chris Allen, formerly managing director at Hilltop’s Houston office, will carry the same title at RBC. Allen has 26 years of financial advisory and underwriting experience, including 13 years at Public Financial Management before joining Hilltop, then known as First Southwest Co. He began his public finance career at the Texas Municipal Advisory Council, where he is now chairman of the board.
Gabriella Briceno, who started her career at First Southwest/Hilltop, moves to RBC as vice president. Briceno has six years of financial advisory and underwriting experience, working with municipal issuers across Texas. She is a member of National Women in Public Finance and an Executive Officer — Secretary of the Texas Women in Public Finance.
“RBC provides us with an investment banking platform that is very well established in Texas, and is a top performer in Texas and nationally,” Allen said. “The significant resources of RBC really appealed to me and will assist us as we serve our clients and continue to grow our business.”
Continuing their work as a team, Allen and Briceno will report to managing director Matt Boles.
“Chris and Gabriella complement our well established Texas municipal finance platform where we have a top ranked municipal advisory and underwriting practice,” Boles said. "They bring with them deep knowledge of the Texas muni landscape and significant relationships that we believe fit well with our franchise. Specifically, we believe they can assist us in the large issuer space and in the middle market across a variety of sectors.”
At Hilltop, Texas’ perennially top-ranked financial advisor by par value, Allen has been involved in the structuring and sale of billions of dollars of new money and refunding issues. He moved from Austin to the Houston office after Hilltop lost 11 Houston bankers to other firms in 2018.
In January, Hilltop hired C. B. “Bix” Rathburn, former senior vice president with Moody Bank and a former education administrator, to work in the Houston office.
Bat Taniguchi, formerly associate relationship manager with Frost Bank, also joined Hilltop in Houston.
As one of the fastest growing states in the U.S., Texas anticipates rising volume in new money issues, even as the loss of advance refundings shrinks overall volume from record highs in 2016.
"Texas is a high-volume state for municipal bond issuance," Boles said. "As a firm that has served the state for almost 90 years we want to expand upon our legacy business and continue to grow."
