WASHINGTON – Kym Arnone has joined Jefferies LLC to jointly head its municipal investment banking business with Neil Flanagan as part of an effort to expand the firm's municipal securities business.
Arnone, who chaired the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board until Oct. 1, left Barclays in August where she had been a managing director focused on New York City, New York State and certain Midwestern clients. She was also head of the municipal securitization initiatives, specializing in tobacco bonds.
Arnone started at Jeffries on Monday and confirmed the move.
"I am delighted to join my former colleague Neil Flanagan in expanding Jefferies' municipal investment banking business," she said. "The opportunity to join and help build a full service municipal investment bank that is in growth mode was very attractive to me."
Arnone and Flanagan worked together for 16 years at Bear Stearns, which failed in 2008 as part of the financial crisis and was sold to JPMorgan Chase. She briefly worked at Lehman Brothers, which filed for bankruptcy protection as a result of the crisis, before joining Barclays in September 2008. Flanagan joined Jefferies as head of its municipal investment banking business in March 2009.
The hiring of Arnone is the latest step in Jefferies expansion of its municipal investment banking business.
Based in New York City, Jefferies' municipal securities group, including banking, sales, and trading consists of 80 persons operating in 12 cities in the U.S.
Most recently, Jefferies hired Peter Stevens from JPMorgan as a managing director to head East Coast health care coverage. In October, it hired Nic Malas from PNC as a managing director and head of its municipal transportation team.
At the end of 2013, Jefferies hired James Olsen from Bank of America and Patrick McCarthy from Goldman Sachs as managing directors and co-heads of its nonprofit health care investment banking group.
The hiring of Arnone is unrelated to the expected Nov. 30 departure of Ken Gibbs, who has been president of Jefferies' municipal securities group since March 2009, according to sources familiar with the situation.
Gibbs announced in August that he planned to leave Jefferies to take over leadership of the Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, where has been chair of the Maimonides Board of Trustees. He is to become president and chief executive of the hospital in January.
There are no plans at this point to replace Gibbs, the sources said.
