DALLAS - Ten former Southwest Securities public finance employees jumped to Samco Capital Partners after their firm's parent company was acquired by the parent corporation of First Southwest Co.
Doug Whitt, senior managing director of the Dallas-area office, and Mark McLiney, senior vice president of the San Antonio office, were among those moving over from Southwest Securities Inc., the public finance unit of SWS Group Inc.
Joining Whitt in the Dallas area from are managing directors Brian Grubbs and Robert White, and associates Cristi Stephenson, Tom Pate, Victoria Bustamante and Mark Allison.
Joining McLiney in San Antonio are managing director Andrew Friedman and associate Veronica Alonzo.
Whitt declined comment when contacted by The Bond Buyer.
Hill Feinberg, chairman and chief executive of First Southwest, said he had hoped to keep the SWS team on board after the merger but that others had been leaving the firm in advance of the acquisition closing Jan. 1.
Feinberg will direct the integration of the two broker-dealers, which will operate independently until all regulatory approvals are in hand.
"It's all going to end up as one firm once we go through the regulatory process, which could take some time," Feinberg said.
"The two firms are very complementary," he said. "The only place where there was a lot of overlap was in public finance. And even there, there were different specialties. They have a much larger retail effort that's very complimentary to us."
For 2014, First Southwest ranked first among financial advisors in Texas with 464 deals valued at $13.08 billion, according to Thomson Reuters data. Southwest Securities ranked third with 147 deals worth $2.35 billion. Samco ranked 13th with 19 deals valued at nearly $380 million.
Both First Southwest and SWS Group will operate under Hilltop Holdings, which also owns Plains Capital Corp. and its subsidiary Plains Capital Bank. Plains Capital merged with First Southwest in 2008 as investment banks joined commercial banks during the financial crisis.
Under the terms of the $350 million merger agreement, SWS stockholders will receive 0.2496 shares of Hilltop common stock and $1.94 of cash, equating to $6.92 per share based on Hilltop's closing price on Dec. 31, 2014.
"We look forward to bringing together the best of both firms and are confident in our capable and proven management team to work through this integration," Gerald J. Ford, chairman of Hilltop, said in a statement.
SWS Group's chief executive, Jim Ross, will remain as vice chairman and also will be charged with leading the retail division.
Robert Peterson, who has extensive broker-dealer experience in previous roles at Piper Jaffray Companies, has been brought in to be the president and chief operating officer. He will play a key role in combining the two firms' broker-dealers, the companies said.
John Muschalek will be the new chief administrative officer, with direct oversight of clearing, stock loan, information technology and operations. Mike Edge will serve as chief financial officer, overseeing all finance and accounting as well as human resources.
The SWS financial advisors who went to Samco specialized in school finance.
Whitt has over 18 years of Texas investment banking experience. He has structured and executed municipal bond financings for school districts, college districts, cities, counties, hospital districts, public facility corporations, municipal utility districts, economic development corporations and water supply corporations.
McLiney joined Southwest Securities in 1996 as vice president in fixed income department representing public finance clients.
With the acquisition of Southwest Securities' commercial bank, which has nearly $1 billion in deposits, PlainsCapital Bank becomes the fourth-largest Texas-based bank by deposits. PlainsCapital Bank has $6.7 billion in deposits.
Hilltop also owns mortgage company PrimeLending.
Hilltop officials would not say whether the merger would result in job cuts. Hilltop has 4,550 employees, while SWS Group has 1,055.
