Thomas Weisel Partners Completes Acquisition of Westwind Partners - Announces Appointment of Westwind CEO as President of TWP an
January 02 2008 - 5:31PM
Marketwired
SAN FRANCISCO, CA announced today that it has completed its
acquisition of Westwind Partners, a full service, institutionally
oriented, investment bank focused on the energy and mining
sectors.
"I am pleased to announce the completion of our acquisition of
Westwind and the appointment of Lionel F. Conacher, formerly
Westwind's CEO and President, as President of Thomas Weisel
Partners," said Thomas Weisel, CEO and Chairman. "The completion of
this acquisition establishes Thomas Weisel Partners' presence in
the energy and mining sectors, expands our presence in Canada and
Europe and represents a significant milestone in the building of
the premier, global growth-focused investment bank."
"Over the past three months, professionals from both firms have
been working to prepare for the integration of our two firms under
the Thomas Weisel Partners brand. We will begin immediately
leveraging the TWP brand in Canada and abroad in order to
capitalize on the synergies that we expect from the combination of
our firms," said Lionel F. Conacher, President of Thomas Weisel
Partners. "Already, our clients have seen how this combination can
enhance the services we provide, and under our integration plan we
will begin demonstrating the advantages that this transaction can
produce."
In connection with the integration of Westwind, Thomas Weisel
Partners will more closely align the compensation practices of the
two firms with one another and with industry practice by
discontinuing the payment of mid-year retention bonuses. Thomas
Weisel Partners will accelerate the payment of its 2008 mid-year
retention bonuses, which were historically established at year end
and paid in the following July, so that they become part of 2007
year-end bonuses, which are paid in February. Thomas Weisel
Partners will record a one-time compensation expense in the fourth
quarter of 2007 related to this change in compensation practice, as
well as a one-time expense related to certain acquisition-related
severance payments. The aggregate one-time charge associated with
these matters is expected to total approximately $23.2 million and
to reduce GAAP diluted earnings per share by approximately $0.50
per share for 2007.
Thomas Weisel Partners also is announcing selected preliminary
fourth quarter 2007 financial results and estimates of the 2007
compensation ratio. In the fourth quarter of 2007, Thomas Weisel
Partners estimates that its brokerage revenues increased by
approximately $4 million to $34 million and its investment banking
revenues increased by approximately $6 million to $32 million, in
each case compared to the third quarter of 2007. A preliminary
estimate of asset management revenue is not being provided because
many of the inputs used to estimate the fair value of
non-marketable investments are not available at this point
following a completed quarter. In addition, Thomas Weisel Partners
currently estimates that, as a percentage of net revenue (excluding
investment gains and losses attributable to investments in
partnerships and other securities), compensation and benefits
expense (excluding expenses relating to equity awards made in
connection with its initial public offering and the one-time
compensation expenses described above) will be approximately 59.0%
for 2007. Thomas Weisel Partners estimates that the one-time
compensation expenses described above will increase the 2007
compensation ratio by approximately 9%.
About Thomas Weisel Partners Group, Inc.
Thomas Weisel Partners Group, Inc. is an investment bank,
founded in 1998, focused principally on the growth sectors of the
economy. Thomas Weisel Partners Group, Inc. generates revenues from
three principal sources: investment banking, brokerage and asset
management. The investment banking group is comprised of two
disciplines: corporate finance and strategic advisory. The
brokerage group provides equity and convertible debt securities
sales and trading services to institutional investors, and offers
brokerage, advisory and cash management services to high-net-worth
individuals and corporate clients. The asset management group
consists of: private equity, public equity and distribution
management. Thomas Weisel Partners is headquartered in San
Francisco with additional offices in Baltimore, Boston, Calgary,
Chicago, Cleveland, Denver, Montreal, New York, Portland, Silicon
Valley, Toronto, London, Mumbai and Zurich. For more information,
please visit www.tweisel.com.
Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements
This press release contains forward-looking statements, which
are subject to risks, uncertainties and assumptions about us. In
some cases, you can identify these statements by forward-looking
words such as "may," "might," "will," "should," "expect," "plan,"
"anticipate," "believe," "estimate," "predict," "optimistic,"
"potential," "future" or "continue," the negative of these terms
and other comparable terminology. These statements are only
predictions based on our current expectations about future events.
There are important factors that could cause actual results, level
of activity, performance or achievements or other events or
circumstances to differ materially from the results, level of
activity, performance or achievements expressed or implied by these
forward-looking statements. These factors include, but are not
limited to, Thomas Weisel Partners' ability to implement its
strategic initiatives and achieve the expected benefits of the
transaction with Westwind, integrate Westwind's operations and
retain its professionals, as well as competitive, economic,
political, and market conditions and fluctuations, government and
industry regulation, other risks relating to the transaction,
including the effect of the completion of the transaction on the
companies' business relationships, operating results and business
generally and other factors; in the case of the preliminary fourth
quarter 2007 results reported, these factors also include, but are
not limited to, completion of Thomas Weisel Partners' financial
statements for the quarter and year ended December 31, 2007. Some
of the other factors are those that are discussed in (i) the Proxy
Statement relating to the Westwind transaction, (ii) Item 1A -
"Risk Factors" in our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended
December 31, 2005 and (iii) in our Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q
filed with the SEC thereafter. We do not assume responsibility for
the accuracy or completeness of any forward-looking statement and
you should not rely on forward-looking statements as predictions of
future events. We are under no duty to update any of these
forward-looking statements to conform them to actual results or
revised expectations.
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