Jefferies Group Inc.

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Jefferies Group, Inc., along with its subsidiaries, operates as a full-service global investment bank and institutional securities firm serving companies and their investors. The Company offers these companies capital markets, merger and acquisition (M&A), restructuring and other financial advisory services. The Company provides investors fundamental research and trade execution in equity, equity-linked, and fixed income securities, including corporate bonds, United States government and agency securities, repo finance, mortgage- and asset-backed securities, municipal bonds, whole loans and emerging markets debt, as well as commodities and derivatives. Jefferies Group, Inc. also provides asset management services and products to institutions and other investors. The Company operates in two business segments: Capital Markets and Asset Management. In March 2009, Jefferies Group, Inc. completed the acquisition of Depfa First Albany Securities LLC, from DEPFA Bank plc.

New York-based Jefferies Group, Inc. (widely known as Jefferies) is an independent securities and investment banking firm that was founded almost 50 years ago.  Today, it employs more than 2,300 people in over 25 offices worldwide.

Jefferies’ investment banking practice focuses on industry specializations including aerospace and defense, clean technology, consumer, energy, financial services, gaming, health care, industrials, maritime, media, technology and telecom.  It also has a dedicated financial sponsors group, and dedicated product groups, including equity capital markets, debt capital markets, recapitalization and restructuring, and mergers and advisory.

Jefferies can trace its roots to 1962 when Boyd Jefferies established his eponymous firm with a $30,000 business loan and one employee—a floor runner.  The two began conducting business on the Pacific Coast Stock Exchange floor.  Along the way, Jefferies recognized that institutional investors often wanted to trade large blocks of stock without making an impact on the market (or tipping their hand to other traders) but had no mechanism for doing so.  He began catering to these investors, discreetly matching large institutional buyers and sellers off the exchange.  So-called third-market trading is standard practice today, but in the 1960s, it was a novel idea.  Jefferies prospered, becoming a respected equity trading firm and launching an IPO in 1983.  Expansion followed in the 1990s, as Jefferies began offering investment banking, asset management and research services, opening offices throughout North America, Europe and Asia.

More recently, as a result of a worldwide financial crisis that began in 2007, Jefferies, like many other financial firms, was forced to make staff cuts.  Jefferies laid off nearly 20 percent of its workforce in 2008.  However, the firm took advantage of the severe dislocation on Wall Street, hiring several seasoned professionals in its investment banking and other business groups, including fixed income, research and equities.  This included the addition of the 40-plus person health care investment banking team from UBS, and substantial new hires on its trading desks in the U.S., Europe and Asia.

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