Intrepid Investment Bankers, a leading middle-market investment bank and the advisory arm of global financial group MUFG, announced it hired William Koo to launch its Financial Institutions Group (FIG) to focus on providing a range of advisory services to the insurance industry.
The FIG vertical is a natural extension, as MUFG is already one of the largest providers of capital markets, structured products, balance sheet restructuring, commercial banking and treasury products and solutions to financial institutions around the world, with major focus on the insurance sector.
Koo brings over 16 years of investment banking and industry experience executing M&A, capital raising, and other strategic transactions for private and public companies, financial sponsors, and pension plans across the insurance industry, including P&C and life insurance, insurance brokerage and insurance servicing.
“This is a unique opportunity to build a middle market advisory practice in the insurance sector with the backing of one of the largest financial institutions in the world,” said Koo.
“MUFG is one of the major providers of capital and expertise in complex structured products and solutions. Middle market companies, especially those in the financial institutions sector, tend to be underserved by large investment banks. Intrepid delivers relationship-focused, tailored advisory services to each of our valued clients with the resources, sophistication, balance sheet strength, and access to global investors through the global infrastructure of MUFG readily available at our disposal,” said Ed Bagdasarian, CEO of Intrepid.
“The unique combination of William’s investment banking and industry experience, Intrepid’s middle-market M&A advisory platform, and MUFG’s balance sheet and credit solutions bring a compelling offering to the marketplace,” Bagdasarian added. “Our FIG practice is the latest addition to our growing number of sector-focused advisory teams that work seamlessly with MUFG’s industry-coverage teams to bring all of the resources and capabilities of one of the largest global financial institutions to our clients.”
Mark G. Doctoroff, Managing Director, Global Co-Head of Financial Institutions Group, Co-Head of Sponsor Coverage at MUFG, Global Corporate & Investment Banking Americas, said of the addition, “MUFG is excited to welcome William Koo to our larger Financial Institutions banking practice as our mid-market M&A partner and center of excellence. We have spent the last few years developing our structured lending, solutions, risk management, transaction banking and capital markets practice for banks, insurance companies, and alternative asset managers. Now with William on the team, we hope to further expand our insurance side car capital structuring capabilities and marry that with William's many years of M&A structuring and execution experience and expertise. The addition of a financial institutions practice within Intrepid will further augment the solution set we can bring to our clients.”
Prior to joining Intrepid, Koo held various senior leadership roles at Corebridge Financial/AIG Life & Retirement including Managing Director, Corporate Development and Chief Financial Officer, Institutional Markets. He has developed his FIG investment banking expertise at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, and BMO Capital Markets.
Koo earned an M.B.A. from the Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University and a Bachelor of Electrical Engineering from the University of New South Wales.