Oppenheimer hires two ex-UBS public finance bankers

Oppenheimer & Co. Inc. has brought on a pair of former UBS bankers to its public finance team under new public finance chief Elizabeth Coolidge.

New York-based Kristin Stephens will head the firm’s Northeast region and Atlanta-based David Moffett will head the Southeast, the firm announced Thursday.

“Kristin’s past work with issuers in developing innovative credit strategies has allowed her to build longstanding relationships with key clients, not only in the Northeast but across the country,” said Coolidge, who joined the firm in January from UBS, which shuttered its public finance business in October. “David has managed some of the most important transactions in recent history for issuers in the Southeast.”

Oppenheimer’s public finance team includes 25 professionals. In 2020, the firm acquired San Francisco-based Brandis Tallman.

The pair follow the hires of Coolidge, who led UBS’s Midwest business, and former Chicago UBS bankers Liberty Ziegahn and Madison Maher.

Stephens worked at UBS for more than 15 years, most recently as managing director and head of credit strategies for five years, and before that worked in the firm’s Chief Investment Office where she was head of municipal credit. Prior to UBS, she worked at ACA Capital, J.P. Morgan Chase, and ABN AMRO Bank N.V.

Moffett was an executive director in the Southeast for public utilities and project finance for six years. Prior to that he was a managing director at Jefferies after stints at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, A.G Edwards, PriceWaterhouse Coopers and Accenture.

Oppenheimer now has a trio of women leading its public finance team: Coolidge; Beth Wolchock, who is head of municipal underwriting; and Cynthia Henry Pinto, head of municipal sales.

Coolidge replaced former Oppenheimer public finance head Bill Reisner, who in December moved to Janney Montgomery Scott LLC as the firm’s head of municipal finance.

The hires come amid a  larger Wall Street retrenchment  — capped by  Citi’s December exit from the business  — following two years of declining volume, increased competition for fewer deals and tightened underwriting spreads.