Even Rainmakers Sometimes Grab an Umbrella
Former Vivendi boss Jean-Marie Messier's advisory firm is being taken over by Italy's Mediobanca.
Mediobanca’s headquarters.
Photographer: Alessia PierdomenicoA decade ago, a company couldn’t do much in Italy without hiring Mediobanca Spa, the merchant bank whose network of shareholdings in the country’s biggest corporations gave it commanding influence. The lender’s acquisition of a two-thirds stake in Jean-Marie Messier’s Paris-based advisory boutique shows how things have changed. Customers have a choice of advisers and the Italian bank needs a strategy that looks to other markets.
Thursday’s transaction will bring another 40 or so dealmakers into the Mediobanca fold and accelerate the bank’s effort to reposition itself as a southern European advisory shop and wealth manager.