Oppenheimer Holdings

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Oppenheimer Holdings Inc.
Company typePublic company
NYSE: OPY
IndustryFinancial services
Founded1881; 143 years ago (1881)
FounderHarris C. Fahnestock
HeadquartersNew York City, United States
Number of locations
92 (2022)
Key people
Albert G. Lowenthal (Chairman and CEO)
Products
RevenueDecrease US$1.11 billion (2022)
Decrease US$45.6 million (2022)
Decrease US$32.1 million (2022)
AUMDecrease US$36.8 billion (2022)
Total assetsDecrease US$2.71 billion (2022)
Total equityDecrease US$795 million (2022)
Number of employees
2,912 (2022)
Websiteoppenheimer.com
Footnotes / references
[1]

Oppenheimer Holdings Inc. is an American multinational independent investment bank and financial services company offering investment banking, financial advisory services, capital markets services, asset management, wealth management, and related products and services worldwide. The company, which once occupied the One World Financial Center building in Manhattan, now bases its operations at 85 Broad Street in New York City.[2]

History[edit]

Originally created as Oppenheimer & Company and named for German-American investment broker Max E. Oppenheimer (c. 1899-1964), a Jewish refugee from the Nazis who advised the Synagogue Council of America and worked at a New Hampshire real estate firm, a Bay Area savings and loan association, and Lehman Brothers,[3] Oppenheimer Holdings was founded in 1950 when a partnership was created to act as a broker-dealer and manage related financial services for large institutional clients.[4] While the 1960s and 1970s was a time of great prosperity for the company, the origins of the firm trace back to 1881. After re-configuring operations in 1975, Oppenheimer & Co. formed three operating subsidiaries:

  • Oppenheimer & Co. Inc., a retail brokerage firm
  • Oppenheimer Capital Corporation, an institutional investment manager
  • Oppenheimer Management Corp. (subsequently spun off and acquired by Invesco)

In the 1980s, OpCo founding partners began looking for a buyer. Mercantile House Holdings, PLC, a publicly owned British corporation, made an offer in 1982, which was accepted and closed a year later.[5] In 1986, a majority interest was bought in Oppenheimer & Co. and Oppenheimer Capital by the firm's management, chairman and CEO Stephen Robert and president Nathan Gantcher, along with a small group of their colleagues from Mercantile, for $150 million. A year later, British & Commonwealth Holdings, PLC, acquired Mercantile. The 1990s brought another separation of the original firm when Oppenheimer Capital's senior personnel acquired a majority interest in the subsidiary and separated from OpCo.

In 1995, Robert and Gantcher, who controlled about 40 percent of OpCo's equity, became eager to locate additional capital to grow their firm. At first, OpCo explored options of forming a possible alliance with ING Groep NV that eventually fell through. Carrying on with this goal, management set out to merge with a bulge bracket bank that had access to the foreign markets.

Robert and Gantcher entertained offers from the second-largest private German financial institution and retail bank, Bayerische Vereinsbank.[6] On May 8, 1997, The Wall Street Journal announced that Pittsburgh-based PNC Bank Corp. was in talks to buy Oppenheimer & Co. for about $500 million in cash, stock, and options. Despite that, according to the article's source, PNC and Oppenheimer hadn't arrived at a fixed price and that chatter could break the formal agreement.[7] 13 days following the announcement, the Bloomberg News desk announced that for the third time in two years, OpCo had been abandoned by a prospective buyer.[8] Two months later, it was announced that CIBC wanted to expand its brokerage business and was interested in Oppenheimer.[9]

CIBC Oppenheimer[edit]

In 1997, CIBC Wood Gundy acquired Oppenheimer Holdings for $525 million and paid over for the next three years and included $175 million in order to retain the loyalty of key Oppenheimer executives who were not shareholders in the closely held private firm.[9] When the deal was closed, the firm's name was changed to CIBC Oppenheimer Holdings.[10] In 2003, CIBC made the decision to sell Oppenheimer's retail brokerage business and name for $257 million to Fahnestock Viner Holdings, which subsequently changed its name to Oppenheimer.[11]

Fahnestock Viner Holdings[edit]

Fahnestock Viner traces its lineage back to Harris C. Fahnestock, an investment banker who was a founding member of one of Citigroup's predecessors, the First National Bank of New York. In 1881, Harris' son William formed his own investment bank at Two Wall Street, Fahnestock & Co.,[12] which expanded through the decades and was eventually acquired in 1988 by E.A. Viner Holdings, Ltd. The new company, Fahnestock Viner Holdings, would eventually change its name in 2003 upon the acquisition of CIBC Oppenheimer's retail brokerage business (the Private Client and U.S. Asset Management Divisions).[13]

CIBC World Markets[edit]

On November 4, 2007, CIBC announced that it agreed to sell to Oppenheimer & Co. its American domestic investment banking, equities, leveraged finance, and related debt capital markets businesses. The transaction also included CIBC's Israeli investment banking and equities business, and certain parts of other U.S. capital markets-related businesses located in the UK and Asia.[14] The acquired businesses by Oppenheimer had over 700 employees and annual revenue of 400 million. According to the agreement, Oppenheimer borrowed $100 million from CIBC in the form of a subordinated debt. Additionally, CIBC agreed to provide an initial $1.5 billion lending, to the entity for financing the syndicated loans for American middle-market companies. CIBC President and Chief Executive Gerry McCaughey said, "It [transaction] will permit CIBC to redeploy capital over time to further support the continued growth of our strong and profitable U.S. and international operations, as well as our core Canadian businesses."[15] The deal was closed on January 14, 2008.[16]

Settlements with US regulators[edit]

In January 2015, Oppenheimer & Co. paid $20 million in civil settlements with U.S. regulators, who had alleged that the group had improperly sold penny stocks and did not take adequate steps to fight money laundering.[17]

Ownership[edit]

As of 2020, the company has Class A non-voting stock which is publicly traded, while 98% of the Class B voting stock is owned by its chairman Albert G. Lowenthal.[18]

Major locations[edit]

United States

International

Notable current and former equity research analysts[edit]

Business[edit]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ "Oppenheimer Holdings 2022 Annual Report (Form 10-K)". SEC.gov. U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. 28 February 2023. Archived from the original on 5 April 2023. Retrieved 5 April 2023.
  2. ^ "Oppenheimer Holdings". Craft. 2017. Archived from the original on October 26, 2019. Retrieved May 15, 2017.
  3. ^ "Obituary: Max Oppenheimer, Investment Broker". The New York Times. June 4, 1964. Archived from the original on May 1, 2022. Retrieved September 14, 2023.
  4. ^ "Oppenheimer & Co. Background Information". Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas. 2017. Archived from the original on August 3, 2016. Retrieved May 15, 2017.
  5. ^ Vartan, Vartanig G (June 2, 1982). "Big Oppenheimer Deal: Its Sale". The New York Times. Archived from the original on August 27, 2020. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
  6. ^ "International Business; Munich Bank Considering Oppenheimer Acquisition". The New York Times. November 9, 1995. Archived from the original on September 4, 2020. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
  7. ^ Anita Raghavan, Michael Siconolfi (May 8, 1997). "Oppenheimer May Be Sold For as Much as $500 Million". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on August 6, 2020. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
  8. ^ Anita Raghavan (May 22, 1997). "PNC Bank Breaks Off Talks To Buy Oppenheimer & Co". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on August 6, 2020. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
  9. ^ a b Andrew Fraser (July 22, 1997). "CIBC to acquire Oppenheimer & Co. for $525 million". Associated Press. Archived from the original on September 4, 2020. Retrieved May 15, 2020.
  10. ^ "CIBC Wood Gundy to Buy Oppenheimer". Los Angeles Times. July 23, 1997. Archived from the original on July 28, 2020. Retrieved May 15, 2020.
  11. ^ "CIBC sells U.S. retail broker Abandonment of Oppenheimer marks bank's second retrenchment in a month". The Globe and Mail. December 11, 2002. Archived from the original on July 28, 2020. Retrieved May 16, 2020.
  12. ^ "FAHNESTOCK CONCERN 50 YEARS OLD TODAY; Brokerage House Founded in 1881 by Father of Present Member in Stock Exchange" (PDF). The New York Times. 11 May 1931. Archived (PDF) from the original on 5 December 2023. Retrieved 11 November 2019.
  13. ^ "Annual Report Pursuant to Section 13 or 15(D) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934". U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Archived from the original on August 6, 2020. Retrieved May 17, 2020.
  14. ^ "CIBC to sell several international operations". Toronto Star. November 4, 2007. Archived from the original on August 6, 2020. Retrieved May 17, 2020.
  15. ^ "Oppenheimer to buy part of CIBC's capital markets". Reuters. November 4, 2007. Archived from the original on August 6, 2020. Retrieved May 17, 2020.
  16. ^ "Oppenheimer Closes Previously Announced Acquisition of a Major Part of CIBC World Markets' U.S. Capital Markets Businesses". U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Archived from the original on August 5, 2020. Retrieved May 17, 2020.
  17. ^ "Oppenheimer paying $20M in settlements with US regulators". The Mercury News. 27 January 2015. Archived from the original on 2 February 2022. Retrieved 2 February 2021.
  18. ^ "Oppenheimer Holdings Inc. 10-K Mar. 2, 2020 4:50 PM". Seeking Alpha. Archived from the original on 2020-08-06. Retrieved 2020-03-27.
  19. ^ "As others fled Venezuela, Stanford International saw a golden opportunity". The New York Times. 9 November 2009. Archived from the original on 10 May 2017. Retrieved 15 September 2016.
  20. ^ "Scrutiny of Stanford's bank spreads to Caribbean". Reuters. 13 February 2009. Archived from the original on 10 May 2017. Retrieved 15 September 2016.

External links[edit]

  • Official website
  • CIBC sells Oppenheimer unit for $400 million
  • Business data for Oppenheimer Holdings, Inc.:
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