Cantor Plans to Double Europe Equities Staff in Coming Years

(Bloomberg) -- Cantor Fitzgerald LP may almost double staff numbers at its European equities business over the next few years as the brokerage expands beyond Wall Street.

The broker has recruited Andrew Shortland, a former head of international equities at Jefferies Financial Group Inc. and chief executive officer at Olivetree Financial, and Massimiliano De Mattia, most recently head of program trading risk at Barclays Plc to lead an expansion. Shortland will become European head of equities and De Mattia will run European trading.

The broker currently employs about 40 people in the area, and expects that number to grow, Pascal Bandelier, global head of equities at Cantor, said in an interview. He expects to hire about 20 people into European equities in the next year or two and said headcount could even rise to around 75.

“We’ve been a little slow to build up our European franchise,” Bandelier said. “We should not be holding back and only playing for the U.S. investor base. There’s a lot of opportunity to grow into European family offices, hedge funds and long onlys.” 

As well as hiring Shortland and De Mattia, Cantor has appointed Talat Khan as head of private distribution, syndicate and alternative asset strategy. Khan, who was previously head of European equities at Cantor, will focus on expanding the firm’s equity capital markets business, particularly for blank-check company listings.

Shortland and De Mattia will work alongside Reggie Mills, who joined the broker in London from Peel Hunt, where he had led its private capital markets business.

Cantor’s push comes a few months after the firm told Bloomberg News it was planning a major hiring spree. The company’s equities business has grown by more than 200% since 2017, Bandelier said in the October interview.

The closely-held broker has been on a tear helped by the boom in SPACs. Cantor is a top ten U.S. equity underwriter this year, having gained six places in the rankings compared to the same time in 2020, according to Bloomberg data. Five years ago, the firm barely made the top 30 in the Bloomberg rankings.

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