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The best agency players make attractive acquisition targets.
Bulge-bracket investment banks have tightened their grip on the US equity market by increasing their market share of the listed and Nasdaq markets to 61%, from 55% in 2001, according to consultants Aite Group.
Although the leading IT-focused agency brokers have also done quite well in recent years, many small and mid-sized agency brokers with traditional business models have either been acquired, downsized, or left the business altogether, as they have been unable to compete against the scale and investment expenditure of the bulge-bracket firms.
A key factor behind the growing market share of the large investment banks has been the growth...