How Dealers Made a Dent in Wall Street’s Lack of Diversity
Small investment banks owned by women, minorities or veterans are making some progress managing bond sales.
Photographer: Angela Weiss/AFP via Getty Images
When drugmaker Amgen Inc. sold $24 billion of bonds in February to fund its takeover of Horizon Therapeutics Plc, it had 12 banks as joint bookrunners and a further 16 as co-managers on the deal. Eight of the 16 were small investment banks certified as owned by women, minorities or military veterans.
In April, a $5 billion bond sale from Walmart Inc. had seven similarly owned investment banks out of 15 co-managers, while on RTX Corp.’s $6 billion issue in September, all seven co-managers were like this.
Broker dealers that qualify as diverse and inclusive firms because of their ownership have been on course for involvement in a record volume of bond deals this year, as Bloomberg News reported, surpassing the high-water mark set last year. About 60% of US investment-grade bond sales by value employed at least one diverse firm in each of the past two years, up from fewer than half in 2020 and barely a quarter a decade ago.