Julius Baer, which is a major Swiss financial firm, has undergone a big transformation over the past few years.
And the latest move came today: the IPO filing of its US asset management division. After the deal, the firm will be called Artio Global Investors (which, by the way, doesn't seem like a good name).
The company is most well-known for its International Equity strategies (which accounts for 92% of assets under management). But there are other categories, such as Global High Grade Fixed Income, Global High Yield and Global Equity.
Most importantly, the funds tend to rank high, with 4-star and 5-star evaluations from Morningstar, Inc. (Nasdaq: MORN). As a result, assets under management have skyrocketed from $2.9 billion in 2002 to $73.2 billion in 2007.
But, as seen with the offerings of The Blackstone Group L.P. (NYSE: BX) and Och-Ziff Capital Management Group LLC (Nasdaq: OZM), the public offerings of asset managers haven't gone so well lately.
The lead underwriter on the Julius Baer IPO is The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE: GS) and the proposed ticker is "ART."
You can find the prospectus at the SEC Website. Also, if you want to check out other IPO activity, visit DealProfiles.com.
Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook
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