DUBAI: In a low-key second-floor office in the heart of Dubai’s financial centre, bankers working for Moelis and Co are busier than ever – so much so that the firm has had to tear down walls to add desks for its expansion drive.
In the otherwise stark workplace, shelves are covered with Lucite deal tombstones featuring equity offerings and deals by Middle Eastern companies, from Saudi Arabia’s petroleum behemoth Aramco to Abu Dhabi National Oil Co.
Envious rivals whisper that Moelis has turned its Middle Eastern operation into one of the bank’s biggest revenue generators per employee, no mean feat in a part of the world that’s not known for big fees.
This all reflects the frenzy of dealmaking that’s gripped the Middle East while bankers elsewhere suffer a dearth of business.
Gulf initial public offerings (IPOs) have raised more than US$30bil over the last two years, and Moelis, a minnow by Wall Street standards, has worked on more than half of those that hired independent financial advisers.
That, bankers said, is the payoff for years of relationship building by its founder Ken Moelis. But it has also involved big compromises and risks.
The Wall Street veteran chose to maintain his relationship with Saudi Arabia in the aftermath of the 2018 killing of government critic Jamal Khashoggi.
He’s also stuck through dramatic downturns in Dubai. More recently, the widening Israel-Hamas war has offered fresh reminders of the challenges of a region susceptible to political turbulence and frequent boom-and-bust cycles. — Bloomberg