Rosenblatt Securities is pleased to announce it has hired veteran equity analyst Kenneth Hill to cover exchanges and financial technology. Hill has more than a decade of experience analyzing financial services, particularly market-structure-related companies like exchanges, market-making firms and online brokers.

Prior to joining Rosenblatt, Hill spent eight years as a senior analyst with Barclays, where he also covered asset-management companies. Before Barclays, he worked in equity research at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, following stints in planning and analysis at Credit Suisse and as a business analyst with State Farm Insurance Companies. He will begin launching coverage in the coming weeks, in advance of Rosenblatt’s 11th Annual Global Exchange Leader Conference.

Hill, a CFA charterholder, is the latest addition to an expanding equity-research team at Rosenblatt. In March, the firm hired Ryan Koontz and Mark Zgutowicz to cover the communications/networking and internet sectors, respectively. The pair are part of a team of six senior technology, media and telecom analysts.
“We’re excited to have someone of Ken’s caliber on board,” said Evan Morgan, managing director and head of research sales at Rosenblatt. “Like our other senior TMT analysts, he’s a veteran researcher who previously worked in the industry he covers. His work, alongside our existing, industry-leading market-structure team and all the work we do in FinTech, including our annual Financial Technologies Summit, represent a powerful combination for our institutional clients.”

Rosenblatt also provides US investors with research on and access to hundreds of emerging- and frontier-market companies, via leading local-market partners. The firm’s growth in equity research comes as many other providers are rethinking their commitment to the area, amid new commission- unbundling rules that are part of revisions to the European Union’s Markets in Financial Instruments Directive and other headwinds.

“We see opportunity in the disruption of equity research business models globally,” said Rosenblatt President and COO Joe Gawronski. “We thrived during a very difficult period for the agency execution business by stressing deep, unconflicted market-structure expertise, and believe a similar approach — responsive to and driven by client needs, not investment-banking demands — can help us succeed in equity research while others retreat. We are committed to becoming the premier TMT research boutique.”