MFO Rockefeller implements institutional game plan

Thomas Coyle

13 March 2009

Wealth firm sees opportunities for int'l growth in investment-platform play. Rockefeller & Co. has hired former Merrill Lynch executive Jon Pratt to develop and expand its standing as an investment-platform provider to other firms as the firm's managing director for institutional relationships, a new position.

The multifamily office says it has come through the global downturn, so far, as "a profitably growing enterprise that continues to create value for our individual and institutional clients." As a result, it wants to seize what its CEO James McDonald calls "a unique opportunity to significantly expand our relationships on a global basis with family offices, foundations and endowments, third-party banks and other financial institutions."

B2b

Rockefeller & Co. probably also has funds on hand as a result of the 37% buy-in last spring by SG Private Banking, the wealth-management division of Paris-based investment bank Société Générale.

Prior to joining Rockefeller & Co., Pratt was in charge of debt origination in Merrill's Asia Pacific region. Before that, he was head of debt capital markets in Asia for Credit Suisse.

In his new role, Pratt "will assume responsibility for spearheading the firm's continued expansion of its global institutional business by developing new institutional client relationships as well as new products and strategies targeting this client base," says a Rockefeller & Co. press release.

More specifically, Rockefeller & Co. has a range of proprietary and third-party investment vehicles and strategies to offer high-wealth families and institutions that cater to them, according to a Rockefeller & Co. spokesman. So Pratt will be looking to establish the firm as a provider of high-end investment platforms and related consulting services -- sort of like Rockville, Md.-based Fortigent, which started out as the back office and investment platform of multifamily office Lydian Wealth Management (now Convergent Wealth Advisors).

Separate from its investment-platform product and service offerings, Rockefeller & Co.'s sister company Rockit Solutions provides investment-data aggregation and performance-reporting services to single- and multi-family offices that families with at least $100 million in total assets.

Rockefeller & Co. is the commercial successor to the nineteenth-century family office of U.S. industrialist and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller. The firm, which provides wealth- and investment-management services to families with more than $30 million in liquid assets, had $28 billion under administration at the end of September 2008 including $6 billion in assets under management and $3 billion in assets under external management. In addition to its headquarters in New York, Rockefeller & Co. has offices in Boston and in Washington, D.C. -FWR

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