December 2, 2013

Domanski Joins Braver Stern

A look at the equity industry's prominent hires, promotions and other notable happenings around wall Street's trading community

By By Editorial Staff

Industry veteran Gerald Domanski joined Braver Stern Securities as global head of equities. In recent years, Domanski has held senior equities/trading roles at Tejas Securities and S.J. Levinson. He also spent five years as an international trader at BTIG. Domanski was at Spear, Leeds & Kellogg for 14 years.

Stephens Inc. hired seven sales traders and two position traders from Lazard Capital Markets, including Michael Conte as head of sales trading. All of the traders will work in Stephens' New York office. Stephens is based in Little Rock, Ark. Conte spent the past five years at Lazard. Before that, he spent about eight years at Cowen & Co. Other sales traders include Matt Delia, Bill Burchfield and Marylou Panza, at the managing director level; George Boudria and Michael Sheehan as senior vice presidents; and Jeffrey Castellano as vice president. The two position traders are managing directors Jimmy Law and Anthony Pignio.

FBR Capital Market recently hired a group of traders from Lazard Capital Markets. On the sales trading side, it brought on six traders, including Peter Cairney, Chris Mitrano, Trey Laird, David Jones and William Cantor. All previously worked at Lazard for four to six years. Cairney, Mitrano, Laird and Jones are based in New York. Cantor is based in Boston. FBR also hired three position traders, including Jason Lanzetta, who spent four years at Lazard Capital Markets.

Steven Lachenauer joined Cannacord Genuity as a sales trader in the Canadian broker's New York office. Lachenauer previously spent about eight years as a sales trader at Lazard Capital Markets. Before that, he spent about four years at Lazard Frères & Co.

Chris Sexton joined Cantor Fitzgerald & Co. as a sales trader in the firm's new Denver office. Sexton, a 20-year trading industry veteran, spent about five months this year as a financial advisor in Merrill Lynch's Greenwood Village, Colo., branch. Before that, he spent nine years at research boutique Wedge Partners, in Greenwood Village, as a sales trader.

Tara Horton joined investment adviser Delta Asset Management in Memphis in client relations, portfolio management and trading. Horton previously spent 25 years as a Nasdaq market maker at Morgan Keegan & Company.

Chris Hempstead joined KCG Holdings, formerly Knight Capital Group, to head its exchange-traded funds sales team. Hempstead previously worked at WallachBeth Capital as director of ETF execution for about two years. He joined KCG following the recent departures of senior ETF team members Reginald Browne, Eric Lichtenstein and Darren Taube.

Veteran options trading executive Michael Khouw joined agency brokerage Dash Financial, a unit of Electronic Brokerage Systems LLC, as a derivatives strategist. He works in the Chicago-based firm's New York office. Prior to joining Dash Financial, Khouw previously worked at CRT Capital in a trading/strategy capacity for about a year. Before that, he spent five years at Cantor Fitzgerald on the options desk.

Program trading veteran Doug Aronstein joined RBC Capital Markets in New York as a director responsible for program trading and electronic trading sales. Aronstein joined from Piper Jaffray's New York office, where he spent about five years as head of the regional broker's program desk. He has worked in portfolio trading for nearly 20 years, after getting his start at Merrill Lynch.