当HBOS在9月中旬突然遇到流动资金时，在其股票价格在两天和交易对手撤回了70％的时间内，银行首席执行官Andrew Hornby迅速转向Simon Robey的帮助。摩根斯坦利全球并购的联合主管，说服了Hornby，寻求一份从政府寻求短期的流动性输液，以留下漂浮，然后开设了12小时的过夜谈判会议，成功结束了120亿英镑（$ 195亿美元）通过竞争对手劳埃德TSB收购HBO。Less than four weeks later, with global markets — and HBOS — on the brink of a meltdown, Robey advised Hornby on the terms of what was in effect a forced nationalization that will see HBOS accept £11.5 billion in capital from the U.K. government, then merge with Lloyds TSB on revised terms. The state will hold a 43 percent stake in the combined group.
Robey对酷炫的声誉，仔细分析使他成为英国最值得信赖的合并顾问之一;金融危机只加强了对其服务的需求。In addition to assisting HBOS, Robey in September advised U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling on the rescue of Bradford & Bingley, under which the government nationalized the savings bank’s £41 billion mortgage portfolio while selling its 200 branches, with their £22 billion in deposits, to Spain’s Banco Santander for £612 million (see story,超级桑坦德）。
“As an investment banker these days, you’ve got to see how the world is changing and be decisive when it comes to advising in ways that might not have made sense only the day before,” the 48-year-old banker tells Institutional Investor. “You’ve also got to be one of the calmest people in the room.”
据数据提供商Dealogic的数据，摩根士丹利的英国团队自2004年以来一直是该国四大并购顾问之一，当时在该行工作了21年的罗比被任命为整个英国业务的负责人。2008年前10个月，摩根士丹利在英国并购交易中排名第三，完成了33笔交易，价值981亿美元。多年来，罗比与广泛的客户建立了联系;他曾在2001年为制药公司葛兰素史克(Glaxo Wellcome)以760亿美元收购竞争对手SmithKline Beecham担任顾问，目前还在为英国和澳大利亚矿业公司里约热内卢Tinto在过去一年里抵御竞争对手必和必拓(BHP Billiton) 1477亿美元的敌意收购担任顾问。
伦敦私募股权公司奥赛斯特的创始人和首席执行官Luqman Arnold说：“遇到了一个银行家，他们遇到了一名深受思想和仔细准备的人，以了解他的客户的需求。”截至2004年修道院首席执行官，阿诺德聘请了罗伊伊担任桑坦德10.5亿美元销售的顾问，以至于最大的跨境银行收购。
After the early death of his father, Robey was raised in Cambridge, U.K., by his mother, an elementary school teacher, and he obtained a bachelor’s degree in English from Oxford University’s Magdalen College in 1983. One day that year, while training to be a professional choral singer, he was putting up recital posters in a room where a group of Lazard partners, led by Marcus Agius, now chairman of Barclays, was giving a recruitment presentation. Robey caught the bankers’ attention with some astute questions about the business, got an invitation to dinner and, eventually, a job offer as a trainee banker. He worked under Philip Hampton, now chairman of supermarket group J Sainsbury, and advised B.A.T. Industries on its $1.4 billion acquisition of insurer Eagle Star Holdings before joining Morgan Stanley four years later. “I immediately fell in love with the fast pace and constantly changing action in investment banking,” Robey recalls.
他认为，美国银行的银行救助将提高经济信心“因为它将英国银行的命运不仅仅是一个合理的怀疑，而且根本没有疑问。”对经济的好处也适合罗伯。他希望银行提供充足的工作，因为他们销售企业重建资本并购买政府赌注。“自从一开始，人们需要资本和建议，”他说，“这并不是改变。”