The creation of the ‘new’ Jarden following the sale of its wealth management division has seen the prominent role played in the new company by leading lawyers from the LawFuel Power List, plus a leading Australian investment banker and lawyer.
LawFuel’s Power List already had Silvana Schenone and Matt Whineray but in Australia former Allens lawyer and leading investment bankeer Sarah Rennie has also played a key role in the company and co-leads the Australian operation.
Rennie was recruited by Jardens along with three other leading Australian investment bankers in 2020 and cut her teeth on investment banking while working as a commercial lawyer at Allens.
She studied law at University of Sydney and then scored a graduate job at Allens, one of the major commercial law firms. she acquired a taste for investment banking while working at Allens as a junior lawyer. Since then she has gone on to become one of the country’s leading investment bankers and a strong advocate for the role of women in banking and the law.
“I was incredibly engaged by it,” she told the Australian Financial Review. I felt like they were the architects of transactions, and really at the front end of ideas generation for transactions. I made a decision pretty early on that I wanted to move into that field.”
Her brother, Andrew, was working at UBS at the time and later became head of equities at Goldman Sachs. She later moved to the Swiss bank as a graduate.
Rennie says of her brother: “He definitely was an early mentor of mine and encouraged me to make the jump.
“At the time, there was only a handful of women in investment banking, so there weren’t a lot of role models, or other people that I could talk to about it. I think that really gave me the extra confidence to make the jump.”
Jarden Sale
In March Jarden Group shareholders approved the sale of the company’s wealth and asset management business after financially stumbling upon entering the Australian market, providing cash for the investment banking operations in both new Zealand and Australia.
Nearly all shareholders voted in favor of the transaction, which lead to the creation of the new wealth management group FirstCape.
Under the agreement, NAB will hold a 45 percent stake in FirstCape, private equity firm Pacific Equity Partners will own 35 percent, and Jarden will retain the remaining 20 percent shareholding.
FirstCape will manage 113 wealth advisers, NZ$29 billion (A$27 billion) in funds under advice, and NZ$15 billion in funds under management, including NZ$5 billion in KiwiSaver funds.
The sale comes at a crucial juncture for Jarden’s local investment bank, led by co-CEOs Sarah Rennie and Aidan Allen.
The Australian arm previously reported a NZ$8.7 million loss in the six months to September, weighing on group profits. With the FirstCape transaction, Jarden expects its cash levels and net assets to increase substantially.
Power Lawyer Roles
Matt Whineray, former CEO of the NZ Super Fund has moved to run the new First Cape wealth management division, which combines Jarden Wealth, Harbour Asset Management, NAB’s JBWere NZ, and BNZ Investment Services into a new entity called FirstCape. The deal values FirstCape at NZ$700 million (A$651.7 million) and still requires regulatory approval.
First Cape will be one of the major wealth management groups in New Zealand sees Whineray continue to play a prominent role in financial affairs in New Zealand.
Following the separation of the wealth management business, Jardens returns to its roots as a investment banking operation and Power Lawyer Silvana Schenone (pictured) will once again be at the forefront of some major deals involving New Zealand, Australian and other corporates.
The former MinterEllisonRuddWatts partner joined Jardens in 2023 after leaving Minters the previous year. A winner of the ‘dealmaker of the year’ in 2021 she was in last year’s LawFuel Power List as one of the country’s influential commercial lawyers.
