UBS hires Evan Raine as head of media and telecom M&A for Americas

By Milana Vinn

(Reuters) -UBS Group has hired Evan Raine to head its media and telecoms mergers and acquisitions unit in the Americas to help the bank capture more market share from advising on deals in the sector.

Raine will start at UBS on April 14 and will be based in New York, Jeff Hinton, global co-head of mergers and acquisitions at UBS, according to an internal memo reviewed by Reuters on Thursday.

A spokesperson for UBS confirmed the contents of the memo.

Raine joins UBS from Adams Outdoor Advertising, a home advertising operator, where he was Chief Financial Officer for the past two years.

Prior to that role, Raine was a managing director in the technology, media and telecoms group at Barclays and held several positions across the media and communications M&A group. Raine spent 14 years at Barclays after joining the bank in 2008, according to his LinkedIn profile.

Hinton said Raine has led many high-profile strategic transactions across M&A, leveraged capital markets, and other deals in his more than 30 years of experience. He has represented a broad range of industry leaders, including Cox Media Group, Endeavor, Clear Channel, Univision, Verizon and Sprint, among others, the memo added.  

Hinton said Raine would help UBS focus on growing its market share in the media and telecoms industry, which “represents a significant global fee opportunity for the firm.”

"We are committed to expanding our client relationships and capabilities in this important sector," Hinton said in the memo.

In March, UBS also hired Ethan Sawyer as global head of media from Guggenheim Securities. The bank's previous global head of media and entertainment, Aly Alibhai, left UBS to join Deutsche Bank as its new head of North America M&A last year.

(Reporting by Milana Vinn; Editing by Nia Williams and Diane Craft)