Amo Chahal joins A&M to develop new portfolio advisory wing
Global consulting firm Alvarez & Marsal has launched a new Global Portfolio Advisory Business, as it looks to support financial sector clients with the post-Covid-19 recovery phase. Amo Chahal has joined as Managing Director of the new practice, arriving as the latest in a succession of appointments from Deloitte.
With over 5,000 people across four continents, Alvarez & Marsal (A&M) works with corporates, boards, creditors, private equity firms, law firms and government agencies facing complex challenges. Over the last year, in response to growing client demand, the firm has opened five new offices in Geneva, Düsseldorf, Oslo, Helsinki and Glasgow.
While A&M is perhaps best known for its work in restructuring, however, it is also looking to build on its traditional growth by expanding its offering in 2021. As the financial services industry looks beyond the effects of the pandemic, it will require strategic guidance to re-evaluate its core offering, and adapt to the sustained economic downturn that is likely to last well beyond the Covid-19 lockdown.
The launch of A&M’s Global Portfolio Advisory Business marks the next step in A&M’s European strategic growth plan.
Richard Fleming, Managing Director and European Head of Restructuring at A&M, explained, “As we move from the current health crisis, a larger financial crisis will start to emerge. It will drive banks to redefine their core business and pursue strategies to reinforce their capital structures… We are committed to building a market-leading practice in response to growing challenges facing the sector.”
In order to develop the practice, A&M has appointed Amo Chahal as Managing Director of the new practice. Joined by an initial team of five senior professionals including Nahuel Callieri and Ankur Patodi, Chahal brings over 14 years of financial services experience to the firm, covering both restructuring and transactions.
Antonio Alvarez III, Managing Director and A&M’s European Practice Leader commented, “This past year has been unprecedented in terms of shocks facing businesses during which our agile operating model and independence enabled us to deliver impressive results for our clients. Amo’s arrival is another important step in our growth journey focused on financial institutions.”
Chahal spent the last 13 years with Deloitte, where he was most recently Partner for the firm’s Portfolio Lead Advisory Services arm. In this role, he built transaction advisory experience including multiple asset classes within commercial and consumer debt across the UK, Ireland, Germany, France, Spain, Netherlands, CEE, the Nordics and Asia. He also has extensive expertise in bank wind-downs and implementation of core and non-core strategies, having originally worked in Deloitte’s Banking & Capital Markets practice.
Deloitte itself looks poised to offload its restructuring practice in the UK, following regulatory changes which will make it more difficult for audit and advisory firms to hold onto clients on both fronts. This seems to be prompting a sizable exodus of the firm’s senior restructuring staff, as Chahal’s appointment follows on a number of recent senior hires from Deloitte in the restructuring area including Christian Ebner, James Dervin, Michael Magnay and Floris Hovingh.
