Two years after leaving investment banking for M&A consulting, Annabelle Mooney has returned to her roots.
Mooney spent eight years in investment banking between 2009 and 2017 before jumping to PwC, one of the world’s largest professional services firms. Her banking spell saw her work for two US giants in the space – Goldman Sachs and Merrill Lynch – and Japanese institution Nomura.
Prior to joining PwC, she was Director of Financial Sponsors at Bank of America-Merrill Lynch in the role of head of the bank’s offering for the private equity sector. At the Big Four firm, she was tasked with leading the newly created Private Equity M&A practice. “My goal is to provide PwC services to private equity clients in an integrated way and help private equity identify and realize investment opportunities,” she said.
After two years in her role, Mooney has now decided to take the opposite route and join the commercial banking team at Wall Street giant JP Morgan. The bank describes itself as “one of the few full-service and fully integrated investment banks in Australia”, building on its expertise in investment banking and corporate finance, treasury and securities, asset management and fund administration.
He brings to the bank approximately 16 years of experience with mergers and acquisitions in legal and investment banking. “My M&A experience includes public, private and cross-border transactions across a range of sectors, particularly with private equity clients,” Mooney said.
Its move comes at a time when business activity in Australia is at a healthy level, amid strong global M&A fundamentals, including low-cost and private equity groups that have a record amount of dry powder. This is according to a recent study by Deloittethe outlook for Australia’s M&A industry remains bright for the coming twelve months. In line with developments in other developed markets, financial sponsors are increasing their stakeswith local Australian players such as Quadrant Private Equity and Champ Private Equity eagerly seeking capital.
Annabelle Mooney studied law and began her career in the legal industry where she worked for Blake Dawson Law Firm in Sydney for eight years.