George Graham and William Grady have joined Ramius Capital Group, a New York-based hedge fund with $7 billion in assets under management, effective at the start of the year. The pair, which jointly founded Gryfon Partners in November 2002, become managing directors and will run a new investment unit, named RCG Resolution.
RCG Resolution will focus on special opportunities in collateral assets, as well as distressed securities. RCG Resolution aims to be involved in spaces in the market where CDOs currently aren't, indicating distressed assets and below investment-grade securities.
Graham and Grady's Resolution will complement the RCG Endeavor entity, which focuses on the structured investment space headed by Managing Director Julian Vulliez.
Graham and Grady founded Gryfon in 2002, after leaving their respective positions as co-heads of principal finance at Citigroup Global Markets. Prior to that, the pair ran the structured finance group at Citigroup.
Ramius Capital was formed in 1994 by former Shearson Lehman Brothers executive Peter Cohen. The managing partnership consists of Jeffrey Salomon, former head of corporate development and strategic planning at Republic New York Securities Corp., Tom Strauss, former co-chairman of Granite Capital International Group, and Morgan Stark, managing director and portfolio manager at Granite Capital.
The firm was named after the lead character in the 1990 film adaptation of the Tom Clancy novel The Hunt for Red October and Ramius' business units share seafaring themed names. In fact, Endeavor and Resolution were the names of the ships Captain James Cook sailed on his first and second voyages, respectively, in the South Pacific Ocean from 1768 to 1775.
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