Jefferson National completes management buyout
Jefferson National Financial has completed an $83 million management buyout financed by Financial Partners Fund (a unit of Citi Capital Advisors), The Stephens Group and private investor Eric Schwartz. The buyout was led by Mitchell H. Caplan, Jefferson National’s CEO.
The company, which sells variable annuities to Registered Investment Advisors (RIAs) and fee-based advisors primarily as tax deferral vehicles, charges a flat insurance fee of $20 a month rather than commissions or expense ratios, and has taken advantage of the trend away from commission-based sales by advisors.
In a statement, Caplan said, “Starting in 2005, Jefferson National completely re-engineered the way variable annuities are bought and sold with a singular focus on serving fee-based advisors.
“Transforming the product with a proprietary technology platform, and rebuilding the distribution from the traditional wholesaler-driven model to a unique direct-marketing model, we have been able to dramatically reduce costs, create greater consumer value and become the leading variable annuity provider to the fee-based channel.”
A former CEO of E*Trade Financial, Caplan joined Jefferson National in 2010, reuniting with a leadership team that worked on Telebank, the nation’s first direct bank, and E*Trade. The team includes Laurence Greenberg, president of Jefferson National and former COO of Telebank, and David Lau, chief operating officer of Jefferson National. During their tenure, Telebank’s deposits grew from $200 million in 1994 to more than $8 billion in 2000. During Caplan’s tenure as CEO of E*Trade, revenue increased from less than $1 billion in 2003 to approximately $3 billion in 2006.
Donna MacFarland named CMO at Lincoln Financial
Lincoln Financial Group today has named Donna MacFarland chief marketing officer of its Retirement Plan Services business. She will lead marketing initiatives, including the development of integrated business-to-business and business-to-consumer marketing strategies, and will manage Retirement Plan Services Participant Communications and Education offering.
MacFarland joined Lincoln in May 2010 as marketing director. She reports to Chuck Cornelio, president of Retirement Plan Services for Lincoln Financial.
Prior to joining Lincoln, MacFarland was founder and president of Symphonic Marketing, LLC, a marketing strategy consultancy focused on partnering with companies to drive growth through insights generation and marketing planning. Previously, she held senior brand management and marketing positions with The Vanguard Group, Inc., Merrill Lynch, Citibank, and Smith Barney.
Thomas Mann and Laura Dagan join F-Squared board
Thomas F. Mann and Laura P. Dagan have joined the Board of Directors of F-Squared Investments, which currently has nearly $6 billion in assets under management or model manager agreements, the company said in a release.
Mann is a managing director and senior banker at Société Générale (SocGen) in New York. Dagan retired in 2010 as chairman of Dwight Asset Management Company, a fixed income and stable value asset management firm that invests on behalf of institutional clients including retirement funds and endowments.
Mann and Dagan are the fourth and fifth members to join F-Squared’s board, which includes the firm’s president and CEO, Howard Present; vice chairman, George McClelland; and outside director Steve Ricci, the co-founder of OneLiberty Ventures and Special Partner at Flagship Ventures.
Mann, a Chartered Financial Analyst, graduated from State University of New York in 1972 and holds an MBA from New York University and a JD from Fordham Law School. He has also completed the Advanced Management Program at Harvard Business School.
Dagan, a Chartered Financial Analyst, graduated from Bucknell University in 1974 and attended the Women’s Director Development Program at the Kellogg School of Management. She has also completed the Advanced Management program at Harvard Business School.
