**The Winterbotham Trust Company Limited** has announced the launch of its new corporate finance division – **Winterbotham Corporate Finance**. The new division will focus on providing specialist services to the Group’s existing world-wide client base and to medium-sized corporates in the Caribbean and Latin America.
The focus will be on transaction structuring in the areas of: Trade finance services, including an expanded role for Winterbotham’s own trading company; Private equity; M&A; and Corporate advisory services;
Winterbotham believes the market niche for mid-sized corporates is currently under served by the leading institutions and is confident that this incremental offer will appeal to its existing clients and correspondents, enabling it to build a strong net work of “partnering relationships” with financial institutions and investors interested in accessing mid-sized transactions and developing business in the Caribbean and Latin America.
The new division is being headed up by James Leppard, an experienced international banker who has spent much of his career in Latin America, in particular, in Brazil and Argentina. Before joining Winterbotham, James occupied senior positions with Lloyds Bank International, Samuel Montagu and Dresdner Bank, and has also worked closely with leading regional financial institutions.
Since its foundation in 1990, Winterbotham has successfully developed as a bank and trust company, providing tailor made services to a broad international client base comprising primarily entrepreneurs and their companies. Recently Winterbotham was appointed as Escrow Agent in a US$210 million FRN issue by Remedial (Cyprus) Ltd and as trustee to several securitized debt transactions on behalf of CarVal Investors, and as trustee with respect to the liquidation of POBT, an affiliate of Banco Pactual which was acquired by UBS at the end of 2006.