Greenhill hires UBS’s Cuise in Chicago focusing on industrials

Greenhill & Co., the independent advisory firm that added at least seven managing directors in 2012, hired UBS AG’s Stephen Cruise in Chicago to focus on industrials.

Cruise, 49, was previously co-head of the Chicago office and the U.S. Midwest region for Zurich-based UBS, Greenhill said today in an e-mailed statement. He was also a senior member of the investment bank’s global industrials group, New York-based Greenhill said in the statement. Before joining UBS, Cruise worked at Credit Suisse First Boston and Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., according to the statement.

Chief Executive Officer Scott Bok, 53, said in November that the firm experienced a “meaningful pickup” in its U.S. merger-and-acquisition business during the second half of the year. Big bank rivals are cutting employees to shed excess capacity in the financial services industry, a trend that will benefit Greenhill, he said at the time.

“Even as we expand our footprint globally, we want to develop a major presence in key U.S. regional markets, and he becomes our fifth Chicago-based partner,” Bok said in the statement. Cruise’s strengths are in industrial, infrastructure and energy services markets, according to the statement.

The firm said in October it hired Rupert Hill from Bank of America Corp. as a London-based managing director focusing on health care. Greenhill also added Jeffrey Wasserstein in September as a managing director for pharmaceuticals.

Greenhill fell 1.4 percent to close yesterday at $56.08 in New York. The shares have advanced 41 percent in the last year, compared with a 16 percent gain by the 83-company Standard & Poor’s Midcap Financials Index.