Jefferies gets boost as Japan's SMFG expands partnership, investment

By Jaiveer Shekhawat and Lananh Nguyen

(Reuters) -Jefferies Financial Group Inc shares surged more than 5% on Thursday after Japan's Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp (SMBC) said it will combine its U.S. equity and M&A business with the U.S. investment bank.

As part of a deal, SMBC's parent, Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group, will expand its U.S. presence and boost its stake in Jefferies from 4.5% to as much as 15%, the companies said in a joint statement Thursday.

"This will give us access to more, and larger, public companies," Jefferies President Brian Friedman told Reuters. "This is hugely strategic and deeply long-term."

The deal gives SMFG the right to nominate a member of Jefferies' board of directors. It expands collaboration between SMBC and Jefferies, which have worked together on cross-border mergers and acquisitions, healthcare and leveraged finance since 2021.

The transaction will enable Jefferies to offer more lending capabilities, with the help of SMFG's balance sheet, alongside its traditional advisory work.

SMFG has long been eager to crack the U.S. and other major overseas capital markets. Its SMBC Nikko Securities unit, formerly Citigroup Inc's Japanese broker and a key investment banking unit that SMFG bought in 2009, has a limited footprint abroad.

SMFG's bigger domestic rival, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc, has boosted its U.S. presence through a $9 billion investment in Morgan Stanley in 2008, which gave MUFG some 20% ownership of the Wall Street bank.

The Financial Times first reported the news on SMBC and Jefferies.

(Reporting by Lananh Nguyen in New York, Kanjyik Ghosh and Jaiveer Shekhawat in Bengaluru and Makiko Yamazaki in Tokyo; Editing by Savio D'Souza and Josie Kao)