BAC Bank of America Corporation

By Maureen Farrell 

Mary Ann Deignan, co-head of global equity capital markets at Bank of America Corp., is leaving the bank to join Lazard, according to a spokesman for Bank of America.

Ms. Deignan will be part of the Lazard corporate preparedness team where she will be focused on activist and corporate governance advisory work.

Craig Coben, who is currently Bank of America's co-head of global equity capital markets, will become the sole head of the group.

No other changes at Bank of America are planned at this time, the spokesman said.

Mr. Coben and Ms. Deignan were named global equity capital markets co-heads in 2014.

Ms. Deignan's departure comes amid a sharp slowdown in IPO activity this year, in what's been the lowest-volume year since 2009 during the depths of the financial crisis.

Ms. Deignan rejoined Bank of America in 2011 as head of Americas equity capital markets after spending seven years at UBS Group AG, where she became head of America equity capital markets in 2007. Before that, she spent 11 years at Bank of America, where she worked in equity capital markets, syndicate and institutional sales before joining UBS.

This year, IPO volume is down more than 50% from last year's volume by mid August, according to Dealogic data. Only 62 companies have gone public on U.S. exchanges this year raising $12.8 billion.

Meanwhile, Ms. Deignan's planned area of focus at Lazard -- activism -- has been a dominant force in corporate boardrooms. Activist investors have seen their assets under management increase sharply in recent years, and last year, these investors launched more campaigns in the U.S. than any other year on record.

--Telis Demos contributed to this article.

Write to Maureen Farrell at maureen.farrell@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

August 20, 2016 13:20 ET (17:20 GMT)

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