Lessin plans

The onetime-investment-banking-star-turned-Internet-entrepreneur is returning to his roots, joining Jefferies & Co. as vice chairman.

The onetime-investment-banking-star-turned-Internet-entrepreneur is returning to his roots, joining Jefferies & Co. as vice chairman. Lessin, a former banker to buyout firms at Morgan Stanley, ran investment banking at Smith Barney before embracing online finance and joining Wit Capital, which pioneered the electronic distribution of IPOs to small investors. Now called SoundView Technology Group, the online bank’s stock is trading at $1.18, down from a high of $36, and it has repositioned itself as a tech-based, research-driven securities firm. Lessin, who resigned in October 2001, will woo banking clients for Jefferies, a powerhouse trading firm with a tiny investment banking unit that has modeled itself after the entrepreneurial Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette (now part of Credit Suisse). “There’s a crying need for firms like this. They trade every part of the capital structure, and they know how it’s all trading,” says the always casually dressed Lessin. Besides, he adds: “It’s the only firm on Wall Street where people are happy and the firm is growing. That places it in a universe of one.”

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