The State of Investment Banking: A Look Back & A Look Ahead

Christine Shin has represented U.S. Fortune 500 companies, international conglomerates and global private equity firms in their most significant transactions. 

Christine has negotiated and closed transactions ranging from less than $10 million to over $3 billion, including representing clients in the automotive, cosmetics, energy, entertainment, fashion, financial services, gaming, healthcare, medical, online gaming, real estate, retail, technology and pharmaceutical industries. She has worked closely with boards of directors in making critical strategic decisions for cross-border expansion in the US and overseas.  Her current practice focuses on middle-market M&A transactions and she has lead various add-on and roll-up transactions for multiple private equity platforms. 

Further, in building the corporate practice at Russ August & Kabat, in addition to the M&A group, Christine has built an active practice which works closely with founders of emerging companies from formation through their liquidity events, general counsel of large strategics in managing their day-to-day legal matters and operators of PE portfolio companies in scaling their businesses.

In 2020 and 2021, Christine was named “A Leader of Influence” Among Private Equity Investors and Advisors by the Los Angeles Business Journal. 

Prior to joining Russ August & Kabat, Christine was part of the corporate practice at Latham & Watkins LLP and worked at the National Assembly of South Korea in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. She earned her J.D. from Yale Law School   and graduated with honors from Wellesley College. 

Christine’s pro-bono activities include work for the Alliance of Children’s Rights and Ellevate. 

Mr. Gale is a Managing Director and Head of Houlihan Lokey’s Financial Restructuring Group in Asia and splits time between the firm’s Singapore and Hong Kong offices. He has more than 15 years of experience advising clients on financial restructurings, M&A, capital raising, and fairness/solvency opinions. 

During his career at Houlihan Lokey, Mr. Gale has participated in a broad range of financial restructuring and distressed engagements worldwide. His disclosable engagements include China Shanshui Cement, Hilong Holding, Huachen Energy, Kaisa Group, LDK Solar, Luckin Coffee, Tahoe Group, Winsway, and Wuzhou International in China; Noble Group, China Fishery Group, and Global Cloud Xchange in Hong Kong; Global A&T Electronics, KrisEnergy, and Pacific International Lines in Singapore; GTL Infrastructure, Jaiprakash Power, Reliance Communications, Rolta, Sterling Biotech, and Suzlon Energy in India; Bakrie & Brothers, Berau Coal, Berlian Laju Tanker, and Bumi Resources in Indonesia; Nghi Son Refinery and Petrochemical in Vietnam; Bis Industries and Paladin Energy in Australia; Oro Negro in Mexico; Bulgaria Telecom, eircom Group, and Independent News & Media in Europe; and Blockbuster, FiberTower, Hawaiian Telcom, Innovative Communications Corp., Oriental Trading Co., Panavision, Suncadia, and William Lyon Homes in the United States.

Before joining the firm, Mr. Gale was a Summer Analyst at Bear, Stearns & Co., working in corporate finance, commercial mortgage, and private client services.

Mr. Gale holds a B.A. in Business Economics, with a minor in Accounting and a specialization in Computing, from the University of California, Los Angeles. He also attended Oxford University, where his coursework included European integration and modern British politics.

Stephen Rossi leads Palm Tree's capital markets solutions, providing clients with private debt and equity sourcing, structuring, and execution as well as ongoing portfolio debt management.

Mr. Rossi brings deep expertise in negotiating and executing ABL, factoring, floorplan, cash flow, junior-lien, high yield, mezzanine, and structured majority/minority equity transactions. He has over 20 years of experience specializing in corporate finance, providing debt and equity capital structuring and negotiations, business diligence and performance analysis, and operational leadership to companies in a variety of sectors including, distribution and logistics, food and beverage, industrials, manufacturing, media, and telecom. He has led or supported over 100 acquisitions and restructurings throughout his career, including serving as a board member, operating committee member, interim CEO, and Chief Restructuring Officer.

Before joining Palm Tree, Mr. Rossi spent nine years as a Founder and Managing Partner of CounterPoint Capital Partners, a lower-middle market private equity sponsor where he managed all capital markets activities for the firm and its portfolio companies across North America. He was also a member of the CounterPoint investment committee.

Prior to CounterPoint, Mr. Rossi served as the Managing Director and VP of Corporate Finance for Platinum Equity, LLC, a multi-billion dollar private equity fund based in Los Angeles. During his nearly fifteen years in private equity, he closed over $9 Billion in financing commitments with over 200 different lending partners, supporting nearly 100 different platform acquisitions, add-on acquisitions, and refinancings while also forming a private debt lender to provide unitranche and 2nd lien debt facilities. Before becoming a private equity professional, he spent eight years as a direct lender in Bank of America’s asset-based lending division.

Mr. Rossi holds an M.B.A. from the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University and a B.A. in the History of Art from the University of California, Berkeley.

He was awarded the M&A Advisor Turnaround Award lower middle market Deal of the Year in 2012 and 2017, and was named to the M&A Advisor 40 Under 40 in 2013.

Ganesh is a Managing Director of CMD Global Partners and leads the firm’s Consumer sector financial advisory practice. Ganesh was previously a senior member of Baird’s Global Consumer Investment Banking team, where he was instrumental in sourcing and executing several successful strategic transactions and financial advisory assignments for a diverse range of global corporate and private equity clients across multiple sub-sectors, including apparel & footwear, food & beverage, sporting goods, juvenile and household products.

Ganesh began his investment banking career at Lazard Frères in the Global Automotive Group, executing a range of mergers, acquisitions and other financial advisory assignments. During his time at Lazard, he was among a small group of analysts directly promoted to post-MBA associate roles and worked across a variety of groups in the Chicago and New York offices. Over the course of his career, Ganesh has executed dozens of financial advisory assignments across the consumer, retail, eCommerce, digital media, marketing and internet sectors.

Ganesh graduated from the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign with a Bachelor of Science in Finance.