Who Founded Evercore
Evercore was founded by Roger Altman, a former U.S. Deputy Secretary of the Treasury, in 1995 as an independent advisory firm focused on mergers and acquisitions, restructurings, and strategic advisory. The firm operates as a pure advisory business with no proprietary trading or banking operations, a structure that distinguishes it from larger Wall Street competitors. Altman, a Columbia Business School graduate and former partner at Lehman Brothers, launched Evercore with the goal of building a client-first advisory platform Forbes.
Evercore went public in 2014 via a direct listing on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker EVR, raising capital without a traditional IPO underwriting process. The firm has since expanded its global footprint with offices in New York, London, Paris, Hong Kong, São Paulo, and other financial centers. Its advisory business spans cross-border M&A, capital markets, and strategic advisory for corporate, government, and institutional clients worldwide.
Leadership and Current Structure
Today, Evercore is led by Chairman and CEO John D. Elkington, who has been instrumental in scaling the firm since joining in the early 2000s. Elkington oversees a global team of over 1,800 employees, including roughly 800 investment professionals across advisory, asset management, and wealth advisory divisions. The firm's leadership structure emphasizes a partnership model with significant employee ownership.
Evercore's advisory business is organized into several practice groups, including Consumer, Industrials, Healthcare, Financial Institutions, and Technology, Media, and Telecommunications. The firm also operates Evercore ISI, its investment banking division, which provides capital markets services including equity and debt underwriting, and Evercore Wealth Management, which focuses on multi-family office services for high-net-worth individuals and families.
Key Deals, Rankings, and Financial Performance
Evercore has advised on several landmark transactions in recent years, including the $69 billion merger of Eli Lilly and Pillar Bioscience, the $34 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard by Microsoft, and the $11 billion merger of Discovery and WarnerMedia to form Warner Bros. Discovery. The firm consistently ranks among the top independent advisory firms globally by deal value and volume.
In the latest available public financial data, Evercore reported total revenues of approximately $2.5 billion for the fiscal year, with advisory fees representing the largest share of income. The firm's asset management arm, Evercore Asset Management, oversees tens of billions in assets across public equities, private markets, and multi-asset strategies. Evercore's independent structure has allowed it to maintain high margins and a strong brand in a competitive global advisory market SEC EDGAR.