Financial services-focused private equity firm Aquiline Capital Partners has continued its recent hiring spree with the additions of Deborah Bernstein and Jason Rotman as investment professionals.
Bernstein previously was a partner at tech-focused venture firm FirstMark Capital, formerly known as Pequot Ventures. Pequot Ventures renamed itself when it spun out of parent hedge fund manager Pequot Capital last March, taking full responsibility for the unit’s $2 billion in assets under management.
At Aquiline, Bernstein will concentrate on technology-enabled financial services investments, a continuation of her specialty at FirstMark. Prior to joining Pequot, she was employed in the principal investments area of Goldman Sachs.
Before joining Aquiline, Rotman was head of alternative investments for the United States at Swiss Reinsurance Company after holding a variety of positions in the company’s private equity, corporate development and insurance-linked securities businesses. He was earlier the head of mergers and acquisitions at a publicly listed financial services company.
Rotman will focus on insurance and asset management investments in his position at Aquiline.
Earlier this month, Aquiline brought on Mark Graf, who was previously a partner at financial services-focused private equity firm Barrett Ellman Stoddard Capital Partners.
The three investment professionals follow last month’s hire of former E*TRADE Financial chief executive Mitchell Caplan as an executive advisor.
Aquiline specialises in financial services enterprises such as property and casualty insurance, specialty finance, securities, asset management, life insurance and transaction processing.
The firm, founded in 2005 as a joint venture between Venturion Capital and Marsh & McLennan chief Jeffrey Greenberg, closed its debut fund on $1.1 billion last year. Greenberg, the son of former AIG head Maurice “Hank” Greenberg, resigned from the insurance broker in 2004 amid bid-rigging and price-fixing allegations levied by then-New York attorney general Eliot Spitzer.
