Triago loses two senior secondaries execs as war for talent heats up

The secondaries advisory market is seeing high levels of turnover as new advisory and principal investing shops spring up to meet demand.

As demand for secondaries talent rises to a pitched level, two senior secondaries professionals at Triago, David Markson and James Fish, left to take jobs at Evercore, sources told Buyouts.

Update: Also, Mike Bynarowicz, principal at Triago, left and joined Evercore, sources told Buyouts.

Markson, a managing partner at Triago, Fish, partner at Triago and Bynarowicz will join Evercore’s secondaries advisory group, which has been the leader since last year in deal volume, sources said. A spokesperson for Evercore did not return a comment request Monday.

A Triago spokesperson confirmed the departures. Triago announced Monday it had hired Michael Pilson as a partner and Marc Fitorre as a principal on the secondaries advisory team.

Pilson joined from Eaton Partners, where he worked as a managing director on GP secondaries advisory in the Americas. Fitorre joined from Cebile Capital, where he led secondaries execution and origination in the Americas and Asia-Pacific. (A spokesperson with Cebile disputed that Fitorre led secondaries execution and origination in the Americas and Asia-Pacific and said he was a vice president who worked at Cebile for nine months. His biography on Cebile’s website lists him as a vice president and doesn’t describe him as leading execution and origination.)

The two hires complement Triago’s 11-person secondaries advisory team.

The secondaries advisory market is seeing high levels of turnover as new advisory and principal investing shops spring up to meet demand. GPs and limited partners are keen to use the secondaries market as a tool for private equity portfolio management, as well as to extend hold periods over treasured assets.

Activity involves well-established groups expanding, and the formation of new teams to take advantage of the demand for secondary options across market size. GP-led deals for the first time last year outpaced traditional LP portfolio sales, taking a slight majority of market volume, according to Evercore’s year-end 2020 activity report.

However, LP portfolio sales are expected to make a comeback this year and advisers are gearing up for what they anticipate will be a flood of deals. One newish firm, Brant Street Capital, is preparing for heavy selling in the second half of the year, founder Gary Gill told Buyouts in a recent interview.

Update: This report has been updated to include perspective from a Cebile Capital spokesperson on the nature of Marc Fitorre’s role with the firm. Also, the report was updated to include information that Fish and Bynarowicz left to join Evercore.