FOR IMMEDIATE DISTRIBUTION

JEFFERIES STRENGTHENS INDUSTRIAL INVESTMENT BANKING PRACTICE

Bill Parkerson Joins As Managing Director To Lead Chemicals Group

The Jefferies investment bank has hired Bill Parkerson as a managing director to head the Firm's US Chemicals investment banking team. Mr. Parkerson has more than 17 years of investment banking experience at firms including Goldman Sachs, CSFB, and Banc of America Securities, where he was most recently a managing director and global head of the chemicals investment banking effort. He joins Jefferies & Company, Inc., the principal operating subsidiary of Jefferies Group, Inc. (NYSE: JEF).

"Bill Parkerson will be responsible for building out Jefferies’ expertise and capabilities for chemicals companies as part of the Firm’s established Industrial Investment Banking effort," commented Chris Kanoff, Co-Head of Investment Banking at Jefferies. “This dynamic sector has both tremendous opportunity and complexity. Bill Parkerson’s investment banking experience, deep expertise in the sector and relationships within the chemicals community will make an immediate contribution to our industrial team."

Jefferies’ broader Industrial investment banking practice serves a wide range of sectors and works closely with the Firm’s cleantech and aerospace & defense teams. Other sectors of coverage within the Firm’s Industrial effort include: autos & transportation, building products, capital goods, diversified industrials, electrical equipment, environmental services, flow control, machinery, metals, paper & forest products, packaging, power & industrial technology, and security. The team completed 65 transactions valued at more than $18 billion in 2007.

As an investment banker, Mr. Parkerson has worked extensively on M&A and acquisition-related financings for high profile chemicals companies and financial sponsors, including DuPont, Koch Industries, Nalco, Airgas, Celanese, Univar, CVC and Blackstone, among others. He has an MBA from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and a bachelor’s degree from Harvard College.

About Jefferies

Jefferies, a global investment bank and institutional securities firm, has served growing and mid-sized companies and their investors for over 45 years. Headquartered in New York, with more than 25 offices around the world, Jefferies provides clients with capital markets and financial advisory services, institutional brokerage, securities research and asset management. The firm is a leading provider of trade execution in equity, high yield, convertible and international securities for institutional investors and high net worth individuals. Jefferies & Company, Inc. is the principal operating subsidiary of Jefferies Group, Inc. (NYSE: JEF; www.jefferies.com).


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