Take Your Partners : Orion, the Consortium Banks and the Transformation of the Euromarkets

Marking the 30th anniversary of the formation of Orion Bank in 1970, financial historian Richard Roberts has written a history of Orion and the rise and decline of the consortium banking movement. Consortium banks were formed as joint ventures to enable banks to operate in the booming Euromarkets, with virtually every major international bank participating in a consortium bank during their heyday in the 1970s and 1980s. Orion Bank was one of the leading players in the Euromarkets in those decades: its shareholders were six of the biggest banks in the world from the three major trading blocks: Chase Manhattan, Royal Bank of Canada, NatWest, Westdeutsche Landesbank, Credito Italiano and Mitsubishi Bank. Like other consortiums banks, Orion Bank was prominent in Eurocurrency syndicated lending, but more unusually, it was also a top Eurobond lead manager. The story of Orion exemplifies the tensions inherent in the joint venture approach to business development and the strategic dilemmas facing consortium bank managements and shareholders. Richard Roberts uses primary archival papers and interviews with former Orion executives and other bankers prominent in consortium and investment banking to present an authoritative case study with great topical relevance as today's European banking industry continues to integrate across borders. Take Your Partners is also an invaluable source of reference for anyone with an interest in the Euromarkets and the development of international banking. Cover......Page 1 Contents......Page 4 Foreword......Page 5 Preface and Acknowledgements......Page 6 List of Tables......Page 9 List of Plates......Page 11 Acknowledgements and Notes for End Papers and Plates......Page 13 Prologue: Meeting in Manhattan......Page 18 1 Origins of the Euromarkets......Page 20 2 Rise of consortium banking......Page 34 3 Formation of Orion......Page 58 4 Orion gets going......Page 72 5 Stormy weather: Montagu takes the helm......Page 94 6 Petrodollars......Page 108 7 Competition and innovation......Page 128 8 Shareholders and management......Page 146 9 Swimming against the tide......Page 162 10 Orion Royal Bank......Page 178 11 Decline of consortium banking......Page 194 12 Consortia and strategic alliances in finance......Page 218 Epilogue: The legacy of Orion......Page 228 Appendix I: Chronology 1963–89......Page 230 Appendix II: Euromarket consortium banks......Page 258 Appendix III: European banking clubs......Page 314 Appendix IV: Orion directors and financial statistics......Page 326 Appendix V: The Orion shareholders in 1970......Page 332 Notes and references......Page 340 Index......Page 368 This book tells the story of the rise and fall of London's consortium banks-specialist joint venture banks formed to operate in the Euromarkets-from the mid-1960s to the 1990s. It focuses in particular on Orion Bank, the leading consortium bank, formed in 1970 by six of the world's biggest banks. Orion and other consortium banks were prominent players in the petrodollar recycling boom, until they succumbed in the 1980s to the Third World debt crisis and to competition from their parent banks.

Author Biography: Richard Roberts is Reader in Business History, University of Sussex.

Author Biography: Christopher Arnander is a banker who worked closely with Orion Bank.

Annotation On the 30th anniversary of the formation of Orion Bank in 1970, Roberts (business history, U. of Sussex) traces the rise and decline of the consortium banking movement, in which banks formed joint ventures to allow them to operate in the booming Euromarkets. He uses Orion to illustrate the tensions inherent in the joint venture approach to business development and the strategic dilemmas facing consortium bank managements and shareholders. c. Book News Inc Consortium banks were creatures of the Euromarkets, and it is with the rise of the Eurodollar that their story begins.