Financial services consultancy Sionic adds James Monahan as partner

Sionic, a London-based financial services-focused consulting firm, has welcomed James Monahan as partner and head of the firm’s new asset servicing team. Monahan is one of the leading experts in asset servicing, and brings 30+ years of global operations management experience to Sionic.

Asset servicing denotes the collection and tracking of payments due to asset owners, with servicers pursuing defaulted assets (like mortgages, for example) to maximize recoveries for the owner.

James Monahan has watched the asset servicing industry grow and evolve for more than 30 years, and has built up deep expertise across operations and change management, as well as risk mitigation and management.

He most recently served as executive director and head of Americas institutional global asset servicing at Morgan Stanley, where he spent ten years. He also previously held the role of asset servicing regional head for North America at Morgan Stanley.

Prior to that, Monahan was a principal at Banc of America and Merrill Lynch, where he was responsible for asset servicing for retail and institutional clients. Before that he worked in mortgage sales at Main Street Funding. Monahan started his career at Merrill Lynch, where he spent 18 years and held numerous senior roles.

“Asset servicing is a multi-billion dollar market in which James is both an expert and a pioneer,” John Byrne, Sionic managing partner, said. “He has played a foundational role in some of the biggest developments in the brokerage industry, becoming a leading expert in the field and one of the industry’s most respected line and project managers.  We are excited that he has chosen to join Sionic and look forward to working with him in collaboration with the rest of our expert teams to develop our asset servicing specialism worldwide.” 

Monahan added, “I’ve been privileged to have a front row seat in the growth of the global asset servicing industry for more than 30 years – often sitting in the hot seat, dealing with some of its toughest challenges. I’ve also known the original Sionic team for many years and I’m delighted to be joining a truly specialist, global firm growing at such pace.”

In April, NYC-based Sionic Advisors merged with London-based Catalyst Development, backed by investment from private equity firm Livingbridge. The two firms had a similar employee footprint (160 employees) and specialization, focusing on advisory offerings to the financial services industry – including strategy & operations, risk & regulatory compliance, technology, and change management.

The deal created one of the larger global financial services sector consultancies, with 300+ employees in nine offices across North America, Europe, and Asia, and annual revenue of more than $60 million. A year earlier, Livingbridge had backed Catalyst’s acquisition of wealth management specialist Knadel.

The merged firms rebranded as Sionic in the summer, and appointed Sionic Advisors cofounder Craig Sher as the CEO of the new consulting firm.