Thomas Weisel to Cut 13 Percent of Workforce

Boutique investment bank Thomas Weisel Partners Group plans to reduce its workforce by 13 percent "over the next couple of weeks." In releasing its first-quarter results, the San Francisco firm said these reductions, combined with job cuts made earlier in the year, will total 160 employees. That will leave the firm with a staff of about 600 going forward.

At the same time, the firm said it "will continue to selectively upgrade its talent pool within revenue generation areas." It recently hired two salespeople in Boston, including a new area head of sales, Ken Murphy. It also added Eamon Hurley to its energy investment banking team, and researchers Kurt Molnar in Canada and Mike Scialla in the U.S. to cover oil and gas exploration and production. In addition, Heather Douglas joined the firm to cover large capitalization international gold companies within the mining sector.

For the quarter, TWP reported a net loss of $17.8 million, or 54 cents a share, on net revenues of $48.9 million. Adjusting for events related to its initial public offering and the amortization of intangible assets acquired along with Westwind Partners in January, the firm's non-GAAP net loss was $14.8 million, or $0.45 per share.

Separately, the firm says Paul Slivon will head its private client department, which has some $9 billion of assets under administration. He had been head of institutional sales. Tom Carbeau becomes head of institutional sales.