James Stone Joins Imperial Capital as a Managing Director, Corporate Finance

LOS ANGELES, CA--(Marketwire - April 21, 2009) - Imperial Capital announced that James Stone has joined the Firm as a Managing Director in the Corporate Finance Group, based out of Imperial's New York Office. Mr. Stone will focus on private equity and other financial sponsor clients and has more than seventeen years of investment banking experience, most recently at Credit Suisse, where he worked for the last ten years.

"We are very excited to have James Stone join us at this very important time in Imperial Capital's growth. His experience with financial sponsors will be a valuable asset to the firm and will bolster our ability to provide key services in this arena," commented Jason Reese, CEO of Imperial Capital. "James Stone's long standing relationships with private equity firms and significant capital market expertise further expands our client offering," said Chris Shepard, Managing Director and Co-Head of Corporate Finance.

Prior to Imperial, Stone was a Managing Director with Credit Suisse and Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette for nearly 10 years in the Leveraged Loan Capital Markets Group and the Financial Sponsor Coverage Group. Mr. Stone has broad experience working with private equity firms and corporate clients across a wide range of advisory and capital market transactions. "I think Imperial Capital is uniquely positioned to advise the financial sponsor community given the firm's superior advisory services and expertise across the capital structure," said Stone.

About Imperial Capital, LLC

Founded in 1997, Imperial Capital (www.imperialcapital.com) is a full-service investment banking firm based in Los Angeles, with offices in New York, San Francisco, and Whitefish, Montana. The firm currently employs over 150 professionals and offers a wide range of sophisticated, value-added products and services to institutional investors and middle market companies. Imperial Capital specializes in the research and sales and trading of high yield and distressed debt securities, bank debt, convertible bonds, preferred stocks, and equities. Imperial Capital's investment banking group provides M&A, capital raising, restructuring and recapitalization advisory, valuation, fairness, and solvency opinions and strategic market advisory services to middle market companies.