We break down complicated enterprise information that will help you perceive how cash strikes in Chicago and the way it impacts you.
R.J. O’Brien & Associates, a family-owned agency intertwined with Chicago’s legacy within the world marketplace for futures buying and selling, mentioned Monday it’s being acquired by a New York-based firm in a money and inventory deal price $900 million.
StoneX Group, a Fortune 100 monetary providers supplier, mentioned it expects the sale will shut within the final half of 2025, pending regulatory overview. StoneX will take up the O’Brien agency’s 75,000 shopper accounts into its personal community of round 450,000 clients.
The Chicago firm, often called RJO for brief, ranks because the oldest unbiased futures brokerage within the U.S. It’s the final founding member of the Chicago Mercantile Alternate to outlive at this time.
RJO might be traced again to 1914, the early agricultural days of buying and selling right here, when founder John V. McCarthy used a pushcart to promote butter and eggs. In 1919, he and others based the Merc when it grew out of the outdated Chicago Butter and Egg Board.
He had a daughter that married into the O’Brien household and a enterprise dynasty developed through the years. The corporate expanded its buying and selling strains, joined the Chicago Board of Commerce and opened places of work abroad, turning into a drive in all futures markets. Right now, the Merc and the Board of Commerce function underneath a single company.
Sean O’Connor, government vice chairman of StoneX, mentioned the “transformational” sale will make his firm a frontrunner in buying and selling of derivatives, the broad title for choices and futures contracts.
Gerald Corcoran, RJO chairman and CEO, mentioned in a information launch, “We’re terribly enthusiastic about this partnership between two nice firms that every carry over a century of historical past within the futures trade and complementary capabilities, merchandise, providers, and cultures. We each prioritize a profound dedication to our shoppers and a give attention to prudent threat administration.”
Corcoran will proceed with StoneX in a “senior management position,” the businesses mentioned.
The R.J. O’Brien title will likely be saved “for a time period to be decided,” an RJO spokesperson mentioned. It’s not identified if the sale will result in layoffs, however StoneX estimates it is going to yield about $50 million in financial savings, largely by trimming redundant again workplace features.
RJO mentioned it has 590 staff, together with 300 in Chicago. “Chicago will completely stay an necessary a part of the material of the mixed firm,” the spokesperson mentioned.
Whereas RJO is generally held by the O’Brien household, possession has gone by modifications lately. John O’Brien Sr. and his father, Robert O’Brien Sr., each died in 2022. They have been a grandson and son-in-law, respectively, of McCarthy.
StoneX has about 4,400 staff. It mentioned RJO in 2024 had $766 million in income and $170 million in earnings earlier than curiosity, taxes, depreciation and amortization.
It mentioned it is going to situation debt to finance the $625 million money portion of the acquisition. The steadiness will come from issuing about 3.5 million shares of StoneX inventory, which ended Monday’s buying and selling at $79.10 a share. The customer assumes $143 million of RJO debt.
“So a lot of our members of the family have been privileged to steer the corporate and supply steerage and counsel. We really feel so near our shoppers, brokers and staff; they’re prolonged household to us,” RJO board member Bob O’Brien Jr. mentioned in a information launch. “This merger is the pure subsequent step within the historical past of the corporate, and the O’Brien household is keen about taking part in a brand new position as main shareholders in one other nice firm that may construct on that legacy.”
