Bankers Hit With Millions in Breakup Fees for Ditching New Jobs

  • Jefferies is seeking to collect $4 million from banker
  • Damages clauses becoming more common in recruitment deals
Jefferies headquarters in New YorkPhotographer: Jeenah Moon/Bloomberg
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Bankers are applying the idea of a “breakup fee,” a longtime fixture in corporate takeovers, to a very different kind of acquisition target: each other.

This story begins happily enough, with a nearly $10 million offer from Jefferies Financial Group Inc. The lucky hire was Dean Decker, a rainmaker at Credit Suisse Group AG.