MAKING EVERY MOMENT COUNT
Turning on a group of seventh-graders about the
excitement of high finance may be difficult for some, but when
First Boston Corp. director Frederick Terrell needs help, he pulls
out his heavy ammunition, comedian Eddie Murphy. Last spring,
Terrell used key scenes from Murphy's hit movie Trading Places
when discussing commodities with a predominantly black inner-city
class at Joan of Arc Junior High School in New York City.
Terrell, who has made a three-year commitment
to teach this class twice a month, explains that there is really
little difference in intellect between a stock broker and the
street hustler character played by Murphy in the movie. He explains
to his class: "The important thing is to get the guy who
could become a street hustler the training he needs to be on Wall
Street instead." Growing up in La Puente, Calif., where very
few children in his neighborhood ever go to college, Terrell is
very concerned about reaching out to minority youngsters.
After receiving his bachelor's from La Verne College,
Terrell pursued a master's degree in urban studies from Occidental
College. Upon graduating and completing a post-graduate fellowship
with the Coro Foundation, Terrell worked as a deputy to Los Angeles
City Council President John Ferraro. But Terrell wasn't interested
in a career in government, so he went to the Yale School of Management.
He spent a summer with First Boston's public finance group in
1981 and returned after graduation the following year.
At 37, Terrell is a senior banker in his 50-member
Mortgage Markets Group. On any given transaction he may have from
20 to 39 people reporting directly to him. He has primary responsibility
for all transactions for federal agencies, including the Department
of Veterans Affairs and the Resolution Trust Corp. (RTC), which
divides about $1 trillion of business a year among a handful of
prominent investment houses. The RTC account has been one of the
firm's most important business opportunities since the inception
of the agency in 1989. In fact, First Boston is considered a forerunner
in investment banks that have developed federal finance groups.
Last spring, Terrell led two back-to-back $1 billion
securitization transactions for the RTC, the second of which,
he notes, was the largest commercial securitization deal ever
done. At roughly the same time, Terrell was at work on a $390
million transaction for Veterans Affairs. The deal, which featured
the use of Guaranteed REMIC Pass-Through Certificates, was the
first of its kind.
During his progression from associate to director,
Terrell worked in municipal finance where he helped establish
an innovative derivatives products group. In 1986, he transferred
to investment banking. It is in his current area that Terrell
says he is "able to combine all of the things I'd been working
on. Asset securitization is one of the more powerful ideas to
come into capital markets. I wanted to be associated with a product
that had legs, something that was going to be around for a long
time."
Terrell credits his own "aggressiveness,
initiative and luck, and knack of making a good impression in
five minutes" for his success. He adds: "I think I've
used my five minutes to better advantage than some."
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