Boutique Investment Bank Bets on Brazil Debt-Advisory Business

With about 25% of large Brazilian companies struggling with high leverage, Ricardo Lacerda says he’s expanding his boutique investment bank’s debt-restructuring advisory services.

“Brazilian companies as a whole are in good financial health, but some took on too much debt for investments or acquisitions when interest rates were low,” Lacerda, chief executive officer of BR Advisory Partners Participacoes SA, said in an interview. “Those investments didn’t work out, and then interest rates went up, and all this ended up strangling these companies a bit.”

BR Partners CEO Ricardo Lacerda

Photographer: Victor Moriyama/Bloomberg

Among his clients is the waste-management company Ambipar Participações e Empreendimentos SA, which hired ...