SNL Financial - History

History

SNL Financial was founded in 1987 in Hoboken, New Jersey by Reid and Jessica Nagle; Reid is still the company’s chairman. SNL began coverage of the thrift industry that same year, then launched coverage of banks in 1989 when it moved to its current headquarters in Charlottesville, Virginia. In 1992, Inc. Magazine recognized SNL as one of America’s 500 fastest-growing private companies.

SNL added coverage of non-bank financial sectors in 1993; real estate in 1994; insurance in 1997; and energy in 2000. Also in 2000, Mike Chinn became company president after starting his SNL career in 1994.

In 2001, SNL launched SNL IR Solutions, its investor relations Web site hosting service. SNL acquired Y-Merge in 2002, headed by Will Pappas who subsequently joined SNL’s board and became Managing Director of Sales.

SNL started expanding its operations globally in 2003 by establishing an office in India, followed by office openings in Pakistan (2005) and London (2007). In the U.S., SNL established an Arlington, Virginia office in 2004 following its acquisition of Io Energy LLC, and a Jersey City, New Jersey office in 2005 following its acquisition of Regulatory Research Associates, Inc. SNL opened a Boston, Massachusetts office in 2008, a Boulder, Colorado office in 2009 and a Richmond, Virginia office in 2010.

After launching coverage of the media & communications sector in 2006, SNL acquiried Kagan Research, a long-time provider of proprietary analysis on the media industry, forming SNL Kagan with an accompanying office in Monterey, California.

SNL expanded its information service outside of the U.S. in 2007 by including coverage of the public real estate market in Europe and the Asia-Pacific region.

In 2008, SNL added statutory insurance data to its product offering, and in 2011, the company launched European banking coverage.

On July 26, 2011, SNL Financial announced that New Mountain Capital had acquired a majority equity stake in the company In August, SNL Financial was named for the fourth year running to Inc. Magazine's Inc. 5000 List, a ranking of the fastest growing private companies in the U.S. On September 28, 2011, SNL Financial acquired Highline Data from Summit Business Media. This transaction positioned SNL Insurance, a division of SNL, as the new standard for insurance information. On November 17, 2011, SNL Financial acquired Datatrac's interest rate data products, further strengthening SNL's product for financial institutions.

2012 marked SNL Financial's 25th anniversary. SNL's product offerings continued to expand with three acquisitions to date. First, a March 19 acquisition of MediaCensus, the flagship data product from MediaBiz. Then on July 11, SNL Financial announced the acquisition of SwiftKnowledge, a leading web-based bank reporting and analysis application, and simultaneous launch of SNLBanker. SNL's third acquisition in 2012 was announced on October 17, in which SNL entered the metals & mining sector through the acquisition of Metals Economics Group (MEG), a leading provider of global mining industry information and analysis. The new division of SNL was named SNL Metals Economics Group. 2012 also marked SNL Financial's expansion into the Asia-Pacific region, with new offices opened in Hong Kong, Singapore and Manila. As of August 21, 2012, SNL Financial was named one of Inc. 5000's Fast Growing Companies for the fifth consecutive year.