A boutique investment bank is a small investment bank that specializes in at least one aspect of investment banking, generally corporate finance, although some banks' strengths are retail in nature, such as Charles Schwab. Of those involved in corporate finance, capital raising, mergers and acquisitions and restructuring and reorganizations are their primary activities. Boutiques usually provide advisory and consulting services, but lack capacity to provide funding. After the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act, investment banks have either had a retail deposit base (JPMorgan Chase, Citi, Bank of America) or have had funding from overseas owners or from Wealth Management arms (UBS, Deutsche Bank, Morgan Stanley). Boutique banks on the other hand often turn to other banks to provide funding or deal directly with capital rich firms such as insurers to provide capital for deals.
Boutique investment banks generally work on smaller deals involving middle-market companies, and usually assist on the sell or buy-side in mergers and acquisitions transactions. In addition, they often specialize in certain industries such as media, healthcare, industrials, technology or energy. Some banks may specialize in certain types of transactions, such as capital raising or mergers and acquisitions, or restructuring and reorganization. Typically, boutique investment banks may have a limited number of offices and may specialize in certain geographic regions, thus the moniker 'regional investment bank'. Traditionally, boutique investment banks are specialized in certain fields of corporate finance and thus not full-service. However, the term is often used for non-bulge bracket full-service investment banks, banks that are also known as middle-market investment banks.
