NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Lightyear Capital LLC, a New York-based private equity firm focused on financial services investments, is pleased to announce a number of promotions in key positions across the firm.

• Jay Comerford has been promoted to Managing Director and appointed to Lightyear’s Investment Committee.
• Max Rakhlin has been promoted to Managing Director and appointed to Lightyear’s Investment Committee.

In addition, Lightyear has promoted Christian Fleming to Senior Associate, Ina Leonova to Assistant Controller and Kern Vohra to Senior Associate.

“The deep domain expertise and commitment of Lightyear’s team remain crucial to our success and we are proud to recognize the continued contributions of these professionals,” said Mark F. Vassallo, Managing Partner of Lightyear.

“Jay and Max have been instrumental in the execution of several investments in financial technology, wealth management, and tech-enabled business services, and have demonstrated an outstanding ability to drive value creation in partnership with management teams.”

Prior to joining Lightyear in 2007, Mr. Comerford was an Investment Banking Analyst in the financial institutions group at Banc of America Securities, where he focused on mergers and acquisitions, leveraged buyouts, and capital raises. Previously, Mr. Comerford was an Investment Specialist at Pimco Advisors, an investment management firm. Mr. Comerford began his career at Cohen, Duffy & McGowan, where he traded equity options.

Prior to joining Lightyear in 2015, Mr. Rakhlin worked at Goldman Sachs in the financial institutions group, where he focused on advising clients on mergers and acquisitions, leveraged buyouts, and capital raises. Mr. Rakhlin began his career as a consultant at Towers Perrin, today a part of Willis Towers Watson.

About Lightyear Capital LLC

Founded in 2000, Lightyear Capital is a financial services-focused private equity firm based in New York. Through its affiliated private equity funds, Lightyear makes primarily control investments in North America-based, middle-market companies across the financial services spectrum, including asset and wealth management, banking, brokerage, healthcare financial services, insurance, payments and processing, and specialty finance. The firm brings focus and discipline to its investment process, as well as operating, transaction and strategic management experience, along with significant contacts and resources beyond capital. For more information, please visit www.lycap.com.