Edmund de Rothschild, Ex-NM Rothschild Chairman, Dies at Age 93

Edmund de Rothschild, Ex-NM Rothschild Chairman, Dies at Age 93

By Jacqueline Simmons and Ambereen Choudhury

Jan. 20 (Bloomberg) — Edmund de Rothschild, who oversaw the family’s London-based investment bank NM Rothschild & Sons in the first half of the 1970s, has died at the age of 93.

Rothschild, who became a partner at the bank in 1946 before taking over as chairman in 1970, died on Jan. 17, the bank said today. He stepped down as chairman in 1975.

During the 1960s, he helped the firm arrange Eurobond sales in Japan, working with clients including Hitachi and Pioneer, according to Niall Ferguson’s family history, “The House of Rothschild.” He was also deputy chairman of British Newfoundland Corp., a Canadian hydro-electricity generation project, between 1963 and 1969.

As Chairman of NM Rothschild, he ended the firm’s status as a private partnership and opened up the firm to non-family members, according to the Daily Telegraph, which reported his death earlier today. He also rebuilt the firm’s New Court offices in London’s financial district, the newspaper reported.

The son of Lionel de Rothschild and Marie-Louise Eugenie Beer, he was educated at Harrow School and Trinity College, Cambridge. During the Second World War, he served with the Royal Artillery in France, North Africa and later Italy.

Rothschild’s hobbies included fishing and gardening. He also worked for charities including the Queens Nursing Institute, and the Association of Jewish Ex-Servicemen and Women.

He married Elizabeth Lentner in 1948 and together they had two sons and two daughters. She died in 1980 and two years later, he married again to Anne Harrison.

To contact the reporters on this story: Ambereen Choudhury in London at achoudhury@bloomberg.net

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