British American Tobacco reignited a relationship with former Schroders bankers to seal a deal for Ente Tabacchi, the former state-owned Italian tobacco group, for €2.3bn ($2.6bn).

BAT has traditionally been advised by Lazard, which provided the company's board with an independent opinion on price, but the bulk of the work was carried out by Citigroup's Ian Hart and Federico Buccellati, both of whom worked for Schroders prior to its acquisition by Citigroup in 2000.