Piper Jaffray

Piper Sandler traces its roots to 1895 when George Lane established George B. Lane, Commercial Paper and Collateral Loans & Co., a commercial paper brokerage, in Minneapolis. In 1913, Piper, Jaffray Co. was established as another commercial paper business by H.C. Piper Sr. and Clive Palmer Jaffray. In 1917, George B. Lane & Co. merged with Piper, Jaffray & Co. to form Lane, Piper & Jaffray.The firm first obtained a seat on the New York Stock Exchange in 1931 with the acquisition of Hopwood & Company, which had been devastated by the stock market crash. In 1971, Piper first offered stock to the public and became a publicly held corporation known as Piper, Jaffray & Hopwood Incorporated. Later, in 1986, Piper's common stock began trading on the NASDAQ under the ticker symbol PIPR. In 1997, the firm was acquired by U.S. Bancorp, also based in Minneapolis, for $730 million in cash. From 1999 to 2003, the firm was known as U.S. Bancorp Piper Jaffray. In 2003, U.S. Bancorp spun off Piper Jaffray in a stock dividend to its shareholders, making the company independent once again under the symbol PJC. In 2006, the company sold its brokerage business to Zurich-based UBS for $510 million in cash. The business had approximately 800 brokers at that time.

On July 9, 2019, Piper Jaffray announced they were purchasing fellow investment bank Sandler O'Neill for $485M. The new combined entity was going to be named Piper Sandler Cos, and Piper Jaffray CEO Chad Abraham would continue to lead the combined company.