Capital America Executive Steps Down

Capital Co. of America Vice Chairman Ethan Penner, one of Wall Street’s highest-paid executives, quit the real estate finance company after clashes with his bosses at Nomura Securities Co. and losing $200 million on loans, people familiar with Penner said. Penner, 37, who earned $93 million over the last three years at Nomura, is said to be preparing to start his own finance company. Penner’s departure is a dramatic turn of events for Nomura, Japan’s biggest securities firm, because the company started San Francisco-based Capital America last year partly as a means to keep Penner from departing. In his six years at the firm, Penner sometimes was responsible for most of the earnings of Nomura’s U.S. subsidiary, Nomura Holdings America Inc.