Kane & Company Expands Senior Leadership Team with Appointments of Stuart Skeates and Jacob Hormes

DALLAS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Mar 17, 2026--

Kane & Company Insights LLC (“Kane & Company” or the “Firm”), a commercial due diligence advisory firm serving private equity investors, today announced the appointments of Stuart Skeates as Partner and Chief Operating Officer in the Firm’s newly established Washington, D.C. office, and Jacob Hormes as Partner in its Dallas headquarters.

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Kane & Company was founded to deliver focused, senior-led commercial due diligence that effectively answers the critical questions driving clients’ investment decisions. The Firm’s differentiated approach challenges the traditional consulting model in commercial due diligence, in which consulting firms often produce costly, dense, and imprecise deliverables created by junior team members. Skeates’ and Hormes’ additions strengthen Kane & Company’s ability to deliver on the Firm’s mission while broadening its geographic presence and deepening its expertise across technology, consumer, healthcare, industrials, and business services.

“We are thrilled to welcome Stuart and Jacob, who share our view that commercial due diligence should be treated as a true partnership with the deal team that helps shape the investment decision, rather than a procedural rubber stamp at the end of a deal process,” said Mark Kane, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Kane & Company. “Their experience advising investors and commitment to a senior-led approach will help us to continue delivering deeper insights and clearer answers for private equity clients. Stuart’s addition also establishes Kane & Company’s presence in Washington, D.C., an important step in our strategy to build a national platform for delivering senior-led diligence to private equity investors.”

Stuart Skeates joins as Partner and Chief Operating Officer

Skeates brings more than a decade of experience advising investors on due diligence, value creation, and strategy. He previously spent nine years at McKinsey & Company, working across the firm’s London and Washington, D.C. offices. During that time, he supported private equity investors on commercial due diligence and post-investment strategy across sectors including technology, industrials, financial services, retail, healthcare, and the green economy. He is also a seasoned operator, having successfully acquired and expanded a chain of children’s gymnastics facilities in the Washington, D.C. area. Skeates earned his MBA at Harvard Business School and his BSc in economics at the University of Nottingham.

At Kane & Company, Skeates will lead due diligence engagements across the technology, industrials, and telecommunications sectors and oversee the Firm’s operations from its new office in Washington, D.C.

“The best commercial due diligence happens when experienced practitioners are deeply involved in the work alongside the client deal team — speaking directly with customers and experts, interpreting the results, and building and presenting recommendations to the client,” said Skeates. “Kane & Company was built around that principle, and I’m excited to help bring our approach to more private equity investors as we establish the Firm’s presence in the nation’s capital.”

Jacob Hormes joins as Partner

Hormes brings more than a decade of consulting and private equity advisory experience, including ten years at Bain & Company, where he specialized in due diligence and growth strategy engagements for private equity clients. His experience spans consumer, retail, and business services sectors, including diligence engagements across retail, hospitality, consumer products, managed services, last-mile delivery, and commercial insurance.

Hormes is an experienced operator, having sourced, acquired, operated, and exited a number of businesses across baked goods, salons, and bars in the Dallas-Ft. Worth area. He holds an MBA from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management and a bachelor’s degree from Vanderbilt University.

“Too often commercial due diligence turns into a bloated process that produces hundreds of pages that fail to answer the critical questions that actually determine the viability of an investment opportunity,” said Hormes. “I was drawn to Kane & Company because they understand the quality of the output, the seniority of the team, the flexibility of the engagement, and the closeness of the partnership are the metrics that matter most. I look forward to working alongside Mark, Stuart, and the full Kane & Company team to deliver clear answers to our clients’ most important questions.”

A new model for commercial due diligence

Kane & Company employs a new model for commercial due diligence that combines the rigor of top-tier consulting firms with the flexibility and focus of specialized diligence partners.

The Firm tailors the scope and pace of each engagement to the priorities and timing needs of its clients. Instead of relying on the traditional consulting staffing pyramid or a standardized diligence process, Kane & Company deploys small, senior teams that focus exclusively on the analyses most likely to shape the investment decision. The result is a partnership with the sponsor deal team in which experienced practitioners execute at every phase of the engagement to deliver clear, focused answers within the required timeframe, rather than junior analysts executing rigid processes built around a standardized set of diligence questions.

About Founder and Chief Executive Officer Mark Kane

Mark Kane spent the first eight years of his career in Bain & Company’s Private Equity Group, serving clients across a variety of industries from Bain’s Dallas, New York, and Mexico City offices. He brings deep experience serving clients in healthcare, healthcare IT, technology, industrials, business services, and consumer. After Bain, he began serving PE clients independently before founding Kane & Company in 2024.

Kane earned his MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, and his bachelor’s degree from the University of Pennsylvania.

About Kane & Company

Kane & Company is a commercial due diligence advisory firm serving private equity investors across a variety of industries, including healthcare, technology, consumer, industrials, and business services. The Firm is built on the belief that delivering focused answers to the critical questions driving clients’ investment decisions leads to better investment outcomes. Kane & Company partners bring experience from leading consulting firms including Bain & Company and McKinsey & Company. The Firm serves leading private equity firms across the U.S. from its headquarters in Dallas and its office in Washington, D.C. Learn more at www.kanecdd.com.

From left to right: Jacob Hormes, Mark Kane, Stuart Skeates

NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks are rising Tuesday, led by airlines still seeing customers want to fly despite worries about the economy. That's despite another climb for oil prices because of the war with Iran.

The S&P 500 added 0.7%, coming off its best day since the war began. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 352 points, or 0.8%, as of 10 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.7% higher.

It’s a break, for now at least, from the usual playbook since the start of the war, where stock prices have tended to go in the opposite direction of oil prices. The fear in financial markets has been that a long-term disruption to the global flow of oil because of the war could send prices so high for so long that it damages the global economy.

On Tuesday, the price for a barrel of benchmark U.S. crude rose 1.8% to $95.18. Brent crude, the international standard, climbed 1.4% to $101.63. But they pared even bigger gains from earlier in the morning, and they're still below where oil prices were at the end of last week.

Delta Air Lines also offered an encouraging signal about the strength of the economy after raising its forecast for revenue for the first three months of 2026. It said it’s seen demand to fly accelerate into March from both businesses and households.

Of course, it’s also having to pay higher prices for jet fuel because of the spike in oil prices. But it said the strong demand for flights could nevertheless allow it to report profit for the start of 2026 that’s in line with its earlier forecast.

Delta’s stock flew 5% higher, and it helped other airline stocks trim their own sharp losses for the year so far. United Airlines climbed 2.8%, and Southwest Airlines rose 3.4%.

American Airlines gained 3.8% after saying it's also likely to report stronger growth in revenue for the start of this year than it had forecast earlier.

Other areas of the market whose profits are closely tied to the economy's strength were likewise rising. JPMorgan Chase climbed 1.2% and was one of the strongest forces lifting the S&P 500.

Some beaten-down stocks in the financial industry recovered losses from earlier in the year, including companies swept up in worries about whether software businesses and other industries potentially under threat will pay back all their loans. Blue Owl Capital gained 5%, and Ares Management rose 5.1%.

Another big winner was Uber Technologies, which rose 5.7% after announcing an expansion of its partnership with Nvidia. They plan to launch a fleet of autonomous vehicles using Nvidia’s technology, beginning with Los Angeles and San Francisco in the first half of next year.

The U.S. stock market has a track record of bouncing back relatively quickly from military conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, as long as oil prices don’t stay too high for too long. Many professional investors are expecting that to be the case again, which has helped keep U.S. stock prices near their record levels.

For all its dramatic swings over the last couple weeks, including several that struck hour to hour, the S&P 500 is only 3.3% below its all-time high.

That's even as Treasury yields have climbed on expectations that higher oil prices will keep the Federal Reserve from resuming its cuts to interest rates for a while. Higher yields push downward on prices for stocks and all kinds of investments.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury eased to 4.20% from 4.23% late Monday, but it remains well above the 3.97% level it was at before the war with Iran began.

The Fed will make its next announcement on interest rates Wednesday afternoon, and traders see virtually no chance of a cut, according to data from CME Group.

Cuts to interest rates by the Fed would give the economy and job market a boost, and President Donald Trump has been calling for them angrily. But reductions would also worsen inflation.

In Australia, the central bank is actually raising interest rates. Citing higher fuel prices, the Reserve Bank of Australia made its first hike since November 2023.

In stock markets abroad, European indexes rose following a mixed finish in Asia. Indexes rose 1% in London and fell 0.9% in Shanghai for two of the world’s bigger moves.

AP Writers Matt Ott, Elaine Kurtenbach and Rod McGuirk contributed.

Philip Finale works on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange in New York, Tuesday, March 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

Traders work on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange in New York, Tuesday, March 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

Traders work on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange in New York, Tuesday, March 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

Screens display financial information on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange in New York, Tuesday, March 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

People stand in front of a stock price monitor showing Nikkei index at a security company Tuesday, March 17, 2026, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

A person stands near a stock price monitor showing Nikkei 225 index at a security company Tuesday, March 17, 2026, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

A person looks at a stock price monitor showing New York Dow and Nikkei indexes also US dollar Japanese yen exchange rate at a security company Tuesday, March 17, 2026, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

A person walks near a stock price monitor showing Nikkei index at a security company Tuesday, March 17, 2026, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)