A star Wall Street banker has made a killing on 'Merger Monday'

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The Wall Street boutique adviser M. Klein & Co. landed a major role on a big merger on Monday.

The firm, led by ex-Citigroup dealmaker Michael Klein, is the lead adviser to the analytics company IHS in its $13 billion merger with Markit.

That's pretty impressive for a four-year-old firm with about 20 employees. It's even more notable because IHS' usual advisor is Goldman Sachs.

Goldman is still on the deal, but is acting as a secondary advisor to IHS. Together, Klein and Goldman Sachs are expected to bring in $28-35 million in fees, according to Freeman & Co.

JPMorgan is advising Markit and will earn $24-30 million in fees, according to Freeman.

The IHS-Markit deal is one of several announced over the past two days. Paint giant Sherwin-Williams announced a deal on Sunday to acquire the coatings company Valspar in a $11.3 billion deal, and on Monday Marriott announced an increased offer to acquire Starwood, topping the $13 billion offer made last week by the Chinese insurance giant Anbang.

Klein, who started his firm as a one-man-band in 2012, landed a major role on the $130 billion Dow-DuPont deal announced in December.

He spent more than two decades at Citigroup, rising to the role of CEO of global banking and then moving to Europe to take responsibility for a build out of the bank's investment-banking business in the region. He left Citigroup in 2008, and was paid north of $25 million to not compete with the firm.

He has since taken a number of roles advising on deals on his own. He advised Barclays on the acquisition of Lehman Brothers' assets, and later helped Dubai work through debt issues on the Dubai World project. In 2012, Klein secured a role on the $41 billion Glencore-Xstrata deal.

Now Klein is expanding his firm, and had around 20 employees as of January. He's also extending his presence into London and Beijing. 

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