Bruce Wasserstein, the head of the Lazard investment bank and "the father of modern M&A", died yesterday after a career that put him at the centre of global dealmaking from the go-go days of the 1980s to the current Kraft bid for Cadbury.

During more than three decades in banking, Mr Wasserstein, who was 61, was regarded as one of Wall Street's most influential bankers, advising on daring takeovers such as KKR's $31.4bn hostile bid for RJR Nabisco - chronicled in the book Barbarians at the Gate - and the mega-merger of AOL and Time Warner.