UPDATE 2-Investment bank Greenhill Q1 profit falls 28 pct

* Q1 EPS $0.47 vs estimates of $0.59/shr

* Total revenue down 18 pct

* Financial advisory fees down 6 pct

* Shares fall 5 pct (Recasts, adds details, background, share movement)

April 23 (Reuters) - Boutique investment bank Greenhill & Co Inc (GHL.N), which specializes in deal-advisory work, reported a larger-than-expected fall in quarterly profit, hurt by fewer completed assignments in its advisory business.

However, financing advisory and restructuring business has seen a substantial increase in activity in recent months, and Greenhill expects that the trend to continue as more companies face financing and restructuring challenges, it said.

Companies providing advisory services are expected to see a rise in business as the turmoil in the financial markets leads to a rising number of companies heading for bankruptcy and restructuring.

Greenhill said it has seen a recent increase in new merger and acquisition assignments, some of which relate to financial distress but many others are simply strategic transactions in consolidating industries.

Very recently, the company was the financial advisor for Swiss drugmaker Roche Holding AG in its $46.8 billion buyout of Genentech.

Net income for the first quarter was $13.9 million, or 47 cents a share, compared with $19.2 million, or 68 cents a share, in the year-ago quarter.

Analysts on average had expected the company to earn 59 cents a share, according to Reuters Estimates.

Total revenue fell to $61.8 million and was well short of analysts' estimates of $70.6 million.

Financial advisory fees, the largest contributor to total revenue, fell 6 percent to $65.1 million.

Shares of the company were down 5 percent at $77.94 in morning trade on the New York Stock Exchange. The stock has gained 30 percent in value in the past 12 months. (Reporting by Sweta Singh in Bangalore; Editing by Anil D'Silva and Gopakumar Warrier)