Bidding war for Asia banking talent continues
The mighty grip of the recession has only just loosened its chokehold - and the ripple effects of the crisis are certainly being more than felt around the world as unemployment remains a pressing concern - but some banks in Europe and the US do not seem to view this as a difficulty. Indeed, it would appear that there are not enough candidates to go around.
Institutions such as Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Citigroup and UBS - all of whom received state aid to weather the fiscal storm - are now entering into a fierce bidding war to recruit banking talent in the Asia-Pacific region, offering gargantuan pay packets in order to secure the cream of the crop. And they're not alone; other organisations, perhaps less affected by the last few years' turmoil - such as Barclays, Nomura, Deutsche Bank and Standard Chartered, which makes the majority of its money in Asia - have also unsheathed their chequebooks and charged onto the recruitment battlefield.
UK-based Standard Chartered, for example, has been making waves in the equities market with plans to increase its research team in the next year and move into South Korea and India - a development that has seen weaker rivals targeted and staff lured away. Speaking to the Wall Street Journal, Tim Andrew - global head of equities - observed: "We have big ambitions to grow in all markets in Asia, the Middle East and Africa, given Standard Chartered's footprints in those regions," suggesting that the contracting of new employees will only continue in the months to come.
Similarly, Citigroup recently announced that it will be increasing its hedge fund servicing department, already having made 13 new appointments by March 28th, including five new directors from Morgan Stanley, seven former Lehman Brothers employees and John Nicholson of Barclays Capital.
"These hires are key steps as we continue to expand our business, both through increasing the depth of our product and service offerings and our international footprint," Nick Roe, the company's global head of prime finance, told the Financial Times (FT).
Moreover, industry players have said that it is once more becoming common practice for senior professionals working in niche markets to have multimillion-dollar carrots dangled from a gold-bullion stick in front of their noses - such as guaranteed bonuses, schemes that have proved very controversial in the past - while some who have an established track record in terms of generating revenue in certain countries have been offered remuneration packages of $10 million.
As the FT put it, this interest in overseas employees - arising from a shortage of talent and inter-bank competition to take advantage of this quickly-emerging sector - is a signal that "the compensation curbs pledged by financial groups after the crisis are already being eroded".
One chief of a top investment bank said he was "seeing astonishing salary offers made by banks crippled by the financial crisis", but these facilities have defended their actions, stating that they have no choice but to remain competitive and able to expand in lucrative areas like China, whose economies fared much better during the credit crunch.
All stories