eFinancialCareers

Just when you thought offshore jobs were in decline, ANZ pops up with an expanded growth strategy for South East Asia. The bank hopes to be a trailblazer for other Australian firms as 'emerging Asia' comes to mean more than just China and India. ANZ has strong penetration of Vietnam, Indonesia and Malaysia. And in Cambodia the three year-old ANZ Royal Bank is the largest in the market and... Read more

You might want to head to Singapore or Hong Kong to land an equity research job. Compared to hiring for sales and trading positions, research jobs in Asia appear relatively unaffected by the crunch: banks and hedge funds are still busy hiring in the area. Lehman Brothers has recently created the new role of head of equity research, Singapore and Southeast Asia, and poached Jit Soon Lim from Citigroup to fill... Read more

Boutique investment advisers are picking up the slack as overseas i-banks continue to take heat from the credit crunch. Lazard Carnegie Wylie, which recently announced that it almost trebled its profits in the last half of 2007, is leading the way (Business Spectator). Victoria Biggs, from Jon Michel Executive Search, says tough times often provide local operations with access to quality candidates as the big boys take a... Read more

Private equity recruitment is only just keeping its head above water in Australia, but opportunities are still out there for those bold enough to switch jobs. The liquidity crisis has made debt harder to come by and this is putting a dampener on growth and hiring within private equity, according to Tony Garrett, a corporate finance partner at Deloitte. “At the moment, most PE fund managers are going back... Read more

Massive hiring sprees, skyrocketing salaries and crippling talent shortages – just another year in the life of the foreign banks in China. A new report from PricewaterhouseCoopers, based on interviews with 42 overseas banks, shows just how colossal recruitment in China has been over the last 12 months. The report highlights a 10,000-strong surge in staff numbers, a figure dominated by Asia-orientated heavy-hitters such as Standard Chartered and HSBC. “The... Read more

Banking jobs down under are looking increasingly attractive to both Americans and expat Aussies. But taking overseas experience to Australia doesn’t mean you can shift to a sexier job function. Grant Lovett, head of fixed income at UBS and a recent returnee himself, explains: “You can’t come back and say ‘I was a good credit trader overseas and now I want to try something completely different.’ The quality of people... Read more

Aussie banks are growing in India but they’re not taking too much talent from Down Under with them. Macquarie Bank is expanding its retail and structured products divisions, a sign of where it sees potential for growth. The four majors are divided between disinterest (Commonwealth and NAB) and active plans (Westpac and ANZ). “From a property and infrastructure perspective, India is massive and its retail potential is simply incredible,” says... Read more

Morgan Stanley bankers who were hoping John Mack would take pity on them again this year are due to be disappointed. And Asia is no safe haven from the global carnage. Last December Mack raided the coffers to stump up a 5% increase in average compensation for 2007 over 2006, but he now appears to have decided his people can do without. Whereas the average Morgan Stanley banker had accrued... Read more

Times are getting tougher for bankers, with jobs growth in the finance sector slumping 3.1% since May 2007, according to latest instalment of the monthly Olivier Job Index. Report author Bob Olivier says it’s even worse in i-banking, where job ads are down 9.7% on an annualised basis. “The transactions aren’t happening like last year,” explains Olivier. “IPO activity is also down." Despite the dim jobs outlook for bankers,... Read more

Smaller might be better when it comes to finding a fulfilling private banking role. More flexibility, less sales pressure and fewer country constraints are key draw cards of working for a niche player in Asia. Reto Isenring, Singapore managing director at VP Bank, which also has offices in Hong Kong, says relationship managers (RMs) at big banks often become “product sales machines”. He tells us: “Many of them get... Read more

Searching for your M&A dream job on the back of the Aussie mergers boom? You could be in for a long wait. Bucking an international slump, US$59.6bn of M&A deals targeting Australian companies were announced for the first five months of 2008 – up 38% on the same period last year, according to Thomson Reuters. But this hasn’t created a jobs bonanza for M&A bankers. The employment market is... Read more