eFinancialCareers

Following suggestions that it's about to report record first half profits, some analysts are wondering if Sydney-based Macquarie investment bank can keep up the pace. Macquarie, also known as the millionaire’s factory because of the massive salaries earned by its executives, announced last month that it expects to achieve a half-year profit of around AU$1bn when it reports in November. This will be down on its AU$1.46bn record result for the... Read more

A Sydney-based headhunter warns the chief reason employers are missing out on premium i-banking talent is their own tardiness. Dudley Levell, director of financial services IT recruitment specialist Finrecruit, reports, “There is plenty of competition for high quality talent in Sydney and some employers are missing good candidates because they are slow to provide feedback on interviews or CVs.” If banks want to snare the right employee, they need to go about... Read more

Don’t look now: there are some signs that the US sub-prime mortgage malaise has spread to the Australian market for financial services jobs. Private equity firms and corporate advisers were hit hard with a 9% fall in job advertisements during September, according to the Olivier Internet Job Index. The index also showed ads on the Internet for banking jobs fell by 10.5% in September. Report author Bob Olivier, a director at the Olivier... Read more

Sustainable responsible investment (SRI) is getting hot along with the planet. Shame about the jobs. The latest AMP Capital SRI Median Study says the SRI median outperformed the benchmark ASX 200 index by more than 1.5% over one year, and 2% in the two years to 30 June 2007, returning a healthy 30.2% in one year, 26.7% over three years and 19.3% over five years. Little surprise, therefore, that investors are marginally... Read more

The fallout from the US sub-prime mortgage débâcle continues to be felt, with news of redundancies of up to 1,500 employees at Europe’s biggest bank, UBS. Adding to concerns, this announcement was closely followed by the sacking of two senior US executives at Merrill Lynch. The sackings have sent shock waves through the industry. However one City-based headhunter says it may be premature for those in Australia’s finance industry to hit the... Read more

Despite recent high-profile actions launched by senior executives, the Australian banking sector is still relatively free from litigation by disgruntled employees. ANZ Bank is being sued by its former head of institutional banking, Steve Targett, for AU$2.1m for allegedly misleading him about his career prospects. Another action has been launched against the bank by its former head of mergers and acquisitions, Malcolm Hiscock, who alleges ANZ did not pay him a bonus... Read more

Forget the piles of money in Sydney and Melbourne, there are plenty of Australian bankers earning mountains in London. The huge amounts on offer in the Old Dart were illustrated by the recent case of an Aussie banker living in the UK, who claimed his employer (Dresdner Kleinwort) sacked him because he was “not German enough”. Teutonic or not, the executive is no doubt hopping mad because his annual salary of £2.2m... Read more

Most would-be bankers in Australia plan to work overseas if they can. This is the finding of a recent survey by graduate research company Universum, who asked Australia's finance graduates what they wanted from a career. They found 47% of women and 51% of men plan to make a swift exit and work overseas. They're also keen on having a life outside work – not something banks are traditionally strong on. 60%... Read more

As if there wasn't already enough competition for professionals with corporate or project finance experience, mining companies are now digging deep to hire financial talent. At least that's the experience in Perth, Western Australia, at the moment, where the global resources boom remains in full swing and demand for banking and finance specialists is strengthening from gold and other base metal mining companies. "We're finding that, because of the mining boom, a... Read more

The US sub-prime mortgage crisis will have only a minor impact on the i-banking sector in Australia, says a leading analyst. Troy Angus, a portfolio manager/analyst at Paradice Investment Management, says local banks with exposure are significantly less than one per cent. "The big five domestic retail banks should be largely unaffected," he notes. That's not to say there won't be some bumps and bruises. "There might be problems with some... Read more

Who'll benefit and who won't from the chaos in the markets? Here's our considered verdict… The winners Derivatives documentation specialists Know how to settle a derivatives trade? This could be your lucky day. According to Financial News last week's trading volumes for credit derivative products were so high credit derivatives operations teams were overwhelmed. Banks may yet turn to temps to help out. Risk managers Our US site reports that hedge funds... Read more

Project finance specialists are in such short supply in the Middle East that the oil-fired trajectory of infrastructure investment in the region risks crash landing. Local recruiters say there are simply too few experienced project finance people to plan, oversee and execute the US$1.3 trillion worth of oil and gas, petrochemicals or infrastructure schemes lined up by Gulf Cooperation Council governments and companies between now and 2012. Barbara Van Meir, director of... Read more

Does chaos in the credit markets spell doomsday for jobs? "It's too soon to tell,'' says James Nicholson, director of recruiter Robert Walters. "Macquarie and BNP Paribas are two of our big clients and there have been no directives changing their hiring strategy. But, if this tumult gets worse, I would expect it to have a big effect.' Edmund Gill at recruiter Hays also says it's too soon to call, but if... Read more

Thinking of finding a new job? Have a little something to take your mind off it. Australia's financial services skills shortage is encouraging banks to offer tasty 'buyback' packages to keep stellar performers who threaten to defect. Anthony Ayers, principal consultant at Sydney-based Chandler, says the most common buybacks (AKA 'counter-offer') involve matching money – but adds they may also encompass anything from offering additional education, an offshore secondment, a promotion... Read more