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Are you planning to pursue a different job on Wall Street next year? Even if you plan to stick around at your current firm until you get your 2017 bonus next year, it’s best to get an early jump on preparing forca job search, which starts long before you send that first resume out.

Step up your performance

Late summer through to to the end of the year is a great way of ensuring you’re hitting your goals and getting noticed.

“A strong performance could mean a bigger bonus, providing a financial cushion for your search, especially if you decide to leave to look,” says Caroline Ceniza-Levine, a career expert and co-founder of SixFigureStart.

“A strong performance will also lead to better references, and prospective employers do pay attention to references,” she says.

Challenge yourself to take on a really hard project, so you can talk about something novel, difficult and exciting in your next interview, says Amy Adler, a career coach at Five Strengths Career Transition Experts.

Build relationships

Relationships are the key to accessing the “hidden job market” – unadvertised or early-access jobs – where the best jobs are these days. Build your network now.

Reconnect with people you’ve been out of touch with, using a simple “hello and update” email.

“Remind them of what you’re doing, what you’re looking to do down the road, and ask about them,” says Robert Hellmann, the founder of Hellmann Career Consulting.

Match your skills to potential employers’ needs or skills gaps

Find an organization whose values match yours and that has challenges to which you have a solution, suggests Kim Ann Curtin, the founder and CEO of The Wall Street Coach

Cultivate relationships at various Wall Street firms and pay attention to what you hear about each organization.

“Ask yourself, ‘What skills do I have and what companies are best suited to my strengths?” she says. “Find that out by talking and building relationships with people across the spectrum – go to networking events to find out what’s going on with them, whether the company’s not promoting them or they just got promoted.

Make time for networking

Early autumn through the end of the year is also great for networking.

“The fall is busy with professional associations hosting events again after a quiet summer,” Ceniza-Levine says. “The holidays are a natural time to network – office parties and sending out greetings to contacts you may not have spoken to in a while.

Shift your mindset

You have to think of yourself in terms of your contributions to a prospective employer, rather than thinking, “I need a job; I want a job; why can’t I get anywhere?”

“It’s not about you; it’s about the employer, which requires a mindset shift,” Curtin says. “You’ll be much more successful in getting them to see you as different from everybody else.

Keep yourself informed about what’s happening across the industry

Read up on influencers in your industry, so you are up-to-date on the latest trends in your specific job function, Adler says.

You have to be plugged into the ups and downs of the major firms on Wall Street, Curtin says.

“Target a handful of prospective companies you like, do your research and pay attention to what’s happening,” she says. “Are they hiring? Laying off people? Being plugged into the industry and the competitors of the companies you’re targeting is key.”

Improve your social media presence

To get noticed by recruiters, build a strong presence on social media. Hellmann says that this means three things:

creating a powerful, keyword-rich profile;
build a quality network of people you know in some way from any walk of life where you might be open to helping them and the reverse; and
follow thought-leaders in the industry on Twitter and join relevant LinkedIn groups.

“Do these things to improve your likelihood of being found on LinkedIn for opportunities,” Hellmann says. “When the time comes, you’ll use this presence to find people to reach out to as well.”

Consider writing one or two long-form blog posts or articles to push out across social media that demonstrate expertise beyond what your resume or profile shows.

“I had a client who recently received an interview and an offer because of just such a post,” Hellmann says.
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I’m American born, but I’ve spent my career working for a succession of major European and U.S. investment banks in London. I came here in 1995 and I became a British citizen in 2003. I’ve loved and lived in London, but now I’m going home.

It’s Brexit. Of course, it’s Brexit (Doh!). But it’s not just that. It’s also the British economy and Britain as a whole. The country has lost its ebullience; the economy is sick and the people are among the most indebted in the world. Brexit can only make matters worse. In the next few years, it seems the UK will voluntarily put itself through a Brexit-induced recession. Inflation is rising but it’s almost impossible for the Bank of England to increase interest rates. Manufacturing and consumer spending are slowing. The housing market is likely to go into reverse and many finance jobs are likely to leave. London is losing its lustre. I remember this city in 1995; it was a parochial place with hardly any good restaurants, where you couldn’t get takeaway coffee and the tube stopped twice a day; the IRA bombed Canary Wharf. Are we going back to the future?

In New York, it’s a different matter. It’s not just that the U.S. economy is healthier, but that the U.S. markets are deeper. There are more clients, the platforms are bigger. And U.S. markets will be less affected by MiFID II.

I’m not saying it will be easy for me to get a job on Wall Street, but I know New York. I’ve lived there and I still own an apartment there. I already have a network of clients and colleagues there – although I’ve been based in the UK, I’ve traveled to the U.S. regularly and have always worked on international teams. I think I’m in with a chance.

Of course there’s nothing unusual about an American banker leaving London. In 2009, I was part of a group of 10 Americans who got together every few months – the rest all went home long ago. It’s been standard practice for Americans to come to London for two or three years before going back and demanding a promotion on the back of their “international experience.” The Americans who stay on tend to be married to Europeans, although this isn’t the case for me.

I have some regrets about leaving. There’s a sense of history in the UK. You can walk down a street and see a building that was built in the 1700s or 1800s – not many U.S. cities have that. You can travel to Europe easily, although I wouldn’t move there; Frankfurt’s too small and Paris is only good if you speak French.

In New York, you can be in the Caribbean in three hours. You can drive up the coast to Maine and New England. You can be in Florida in two and a half hours and California in 5.5 (if you fly). America’s massiveness is part of its problem and part of its appeal. I hope to find a job in its bigger pond; I’m leaving these murky waters behind.

Clara Rand is the pseudonym of a senior U.S. securities professional in London

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Photo credit: Stars and Stripes by Jack is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

Guy Hands, the founder of private equity firm Terra Firma has a theory – to avoid attracting money-motivated graduates who are also applying for jobs at Goldman Sachs, cut pay and wipe out bonuses for juniors. At Terra Firma, which is based in the UK, the upside for analysts joining the firm’s graduate programme is that if they hold out for five years it will put down a 40% deposit to help these millennial employees get a foothold in the notoriously expensive London property market.

The problem is that most other private equity firms are not following suit. Not only are investment banks creating a golden cage for their young recruits, buy-side firms are offering even more to entry level and junior employees to sway them across from big banks. New figures from Wall Street Oasis suggest that private equity firms pay their first year analysts the same on average as bulge bracket banks – namely $102k. After that, private equity firms stretch ahead.

In their second year, analysts in PE bring in $140k (compared to $113k at a large bank) and by the time they make it to VP, private equity professionals are earning an average of $69k more.

More to the point, most junior private equity jobs are missing one vital element of overall compensation – carried interest, or a share of the profits an investment generates. Certain larger private equity firms pay their analysts carried interest, but most start at associate level, according to separate figures from Preqin. It becomes a bigger deal once you hit director level, with carry hitting close to $1m, and then senior staff can get $3.3m plus.

Not all PE firms pay the same, however. Respondents to WSO’s survey said that The Riverside Company offers the best pay, followed by Fortess Investment Group and then buyout giants Carlyle Group and KKR.

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BNP Paribas has poached a senior credit trader from HSBC in Hong Kong as its global hiring drive in credit reaches Asia.

Jeff Leung joined the French bank earlier this month after three years as a flow credit trader in HSBC’s global banking and markets division, according to his online profile.

BNP Paribas has more than 250 credit traders across 10 offices worldwide, and it has been hiring this year following an excellent 2016 for its global markets unit.

Last month we reported that Shokat Khan, a senior emerging markets trader at Cantor Fitzgerald, is to join BNP Paribas in London. The bank also took on UK-based Goldman Sachs traders Robert Boeheim and Eusta Qin in May.

In Asia, while banks (including BNP Paribas) have been axing scores of equity traders, recruitment in credit trading remains comparatively buoyant, say headhunters.

“Interest in credit is coming back at the hedge funds and asset managers in Hong Kong, so it’s not surprising that banks like BNP now want in on the game,” says trader-turned-headhunter Matthew Hoyle.

Oxford graduate Leung started his career as a structured credit trader at RBS in London in 2008 before moving to Hong Kong in 2012 with CITIC Securities.

His stint at the Chinese firm lasted less than two years and was followed by a one-year tenure at Credit Suisse. Credit traders in Asia tend to move between banks fairly frequently during their early careers, say recruiters.

BNP Paribas’ hiring in Asian credit trading is dwarfed by its headcount needs in private banking, however. Last month we estimated that the firm will have to recruit about 120 relationship managers in Singapore and Hong Kong to achieve its new goal of being a top-five private bank in Asia by assets under management.

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Singapore’s three local banks – DBS, OCBC and UOB – are not adding headcount as much as they were in 2016. But they still dominate recruitment in the Republic (DBS alone has 400 Singapore-based vacancies right now).

Recruiters in Singapore have also seen an increase in candidates from global banks wanting to join the local players in the wake of foreign firms like Deutsche cutting jobs in Singapore over the past year.

If you are among this group of candidates, here are some of the generalist questions you should prepare for when you interview with DBS, OCBC or UOB.

1. Why work here instead of an international bank?

Expect to get this question almost before you’ve taken a seat. Try to focus on the specific, positive pull factors of DBS, OCBC or UOB. “When moving from an international bank to a Singaporean bank, show you understand how local banks differentiate themselves in your job function,” says Matthieu Imbert-Bouchard, managing director of recruiters Robert Half in Singapore. “This question is an opportunity to show you’ve done your research as each bank will have a reputation for doing something well.”

2. But why would you want to give up having a wider international exposure?

You’re not off the hook yet – prepare for this question as a follow-up to the above. Evelyn Lee, manager of financial services at recruiters Robert Walters, suggests this answer: “After working in a global bank for a number of years, my experience covers the breadth of international banking. However, I’d now like to focus my skills on a more targeted market – Singapore. This will allow me to gain more in-depth exposure and better use my strengths to more directly contribute to the bank.”

3. Do you want to join us just because you think we offer better job security?

Avoid any hint that you want to move to a Singaporean bank because they tend not to make many mass layoffs. “Interviewers will be trying to find out if you’re looking to join them due to a perceived safety net. While it’s true that local firms are unlikely to dramatically scale down their busineses, your compensation and job security will still be tied to your individual performance,” says Gary Lai, managing director, Southeast Asia, at recruiters Charterhouse Partnership.

4. How would you cope with more accountability to locally-based senior management?

At most international firms in Singapore, the global head of your department will be in another country and there may be multiple management layers between you and them. Interviewers will want to know how you will cope with the smaller hierarchy you will encounter at a Singaporean bank, says Lai. The key to your response is to show how you have successfully adapted to managerial changes in the past, he adds.

5. Where do you see yourself in five years?

“When you’re moving from an international bank to a local one, this question can be tricky,” says Imbert-Bouchard from Robert Half. “What the interviewer is really asking is whether you intend to stick around, or are just waiting for a better opportunity with an international bank to come along. You should highlight your ambition to build a future within one organisation and your desire for continuity and stability in your career.”

6. Why have you changed jobs so often within the past few years?

Local banks value long tenures and don’t like the tendency of some young banking professionals in Singapore to ‘job hop’ between different global firms. “If you’ve had three or four jobs in a short period of time, you can definitely expect this question,” warns Imbert-Bouchard. “You can’t lie, so try to turn it into a positive by indicating how each job was a positive step in the direction you wanted your career to move. It’s easier to accept that your frequent changes were part of a career strategy to achieve a goal and weren’t just jumps for a bit of extra pay.”

7. Team dynamics is important to our corporate culture. How well do you assimilate into teams?

While you could be thrown a teamworking question at a global firm, Singaporean banks – largely because of their comparatively low staff turnover – are particularly keen on them. Begin your reply with an example of how you contributed to a team objective in a recent job, says Lee from Robert Walters. If you’ve researched the bank’s approach to teamworking, then add a few comments about it and why you’d fit right in.

8. Tell me about the most important requests for proposal that you’ve opened in Singapore during the last quarter.

Singaporean banks obviously have huge books of local clients and for front-office roles they will test your own local networks with questions similar to this one, says Farida Charania, Asia Pacific CEO of search firm Nastrac Group. “Always show your knowledge of local businesses and their requirements as well as any relationships you’ve got with corporate decision makers.”

9. What exposure to Asian regulators or exchanges have you had?

“This question is being asked a lot, especially to candidates moving from a global bank to a Singaporean one,” says Lynne Roeder, managing director of recruiters Hays in Singapore. “Due to headcount being tight in the banking sector, hiring managers don’t have time to train new employees in the basic functions of the role. You need to tell the interviewer about the extent of your exposure to the various exchanges and local regulations.”

10 What languages do you speak?

As Singaporean banks expand across Asia, language skills are becoming more important. If you speak a language in addition to English you increasingly have an edge.

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When is a banker not a banker? How about when he’s a former project manager turned, “head of tax transparent fund implementation,” at a major global custodian who has time for some serious hobbies on the side?

This is the case with 46 year-old James Hillery, the celebrated “banker” on the popular U.K. TV show, The Great British Bake off.

Alongside his senior “tax implementation” day job at Northern Trust in London, Hillery has time to participate in Bake Off, to write and maintain a beautifully presented food blog, management an allotment, walk the dog and feed his chickens. He describes himself as a “serial hobbyist” and posts regular photos of food he’s made to his Twitter account even on weekdays. Other bankers working 100 hour weeks may well look on in envy.

Of course, Hillery isn’t really a banker. – He’s a former project manager in a senior regulatory role at a custody firm. He does, however, work in finance and he demonstrates that some jobs in the industry aren’t all-consuming and do allow for a very fulsome life on the side. Despite the career misnomer he may also be a good ambassador for “bankers”, who are still vilified by a large proportion of the British public for causing the financial crisis.

Separately, Goldman Sachs is having to explain itself. Reuters reports that Goldman is going to be detailing precisely how it plans to turn around its fixed income trading business at the Barclays Global Financial Services Conference in September. The unprecedented explanation follows a 40% fall in Goldman’s fixed income trading revenues in the second quarter and some unsatisfactory responses to investors’ questions from new CFO Marty Chavez. The explanation will be delivered by former CFO, Harvey Schwartz.

Meanwhile:

Goldman Sachs still wants to be number one in Asian ECM even though it only ranked 15th last year. It has to aspire: the Chinese market is huge. (Financial Times)

VTB Group hired Ronan Connolly, the former head of equities trading at Nomura, as its global head of equities. (Financial News)

Bankers at Ireland’s bailed-out banks currently have their salaries limited to €500k ($598k) and are banned from receiving bonuses. This may change now that the Irish economy’s booming again. (Bloomberg)

BAML bankers with deferred stock bonuses can thank Warren Buffett. (Business Insider)

World’s new richest man sells women’s clothes. (Business Insider)

Neither Citi nor Chase has lent to Trump since the mid-1990s. Deutsche Bank, however, always comes through. (Financial Times)

Coffee cravings ruin your memory and metacognition. (British Psychological Society Digest)

I failed to prevent my kid going to college. (James Altucher)

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Point72 has poached a new head of algorithmic trading from Citadel in another sign that the family office is embracing a quantitative approach.

Jerrell Watts, the former head of algorithmic execution and order routing at Citadel, who has worked across both its hedge fund and securities business, joined Steve Cohen’s firm as head of algorithmic trading earlier this month.

Around two thirds of investments at Point72, which manages around $11bn of founder Steve Cohen’s money, are applied through a traditional discretionary model, and the remainder is invested through quant strategies.

Matthew Granade, managing director and chief intelligence officer at Point72, has this year been espousing the need for portfolio managers at the firm to embrace the so-called ‘quantamental’ approach, which merges computer and human-based decision making. All new graduate hires at the firm are now required to undergo some data science and computer programming training, he said at a conference in January.

Watts has a PhD in computer science from the California Institute of Technology and has held various senior quant roles at both investment banks and hedge funds during a 19-year finance career.

He worked at Citadel in New York for nearly eight years, before departing in April 2016. Like many hedge funds, Citadel often imposes one-year non-compete clauses on senior staff, which may explain the gap between jobs.

Before joining Citadel, Watts worked as portfolio manager and quantitative researcher within Merrill Lynch’s high frequency market making business. Prior to this, he established Lehman Brothers’ equity options automated trading operation in New York.

Point72 has also hired Raghav Misra for a trading analytics role. He was previously at J.P. Morgan in New York.

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It’s over, and I made it – I received an offer to join my investment bank, which finally means I can swap Red Bull and coffee for a little champagne.

If the defining image of the financial crisis is bankers trudging out of Lehman Brothers’ offices with their possessions in a cardboard box, the process for choosing intern conversions is a little less dramatic.

Those with offers are given an envelope and walk around the office holding this with a big grin on their face. Those who didn’t make the cut simply left the office immediately with no ceremony whatsoever. This is sad – of course the bank doesn’t owe us anything, but it’s still a bit strange to spend the summer with a group of people, consider them your friends and then not even have a chance to say goodbye. Like clearing for university, these guys are now going to try to leverage their experience this summer to secure a job at another bank. Good luck to them, but it’s not a position I’d like to be in.

I’ve mentioned before that I’ve struggled with the long hours and never making it out of the office before 2am, but this isn’t the case for every bank. Bank of America Merrill Lynch requires its interns to leave the office before midnight and not to work at all during the weekend. This is a policy adopted after the death of BAML intern Moritz Erhardt in 2013. He died of natural causes, but worries were raised that he was working too hard after pulling consecutive all-nighters.

Apart from anything else, this made me wonder how their interns managed to get all their work done and do the necessary networking to secure an offer. The past few weeks have been a carefully orchestrated campaign of setting up coffees with senior bankers and working hard to show those on my desk that I’m worth hiring.

There are a few reasons why I believe certain interns didn’t make it. Firstly, I’d say it’s not down to business conditions – the bank could have hired all the interns if it wanted to, but chose to cut a few loose.

It’s also not all about networking. Yes, you need advocates in various business lines to give you the thumbs up, but you can spend too long cultivating contacts. Interns here spent loads of time setting up little dates with senior bankers to butter them up and impress them, but they let their work slip and this is just not acceptable.

If you want an offer, I think you need to be humble and competent. Personally, I’ve learned a lot about Excel and PowerPoint here, but a lot of interns came in thinking they know it all. The result was that they had ‘their’ way of doing things and kind of refused to learn the necessary hoops the bank requires you to jump through. Nothing pisses an analyst off more than having to redo an intern’s work, and then have them refuse to change.

For the past few weeks, a bunch of us have been working on a merger simulation case study based on a recent deal the bank completed. Essentially, we’ve been creating pitchbooks, pulling apart the financial aspects of the deal and presenting our rationale for taking the deal forward in a certain way. It’s been great to use our brains on this project, as a lot of the work you’re given as an intern can be quite basic.

This feeds into the bank’s decision to hire you – that and how you demonstrate softer factors like an ability to work in a team – so don’t underestimate it.

It’s weird, I have an offer on the table from a big investment bank and still a year left at university. For the past two years, I’ve combined my studies with a single-minded goal of getting into an investment bank after graduation. Now I have that job, I’m looking forward to taking it easier before the hard work really starts next September.

James Roberts, an pseudonym, is a summer intern on an M&A desk at a bulge bracket bank in London. He’ll be writing about his experience here.

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RBC Capital Markets has been steadily hiring in some senior investment bankers from larger rivals over the course of 2017, and has just brought in a mid-market specialist from Bank of America Merrill Lynch (BAML).

Kurt Kovalick, a managing director in BAML’s investment banking division who focuses on mid-market deals, has just moved across to RBC Capital Markets as a managing director in M&A.

Kovalick spent nearly four years working at BAML until his departure in July, advising on some prominent deals like GE’s $11.5bn sale of its plastics business to Saudi Arabian Basic Industries, and 3M’s $1.2bn acquisition of Aearo. He moved from Barclays, where he was also a managing director in M&A in New York, switching across to the bank from Lehman Brothers following Barclays’ acquisition of its U.S. operation in September 2008.

Kovalick started out as a project manager in the United States Airforce, but moved into banking following the completion of an MBA at Columbia Business School in 1999.

RBC Capital Markets also hired former BAML and KBW managing director Neil Chawhan to its investment banking division in New York in May, while Shane Kovacs, a former Credit Suisse investment banker who was latterly CFO biotech firm PTC Therapeutics, and Nate Chang, head of West Coast healthcare at Credit Suisse, both joined as managing directors in healthcare M&A in April.

There have been departures, though. Peter Ma, a managing director in its M&A team in New York, left for BMO Capital Markets earlier this month.

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You wouldn’t want to be a portfolio trader now. So far, the portfolio traders (also known as program traders) who trade whole baskets of stocks have emerged unscathed from changes to market structure, but their days are surely numbered.

In the decade that I’ve worked in electronic trading, I’ve seen equities sales and trading teams change beyond all recognition as electronic trading systems and algorithms took over. Program traders, however, were able to avoid the tumult; if anything they benefited as difficult trades and blocks were left to them while electronic systems competed at the more liquid end of the market.

This is all changing. As trading becomes more and more cutthroat, program traders are being squeezed on both sides – both by electronic trading teams and by the remaining human cash traders and sales traders who haven’t traditionally been in the program space. Electronic trading teams have taken control of transaction cost analysis (TCA), market structure and good execution – all crucial in the MiFID II world. Meanwhile, cash traders are increasingly focused on differentiating themselves by providing trade ideas. Program traders do neither and are left precariously in the middle.

The role of the program trader has become harder. Clients are more demanding but resources are more limited. There’s less bespoke work and more attempts to shoehorn clients’ requirements into “one size fits all” offerings, but these can be problematic. Baskets designed to be all things to all clients can be difficult to trade if they include challenging names, and this can negatively impact the basket overall.

At the same time, clients are becoming smarter and more demanding and margins on portfolio trades are falling. It’s tough to keep clients as a portfolio trader now – a lot of brokers want to keep their risk business to a minimum or to save it for key clients and other clients aren’t pleased with this.

Most importantly, brokers have invested heavily in portfolio trading algorithms for years but it’s only now that these algorithms are really taking off. Suddenly, I see traditional portfolio traders being replaced by quant and IT staff. Even so, the algorithms still require tweaking and customizing per client and it can take time to find the optimal settings. This takes time, and brokers are finding it necessary to invest to reduce human intervention and error – something which is also putting pressure on portfolio traders themselves.

Clients are also changing. The portfolio trading business traditionally had long only asset managers as its clients. Now, however, it mostly gets work from quant funds, particularly if those funds have their own portfolio trading algorithm. Quant funds typically deal with brokers’ electronic traders and the fact that they’re dealing with the portfolio traders instead often ruffles feathers. It can cause the kind of rivalry that was last seen between cash sales traders and electronic traders – and that didn’t end well.

This story isn’t over. It seems inevitable that electronic trading teams and portfolio trading teams will be integrated and that the electronic traders will come out on top. The survivors in the new world will be the quants of portfolio trading and the market structure specialists of electronic trading. The traditional portfolio trader will all but disappear. It’s only a matter of time.

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Aaqil Jalali is the pseudonym of an electronic trader who’s worked for major U.S. banks in London.

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Want to work at a bank in Hong Kong where your bonus is paid entirely in cash and none of it is deferred, leaving you free to move jobs without sacrificing future income? Try a Chinese firm.

An investment banking recruiter in Hong Kong, who asked to remain anonymous, has surveyed 20 leading Chinese banks and securities firms and found that they all pay cash bonuses to the overwhelming majority of their staff.

Sources within listed Chinese banks tell us that only very senior managers receive any stock. “My bonus is all cash, calculated as a percentage of base salary, with no deferrals of my money,” says a mid-level banker at CICC.

Despite CICC having listed in Hong Kong in 2015, the banker says only MDs are receiving stock options as part of their bonus package. “There’s no stock at my level – cash is definitely better as it’s more secure and liquid,” she adds.

Another source at CICC in Hong Kong confirmed to us that he receives all his bonus in cash. A banker at BOCI, whose parent company Bank of China listed in Hong Kong 10 years ago, says the cash component of his bonus is also 100%.

She adds that “cash bonuses are definitely better than stock” because you can change banks after receiving your bonus without the additional burden of giving up stock which has not yet vested.

While Chinese banks in Hong Kong typically offer lower base salaries than their Western rivals, their bonuses can actually be larger, says Maggie Li, a director at recruiters Executive Access.

“The bonus component of total earnings at global banks has been decreasing, so experienced candidates are increasingly open to opportunities in Chinese banks and securities firms due to potentially better bonuses,” says Juliana Chung, a managing consultant at recruiters Michael Page in Hong Kong.

While CICC has adopted the Western practice of paying a single bonus around March, smaller mainland firms in Hong Kong are spreading out their payments. “The boutique Chinese firms usually divide their bonuses into three instalments – typically before Chinese New Year and then in May and December,” says Chung.

These regular payments help “incentivise employees to stay,” adds Mirjam Gustafsson, a senior consultant at recruiters Robert Walters in Hong Kong. “Chinese banks in Hong Kong mainly use this strategy for front-office positions in corporate finance and M&A.”

Still, employees at Chinese banks are not always enamoured with their bonuses. “My performance last year was good and the bank did ok, but my team’s performance was bad, so I end up getting a below-expectation bonus. Team performance is important to the calculation,” says the first CICC banker.

“Feedback from candidates on bonuses at Chinese firms is mixed,” says another Hong Kong-based recruiter. “We’ve seen cases where bonuses have been delayed or even not paid in certain years, while other employees have been pleasantly surprised with their bonus.”

The second CICC employee we spoke with says bonuses won’t dictate his future career plans. Ultimately he’d like to work at a Western bank because “the working culture is better”.

“Many junior candidates are willing to go to international banks even if the total compensation is lower just to have a well-recognised brand name on their resume,” adds Chung from Michael Page.

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If you’re a banker with an addiction, try going cold turkey first. This approach worked for Bilal Hafeez, Nomura’s London-based global head of G10 FX strategy and head of EMEA research. His cravings, however, weren’t of the Wolf of Wall Street kind…they were for his smartphone.

“I’ve discovered I have a smartphone addiction. I have the itch to take out my phone every 15 minutes,” Hafeez wrote in his blog after his device bit the dust while he was on holiday last month. “I initially suffered withdrawal symptoms without my iPhone. My mood went down, I felt uncomfortable, even angry at times. But once I got through that, I realised I had more time to fill with things to do.”

While Hafeez’s phone is now repaired, his stint without it made him determined to avoid it hijacking his life ever again. In a new post, Hafeez presents a practical guide for other bankers battling phone addiction.

You should, for starters, switch your phone to a black and white display (this makes it “much much less appealing”), and keep it out of the bedroom so it doesn’t bookend your day. Hafeez also recommends switching off all notifications and – most dramatically – only checking your phone three times a day.

Hafeez has, admittedly, only been taming his phone habit for a few weeks, but he claims this has already made a “big difference” to his life. “I’m no longer intravenously feeding my mind the neurosis of people who post stuff in the digital world. The real world is a lot nicer place to be in.”

Separately, Gregg Lemkau, co-head of Goldman Sachs’ investment banking division, has revealed where he wants to hire next: China. Goldman has already added 25, mostly junior, bankers in APAC countries over the past year, reports Reuters.

It is now turning its attention to recruiting senior bankers in China, following the appointment in July of Bill Chu to lead investment banking in the country. “The growth in China, even in a more subdued GDP environment, is still much more significant than anything else we see globally,” Lemkau told Reuters.

The catch? The recruitment comes almost exactly a year after Goldman axed scores of experienced M&A, ECM and DCM bankers across Asia, including China. This senior hiring spree may actually be more about replacement than expansion.

Meanwhile:

UBS said to move 250 jobs out of London because of Brexit, with Frankfurt the preferred location. (Bloomberg)

How to lose 83,000 banking jobs. (Bloomberg)

Asia, not Europe, is the biggest threat to London finance jobs. (The Conversation)

Macquarie hires Credit Suisse’s Daniel Kaye to run European cash execution and sales in its commodities and global markets team. (Financial News)

Leading Citi banker in Australia jumps to UBS. (The Australian)

Merrill Lynch financial adviser uses boat to help stranded Houston residents. (Charlotte Observer)

MUFG hires in Southeast Asia debt. (Finance Asia)

The top-15 best looking Swiss bankers. (Finews)

The books Goldman Sachs bankers like to read. (Goldman Sachs)

Why bankers wear big watches. (MarketWatch)

How the world’s mega rich have fared since the financial crisis. (Financial Times)

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““

Rokos Capital Management has taken on a senior economist in the White House as it continues its recruitment drive.

Benjamin Harris, the chief economist and economic adviser to the vice president of the United States has been working as an economic adviser to the hedge fund this year. Chris Rokos, a former star trader at Brevan Howard, launched Rokos Capital Management in 2015 after successfully contesting a five-year non-compete clause with his former employer and has been making some big hires this year.

Rokos has been recruiting both portfolio managers and economists in 2017. Harris has been working as an adviser to the hedge fund alongside his role in Washington and his job as a visiting professor at Northwestern University – Kellogg School of Management.

Harris joined the White House economics team in 2014, having previously worked as policy director for the Hamilton Project – an economic research group within think-tank the Brookings Institution in Washington. His main areas of expertise are tax, budget and retirement security.

There’s a pattern to the recent hires at Rokos. Its economics division has primarily focused on bringing in people who worked within government institutions. In May, it hired Benjamin Nelson, the economic assistant to the governor of the Bank of England, as a senior economist focused on macro research. Antonello D’Agostino, a senior economist at Rokos who joined in January 2016, previously worked at the European Stability Mechanism.

Rokos was reportedly planning to double its number of portfolio managers to 10 people this year in a renewed hiring push, and has taken on some big names from investment banks.

Ramnek Matharu, a former Goldman Sachs managing director who retired from the bank in 2014, was the first big name to join Rokos in May. His appointment was followed by former Barclays MD Omar Gzouli, who traded equity derivatives at the bank, and Robin Wilson, who held various senior roles during 20 years at Credit Suisse including head of emerging markets trading for Europe, Middle East, and Africa.

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““

If you’re looking for a new quant fund whose employees have an impeccable pedigree, you might want to alight upon Havelock London, a brand new investment management firm co-founded by Matthew Beddall, a former CIO at Winton Capital Management.

Beddall has left Winton after 17 years and set up Havelock with three other co-founders: Neil Carter, the former co-head of distribution at Jupiter; Kate Land, the former research director at Winton; and Alisdair Wren, the former technology director at Winton.

The new business will both manage client money and provide consultancy services to funds looking to make the most of new data-driven tools. Beddall says Havelock focus on using “data and technology.” Carter says the company will apply a, “value-based approach to investing,” that’s “made made more efficient and rigorous through the use of technology” and data analytics. Beddall in particular has extensive experience in this area: in May 2016 he moved to San Francisco to join the board of Winton Ventures, Winton’s new venture capital arm which invests in cybersecurity and data analysis companies. Havelock marks his return to London.

Right now, Havelock only has four employees (Carter, Land, Wren and Beddall). Its website is not yet live, but is due to be launched next week. When it does, it seems likely that Beddall et al will need some more – junior – staff.

Winton Capital Management is renowned for having made its founders, most notably CEO David Harding, very rich through the use of quantitative, data-driven investment techniques. Beddall was with Winton at its inception in 2001, and left on August 24 according to the Financial Conduct Authority Register. In Havelock it seems likely that he’s trying to recreate the success of his former employer. Apply now and get in at the start.

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““

Boutique firms excepted, summer internships in the City of London are now over. Some interns got offers; some didn’t. Some interns have already gone on holiday to erase the stain of 80 hour weeks; others are hanging around trying to secure full time offers if they haven’t got one already, or to upgrade the ones they’ve got.

Now that the official intern experience is done, the need to rein-in alcohol consumption and demonstrate good behaviour at all times has lessened. Accordingly, rumour has it that interns from one major bank at Canary Wharf got carried away and were ejected from All Bar One for poor behaviour, something the bar itself declined to confirm or deny.

Either way, some banking interns complain that offers were hard to come by in front office divisions this year. While 70% to 75% of interns in hot business areas like leveraged finance and technology appear to have received offers to return full time in 2018, interns in areas like sales and trading seem to have been less successful.

One J.P. Morgan intern claims the bank extended offers to fewer than 50% of the people on her sales team. “Maybe it was Brexit,” she said, ” – Although I heard the same thing happened last year.” Another J.P. Morgan intern claims that although 75% of people on the tech team received full time offers, this was down from 100% last year and that only 60% accepted: “Some people decided this wasn’t what they wanted to do after all.”

As usual, the most desirable interns are now being feted by banks who want to poach them from rivals. One J.P. Morgan tech intern says he’s already received a message from a recruiter representing Goldman Sachs inviting him to a “networking breakfast.” A leveraged finance intern at another bank says he’s already been invited to a similar breakfast hosted by private equity firms. Another intern claims to have been contacted by Morgan Stanley.

Even the interns who ended the summer without much to show for it (except possibly being barred from hostelries in Canary Wharf) say the experience was worthwhile. “I used to be sh*t at Excel” says one.”I didn’t even know how to multiply two numbers in it when it started.”

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“”

Photo credit: Champagne by acearchie is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

Joumanna Bercetche was doing pretty well as a rates salesperson. After joining Citi from Goldman in 2013, insiders say she became one of the biggest “producers” on the U.S. bank’s G10 hedge fund rates sales desk. This didn’t stop her throwing it all in: last month Bercetche quit Citi and became a news reporter in the London office of CNBC.

Bercetche actually started at CNBC on Tuesday. As per the tweet below, she seemed pretty excited about it all and has since cut her journalistic teeth with a story about the incoming chairman of HSBC and a piece on Greek debt restructuring.

After eleven successful years in banking, including nearly four and a half at Citi and over five at Goldman, what persuaded Bercetche to quit? She doesn’t say, although the implication of her tweets seems to be that she wanted a ‘new challenge.’

It’s not the first time she’s tried something outside of banking. In August 2015, Bercetche, who’s half Lebanese and who’s maiden name is Nasr, started Joumanna.com, a jewelry website showcasing Lebanese designers. In an interview at the time, it was implied that she’d left banking although her LinkedIn profile suggests she only came off the Citi payroll last month.

It’s not clear how much Bercetche is earning as broadcast journalist at CNBC, but it’s almost certainly less than as a major hedge fund producer at Citi. As a reporter, however, Bercetche may be hoping to avoid the long hours associated with sales jobs. Last year, she married Martin Bercetche, a portfolio manager who joined hedge fund Millennium Management in April 2017.

From the trading floor to the studio : First day at CNBC- super excited to be here! Now the hard work begins #NewChapter pic.twitter.com/DjZUXH3E0d

— Joumanna Bercetche (@CNBCJou) August 29, 2017

Great first day on air for @JouBercetche here at @CNBCi . Welcome on board. pic.twitter.com/DcSWxzzGaq

— Amanda Drury (@MandyCNBC) September 1, 2017

Â

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““

Berenberg is busy hiring analysts from larger investment banks, taking advantage of their retreat from equity research as MiFID II looms. Its most recent recruit is Chris Turner, Goldman Sachs’ lead analyst for asset management and exchanges.

Sources say Turner, an executive director in equity research at Goldman who built out the coverage of its diversified financial stocks – mainly asset managers and stock exchanges – is set to join Berenberg in a similar role next week.

He spent over ten years at Goldman Sachs within its speciality finance research division, and was its only analyst covering the asset management and exchanges at the bank.

“Big banks tend to suspend research coverage whenever there’s an M&A deal in which they’re involved, which is precisely when the buy-side needs it most. This will be a big problem under MiFID II when buy-side clients are paying for research directly,” says another bulge bracket analyst who switched to a smaller bank recently. “Asset managers and exchanges are consolidating rapidly and investors are going to find that good research isn’t available through big banks with M&A businesses.”

He contends that analysts are therefore better off working for independent firms without this M&A conflict. Meanwhile, big banks will need to chip away at their analyst ranks even more. “Under MiFID II, the buy-side will want one analyst who covers a sector globally, rather than patching together two or three regional analysts,” says the analyst. “Researchers are safer in a privately-owned firm who can take a longer term view, rather than relying on quarterly revenues.”

Berenberg has certainly continued its push to hoover up analysts in London in a recruitment drive that’s been ongoing for 18 months. In May, it hired Charles Weston, who was CFO at biotech firm Genomics, as a senior analyst along with Ian Osburn from Cantor Fitzgerald and four other mid-market analysts, according to Reuters.

David Mortlock, Berenberg’s head of corporate and investment banking in the UK told us previously that it planned to add five-10 people for its UK corporate business this year, and that it had upped its graduate recruitment to 25-30 starting in October.

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““

Singapore and Hong Kong are no longer the banking operations hubs they once were. Banks continue to build their back offices in less costly Asian markets (think Deutsche Bank in the Philippines or Standard Chartered in India), often at the expense of jobs in the two cities.

But while many junior processing and settlements roles are being offshored, these seven back-office roles are staying put in Singapore and Hong Kong.

1. Internal audit

“Banks are growing their audit teams across Asia,” says Richard Aldridge, a director at recruitment company Black Swan. “The need for audit to work closely with the business means that even though it’s seen as back office it will only become more tightly entwined with the first and second lines of defence.”

2. Private banking client services

“People attached to private bankers who execute orders and trades are in demand,” says Christina Ng, an executive director at LMA Recruitment. “As this requires client interaction, the role can’t be offshored easily. Sometimes these client services associates or assistant relationship managers even get the chance to become RMs if they perform well.”

3. Loan administration

“Loan administration roles aren’t facing offshoring at the moment as corporate lending is still active in Singapore,” says Glen Chua, a manager at recruiters Robert Walters. “Offshoring this function isn’t the most efficient support structure for the front office as domain knowledge of the domestic regulatory landscape is required.”

4. Client onboarding/due diligence

“Client due diligence roles aren’t being offshored, especially those within periodic review,” says Chua. “With the tightening of the client onboarding/due diligence processes by the Monetary Authority of Singapore, banks want to keep and even beef up local teams.”

5. Senior settlements managers

“Some settlements roles that support Singapore trades are remaining in Singapore, as required by MAS,” says Adam Solomons, Asia director at recruiters Hydrogen. “However, it’s now common that while the managers sit in Singapore or Hong Kong the rest of the team are in the offshore hubs.”

6. Transaction banking operations

“Roles such as cash and trade finance operations are evergreen,” says Sherry Zerh, an associate director at recruiters Kerry Consulting. “But we’re seeing more hiring at AVP-to-head level rather than at junior level.”

7. Regulatory reporting

“MAS regulatory reporting is a critical function needing on-the-ground presence and requiring communication with various internal teams,” says Bien Law, a senior recruitment consultant at Eames Consulting. “And although banks have automated the consolidation of some regulatory information, a professional will still need to check, validate and present that information in the format required by MAS. Some functions can be offshored, but not regulatory reporting.”

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““

Firstly, this won’t work if you’re on Wall Street or in Asia. There, if you want to avoid 80+ hour weeks, you’ll either have to make an executive decision that working all those hours won’t make much difference to your pay, or you’ll need to work for a bank that’s a stickler for enforcing the new weekends-off rules – and even so, you’ll still be working a lot longer than the average.

If you’re in London or elsewhere in Europe, however, a more straightforward option for getting your evenings and weekends back is available. Any time you like, you can simply opt back into the European Working Time Directive, which says you must work – on average – no more than a 48 hour week and must have 11 consecutive hours of rest in a 24 hour period.

The Working Time Directive is enshrined in law, but it’s possible to opt out. Employers can ask you to opt out, but they can’t compel you to. More importantly, they can’t sack you or treat differently if you refuse to. Most banks and professional services firms expect employees to sign opt-outs as a matter of course, but….it seems one trainee has come up with the bright idea of opting in again.

Roll on Friday, the website which reports goings-on at UK law firms, reports that a trainee at Evershed Sutherland who’s decided not to stay with the firm after qualifying has figured that he/she might as well take it easy for the final few months, and has opted back into the working time directive. Solicitors typically spend 24 months on training contracts before taking qualifying exams in the final quarter of the second year and – like junior bankers, junior lawyers can work very long hours. UK law firm Eversheds merged with U.S. firm Sutherlands last year and U.S. laws firms (like U.S. banks) are notorious for working their employees the hardest of all.

Eversheds isn’t commenting on the claim, but opting back into the EU working time directive could catch-on among over-worked juniors in law firms and banks. The British Trades Union Congress has even drafted a helpful email for anyone who wants to contact their employer and assert their rights. In some cases, the TUC says your opt out will have specified a three month notice period for opting-in again; if not you can opt back in within seven days. Needless to say, doing so is unlikely to go down well with banks who expect juniors to work 80+ hour weeks as a matter of course. Even though they can’t sack you for opting-in, they’ll likely to find another reason to get rid of you given time, so it’s only really worth wielding the opt-in if your days are already numbered.

Separately, Deutsche Bank is modernizing. Not only is it engaging in a full upgrade of all its IT systems, but its decided to ditch the Blackberry. Four years after Goldman Sachs began embracing iPhones and seven years after J.P. Morgan and UBS made the switch, Bloomberg reports that Deutsche is doing it too. From now on, the German bank will not be issuing Blackberries to employees any more. The move comes after clients reportedly mocked Deutsche Bankers for their Blackberry fetishism.

Meanwhile:

Swiss private bank, Vontobel, is going to start targeting customer in the U.S. (and may therefore need to hire some U.S. wealth managers to help). (Financial Times)

In the last 12 months, Haitong International Securities has nearly doubled the size of its trading team. It plans to compete with the biggest electronic algorithmic traders. (Bloomberg)

Now is not the time to work for a high frequency trading firm. HFTs are being killed by low volatility. (Business Insider)

Now is not the time to work in fixed income research – Credit Suisse will offer it for free under MiFID II. (Bloomberg)

It’s not just Barclays: Standard Chartered, Deutsche Bank, and Lloyds Banking Group have under-desk heat sensors too. (Financial Times)

Meet the top 20-somethings in venture capital. (LiveMint)

Why Saudi Arabia is where bankers want to be. (Guardian)

How to be assertive: Start with a short, simple, objective statement about the other person’s behavior — what you’d like to see changed. Describe the negative effect that this behavior has had on you. End with a feelings statement. (Harvard Business Review)

American banker whose ‘manhood’ was poking from shorts in London says he didn’t intentionally expose himself. (Daily Star)

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“”

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Is it Brexit? Is it Goldman? Is it the general sense that there’s a better life on offer on the buy-side than the sell-side? Who knows, but one of Goldman’s fairly senior economists in London has decided to jack it all in for life at a fund in Hillerød, Denmark.

The man in question Kasper Lund-Jensen, a Dane with a PhD in economics from Oxford University and an MSc in finance and economics from the London School of Economics, who’d been in the UK since at least 2009 (a short period at the IMF in Washington excepted).

Now Lund-Jensen is jettisoning rainy London for rainier Hillerød, a town 40km outside Copenhagen which boasts a 17th century castle, but has only seven hours of daylight in the winter months. There, he will work for ATP Group, a fund manager with more than DK748bn ($120bn) of assets under management, as a senior portfolio manager.

Lund-Jensen spent six years at Goldman in London after joining as an associate in 2011. In 2013 he put together a presentation explaining what his Goldman job entailed, which you can see here.

He’s certainly not the first London banker to leave for his home country. Nor is he the first London banker to leave for his home country and get a job on the buy-side. As we noted previously, this is a definite pattern. ATP even employs another ex-Goldman banker from London – Jacob Kolind, a former associate in Goldman’s equity structuring team, joined in 2014.

Are more people leaving than before though? It’s hard to tell. Anecdotally, the prospect of Brexit is starting to hit home. In any case, Goldman is likely to pay badly this year after an awful first six months. If you’re thinking of going, it’s as good a time to get out as any.

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“”

Photo credit: Denmark_0432 – Frederiksborg Castle by Dennis Jarvis is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

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1. Why work here instead of an international bank?

2. But why would you want to give up having a wider international exposure?

3. Do you want to join us just because you think we offer better job security?

4. How would you cope with more accountability to locally-based senior management?

5. Where do you see yourself in five years?

6. Why have you changed jobs so often within the past few years?

7. Team dynamics is important to our corporate culture. How well do you assimilate into teams?

8. Tell me about the most important requests for proposal that you’ve opened in Singapore during the last quarter.

9. What exposure to Asian regulators or exchanges have you had?

10 What languages do you speak?

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1. Internal audit

2. Private banking client services

3. Loan administration

4. Client onboarding/due diligence

5. Senior settlements managers

6. Transaction banking operations

7. Regulatory reporting

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