UK
Would you rather work for Nomura or BarCap?
2 June 2009
At first sight, BarCap may appear the obvious choice – while Nomura unveiled a very large Lehman-related loss when its full year results were announced in April, first quarter profits at Barclays Capital were up 360% in the first quarter. And BarCap has embarked upon a big hiring spree that may yet see it takeover the known world.
Despite this, Nomura has successfully poached Jeff Zorek, a 20 year Lehman veteran, from BarCap in the US, and it stands ready to strike again.
According to ex-Lehman bankers now at Nomura, their new home is more appealing than BarCap, especially in the US. “BarCap already had a fully-fledged US operation, whereas in the US Nomura is small,” says one. “Barclays is therefore imposing its culture on the ex-Lehman bankers, Nomura isn’t.”
This portrait of Nomura’s embrace of ex-Lehman employees is slightly thrown into question by an article in yesterday’s Financial Times saying that anyone mentioning the word ‘Lehman’ in a meeting has to contribute £5 to a swear box.
However, European insiders say this is a small matter and point instead to Nomura’s ascension in European equities – it now ranks eighth by volume and value of stocks traded on the London Stock Exchange and aspires to be in the top five by the end of July. It also aims to deliver a profit by the end of next year.
In the meantime, senior insiders say Nomura is hiring “across the board” in both Europe and the US. BarCap’s big hiring plans are already well known. So where would you rather work?
Neither one..
G 02 Jun 2009
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