America’s loss is Asia’s gain
September 22nd, 2008 - by Nazia Vasi
There is a brilliant white light at the end of the tunnel of U.S. financial woes - lucrative jobs in emerging Asia. As investment banks fold in the U.S. and hundreds lose their livelihoods, banks in India and China are lapping up wall street bankers by the dozens. Asian economies which are growing at an average of seven percent annually, can easily absorb these globally experienced whiz kids.
New York’s governor reckons 40,000 Wall Street jobs could go in a worst-case scenario, with talk swirling of more bank deals and mergers.
A kind of forced brain drain, the quickest talent gain for Asia came within hours of Bank of America agreeing to buy Merrill Lynch last week. Indian financial services firm Ambit hired five Merrill executives, a sign that Asia hopes to gain from massive Wall Street layoffs, Reuters reported.
According to Reuters investment banking sources BNP Paribas and Nomura Securities in India and Hong kong are looking to hire Lehman executives.
“I think there’s opportunities to improve our team or bring key people into key positions relatively easily and quickly and painlessly. Normally, it’s quite expensive and difficult to move investment bankers around,” one banker in Hong Kong told Reuters.
Executives at Lehman’s real estate and capital market divisions in China said there was still huge demand for talent in specific areas such as deal making and investment banking.
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