foreign manpower tightening

[Callput]

For myself - don't see any reason to jump from bank to bank right now. Barclays is more often in the news than CS (always in a trouble). CS already cut few billion swiss franks of costs (read: laid off a lot of people) - don't think it is easy to get much leaner than that. Still one billion to cut in plans, but throughout the world (not only in SG) and within 3 years.
And UBS cutting fixed income is not a big concern for CS: CS already killed its fixed income almost completely in the end of last year.

Btw, Barclays is very suspicious: always hiring and laying off big bunches of people - recession or not. Regularly freezes and unfreezes hiring. A few years back I applied there, passed all interviews successfully, freeze came right after I sent them my documents... I'm not sure how Barclays works in other countries, but SGrean HRs in Barclays are quite scary.

+1 from me on that one

[Sergei82]

One guy was hired a few months back to fellow team - he jumped from Merill Lynch. I wonder, is it that bad over there if people change it for CS? Is BOA finishing its squeeze on former Merill's staff?

[JR8]

In any case, I'm not sure what you mean by your comment. Can you clarify?

I meant that only a single thought about India makes me cringe. I dun want to take crap in bushes or under a tree (otherwise only in pants since no toilet around), wash my ass with my left hand from a jar with tap water (no toilet paper) and then eat rice with my hands after it. And after all I'll come back home having 50 meter long segmented "friend" eating my liver alive and science does know any way how to get it out of me...

*grabs popcorn*

Sorry to rain on the parade V4 but the question was not directed at Sergei.

[Callput]

One guy was hired a few months back to fellow team - he jumped from Merill Lynch. I wonder, is it that bad over there if people change it for CS? Is BOA finishing its squeeze on former Merill's staff?

I have no idea about Merill, I am only familiar with CS and Barclays and some people from CS have even recently jumped to local banks like OCBC and DBS from vendor roles in CS to direct contract roles(1 year and then renewable) in those banks. Bold moves, I must say

[Brah]

Bold or on the only choices left is the question.

Finance is / has been dying, time to get out. Yes there will always be roles there, but the ramp-up that started in the 80s is over and it ain't coming back, and the throngs of workers that went into that industry are going to have to find a new one. And Finance's demise, or decline has a knock-on effect on so many other industries.

Maybe the next generation will enable a new industry that does more than play with OPM, and actually contribute to the human race.

Do I sound dark? Or realistic...

One guy was hired a few months back to fellow team - he jumped from Merill Lynch. I wonder, is it that bad over there if people change it for CS? Is BOA finishing its squeeze on former Merill's staff?

I have no idea about Merill, I am only familiar with CS and Barclays and some people from CS have even recently jumped to local banks like OCBC and DBS from vendor roles in CS to direct contract roles(1 year and then renewable) in those banks. Bold moves, I must say

[JR8]

Maybe the next generation will enable a new industry that does more than play with OPM, and actually contribute to the human race.

[/quote]

So just for starters you don't have a bank account, investments, mortgage, insurance or pension?

[Sergei82]

In 2008 everybody was talking about dying finance as well. Not dead yet. Not the first, not the last recession.

[Callput]

In 2008 everybody was talking about dying finance as well. Not dead yet. Not the first, not the last recession.

It would be interesting to see the CS stock chart, we are now below 2008 levels, whereas s&p is now closer to its all times high and that says a lot about how banking is positioned vis a vis other industries

http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=CS&t=my&l=on&z=l&q=l&c=


Although 2008 was bad, 2009 saw a big up move that made up for it. I don't see the same up move coming back again.

[Sergei82]

In 2008 everybody was talking about dying finance as well. Not dead yet. Not the first, not the last recession.

It would be interesting to see the CS stock chart, we are now below 2008 levels, whereas s&p is now closer to its all times high and that says a lot about how banking is positioned vis a vis other industries

http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=CS&t=my&l=on&z=l&q=l&c=


Although 2008 was bad, 2009 saw a big up move that made up for it. I don't see the same up move coming back again.

Yes, its indeed a bit worse now. One VP from CS told me that in 2008 they just laid off a bunch of people and saved the day by that. Now its more serious. But since CS is one of the fastest and biggest cost cutters in the industry, the worst is already behind (hopefully) - a few billion of cost cutting is already done (and those Singaporeans who lost their jobs because of that don't complain much about foreigners infesting their country), a little bit more to cat and... either we are going up or closing the shop completely.

I do hope that by the time things are settled Singaporean government will not drive us out of the country. Just in case since I need to think big and look for perspectives, I keep my luggage packed and looking for prices of one way air tickets to Zimbabwe...

[Brah]

I think you know that's not what I meant.

One thing's for sure, a lot less people are investing a lot less, and a lot less people have money to invest.

Maybe the next generation will enable a new industry that does more than play with OPM, and actually contribute to the human race.

So just for starters you don't have a bank account, investments, mortgage, insurance or pension?

[/quote]

[Brah]

Don't need to tell me, I was on Wall St. on Black Monday 1987, and I worked at Drexel, Burnham Lambert. I've seen crashes and recessions up front and personal - this has been and continues to be something else.

Maybe there's a graduated sine wave curve chart to show this, with the less frequent and shorter blips 30 years ago followed by more and longer blips up to present date.

I still say Finance will not come back to what it was in my working lifetime, and maybe longer. Dying doesn't mean dead, but all those jobs that were lost over the past 5 years, and as this continues, they ain't coming back anytime soon.

I would really like to know how many people were employed in Finance from the 80s to present day, by location.

Hey, I hope I'm wrong, most of the 80s and 90s were fun.

I do hope another industry comes in to take its place and kicks butt, say in the States, rebuilding the archaic infrastructure to bring it up to par with most of the rest of the world. Or HSR.

In 2008 everybody was talking about dying finance as well. Not dead yet. Not the first, not the last recession.

[offshoreoildude]

Don't need to tell me, I was on Wall St. on Black Monday 1987, and I worked at Drexel, Burnham Lambert. I've seen crashes and recessions up front and personal - this has been and continues to be something else.

Maybe there's a graduated sine wave curve chart to show this, with the less frequent and shorter blips 30 years ago followed by more and longer blips up to present date.

I still say Finance will not come back to what it was in my working lifetime, and maybe longer. Dying doesn't mean dead, but all those jobs that were lost over the past 5 years, and as this continues, they ain't coming back anytime soon.

I would really like to know how many people were employed in Finance from the 80s to present day, by location.

Hey, I hope I'm wrong, most of the 80s and 90s were fun.

I do hope another industry comes in to take its place and kicks butt, say in the States, rebuilding the archaic infrastructure to bring it up to par with most of the rest of the world. Or HSR.

In 2008 everybody was talking about dying finance as well. Not dead yet. Not the first, not the last recession.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business ... l?hpid=z3
I believe the US has actually begun another revival. I keep telling my unemployed relatives there to retrain for the oil and gas market.

[Brah]

On one hand, if so this is great news (and oddly timely given the BP payout this week);

on the other hand, when I contacted headhunters here about moving from Finance to O&G they told me it would not be an easy transition.

My kind of work is the kind that is supposedly transferable, within reason, between many industries.

I still say Finance will not come back to what it was in my working lifetime, and maybe longer. Dying doesn't mean dead, but all those jobs that were lost over the past 5 years, and as this continues, they ain't coming back anytime soon.

I do hope another industry comes in to take its place and kicks butt, say in the States, rebuilding the archaic infrastructure to bring it up to par with most of the rest of the world. Or HSR.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business ... l?hpid=z3
I believe the US has actually begun another revival. I keep telling my unemployed relatives there to retrain for the oil and gas market.

[JR8]

I think you know that's not what I meant.

One thing's for sure, a lot less people are investing a lot less, and a lot less people have money to invest.

No honestly, I don't know what you are trying to say. And I don't understand your comment above. I see stock-markets at record highs, ditto property markets. That suggests to me that people have record sums of money to invest. What indicators are you using to gauge # of investors and their available funds?

Maybe the next generation will enable a new industry that does more than play with OPM, and actually contribute to the human race.

It sounds rather like you'd welcome the return of the Khmer Rouge, you know, everyone out of their Raffles Place offices and engaged in the noble
labour of tilling the soil on the Padang instead.

More seriously though which industries 'actually contribute to the human race', where finance, apparently in your eyes, does not?

[zzm9980]

More seriously though which industries 'actually contribute to the human race', where finance, apparently in your eyes, does not?

Quite funnily, my friends like to joke that I had a mid-life (more like third-life?) crisis a few months ago. It was mostly me ranting about what stupid work we all do, and how most of it doesn't really matter or advance the human race in any meaningful way. This was right around the Space-X launch; it made me think I should be working for a company like that which actually contributes something towards the future instead of one which just designs aesthetically pleasing pieces of digital crack to keep people busy and blur to the world around them.

I got over it quite fast though. Must have had a few too many to drink that night