Downturn cuts into banks' graduate hiring programme

David Ainscough, deputy director of Cambridge University Careers Service, says: "Many banks are putting an emphasis this year on looking for summer interns, rather than wanting to be overloaded with full-time graduate employees."

About 30 firms attended a banking recruitment forum held at Cambridge last week, 10 more than last year. They included the bulge-bracket banks as well as smaller houses. Ainscough says: "The banks are as committed as ever to maintaining their trainee programmes. It remains a core strategy, but the economic downturn is having an effect on the number of hires."

He says he was advising some students to consider doing a qualification, such as an MSc, while the job market remained slack.

George Wilson, head of human resources at Rothschild, says his bank had hired 30% fewer trainees in London in 2002 than last year, and about 20% fewer globally. He says: "I expect a downward trend to continue into 2003. But we will certainly maintain our presence - it sends the wrong signals to treat this as a market to dip in and out of."

He says the bank would like to see 50% of its graduate trainee hires coming from among its interns in future, which would be higher than the current figure..

Jane Houzer, global head of graduate recruitment at Deutsche Bank, says its hiring of graduate trainees was falling in the same proportion as its overall headcount. She says 2000 and 2001 had been peak hiring years for the industry. Deutsche Bank expects to hire more than 200 graduate trainees in Europe in 2003, however.

Some large banks are understood to have cut hiring by one third or more between 2001 and 2002.

Vincent Thomas, global head of campus recruiting at Barclays Capital, says he expected the bank's hiring to remain flat in 2003. This year it took on about 180 trainees globally. "But a lot depends on market conditions in the next six months," he says.

This year graduate trainees joining in London can earn around 35,000 in base salary at the top banks.

Some of the 800 Cambridge students who attended the recruitment forum were downbeat about their prospects of landing a job. Leila Stansfield, reading Natural Sciences and hoping to get into private banking or corporate finance, says: "I'm quite depressed. I know that two years ago my chances would have been much better."

Elliot Han, who once worked for a bulge-bracket firm in corporate finance, says he came to Cambridge to study until the market improved. "I plan to get back into corporate finance, but I know it won't be easy," he says.