How much am I worth? Emerging markets fixed income specialist, international bank

A panel of specialist headhunters give their assessment of typical London pay packages: Emerging markets fixed income specialist, international bank: salary 85,000-90,000, bonus up to 200%

With equity markets still rocky and the flight to fixed income pushing up the price of many traditional fixed income products, it's a case of any port in a storm in investment banks these days - which may be why some emerging markets are making something of a comeback.

Earlier this year emerging markets generally were quiet, as after September 11 investors shied away from anything that looked risky.

Most of the news affecting the fixed income side was bad, relating either to the collapse of Argentina's currency, possible contagion effects elsewhere in Latin America or the effects of the collapse of Turkey's coalition government on that country's mounting external debt.

In the last two months, however, there has been a change.

'Following an absolute dearth of new issuance for the first of this year, banks are beginning to see a healthier pipeline...we have seen several houses express an interest in building up their coverage of the emerging markets so that they have the analysts in place ready for any potential upswing,' says Peter Win, principal consultant for Alexander Mann Global Markets (AMGM).

With EU membership imminent for many countries in central and eastern Europe, this area has benefited most from the upturn in interest, with fixed incomes sales teams looking for products where this factor has not been fully priced in.

Given that in reality these are few, the onus has been on finance houses to find analysts and sales staff with a good local knowledge who can sniff out opportunity whenever it arises - municipal, sovereign or whatever.

Marta Bollman, head of emerging markets at Napier Scott, says the ideal sales specialist generally has a strong quantitative background - with a degree in mathematics or economics and finance - and possibly also an MBA.

In addition they will be multilingual, often headhunted from countries such as Hungary, Poland or Russia where they will have extensive contacts.

'East European desks especially constitute the greatest density cerebral power in most sales floors,' she says, noting that what is most essential is to have a good client base among local banks, investment funds, insurance companies, pension funds, corporates and sovereigns.

For fixed income sales people whose expertise is to sell products to a pan-European client base, an understanding of the region and experience of working in European teams is key to building up a European client base.

So what's the bottom line? For analysts, Win says a person with about five years experience would be looking at a total compensation package in the region of 350,000-400,000.

Sales staff also do well particularly if they are involved in the more complex, non-cash side of the business: Bollman believes a cash sales specialist with around three years experience is looking at 70,000 basic and a bonus up to 200,000, while a fixed income derivatives specialist with four years experience, at a US investment bank, would earn basic salary of 100,000-110,000 and a bonus between 200,000 and 400,000.

Nice work if you can get it. The future? It doesn't look bad, especially for those with an established client base.

Contributors include AMGM and Napier Scott