Morgan Stanley is not the only one hiring for e-trading

Morgan Stanley's hire of top electronic trader, Richard Evans, could be construed as a signal the bank is about build up in this sector. But it's has still been relatively cautious in taking people on, say headhunters, and other investment banks have been recruiting more aggressively in this sector.

Evans has been swayed from Citigroup and will join Morgan Stanley next month to oversee the strategy of its Delta One equity-trading system in Europe, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Morgan Stanley did, however, lose its European head of electronic trading, David Tait, to Barclays Capital, which hired him to head up its European program trading desk in June.

The bank has made no secret of its intention to hire once again, and we understand that technology is one of the areas it has been building in the last two months.

However, within electronic trading, headhunters tell us that Morgan Stanley has so far restricted hires to replacement of senior staff, but that it has been putting feelers into the market, without actually recruiting.

"They have developed a bit of a reputation over the last 6-9 months of putting candidates through extensive interview process including final HR stage and then not hired them," says one.

Other headhunters tell us that Barclays Capital has been very busy taking people on and intends to make further e-trading hires going forward. Deutsche Bank is also believed to be interested in recruiting a decent number of people in this sector and Citi has been building its capabilities.