Lunchtime Links: Another possible sign that Nomura is paying large amounts to hire people

As we noted many months ago, Nomura appears to be digging deep in order to attract people. Earlier this year it lured Steve Ashley and Chris Fleming from RBS, followed by Guy Cornelius who everyone had thought until that point was going to UBS.

Now it emerges that Nomura has rustled up Christian Dalban, a former hedge fund trader, to head equity trading for EMEA. Financial News reports that Dalban will be joining after the summer, and quotes a 'person familiar with the situation,' as saying that Nomura plans to make a further 150 equities hires in EMEA and Asia ex-Japan before the end of this year.

At first sight, Dalban is a bit of a catch. A former global co-head of equity derivatives at JPMorgan, he left with colleagues to set up Castlegrove Capital Management, a European multi-strategy hedge fund in 2006. In 2008, Castlegrove was acquired by the mega-$8bn New-York based hedge fund, Millennium Management LLC, with Castlegrove joining Millennium's existing UK arm Millennium Capital Partners.

As such, Dalban would probably be a costly hire, and it could be assumed that Nomura has tempted him with an enormous guarantee. On the other hand, however, maybe Dalban's decided hedge funds are too much hassle. At Millennium all managers are reportedly paid off their own P&L, and despite annualised returns of 15%, assets under management across the firm as a whole are reportedly down 40% from their peak.

US Senate passes biggest overhaul of big banks since Depression. (Telegraph)

Wall Street could recoup some of the lost profit by keeping pay below historical levels. (Wall Street Journal)

The death of corporate credit issuance. (Alphaville)

BofA Merrill is trying to grow in investment grade loan syndication. (Bloomberg)

Morgan Stanley poaches SocGen hedge fund marketer. (FinAlternatives)

SWIP is building a private equity team. (Financial News)

MF Global is cutting 15% of its staff after 'completely unacceptable' losses. (BusinessWeek)

Citigroup has cut more jobs than any other Fortune 500 company. (CNN)

Bonuses and attempts to avoid the 50% tax rate led to soaring UK tax receipts in April. (Reuters)

US private equity partners' carried interest may soon be taxed as income too. (Financial Times)

It may not be safe to join the FSA after all. (Guardian)

The UK domestic banking sector is enfeebled enough. The last thing it needs is a post-crisis regulatory system that hands the advantage permanently to its foreign competitors. (FT)

Arki Busson: handicapped by handsomeness. (FT)