Just when we thought hiring at Cantor Fitzgerald was really, really hot...
Last time we mentioned the big trader hiring that's happening at Cantor Fitzgerald, we were lambasted by people pointing out that Cantor is an interdealer broker and therefore only hires brokerage professionals. This appears to be a little out of date.
If Cantor only hires brokerage professionals, why has it added "over 100 fixed income and equity sales and trading professionals" over the past year?
And why has it just hired 12 new people in the fixed income, ABS and structured credit markets in the UK, Italy, Ireland and Germany, including an ex-Lehman hedge fund sales professional, and various former investment bankers?
Since spinning off BGC Partners in 2008, Cantor is primarily a bond trader.
Last year, it set out to become a player in mid-tier ECM and DCM, and pushed into leveraged finance.
As we noted a few weeks' ago, it's now going big in derivatives, and wants to hire around 100 people to trade equity linked securities, primarily in London. Its most recent 12 hires are also apparently all part of a push to build, a "dedicated Structured Credit trading and distribution team covering all European asset classes."
Lukewarm after all?
However, while Cantor is undoubtedly hiring, it's degree of hotness is thrown into question by last week's press release.
Although this claims that Cantor has added 12 "new people", only 11 are named. Of those, a quick perusal of the FSA register suggests that at least four joined in September last year, suggesting they're not exactly brand new hires after all.
Moreover, some of them appear to have been out of the market for quite a few months before joining Cantor - Vanessa Bradford started in September 2009, but appears to have left Lehman in June 2008, for example; Dacil Acosta joined Cantor in January this year, but left Mitsubishi UFJ in December 2008.
None of this suggests that Cantor is finding it as easy to attract banking talent as its chief executive, who speaks of a "once in a lifetime" opportunity to hire from investment banks, might like.
One recruiter who works with brokers like Cantor says investment bank employees really are more receptive to working for inter-dealing broking firms, however. This is apparently mostly due to the format of their pay.
"Brokers are much more open to paying percentage packages. They will also consider paying bonuses on a quarterly basis," he claims.
