Should M&A bankers in the Gulf be worried about job security?
After a brief flurry of activity in the first quarter of this year, M&A activity in the Gulf is once again making spluttering sounds. And, after such a long period in the doldrums, should M&A bankers in the region be concerned about their employment prospects?
Middle East M&A deal-making amounted to nearly $4bn in the first quarter of this year alone, according to data from mergermarket. But a trickle of deals since this time has seen total deals for the year to 2 September amount to just $7bn.
Unless there's any sudden influx of activity, 2010 is on track to be the most barren year since 2005, says mergermarket. Clearly this is bad, particularly when you consider that this is on the back of a tough 2009, when M&A deal volumes slumped by 50% on 2008, according to Thomson Reuters figures.
Should M&A bankers in the region be concerned about their job security?
Omar Taha, managing director of Middle East financial services headhunters The S&T Group, believes not.
"The M&A bankers we speak to do not seem too scared about their job security, since most teams in the region are already running fairly light," he says. "What's more, some firms have been transferring people from the Middle East, but I don't think this will last too long."
Not surprisingly, job opportunities in the sector are relatively thin on the ground. Most of the recruitment within M&A is taking place at analyst and associate level, suggests Taha. However, investment banks remain open to the possibility of poaching key talent.
For example, Apoorva Shah, formerly head of M&A for the MENA region at Deutsche Bank, joined Standard Chartered in May. The bank also added Ragnar Meitern to its technology, media and telecommunications team last month. Similarly, BarCap poached Michael Helou from Rothschild to lead its MENA FIG team earlier this year.
"Unfortunately, the number of M&A roles has dropped off in the second half of the year so far," says Jonathan Gould, consultant in the financial services division of recruiters iQ Selection. "We are still seeing jobs coming out of international banks, however, but these are largely based in Saudi Arabia."
