Morning Coffee: UBS will be hiring for its investment bank here. How to speak like a real banker

UBS has stopped firing in its investment bank! So, what, it’s a hiring freeze? Well…So, it’s hiring?! Not exactly.

In a wide-ranging interview with Bloomberg, UBS’s investment bank CEO Andrea Orcel said that it was, while “not exactly comfortable”, the bank was “where it should be” to face the current environment and it had no reason to show more people the door.

It would be easy for UBS to follow Barclays’ lead and sit tight, enforce a hiring freeze and watch the costs fall away. But Orcel says they’re not doing this. It will be hiring selectively, rather than expanding, but this is something it has “never stopped” doing.

UBS’s selective hiring seems to be isolated to one part of the world, however – the U.S. It’s big in Asia, the right size in Europe, but is “under-represented” state-side.

Specifically, finding the right people in investment banking advisory work is especially challenging and it’s “taken longer to attract the right talent”, says Orcel. In other words, it seems that UBS is pursuing the same UK strategy of hiring “grey-haired” bankers in the U.S now.

Separately, in an effort to shed some light on the inner workings of investment banking, former Goldman Sachs analyst Alan Li – blogging under the moniker ‘Vampire Squid’ – has highlighted some of the buzzwords you must use as a banker.

The best/most degrading is “out of pocket” – as in at an event where you cannot be phoned, emailed or conferenced in anywhere. "Mr. MD I can't join the 3 p.m. call. I'm going to be in Patagonia; I'm going to be out of pocket."

Meanwhile:

J.P. Morgan has hiked pay for 18,000 of its tellers and customer service staff (WSJ)

Deutsche Bank’s co-CEOs, Jurgen Fitschen and John Cryan have the highest salaries among bank chiefs, but are among the lowest paid overall. Jamie Dimon tops the rankings and was paid $7m more than 2014. (Financial Times)

J.P. Morgan’s head of trade finance says the there won’t be a “huge impact” on its London business, even after Brexit (Financial News)

J.P. Morgan is building its investment bank in Peru (Leaders League)

If the bond market is right, we should all be terrified (New York Times)

Jefferies is preparing for the day its key energy investment banker, Ralph Eads, moves on (Bloomberg)

Swiss fund manager Unigestion says it will be expanding its UK office, even after Brexit (Financial News)

Schroders is bucking the trend in asset management and cutting its heads of trading. Most firms are creating these roles (Financial News)

Blythe Masters has moved on again – heading up blockchain at Santander (Daily Mail)

The City of London is better than Wall Street…at tennis (Business Insider)

Time to retrain: François Hollande's barber earns $130k a year (Politico)

Photo: Getty Images.