BNP Paribas's new big hire from Citi has not left already, is merely travelling

Following last week's revelation that Francisco Oliveira, the global head of macro and credit trading at BNP Paribas, had suddenly disappeared amidst a rationalisation of the fixed income business at the French bank, there's been some excitement today about the apparent disappearance of BNP's recent big hire from Citi from his desk in London.

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Conor Davis joined BNP Paribas in August after being let go during Citi's cuts in February. Davis spent nearly two decades at Citi, where he was a popular guy. We understand that he had various offers from rival banks while he lurked on the beach all summer, but went with BNP, which made him its global head of institutional sales. 

Davis is out of the office at BNP in London this week, and this has led to speculation that having hired him, BNP has fired him again, or that having joined, Davis has left for somewhere else. 

Neither is the case: he's simply on the road, meeting his new clients. 

However, it is the case that BNP's London staff are increasingly assailed with job offers from rival banks. Citi, for example, hired Courtenay Watson from BNP for its flow rates business this summer. Other senior BNP traders, like Ioana Sciparu, are now at Citadel Securities. 

As US banks look to hire for 2025, BNP is a popular place from which to poach people. It has a strong repository of talent, but often pays slightly less than US rivals. Davis has gone nowhere, but the twitching over his absence from the desk reflects suspicions that there might be more exits from the French bank before the year ends. 

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