Cost cutting is never far from people’s thoughts even in the hazy days of August. It seems some of those working in London’s asset management industry have redundancies on their minds this summer, with the gloomiest view coming from fund managers owned by banks.
Nearly two thirds expect more job cuts to loom on the horizon this year, according to a survey of over 200 asset managers by efinancialcareers.com Such a pessimistic outlook is not surprising given that many banks have been mulling whether to sell off their asset management arms to focus on their core business, while others have put up the “for sale” sign only to take it down again because the price is not right.
But there is a ray of hope too. Fund managers working in multi-strategy boutiques are the most bullish with the majority of them confident their headcount would remain unchanged.
Perhaps they are drawing confidence from another piece of research that Penrose Financial carried out this week where the investment industry expects multi-strategy asset management businesses that offer alternative and traditional investments to emerge as the winning model in the financial crisis.
Those in the multi-strategy part of the business were also more upbeat on future hiring prospects.
Views on hiring and firing activity in the coming six months may be mixed depending which part of the industry individuals come from. But the sense of relief of those who have survived the first six months of the year is shared and must be palpable.
