Obituary: The Bonus

It is with great sadness that we report the loss of a beloved friend who has been an inspiration to many of us. It was he who has been the incentive to work hard, and who has lifted us from mediocrity to excellence: the investment-banking bonus.

During his short existence the deceased touched the lives of hundreds of thousands in a remarkable fashion. Born into a world where 'leverage' was not deemed a swear word, he showed early signs of almost messianic leadership skills. When he spoke people listened, and his admirers craved his friendship and wanted to align themselves with him to form long-standing bonds.

Those close to him would not hesitate to testify how enriching his friendship was, and how it had elevated their lives to levels they could never have reached without his acquaintance.

However his life was not without controversy. Often his friendship was flighty. Those who relied too much on his alliance found themselves in a state of despair when they discovered that his favours had changed and that he had moved on to other partners.

Since people were aware of his volatile nature, they sometimes demanded written assurance of his loyalty, a practice which earned him huge criticism, in particular from those who could not secure this type of guarantee.

In the later stages of his life many of his friends were found to be involved in a global network of fraud, dodgy dealings and other misdemeanours. After the extent of these activities came to light, the late bonus was - maybe wrongly - singled out for his negative influence on the key decision makers at the heart of these aberrations.

Finding himself under intense scrutiny from media and politics, he finally succumbed to the pressure when he decided to end his colourful existence.

He is survived by his modest long-term partner, the base salary. He will be sorely missed.

First published on HereIsTheCity Life on the 4th March 2009.

Sacked or Just Offline?

In this day and age, somebody being offline on his Bloomberg can only mean one thing, right?

When I meet with a friend of mine last weekend (who happens to work in Derivatives in a large investment bank) he mentioned that he had been given information about another round of layoffs being announced the following Monday. When wondering whether he could potentially affected, he assured me this would not be the case since he had been doing well over the course of the year, and was continuing to do good business. He rated the chances of him being part of the alleged 15% of the workforce to be let go as fairly slim.

A few days later, I thought I would check with him that everything was fine and tried contacting him via Bloomberg (so it looked like work). He was showing as 'Offline', so I decided to follow up the next day just to make sure. When he was still showing as offline, I started getting concerned since this clearly could only mean one thing: his optimism must have been poor judgement.

As I was about to contact his wife to check whether he was OK, I started remembering that the to-be-announced-layoff was not the only thing we had talked about over drinks, but clearly the only thing that was present in my mind.

It occurred to me that aside from that he had mentioned something about embarking on his long-delayed honeymoon the day after we met up.

Whilst I had already pictured him down at the local Job Centre, it turned out he was enjoying himself in sunnier climes, a few hours flight away from the corporate bloodshed at home.

And that's a much better reason to be offline.

Unfortunately, it's just not necessarily the first reason that springs to mind nowadays.

Originally published on HereIsTheCity Life, the original can be found here.

An Apple a Day

keeps the doctor away, an entry a month the readers. If only the max no. of characters was 140, I'd be done by now. Ugh, now.

Crunch Time for Soul-Searching

When bankers got together they used to talk money, cars and houses. Nowadays, they talk about 'What If' they lost their jobs. Or is it more a matter of 'What When'?

When the number of people losing their jobs goes into the hundreds of thousands, it is not surprising that people in your immediate circle of friends, if not yourself, become affected.

Recently I was taking stock of how my friends fared, and concluded that almost two-thirds of my banking acquaintances had lost their jobs. Given that bad news and disastrous results in banking come out more often now than bad results for Tottenham Hotspurs, it is understandable that my fellow bankers, those who still have jobs, are nervous.

At recent birthday drinks with a finance friend in Canary Wharf, unsurprisingly, the No. 1 topic was the employment situation, the likelihood of more redundancies, and how people perceive the threat of themselves being in the firing line.

And since nobody - not even the boldest optimists - consider themselves safe, a lot of thought is spent on what to do when the pink slip finds its way to you.

After a quick poll, it's clear that very few of my friends are in banking because they love it. It has been an industry that paid over the odds in the past, and therefore attracted bright individuals by the mere fact that salaries were so much higher than anywhere outside of banking.

It is obvious that the banking world is becoming smaller and it will not accommodate as many as it used to. For all of us who never have done anything but, it yields the question of what else there is to do. And unfortunately, retirement is not an option since most of us joined the industry too late to have reaped in the big bucks.

Interestingly enough, I recently met a former banker who has set up a recruitment agency placing former bankers into other industries. Her USP was: "What do you really want to do?" Her argument was that if you ignore your bonus, other industries don't pay that badly in comparison.

If banking has never been one's passion and the absence of bonuses means that the pay gap is narrowing, that suddenly sounds like a decent proposition.

And with bonus season upon us, I suspect the soul searching will continue.

Published on HereIsTheCity Life on 2nd December 2008, the original can be found here.

No Jobs, No Coffee, No Insurance

How do you know things are really bad? When you can't even get a headhunter to buy you a coffee anymore!

Oh well, I do remember the good old days.

Our knowledge on funky derivatives was a sparse asset and when you wanted to be treated to a coffee, you could just call up a headhunter of your choice, tell them that you were interested in opportunities. They would meet you for a coffee, on their expenses of course.

As a sign how far the market has plummeted, I recently got a phone call from a recruitment agent about some opportunity, which was the first call of that sort in a long, long time.

We met up at a local Starbucks and while the recruiter was going on about the exciting opportunity (just like the old days) we were sitting at Starbucks for the biggest part of half an hour - WITHOUT BUYING ANY COFFEE!

Nobody mentioned it, nobody offered it, they didn't have any beverage, and neither did I.

Of course, I could have bought one for me, but that defeats the purpose, doesn't it?

Slightly bemused by the fact I went back to the office, where I found an e-mail from my financial adviser about how insurers do not underwrite unemployment insurance for anyone working in the Financial Services Industry anymore.

So nobody pays me when I lose my job, nobody pays me to take on a new job and nobody buys
me a coffee to tell me about any jobs.

Looks like I'll be downsizing from a Venti Caramel Frappucinos to a regular filter coffee.

7 Reasons to Hate January

With the New Year upon us, it is sometimes a little difficult to be excited about what's ahead of us. In particular since every new year starts with the month of January which seems amongst the grimmest of them all.

Here are some reasons why we hate January:

1. Overcrowded gyms. The gyms are overcrowded with people who have either just subscribed to a membership they are going to use for about one month or with those who have subscribed in one of the previous year's January. Again, they will be gone by February but nevertheless a nuisance for the next few weeks.
2. Feeling the Weight. The excess weight that is. After eggnog lattes and mince pies galore it is impossible not to feel slightly heavy.
3. The Cold. Currently, London does not get anywhere above 0 degrees. But is it a charming, picturesque Winter Wonderland? No. It's just effing cold.
4. The Time to Bonus. With bonuses (albeit small) either already in your account or at least announced, the clock has effectively been set to zero again. Last year's achievements might not have paid off last year. They definitely won't count for this.
5. Detox. And by that we don't mean the rather dreadful Sylvester Stallone movie (which was D-Tox anyway) but rather the fact that there is a peer pressure of giving up booze and washing those toxins out of you. If only to make room for more toxins come February.
6. The aftermath of New Year's Resolutions. Let's face it - nobody ever keeps them, but that doesn't mean that one cannot feel a bit guilty about not living up to all those promises of New Year's Eve. Even if all those promises were born out of too much champagne.
7. Getting Older. Ok, it's a personal thing due to being born in January. Still counts though.

There might be some other things working in favour of good old Janus. But we will deal with those separately.

Bad Present = Bad Relationship?

Does a gift indicate the state of a relationship? Lots of women think so and lots of men worry so. Which does not help to take the pressure off something that already can be a nerve-racking experience.

As everybody knows, women are sensitive creatures. Men assume relationships are fine unless they are told otherwise. They'll assume everything is great until they come home and either find all their personal belongings packed up in suitcases, or realise that the keys to the front door don't fit anymore. That's when they'll start to suspect that things might not be that rosy anymore.

Women however have a more refined approach and constantly question the state of their relationships. Whilst a lot of comments and actions can serve as a barometer of the emotional climate, presents by partners are the most welcome tool to judge the relationship. A not-very-thoughtful - or outright bad - present is read as an indicator that the partner has lost touch with what is important to her, and is seen as a sign of marital decline.

To be fair, it seems to work both ways: good gifts prove that their partner still cares about them and jumps through hoops to keep them happy.

As an example, I once gave my ex (a well-travelled, curious, worldly person) a huge, leather-bound atlas. Of course, she HATED it and if it hadn't been that oversized and heavy probably would have hit me over the head with it straightaway. Needless to say, it was a sure-fire sign that something was wrong, and not very much later I found myself in divorce court with little material possession left apart from said coffee-table atlas.

Then again, it is much easier to please somebody you are generally fond of. Over the years, I learned that diamonds are in fact, a girl's best friend, and that in general you can never go wrong with jewellery. Since you don't want to come across as an uninventive gift-giver however, there is a dangerous requirement to vary gifts. This can prove to be a lethal combination with the perceived pressure that any mishap on the gift front can be the entry ticket to marital counselling.

So when last year's Christmas shopping dawned, I thought long and carefully and finally came up with something I thought would be the perfect present for my significant other.

However, when wrapping up the present, the shop assistant asked me "Who's the lucky guy getting this gift?"

Needless to say, I was left wondering what that says about the state of my marriage.

Originally published on HereIsTheCity Life on 19th Dec 2007, the original can be viewed here.