Bank of America, Barclays & Goldman Sachs may need new US bankers this year
If JPMorgan is right, 2025 could be a fine year for investment bankers. Speaking on the bank's recently released 2025 outlook video, Anu Aiyengar, global head of advisory and M&A at JPMorgan, declared that "animal spirits" are back. "The outlook for the debt markets, the equity markets, M&A markets, all for 2025, is pretty good," she observed.
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Aiyengar is in a good position to make this statement. As the Financial Times pointed out yesterday, JPMorgan committed to spending $200m on new bankers and traders back in 2023. JPMorgan is going in 2025 after staffing-up with new managing directors. However, not every bank looks as well-prepared.
Search firm Sheffield Haworth tracks the comings at goings of managing directors across M&A, coverage and capital markets at top banks in the US. By its reckoning, Bank of America, Barclays and Goldman Sachs all ended 2024 with significantly fewer externally hired US managing directors than they started with. MD headcount at JPMorgan, by comparison, was comparatively flat.
Sheffield Haworth doesn't say so, but the implication is that BofA, Barclays and Goldman may want to add new managing directors soon. Goldman and BofA both underperformed in terms of global M&A revenue growth in 2024, with full year increases of 7% and 8%. JPMorgan, by comparison, increased M&A revenues 17%. Deutsche Bank, which didn't hire much at all last year, but which engaged in some big MD hiring in 2023, achieved a revenue bump of nearly 80%. BofA in particular, has pulled back from hiring for the past two years.
What about banks like Santander, which added 18 new MDs net in 2024? Again, Sheffield Haworth doesn't say so, but the question is partly whether those bankers will stay once their allegedly generous guaranteed bonuses run out. There's also an unspoken question over when revenues from all recent MD hires will come through - it often takes a few years for new senior bankers to pay their way. On this basis, it might be too late for BofA, Barclays and Goldman to hire for this year's revival anyway.
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