Jason Corcoran in Moscow.
Nick Jordan, a leading Russia rainmaker, has been squeezed out from Japan’s Nomura bank in a move which could signal the end for Moscow’s superannuated foreign bankers.
A report by Financial News said Nomura had reneged on a original deal to appoint Jordan as head of the combined Nomura-Lehman Brothers business in Moscow . The management at the Japanese bank had a rethink and Jordan has lost out to Maxim Seltzer, previously the head of Nomura in Russia and the CIS.
The American banker was hired two years ago by Lehman from Deutsche Bank for a $7m guaranteed per annum to lead its second foray into Russia. Jordan, the brother of Rencap co-founder Boris Jordan, had spent a decade at Deutsche working on deals involving energy company Gazprom and other companies closely linked to the Kremlin.
Sources close to Nomura indicated they were negotiating over Jordan’s exit. “Given the market position, the rumours over Nick’ pay and what’s happened over the past month, it makes sense. We can use him but the reality is there’s not much happening in the region.”
Much of the team Jordan recruited over the past two years in Moscow have left or have been let go. Both Jordan and Nomura declined to comment.
Bob Foresman, deputy chairman of Renaissance Capital, is separately relocating with his family back to the US and will commute to Moscow for twelve working days a month. Foresman, who had lured to Rencap from Dresdner Kleinwort with an offer he couldn’t refuse, had previously advised oil giant Rosneft on its $10.6bn initial public offering.
Rencap has been forced to cut a swathe of senior bankers in a job cull, including head of private equity Richard Olphert and group head of finance Greg Dinges.
Competition between bulge brackets and domestic banks to sign Russia’s leading bankers had resulted in remuneration packages comparable with those of footballers. But the slowdown in capital markets since last Autumn had forced all of the banks in Moscow to cut costs and salaries.
Taras Rybak, a Russia and CIS headhunter at Brain Source International and a co-founder of EmergingMarkets.me, said the market won’t see $4-5m guarantees again for two to three years. He said: “It’s not the end of this gravy train. Compensation levels will come back and those who can make money, especially in these difficult times, will always be looked after and get paid well.”
Ed Kaufman, who was reputedly hired by Alfa Bank from UBS for $20 over two years, said he was staying on in Moscow as head of Alfa’s investment banking business.
Speaking on vacation in Florida, Kaufman told EmergingMarkets.me: “I have no plans to leave Alfa or Russia and we have just finished our 2008 bonus rounds. I can understand why some would consider it but we are actually having a great year and our best first quarter ever and with no new accounting. Just good fixed income investing and trading and equities now coming back.”
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Who will be the next to be toppled ? Alfa can’t afford Kaufman given what their earnings are. Isn’t Charlie Ryan already gone from DB And what about Bernie Sucher at Merrill’s ??
MS