(SYDNEY) All I want for Christmas is . . . my job! That's a refrain heard around the world as the financial crisis puts hundreds of thousands out of work. But for some Australian bankers, it's a seasonal wish that may just come true.
A straw poll by Reuters of bankers and investors in Australia's debt markets found that respondents see an 88 per cent chance of keeping their current jobs in 2009.
Good news, yes, but no one is popping the champagne corks just yet.
'I'm not relieved a bit. Only the paranoid survive and it's better to be prepared for the worst,' said one investment banker at a US bank, who has survived several rounds of blood-letting at his firm this year.
Since the credit crisis escalated in August 2007, financial companies have axed almost 300,000 jobs worldwide, mostly in the United States and Europe.
But Asia is not isolated, and investment bankers fear more job cuts in the next few weeks could slice more than 1,000 jobs at Wall Street and European banks in the region.
However, within Asia, layoffs have been more constrained in Australia in part thanks to a strait-laced regulatory regime that prevented bankers indulging in the worst excesses of the sub-prime bubble.
Australian financial institutions have generally kept layoff numbers close to their chest, but analysts estimate the cuts so far amount to just a few thousand - a small drop in an industry that employs 402,500 and accounts for more than 7 per cent of Australia's annual economic output.
In the US, in contrast, the finance and insurance sector shed 20,000 jobs last month alone, according to the monthly payrolls figures, leaving it at just over six million people.
'The problems have been much worse overseas. We don't have the sub-prime or housing defaults seen in the US,' said John Honan, chief economist at Ausbil Dexia.
The crisis has strangled global M&A activity, which dropped by almost a third this year to below US$2.9 trillion, the lowest annual volume since 2005, based on preliminary data from Thomson Reuters.
The outlook for the first half of 2009 is equally bleak, with total deal value forecast to fall around 30 per cent to about US$2 trillion, according to Paul Parker, chairman and head of global M&A at Barclays Capital.
Australian bankers' confidence may be partly due to a wave of company restructurings this year to counter a sharp business slowdown. Still, the optimism is surprising given that bankers in debt markets have been amongst the hardest hit.
Things could get worse too, with Australia's economy set to grow just one per cent in the year to June after 17 years of uninterrupted growth, often averaging above 3 per cent.
'There's no doubt there are tough times ahead and there will be more changes in the industry,' said Anthony Bell, director of debt syndication at Societe Generale in Sydney.
Macquarie Group, Australia's top investment bank, has let go around 500 from its 13,500 global workforce, according to market sources. Macquarie has declined to confirm any figure.
Second-ranked lender Westpac Banking Corp, which acquired St George Bank this year in the nation's biggest banking takeover, has also let go a few hundred staff, according to analysts. Westpac declined to say how many.
Australia & New Zealand Banking Group, the No 4 lender, said that it has cut 800 jobs from a workforce of 36,000. Insurance Australia Group Ltd, the biggest home and car insurer, has cut about 5 per cent of its staff, or 600 positions.
The survey asked bankers what were the chances, expressed as a percentage, of them keeping the same job throughout 2009.
The answers ranged from 70-100 per cent, with an average of 88 per cent. The 11 respondents came from institutions including National Australia Bank Ltd, Aberdeen Asset Management, ABN Amro, Societe Generale, Commonwealth Bank of Australia, Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Ltd and Deutsche Bank. - Reuters
