Citadel appointed Mukunth Raghavan head of American Treasury quants, based in New York. He joined Citadel from Goldman Sachs where he most recently served as vice president within the bank’s global equities team. In an earlier stint at Goldman, Raghavan worked as vice president, quantitative strategies within the bank’s equities prime services. Elsewhere in his career, Raghavan spent three years at McKinsey & Company, most recently serving as a management consultant.

Ninety One appointed Tina Gandhi as a trader. Gandhi joined Ninety One from Muzinich & Co where she spent nearly five years, most recently serving as an emerging markets credit trader. Prior to that, Gandhi worked as a director at Mizuho, focusing on UK real money and hedge fund credit sales. Before Mizuho, Gandhi served as a director at Societe Generale Corporate and Investment Banking, with a focus on hedge fund credit sales.

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Stifel did not respond to a request for comment. 

Seema Arora has been appointed as execution services head for EMEA at the firm after most recently serving at Instinet for five and half years, leaving earlier this year.

During her tenure at Instinet, Arora was a keen supporter of The TRADE’s Rising Stars of Trading and Execution initiative supporting up and coming talent on the buy-side and was nominated for the Industry Person of the Year Award at Leaders in Trading 2023.

Prior to joining Instinet, Arora spent almost 11 years at Kepler Cheuvreux in senior execution services sales roles.

She also previously spent six years at JP Morgan as its head of execution sales and five years at Desdner Kleinwort as head of program trading sales.

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Dolcezza joins Stifel from Hargreaves Lansdown where he spent the last seven years, most recently serving as a market dealer – a position he held for three and a half years.

Prior to that, Dolcezza served as an equity dealer for nearly two years.

Elsewhere in his tenure at Hargreaves Lansdown, he served as an investment helpdesk consultant and a client support agent.

Read more: Stifel and Marex unveil outsourced trading partnership under new broker referral scheme

Dolcezza announced his appointment in a social media post, asserting: “I’m delighted to announce I have joined Stifel Europe as part of their Equity Market Making team. I’m really looking forward to learning from and working with the team.

“I’ve [thoroughly] enjoyed my time at HL, where I’ve worked with some great colleagues and had the honour of learning from some great people.”

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Jack Seibald

Specifically, the arrangement will see Stifel’s institutional sales and trading group offer its institutional client base access to Marex’s multi-asset class custody, financing, securities lending, and capital introduction.

The move comes as Stifel looks to enhance its differentiated products offering, explained John Spensieri, co-head of equity trading at Stifel: “Our sales and trading group at Stifel is primarily driven by the goal of offering our clients exceptional service coupled with unparalleled value.

“Marex has a well-established prime brokerage and outsourced trading business, with technology-powered data, that will complement our emphasis on offering differentiated products to meet the evolving needs of our global client base.”

As part of the partnership, Marex’s institutional clients will receive access to Stifel’s research, banking, and corporate access offerings.

Currently, Stifel’s global sales and trading team consists of traders across the US, UK, Europe, and Canada, with its offering encompassing: block trading, portfolio, and algorithmic trading, ETFs, commission sharing arrangements, options trading, and convertible and preferred trading. 

Read more: Fireside Friday with… Stifel’s Raymond Powell 

Jack Seibald, global co-head of prime brokerage services and outsourced trading at Marex, explained: “This partnership is a key differentiator that will further enhance our capabilities and complement efforts to expand the global reach of both firms.” 

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The short-term dynamic for the UK has improved quite dramatically in the last month or two due to a mix of falling CPI and looming political clarity after the July general election declaration. Longer term, the new Government will face a number of aggressive assumptions regarding UK growth and tax revenue, with implication for absolute debt service levels. The demise of the UK market is exaggerated; however, the challenges are real. Structural reforms could be helpful to make the UK a more accommodative listing destination.

The UK and Europe are unique ecosystems. An evolving product of ‘de-globalisation’.  Brexit clearly did not help, nor help the perception of UK equities. We have seen a stabilisation of money flows in recent months, global funds are returning to the UK, while we continue to see outflows (mostly to US) of domestic asset managers.

European retail is still a growing part of the liquidity pool and there are a number of providers such Turquoise Maxx that are seeking to simplify and cheapen market access. That is something that the mid and smaller brokers can access relative to the bulge bracket who don’t really see that as an important USP for the business right now. In terms of liquidity, and with the fragmentation in Europe is hugely important to access any growing sources of liquidity. The UK market is still a much more capital-intensive market for most accounts.

How does execution strategy differ in the UK and Europe?

There is an ethos for slightly different dealing strategies in the UK. The UK retail network is an established source of liquidity.  A lot of the flow that we see is very much in that mid cap space as large cap execution is highly commoditised. It is about creating a much bigger situation when you trade those names. It is about ensuring that you’re growing the liquidity footprint that you have.

We all know it is very cheap and easy to trade electronically but you’re not necessarily fulfilling your liquidity obligations. Some of the big push back from my meetings with clients recently has been the general lack of sell-side service. We must remember this is a customer facing business. In terms of technology, we are getting to a point now where the ability to differentiate is becoming much more challenging – the role of AI and machine learning ‘smart algorithmic strategies’ are yet to be tested in an extreme market dislocation.

We are currently developing our own differentiated electronic product. We are one of a few mid-market firms that have a significant US presence and that translates to connectivity between US retail, UK retail, European retail. We saw the meme stocks return to the focus a couple weeks ago. Retail trading remains highly topical. Criticality and scale are the issue that everybody faces.

It’s very easy with a large prime brokerage business to support your electronic business on pricing and front-to-back cost. Whereas in the mid-market we have to really differentiate the offering. We’re mindful of the ongoing cost of electronic business. If you look at the progression of electronic in the US over the last decade market share moved from 70 to around 85%. The direction of travel is very clear within the European ecosystem. The business is getting more electronic with more non-human interaction, so you have to have a seat at that table. It’s pushing high touch and marginalised brokers into a smaller section of the market.

There is a clear focus on the businesses that you think are going to add value in the next five to 10 years. Everybody’s moving away from a global focus to being at least good, or exceptional in certain pods. That’s really the way that the business will evolve over the next five to 10 years – in order to maintain relevance to our partners.

We still don’t have the 85% plus penetration of electronic that the US does so there is still more attention to high-touch trading particularly in the mid-cap space and we see that as an area that really differentiates the smaller brokers vs the bulge brackets who are very electronic.  Within the next five to 10 years, Europe will be at that level. The path of travel is very clear.

What are your thoughts on the recent changes to unbundling rules?

Post-Mifid II we have sought to build a differentiated research and corporate broking product in the UK. It depends on who you talk to but certainly for the larger accounts I see little compulsion to move away from unbundling. It is incredibly beneficial to them that they can elect the services that they choose to receive and pay accordingly.  I do not see the larger asset managers moving away from that model at all. There is a clear issue with regards to small and mid-cap coverage and how that the market addresses that. The ability to pay via trading will help. From a complexity point of view, the last thing the sell-side needs is a complex regime of re-bundling.

There is a challenge in creating unique price points for each customer. It is going to be incredibly difficult from a resourcing perspective. The theory of it is compelling but actually the execution could be quite difficult. We would need to see more clarity on that. While the bigger accounts just don’t see any benefit to do that there will be no change and ultimately, they’re thought leaders and drivers of the industry.

What trends are you observing in equities globally?

The macro side is getting a little concerning. Confidence numbers in the US have been falling not dramatically but enough to question whether the US consumer is really starting to rain in the Covid spending. The savings rates through Covid and subsequently we’re incredibly high and the market has underestimated the physical amount of money that was in the system which has given us a nice tailwind for the last couple of years.

It is going to be very difficult for the Fed and the Bank of England to move inflation to target which is 2%. The markets so far have been really bad at predicting the path of interest rates.

In terms of the summer, volatility is incredibly low there’s quite a lot of complacency around. We have some changes in government potentially beginning in July. Business levels have improved steadily throughout the year, we have seen a very strong end of March/April.

How is your trading desk reacting to these?

We are constantly looking for opportunities. In terms of where we see opportunities for the rest of the year, we think financials still represent a sector that is still very cheap structurally particularly in the UK. Election volatility could bring an interesting dynamic, although we see little direct policy implication. 

Macro-economic headwinds are building but the housing market is showing no real signs of stress. A Labour government could deliver a significant uptick to homebuilding. The de-equitisation in the UK with consolidation and mergers could continue. We need that IPO supply and pipeline to replenish.

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Replacing Siegel, Marex appointed John Orrock as head of fixed income outsourced trading at Marex, alongside several other senior appointments in the division. Orrock takes up the fixed income reins after having served as managing director since February 2022, prior to the spin-off of the outsourced business from Cowen. Prior to joining Cowen International in 2022, Orrock was head of emerging markets and outsourcing at Aurel BGC and before that worked as a trader at BlueBay Asset Management for more than 17 years. He has also held senior roles at Martin International Securities and Tullet & Tokyo Securities.

Alongside Orrock’s new role, Ron Catena was named director, fixed income outsourced trading, joining from JP Morgan Asset Management, where he most recently served as executive director, emerging markets fixed income. Catena has three decades of experience in financial services including a wealth of buy-side trading expertise having previously held senior positions at various firms, including: Vandham Securities, First New York Securities, Securevest Financial Group/GCP, Santander Investment, Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette, and Morgan Stanley. 

Marc Wanner was named director, global low touch execution services at US investment bank Stifel, following nine years at Morgan Stanley. Zurich-based Wanner most recently served as executive director – equity sales trading at Morgan Stanley. During his tenure at the firm, he was a member of the institutional equity sales and trading desk in Europe for global equity cash flow, as well as leading and implementing the first execution service desk (ESD) on the continent for Morgan Stanley. Wanner has more than a decade of experience in global equity sales trading, having also previously worked at UBS, in roles including director, equity sales trading – emerging markets and Asia Pacific. 

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Zurich-based Wanner most recently served as executive director – equity sales trading at Morgan Stanley.

During his tenure at the firm, he was a member of the institutional equity sales and trading desk in Europe for global equity cash flow, as well as leading and implementing the first execution service desk (ESD) on the continent for Morgan Stanley.  

Read more: Fireside Friday with… Morgan Stanley’s Maria Salamanca Mejia

Wanner has more than a decade of experience in global equity sales trading, having also previously worked at UBS, in roles including director, equity sales trading – emerging markets and Asia Pacific. 

Last August, Stifel made a number of job cuts to its London equities business, as revealed by The TRADE. The job cuts were not part of a mass layoff or a larger restructuring of the firm, but part of a regular review of the business, according to sources at the time.

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Elsewhere, Taylor brings over 20 years’ experience in electronic trading sales to the firm. He will be responsible for expanding the firm’s client base in ADR conversions and electronic trading with a focus on selling its new proprietary algorithmic suite. He joined BTIG from RBC Capital Markets, where he most recently served as global head of equity electronic sales.

Stifel Financial Corporation appointed Aviad Axelrod in an algorithmic trading and execution services related role. Axelrod joined Stifel from Virtu Financial, where he spent the last five years, most recently in an execution services, business development and market structure position. Prior to that, Axelrod spent 15 years at ITG (UK), most recently serving as director for algorithmic trading and smart order routing as well as product management. Before taking on that role, Axelrod served as vice president, product manager for the execution management system (EMS) and market data businesses at the firm. Elsewhere in his tenure at ITG, Axelrod served as a trade support manager and application analyst.

Citi appointed Chris Metivier as a credit derivatives trader. Metivier joined Citi from UBS, where he spent six months serving as a credit derivatives trader. Prior to that, he spent just over two years at Credit Suisse as a macro credit trader.

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Axelrod joins Stifel from Virtu Financial, where he spent the last five years, most recently in an execution services, business development and market structure position.

Prior to that, Axelrod spent 15 years at ITG (UK), most recently serving as director for algorithmic trading and smart order routing as well as product management.

Before taking on that role, Axelrod served as vice president, product manager for the execution management system (EMS) and market data businesses at the firm.

Elsewhere in his tenure at ITG, Axelrod served as a trade support manager and application analyst.

Earlier in his career, Axelrod held a business analyst and derivatives trading role at Pi-Finance.

Axelrod’s appointment follows job cuts to Stifel’s London equities business, as first reported by The TRADE in August last year.

Read more: Stifel makes a number of job cuts to its equities business in London

This included Daniel Arnold, a managing director in equities trading and Adam Lawson, a director in specialist technology equity sales.

The job cuts were not part of a mass layoff or a larger restructuring of the firm, but part of a regular review of the business, The TRADE understands.

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Rebecca Scott was named global head of equity over the counter (OTC) settlements at Morgan Stanley, following a promotion from executive director. She previously held the position of EMEA head of equity OTC settlements and vice president of operations, focused on equity derivatives and cash settlements. Scott’s experience includes equity swaps, operational risk management, and business process optimisation. 

Cantor Fitzgerald Europe appointed William Lindsay as its new head of technology, media and telecoms (TMT) sales for the EMEA region. Lindsay joined the firm from Berenberg, where he spent the last two years. Most recently, Lindsay served as vice president of equity research – a role he held for nine months. Prior to that, he spent nearly a year and a half operating as a senior associate for equity research. Before joining Berenberg, Lindsay spent nearly three years at Bell Potter Securities serving as an equities dealer.

US investment bank Stifel made a number of jobs cuts to its London equities business in recent weeks, according to two people familiar with the matter. Daniel Arnold, a managing director in equities trading, left the business, ae well as Adam Lawson, a director in specialist technology equity sales, according to the sources, which spoke on condition of anonymity as the matter is private. A number of equity research roles were also cut, the sources said. Arnold previously worked as a senior trader at Oriel Securities which was acquired by Stifel in 2014. Prior to this he worked in equity trading at Australian bank Macquarie and German firm Dresdner Kleinwort. Lawson was employed at N+1 Singer and Panmure Gordon prior to joining Stifel. The job cuts were not part of a mass layoff or a larger restructuring of the firm, but part of a regular review of the business.

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