Nomura has made another senior hire from Bank of America Merrill Lynch for its regional equities team ex-Japan, according to people familiar with the matter.
Melvyn Boey, BofA Merrill’s Southeast Asia strategist and a managing director based in Singapore, will shortly be joining Nomura.
At Nomura, Boey will be reunited with Yasuhiro Fujiwara, who also has a background with BofA Merrill. Fujiwara joined Nomura in March this year as head of equities for Asia ex-Japan and head of equity derivatives trading for Asia-Pacific .
Before he left BofA Merrill in October 2011 Fujiwara was co-head of global markets and head of equities for Asia-Pacific and, since he joined Nomura, he has been busy hiring a number of key people from his former employer, including Ajay Gupta and Stanley Wong.
The movement has not all been one way. Sonia Song recently joined BofA Merrill from Nomura as Asia-Pacific head of energy research.
Also, Nomura has been making cuts in research. It cut a small number of mostly junior analysts in Asia - less than 10% of its headcount in the division - in recent weeks, according to a person familiar with the matter. Nomura did not drop coverage of any sectors as a result of the cuts.
Equity research headcount is under pressure across the securities industry. Falling revenues in cash equities trading has undermined banks’ ability to bear the cost of big research divisions.
