https://news.efinancialcareers.com/uk-en/3004032/fabrizio-gallo-bank-of-america-traders
16 replies (most recent on top)
Finally.
https://www.fnlondon.com/articles/fab-gallo-leaves-bank-of-america-20201031
Automation won’t come so fast.
Tech, in particular GT&O is future of bank
Automation is the trend, indeed.
We are all going to be replaced by robots and computers one day. Then we can work from home forever.
Most of GBAM employees deserve their pay except MDs. They are way overpaid
In good days, commercial banking supported sustainable growth of firm revenue. Now in bad days, GBAM need to share the pain like other LOBs.
Here are reasons why management should consider cut bonus of GBAM
Their profit come more from market than individual merits.
Many other financial services companies cut people this year leaving job market over supply of people who are looking for jobs.
Clients choose Bank of America because of platform. Individuals should add more values to platform so that bank become less dependent on them.
I don’t understand why most of people in GBAM are so fanatic about bonus. They just need to give up their luxurious lifestyle. Right now, they just simply take everything for granted. Without a well-known and established platform like BofA, they are nothing.
WFH or not, it is a question of risk reward payoff. The risk is high, including reputation risk. Reward is low.
Thanks for NY Times article.
“ He emphasized that their colleagues in India were so dedicated to the bank that they were sleeping at the office. ”
Looks like Soofian really like to sleep at the office. Maybe management should consider move him to India and let him sleep at the office every night? He probably be as happier that way
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-08-08/bofa-stocks-chief-gallo-considers-leaving-after-getting-snubbed
I think bank need to clarify that all those comments Fab or Soofian made on media are just their PERSONAL thoughts doesn’t represent bank opinion. Those words should not be associated with BofA in any sense. If anything unfortunate happened , those individuals need to hold accountable not the firm. Those individuals are probably just terrible insensitive human beings.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/09/business/coronvirus-bank-of-america-workers.html
Look what Soofian said!
Equities management did a terrible job this year. They deserve a big paycut! Their irresponsible comments are all over media and are hurting firm’s reputation!
Fab is a TERRIBLE manager - has to yell and berate people because he is not respected and people would not listen otherwise. No clue who is doing the actual work over there. Fun fact - a kid on the equities floor in NY almost died from Covid (he was at the office, working): https://www.insidelacrosse.com/article/bates-alum-jack-allard-in-critical-condition-after-covid-19-diagnosis/56211
It is Fab’s fault to make trader job in BofA more like a regular job than a lucrative job. What’s wrong paying traders 50%+ bonus? We traders are smart and generating revenue when rest of bank is crashing. We deserved to be paid more. If BofA don’t pay us 50%+ bonus, then BofA s—s. Bank management shall lay off more commercial banks people, their division performance stink this year, and pay us traders more bonus!
Sales & Trading may have a good first half year but doesn’t mean they should get paid more.
You have to contribute success of sales & trading revenue YTD to unprecedented volatility that won’t sustain and company platform instead of individual merits.
Make more sense to use sales trading bonus pool to help LOBs that adversely affected this year like commercial banking. Fed asked commercial bank to help Main Street and sales and trading bonus pool should help commercial bank. Just ask “efficiency ratio” question in next earning call and you will find many other big shareholders will agree with you.
The bonus for sales trading people is they still have a job when traders in other banks lost their job and can’t find a new one.
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Jon
5 days ago
Insider comment here.
I feel this article misleading. The fact is, whether wfh or not, BofA sales trading pay won’t be big anyway. Why? Because BofA is a bank, and bank’s revenue is getting hit hard because of loan provision and lower interest rate. Sales and trading bonus pool will be averaged for helping out other divisions like capital market or investment banking or even commercial banks.
Also shareholders of banks will try to curb trader pay, trust me. Unless banks doing more dividend or buyback, shareholders will try to improve efficiency ratio in every possible way for this industry of no growth. nothing is more politically correct than cutting expensive traders. this happened many times over past several years. Shareholder argued that “you can’t just pay trader because of P&L, you have to account for P&L volatility across multiple years”. What a smart nonsense. In a low volatility market, no matter how hard we try, we can’t keep up. Standard deviation of sales trading p&l is big no matter what.
Finally keep in mind business model of BofA Sales and Trading is more like a platform business, traders make money here because of flow on this platform. If they are unhappy with bonus and go to smaller banks, their P&L won’t look the same. BofA equity derivatives, for example, had many people left already over past years. What I can tell you is majority of their P&L are not as good as when they were in BofA. “without platform you are nothing” is harsh, but it’s fact in this highly commoditized industry. Banks don’t feel the need to pay you because
- they can replace you easily with so many traders lost their jobs in pandemic
- Such market volatility unlikely to happen again over next several years
Given how successful BofA equities’s platform strategy, no one in BofA sales and trading is indispensable, even Fab himself. It is NOT a business rely on individual contribution.
bonus in BofA sales and trading will still be ugly next year too. Like other manager in big banks, management’s job is to give you unrealistic hopes and then crush it again next January when announce bonus. Happened so many times in past decade. You really think this time will be different?
BofA and other banks is not generous in term of bonus pool compare to Morgan Stanley or Goldman Sachs. Federal Reserve would rather banks use surging p&l to increase capital reserve than paying traders.
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Ruth Jon
4 days ago
Good point and it's rare to hear the same from traders (whether at BofA or other banks). They get very defensive when it comes to performance and pay, still believing they're revenue generators rather than process operators. It used to create the false belief to management and shareholders that individuals are the key drivers of pnl rather than franchise, efficient workflows and well the market volumes and volatility regime. Now folks at the top know it's not so much about individual contribution and pnl averages out when measured accross the floor over long enough period of time (I bet there isn't much pnl standard deviation if you look at it on aggregate and normalise it by client volumes and market regime). So yes either way bonus pay is going down, that's a reality, yet it could be offset with a better work life balance by encouraging people to work from home as well as changing the mentality on the floor, having trader embrace this idea that they are process operators and not entrepreneurs. Unlike what Fab is claiming, working in an office or at home is totally tangeant to revenue generation. I can hear the argument for a creative industry that it's important to have people meet in person to stimulate idea generation. In trading it is just not necessary, it's not a creative job, it's a low growth industry that consists in processing orders for clients, that's what drives revenue and not trading ideas which anyway can be communicated over the wire. if anything working from home would save the firm money on real estate. It's unfortunate that management cannot take this leap forward which would also greatly benefit the ecology.
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Marcelo
6 days ago
Bottom line, a 20th century legacy trader is outspoken about pay at his department being all about face-time. It won't come as a surprise to people who have deflected to the buy side or the younger generations: banks are just about facetime, small talks and internal beauty contests. The so called "revenue-generating" functions are process operators who just ride the franchise and volume curve. All they need is a monitor and a mouse to click: one can do that from home.. but wait how do you parade and pretend to be so critical to the firm's revenue generation when you're alone at home in your pyjamas?