Hi everyone,
as WSO always seems to be very American I thought i'd start an European discussion
There was an article on Bloomberg last week giving updates on which banks are moving headcount from London to Frankfurt/Paris/Dublin. (headline: "Brexit Winner Frankfurt gets another shot a Finance Stardom")
Nomura, Sumitomo Mitsui and Daiwa have picked Frankfurt and MS apparently is close to picking Frankfurt as well. UBS and GS are moving up to 2500 people to Frankfurt. Deutsche is rumored to move most of its trading & sales operations to Frankfurt for logistic and cost cutting reasons.
I working at a Cash Equity sales desk in Frankfurt (3+ years) and have lived here all my life so here are my 2 cents: Frankfurt is a bit too small (even when including the suburbs and surroundings) - essentially I am just scared my rent will explode. Also one reason London is a major financial hub is because of the AM & HF money managed out of London + Insurance and reinsurance while there are only 4 large AMs in Frankfurt (Deutsche AM, Allianz GI, Union, Deka). On the other hand Frankfurt has already hosts a lot of banking operations + the ECB which is a major plus. Also the regulator Bafin is one of the few prepared for more complex financial products.
On the plus side i think that there will be a lot of hiring in terms of S&T in Frankfurt due to people not leaving London for Frankfurt. regarding Frankfurt itself: I love Frankfurt and all my mates who moved here love it too. It has the metropolitan feel while still being really small meaning you can get anywhere within 20 mins which imo makes socializing a lot easier compared to London, Paris, Dublin, Berlin, Hamburg etc. Also all of you sports car owning bankers could finally use your cars properly going 300km/h on the A5.
What are your thoughts?
(happy to answer any questions about Frankfurt, changes going on right now etc)
Is German going to be required?...say for Americans interested in working out of Europe.
I agree with this as well. Germans speak English very well. You will be able to ask for directions and get a usable answer from almost anyone below 50 even outside of the cities. While your life is obviously a lot easier if you learn German over time, you can live in Frankfurt without knowing German quite comfortably as opposed to most other cities in Europe according to a few friends of mine. Regarding the comment on Paris, it is simply not possible to live in Paris without speaking at least intermediate French or have a friend and a very supportive employer who can help you with all the administrative documents (and there will be a lot of them!). Additionally, the English language skills of the French are just atrocious. I have had friends who tried living there with out speaking French and it simply does not work. I would recommend that you do a lot of research on the local culture and especially the work culture if you seriously want to move here. Different countries speak to different people. As an example: While Paris certainly has a nice flair as a city, it sometimes also means that a meeting scheduled for 10am will start at 11.30am for no meaningful reason. If a meeting is scheduled for 10am in Germany, people will show up at 9.58am to make sure that everybody is ready to start at 10am.
Work at a BB's capital markets team in London, but mainly cover Germany/Austria. Other than frequently travelling to Germany, have lived in Frankfurt as well as in most other bigger German cities myself.
Here is my view: First off, prefer London simply because it literally never gets boring. There is something for everyone's taste in terms of bars, restaurants, clubs and my bank's EMEA HQ is here so it's a big international working environment in an already huge international city. Don't get me wrong, London is far from perfect...sometimes it feels like a big dirty concrete jungle and it's hard to keep up with friends outside of your postcode.
The thing with Frankfurt is that its full of mostly Germans and the general atmosphere/culture is different. In the two banks I’ve worked at in Frankfurt, there was a disconnect between juniors and seniors, whereby seniors often didn’t really care about the overall well-being of the Analysts to VPs. You will be worked to the bones as a junior in a BB’s M&A/country coverage team, but perhaps this is your thing and can be awarding at the end of the day. The deal flow is high in Germany, the teams smaller and the work produced (from pitchbooks to RFPs) is really good…people seem to genuinely care and don’t present half-baked work.
Not being able to speak German is not an issue whatsoever...plenty of expats and nearly everyone is fluent in English. But it is a lot of work hard, and work harder (as opposed to play hard). People don't go out that often and you don't really do afterhour drinks with the colleagues. The place feels dull at times...it’s a relatively small city and despite the "banking district" being near the central station, which is your go-to hub for brothels and substance abuse, you only really see drones in suites running around during the day. During the night, everyone buggers off to their homes/outer districts in Frankfurt...
That said, Frankfurt is great if you want to have a "metropole" feel, but work in smaller teams. It is also a lot better from a cost/quality ratio...the German standard of life is very high and things are more "social" than in stinky London. Frankfurt is not Munich in terms of quality of life and is not Berlin in terms of fun, but has a solid combination and ticks most other boxes such as high quality, yet affordable, living expenses/rent costs/commutes times/school fees/ etc. paired with solid salary levels and high job security (harder to fire someone with every year the person’s been with the company).
Tldr: Frankfurt is great if you like a more boring environment and/or have family with kids. Perhaps Brexit will make it more anglo-saxonized, but that will have its pros & cons too.