LONDON - The weeks before Easter are usually some of the busiest of the year for bankers, lawyers and consultants in the City of London, as clients rush to get deals done before a run of public holidays.
Average daily turnover on London’s blue chip FTSE 100 stock index fell harder in those two months than all the main bourses in Europe except the DAX 30, according to a Reuters analysis of Refinitiv data. Recruitment firm Morgan McKinley’s latest London Employment Monitor, which tracks financial services hiring trends from January to March, showed vacancies and job seekers dropping 9 percent and 15 percent respectively year-on-year. The number of job vacancies and job seekers in the first quarter were half the level they were in 2017.
“People are not setting up new funds, are not hiring, firing, they’re not doing new deals because they’re just waiting for what’s happening with Brexit,” he told Reuters. The slowdown is not isolated to London - U.S. banks this week reported slides in their trading businesses globally.
Donald Tusk granted Brexit extension to October 31st saying, ‘ Please do not waste this time. A plea. MPs immediately went on a fortnight’s holiday.Can you credit it!Clock on and off when the calendar dictates not when we actually desperately need them to sort out the bloody mess