Following the radical restructuring at Citigroup, Deutsche Bank, UBS and RBS, and the withdrawal from the market by Dresdner Kleinwort, numerous experienced capital markets professionals have left the industry.

Combined with the movement of senior staff to boutiques and hedge funds, this has left investment banks facing a severe lack of choices when it comes to filling leadership vacancies.

As senior level hiring steps up, this trend is likely to become more apparent.

Goldman Sachs, Barclays Capital, Credit Suisse, Nomura and Standard Chartered are already hiring aggressively. HSBC and Lloyds/HBOS are in the market for senior staf. Others are looking for ‘fix’ hires, such as Antonio Polverino going to RBS and Rajeev Misra going to UBS.

Nor are banks the only organizations competing for financial services leaderhip talent. As redemptions slow, hedge funds are also coming back to the market. And they are keen to recruit the kind of big ‘brand names’ that will reassure their investors.

Who are these brand names? Their ranks are looking perilously thin. The industry has been reduced to very few senior leadership figures with experience and multi-product and functional knowledge. They include: Michael Sherwood at Goldman Sachs; Bill Winters and Matthew Zames at JPMorgan; Bob Diamond and Jerry del Missier at Barclays Capital; Anshu Jain and Hugo Banziger at Deutsche Bank; Jonathan Moulds at BoA/ML, or Gael de Boissard at Credit Suisse.

The lack of suitable leaders is making itself felt at a time when leadership has never been more important. As the banking industry comes off its knees, senior staff are needed to drive everything from capital raising efforts to regulatory oversight, risk management, government and regulator interaction, investigations, and acquisitions and divestitures.

AS a result, the emphasis at many banks is now shifting to keeping hold of existing leadership talent. JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs and Credit Suisse are already using retention packages.

As the laws of supply and demand take effect, being a senior banker may become even more remunerative than it used to be. It may not be long before we see some names return ‘from the beach.’