Banks have never been shy of firing staff at the merest whiff of a downturn. First the fat, then the muscle and finally the bone. In the past, cuts have been so deep that firms have found it hard to benefit when the markets rebounded, paying over the odds to restaff at speed. Such wild oscillations in staffing numbers are known as “doing a Merrill”.

There have been staff cuts during this crisis. Citigroup cut 11,000 employees worldwide in the first half of 2008 but, equally, banks have been a little bit more savvy about managing their resources, moving their pieces around the board rather than sweeping whole phalanxes of staff off the table. Asia and the Middle East have risen up the agenda of most investment banks' priorities as business has slowed to a trickle in the industry's traditional heartlands of London and New York.