Monday, October 01, 2007

Prime Brokerage Disintermediation

This is what I am talking about! I'm not the smartest guy on the planet, but this area -- prime brokerage -- looks so susceptible to being broken up. First, I can see an increase in credible competition to Goldman Sachs, Bear Stearns and Morgan Stanley. The credit crunch has shown that, as the big commercial banks with big balance sheets - Citi, BofA - have made inroads in this area. The European banks will be next. However, it will eventually become an issue of service optimization. Plus, there are the competition issues like front running that hedge funds just don't want to deal with. Services will probably peel off into independent providers; that's what makes sense to me.

No comments: