Investment banking group Jefferies has hired a further seven employees from Banc of America Securities to enhance and grow its electronic trading operations.
This is the second time in as many weeks that Jefferies has poached staff from Banc of America Securities. Last week the firm hired a six-person team from the bank to grow its prime brokerage operation.
Jefferies has appointed Vlad Portnoy as head of quantitative strategies, the same role he held at Banc of America Securities. The firm and has also added six additional financial engineers and technologists, all from Banc of America Securities. The financial engineers include Valeri Smelyansky, Branko Stojkovic and Victor Miller.
Jefferies says with the new hires it now has a total of 15 quantitative researchers.
The team will focus on developing the firm's electronic trading offerings, including the creation of the next generation of agency and principal trading technologies focused on the trading of small- and mid-cap securities.
The new group will be based in Jefferies' New York headquarters office.