Morgan Stanley has retained Joe Carney, its global head of fixed-income customer relationship management. Carney had resigned from the firm last week and was slated to join Credit Suisse First Boston in a similar capacity sometime this summer, according to senior CSFB officials. Carney referred a phone call to Morgan Stanley spokesman Mark Lake, who confirmed that Carney was staying at the firm, but declined to comment further. An Morgan Stanley insider says Carney was enticed to stay with "an expanded brief--more people to be involved with and more platforms to analyze."
CSFB insiders say Carney was not supposed to start at CSFB until August because its global fixed-income co-head Jerry Wood (who had worked at Morgan Stanley) signed an agreement barring him from recruiting his former colleagues until then. Because of the stringent poaching agreement, Carney received an oral offer, that was set to be converted into a more formal written one once Wood's agreement expired, says a senior CSFB bond official. Wood, reached at his desk, declined to comment on Carney specifically, saying only "Carney's a great guy and a great professional."
Carney received what several CSFB insiders say was "the full-court press," including a call from firm CEO John Mack, during a recruitment dinner with a CSFB official. In addition to the long-standing professional connection between Wood and Carney, Wood's efforts to woo Carney reportedly led to speculation Carney might eventually replace Mark Landis, the current head of CSFB's fixed-income sales in North America, say several senior CSFB officials. Landis declined to comment. Mandell did not reply to a message seeking comment.
Replacing Landis will not be easy for Wood, says a CSFB insider, who cites the fact that Landis has "an iron-clad agreement" through the end of the year, due to his membership in "the CSFB 40," the group of bond pros who were lured back to the firm after joining Barclays Capital in 2000. Landis already renegotiated his compensation contract once, meaning CSFB practically cannot demote, or even laterally move him, without his prior compensation levels kicking in. One CSFB insider says that "paying out that sort of cash to get rid of a guy is just not what's going to happen."
Another CSFB senior pro says that Landis may well be attractive to other firms. He notes that Landis, along with other fixed-income sales managers, instituted a policy nearly two years ago of focusing the sales effort on the largest 100 accounts by asset size. As a result, this CSFB pro says that sales revenue from the top 100 fixed-income accounts is increasing at double the pace of revenue growth elsewhere in the division.