Wall Street has a new answer to corporate executives' attempts to finesse tough questions from analysts or sugar-coat presentations to investors: Bring in the CIA. "Deception detection" skills used by CIA and other intelligence personnel are gaining ground within top hedge funds, investment banks and consulting firms, Politico reports in an article by Eamon Javers based on his forthcoming book, Broker, Trader, Lawyer, Spy: The Secret World of Corporate Espionage. Like... Read more

You were seeking permanent work but had to settle for a temporary contract assignment. How can you maximize your chances of becoming a permanent employee at your new firm? Asserting yourself in the right ways can help remove "interim from" your title, according to The Wall Street Journal. But it might not be easy. "If you were the primary candidate, they would have just named you to that position," Kansas... Read more

When Elisa Chen was laid off from her job as tax director for Fitch Ratings in early 2008, the Manhattan resident's job prospects were dim and her lifestyle in finance made it hard to muster the energy to return to the sector - even though she'd made a comfortable $200,000 a year. So instead of plastering Wall Street with her resume, she jumped ship and became a fulltime entrepreneur, opening... Read more

The scapegoating of Goldman Sachs among the media and general public doesn't appear to have dimmed the firm's appeal among MBA candidates at leading U.S. business schools. A recent Bloomberg News story gives soundings from several current MBA students and career services officers at institutions including MIT, NYU, Harvard Business School and Columbia Business School. All the students voice admiration for Goldman's performance, success in wending its way through the... Read more

Here's another indicator that the smart money believes the economic and financial market recovery has legs: the trend in the number of people registering to take the MBA school admissions exam abruptly leveled off after a period of explosive growth. The Graduate Management Admission Council reports Wednesday that registrations for the Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT) edged up just 1 percent in 2009, to 301,800 from 298,734 in 2008. That's... Read more

Is there life after investment banking? Yes, but with a few caveats, according to Rob , a former I-banker who asks that his full name not be used. He was downsized in January from his position as a mergers and acquisition associate with a privately-held Washington, D.C., investment bank. In February, he landed a new position as a consultant with defense contractor CACI International. While Rob found it an “easy switch”... Read more

In the following conversation, Doug Henderson, a managing director in KPMG LLP's financial services regulatory practice, explains how to pursue a career path in compliance. The advice starts at the beginning, but should also be of value to those eyeing a shift from other sectors of the finance world, and those seeking their second or third job. What makes compliance an appealing field in which to work? It puts you in a... Read more

If you've just graduated from business school, a story in the current BusinessWeek may be just the pick-me-up you need. It looks back at five students who graduated in 2002 - during the last really awful job market - and asks if there's something to learn from their experiences. In profiling students who graduated amid the recession, the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, Enron and the dot-com bust, BusinessWeek's... Read more

Crain's New York Business argues Wall Street job losses have been exaggerated. Citing recent data from the New York Department of Labor, the newspaper says only 19,000 financial services jobs have disappeared from the Big Apple since August 2008. Sure, three of the five largest investment banks are gone, and Citigroup and AIG are now wards of the state. And yes, there has been severe contraction, including painful job cuts, especially... Read more

A quarter-billion dollars for inspectors-general offices within more than 20 separate federal agencies. Eighty-four million for an entirley new federal oversight panel, the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board. A $25 million infusion to the Government Accountability Office, to help Congress itself better oversee the wide-ranging stimulus programs it just birthed. Additional jobs for government auditors, investigators and lawyers look to be among the first visible results of the $787 billion... Read more

The hiring outlook at campuses across the U.S. has plunged since August, according to a widely cited survey of employers. Although 146 companies polled this month by the National Association of Colleges and Employers said they plan to hire slightly more graduates (1.3 percent ) in 2009 than they hired this year, the same group had projected a 6.1 percent rise when surveyed just two months earlier, according to The Wall... Read more

The latest quarter was one that many Canadian banks would rather forget. That may make them less eager to hire. After reporting a loss of C$1.1 billion, or C$3 a share, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce announced plans to lay off 100 people from its CIBC World Markets. Other big banks, though they didn't announce any cuts, also had dismal results: Profit at Royal Bank, Canada's No. 1 lender, slumped 27... Read more

The ranks of Charter Financial Analysts in Canada are growing. More than 9,990 are registered to take the CFA exam in June, up 68 percent from 5,914 in 2006. Bob Johnson, deputy chief executive of the non-profit CFA Institute, says that's a sign of growing interest in the certification by employers, and the greater availability of training at colleges. Moreover, Johnson says, the number of candidates taking the exam for the... Read more

New managers for Fidelity's international unit, Harvard's endowment and Lehman's European structured finance group. Fidelity Investments' international unit hired a top portfolio manager from UBS to oversee its global equities portfolios. Starting in May, Ilario Di Bon will lead a team comprising sector, U.S. and emerging markets funds for both institutional and retail clients. He'll be based in London and report to Nicky Richards, chief investment officer of Fidelity International. Di... Read more

What'll it be - a graduate degree in finance or a CFA charter? A growing number of universities have set out to provide the tools to acquire both. Around the world, some 41 educational institutions have signed on to a partnership program that the CFA Institute initiated in April 2006. The schools embed in their graduate curricula at least 70 percent of the "body of knowledge" that forms the basis of... Read more

Are fundamental equity analysts doomed to be replaced by machines? That's the implication of a recent Reuters story by Dane Hamilton. The sources quoted are mainly quantitative investment experts from the hedge fund community, but also include Brad Hintz, an influential financial services analyst at AllianceBernstein who was once Lehman Brothers' CFO. "At an increasing number of Wall Street investment banks, hedge funds and elsewhere, computers are churning out investment analyses culled... Read more