There is an old joke in banking that “never again” means five years. Cynics note that this gives the industry just two years before it begins to forget the stresses and resulting lessons of the past three.
As the financial markets have begun functioning again, day-to-day activity looks very much as it did. Just as before the crisis, bankers are busy with client roadshows, constructing deals and “book-building” the resulting investor orders for equity or bonds. Ambitious merger and acquisition deals are in evidence – witness the Prudential's failed bid for AIG's Asian assets – although recent activity has been somewhat subdued by the ongoing market volatility.
Even market-making, a role somewhat sidelined in the past decade by the rise of electronic trading, has made a comeback with bank executives once again keen on “flow” businesses such as trading foreign exchange, a bank-dominated market where they risk little capital overnight but take fees from each trade and can ride the market volatility.