Australia & New Zealand Banking Group plans to expand its commodities trading team in Asia by about 50 percent to 20 staff by next year as part of a regional expansion drive, a top official said.
The bank, which set up its first Asian commodities trading desk in Singapore last year, also said liquidity in Asia's commodities and energy markets has improved significantly from late last year, and there were growing indications the market was normalising.
"We've now got quite a hectic trading platform and we see ourselves having to put more resources onto the team fairly immediately," Geoff Clear, ANZ's Singapore-based global co-head of commodities told Reuters in a telephone interview. ANZ, which has a total of 13 traders and sales representatives under its commodities team across Singapore, Hong Kong and Shanghai, is looking to bring on two more traders by the end of this year and up to five more staff by 2010. The bank trades in agricultural products, precious and base metals, oil, coal, electricity and carbon emissions. Gold and agricultural products together account for about 60 percent of ANZ's commodities portfolio, while coal makes up between 15 and 20 percent and oil accounts for about 5 percent.
Having built up its position in gold and agricultural commodities, ANZ now wants to focus more oil and coal, Clear said. ANZ said liquidity in the energy and commodities markets has recovered significantly compared with October last year, when fears over the creditworthiness of counterparties virtually halted trading.
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