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Bank of America has hired two veteran volatility traders from JPMorgan and Morgan Stanley to run trading teams on its equity derivatives desk, filling holes in one of the hottest hiring areas on Wall Street.
Spencer Cross has resigned from JPMorgan to run US index trading at Bank of America, according to sources familiar with the matter. Meanwhile, Anastasios "Taso" Giannopoulos has left Morgan Stanley to take the role of Americas head of micro derivatives trading, sources told Insider.
Both traders will report to Glenn Koh, head of equities trading, the sources said.
A Bank of America spokesman confirmed the hires. Representatives at JPMorgan and Morgan Stanley did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
After intense bouts of volatility throughout 2020 that helped produce record trading hauls, equity derivatives have become some of the most sought after traders — especially for hedge funds like Balyasny, Citadel, and Millennium. Bank of America lost its two most senior derivatives traders this spring when David Kim, head of equity client solutions, left for Citadel and Mitchell Story, a managing director in index volatility trading, left for Goldman Sachs.
The additions of Cross and Giannopoulos provide key reinforcements for the firm as experienced sell-side volatility traders grow more scarce.
Cross joins BofA after only a brief stint at JPMorgan, where he was hired as an executive director last May, according to FINRA records. He previously spent two years as a managing director at Goldman Sachs, and before that he was head of equity index volatility trading at Deutsche Bank, where he worked from 2013 to 2017. He also spent time trading at Lehman Brothers, Barclays, and Citigroup, according to FINRA records and his LinkedIn profile.
He joins the bank as an MD in July and as part of his responsibilities he'll manage options trading on the main US indices, according to people familiar with the matter, including the S&P 500, Nasdaq, and Russell 2000.
Giannopoulos joins the firm as an MD in August and will be responsible for single-stock derivatives trading, including options, corporate derivatives, and convertible bond trading, the sources said. He's spent his entire career at Morgan Stanley, according to FINRA records, joining the firm in 2013.
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