Headhunting firm fooled Wall Street traders with fake identities

In most cases, the job offers are non-existent and the person communicating is also not real. The calls were made by personnel from Odin Partnersa recruiting and market intelligence firm, as published by Bloomberg.

Odin located more than 900 executives in international financial entities, making it one of the most prominent contracting firms in the world. financial sector in the last ten years.

Although most of its information is obtained through methods legitimate through operators and meetings, he also obtained it using false identities with some of the largest banking entities in the world. Within your customers figure: UBS Group AG, Morgan Stanley, Citigroup Inc., Deutsche Bank AG, among others.

What methods did Odin use?

One of the processes that they used, carries a term known within the recruiting company as “rusing“, which consists of an action aimed at cheat oa mislead. The company uses the information obtained from calls to unsuspecting bankers to include its market mapping with its respective sections.

The data collected was used as part of Odin’s presentations to customers, where they offered a detailed analysis of the competition’s performance. The co-founders, James Hext and Mounaver Thomasare also the sole directors of the market research company Vali Analytics.

Several former members of the staff of Odin, admitted and claimed to have participated in the attempts at deception and that they had received instructions on how to obtain said information from the banks’ trading desks, by the company’s senior managers.

“Odin Partners He is currently in litigation with those he considers responsible for the accusations and has been advised not to get involved publicly on the issues raised by Bloomberg at this time. As far as Vali is concerned, his business is completely separate and distinct from Odin’s,” Odin’s law firm, Vali, Hext & Thomas, issued in a statement. Quastels.

What did the information they collected contain?

The staff had detailed notes of their calls, they noted false names adopted for themselves and for Odin, contained data on losses and profits of individual desks, the salaries of those operated, and the education of their targets and personal data.

The headhunter They bet that the majority of merchants are not going to ask many questions about it when they are offered salary information or about the work space that benefits them.

Business and work value

The banks of Wall Street They usually designate the task to a group of contracting companies, when looking to hire a high-level operator. The placement fees of headhunters, round in the 25% of the total remuneration of the first year with a limit of US$130,000.

Odin is known as one of the most active of the sector, employs some 25 peoplenine in London, 10 in Hong Kong and four in Singapore, according to its website. Company records show that paid dividends for some US$2.6 million in 2023.