Barclays Wants Another 1,000 Bankers

Barclays PLC and its investment banking division, Barclays Capital, continue to post good news. Today, Barclays announced a 10 percent rise in profit for the first six months of 2009, while also saying it will hire another 1,000 employees, largely in its equities, advisory and emerging markets units in Asia.

Once the hires are made, Barclays Capital will look a lot like it did, numbers-wise, at the end of 2008. Since then, it has hired 2,000 people, going a long way toward gaining back the 3,000 it let go before the end of 2008.

Of course, the news is not only good for BarCap but also for the banking industry, sending another signal that the M&A and equity markets are on the rise.