Russian state bank VTB has chosen one of the darkest moments in stock market history to launch share trade at its new investment banking unit, founded to become Russia's new national champion investment bank.
VTB Capital, the investment banking arm of Russia's second largest state-controlled bank, announced it had launched client trading operations with just two traders on cash equities, and two more derivatives in test mode.
"We will add more as the business grows," VTB Capital Head of Equity Trading Andrei Girichev said.
"Whatever happens next year, trade activity will increase."
With €346 million in promised funding from VTB at its back, VTB Capital started up in early this year, staffed by a team hired away from the Moscow unit of Deutsche Bank, and let it be known they were building a future state giant at a shock pace.
It did not turn back on its plans even as the financial crisis destroyed some of its global peers and the Russian stock market plunged more than 70 per cent from its May peak, shedding a trillion dollars in capitalisation in a few months.
VTB's pursuit of an investment banking business in the throes of global industry turmoil is a fresh sign that Russian state structures are ready to deploy the cash accumulated in a lengthy oil boom to emerge from the crisis in pole position.
Russia "has a new bank, which can be a conductor of new government capital," VTB Capital head of research Alexei Yakovitsky said.
The VTB Group has been made a clearinghouse for hundreds of billions of roubles in state bailout money for Russian industry and financial markets.
The head of VTB Capital, Yuri Soloviev, told Kommersant newspaper this month that he is negotiating for a role in state interventions to support the stock market, which are currently conducted by state bank VEB.
The unit launched trade at a difficult moment for entrenched rivals.
Russian media reported last year that one home-grown power house - Renaissance Capital, which sold half its business for €346 million in the wake of the crisis - had rejected a €2.7 billion takeover bid from VTB.
Moscow investment banks have announced staff cuts running into the double digits, contributing to more than 260,000 reported worldwide in the financial industry since August last year.
"The market has changed. Foreign brokers who came and planned to capture the market for their global clients are slashing staff and cutting their budgets," Mr Yakovitsky said.