For adventurous bankers or traders, hedge funds have been the traditional route for striking out on one’s own, but now many are looking at an alternative. Setting up as a proprietary trader in the high-frequency trading world is becoming fashionable, even as high frequency trading is emerging into the uncomfortable spotlight of regulatory concern.

“We’re seeing a disproportionate number of people setting up in this space,” says Martin Cornish of law firm Katten Muchin Rosenman Cornish. As banks have had to reassess their risk profiles and draw in their horns, “a lot of individuals are either without jobs or sitting on their hands at the bank, unable to implement the strategies they want to”, says Mr Cornish.