City analyst Kean Marden, formerly of Merrill Lynch, has taken up a new position at Kaupthing Singer & Friedlander.

At Merrill, Marden followed companies such as Michael Page and Hays. He will still cover them, but he told Recruiter he will now extend his coverage to other UK firms, probably including SThree, Robert Walters and Imprint.

This means less emphasis on the European firms such as Adecco and Vedior. Marden said: "I'll still shadow them as they have substantial UK interests." But he will no longer produce notes on them.

Marden said he was optimistic on the outlook for recruitment companies in 2007, especially the European firms. But he said it would be "tricky" for some UK firms to repeat their spectacular performances of 2006 .

Marden took up his position on 11 December. He had been on garden leave since resigning from Merrill Lynch in September.