Four senior staff have resigned from NCB Stockbrokers and are believed to be on the point of joining competing firm, Merrion Stockbrokers.

The departures came yesterday morning, with two NCB staff leaving the firm's pan-European sales desk and another two resigning from positions in alternative investments.

NCB did not comment on the matter yesterday but the firm is expected to seek replacement staff at the earliest opportunity.

Merrion, which was formed in 1999 by seven senior NCB employees, was equally silent on the possibility of the four individuals joining its ranks.

All four would be seen as highly-marketable professionals within the Irish market.

Mr David Conlon and Mr Paul Deeney, who worked on quantitative analysis for NCB, had both worked with the broker since 2001.

They were behind the development of NCB's European Select Fund, which was launched last October.

Mr David Grainger and Mr Ciaran Duffy, comprised the basis of NCB's pan-European sales execution team.

Both Mr Conlon and Mr Deeney are likely to have a three-month notice period at NCB, while Mr Grainger and Mr Duffy will probably leave immediately.

Yesterday's development was preceded by the recent resignations of Ms Linda Hickey and Mr Ronan Hurley from NCB's equity team and the departure of Mr John Kelly, the broker's financial analyst.

Both Ms Hickey and Mr Hurley have joined rival Dublin brokers, while Mr Kelly is moving to work in Switzerland.

Mr Jim O'Donovan also left the company's equity sales team a few months ago, soon after NCB was bought out last summer by members of its management team and corporate finance house Key Capital for €20 million. The broker is however believed to have hired as many as eight new employees since then.