The financial services industry is facing its most severe crisis in decades because of ­credit markets that remain ­largely impaired, despite unprecedented government intervention in the U.S. and elsewhere. Stock markets are experiencing wild volatility, with triple-­digit point swings in the Dow Jones industrial average occurring with alarming regularity. The U.S. and the 15 countries in the eurozone are already in a recession, unemployment is rising around the world, and few expect the good times to return anytime soon.

Against this backdrop of seemingly universal negative news, at least one positive development can be found. As sell-side firms — and even some buy-side outfits — trim their staffs and streamline their operations in an effort to cut costs, some ­money man­agement firms are adding researchers by choosing from the best of the ­newly available analysts. Investors may still be leery of treating battered markets as a buying opportunity, but ­savvy buy-side firms have been quick to avail themselves of what they see as a hiring ­opportunity.

T. Rowe Price Associates, whose assets under management were $345 bil­lion at the end of the third quarter, added 20 analysts in the past year, for a ­global research staff of 126; the team tracks 1,600 stocks, up from 1,500 one year ago. Eleven of the new­comers work in Asia or Europe, bringing the Baltimore-­based firm’s overseas equity analyst head count to 41.

“Our U.S. analysts have their peers in other countries, and they talk to one another and travel with those peers,” explains Anna Dopkin, co-­director of North American equity research. “That kind of teamwork happens very frequently,” she says, as investors demand a more ­global perspective on their ­investments.

The firm knows about hiring quality analysts: T. Rowe Price researchers capture three of the 11 spots in this year’s Best of the Buy Side, Institutional Investor’s annual ranking of buy-side analysts as chosen by their sell-side counterparts. ­Nearly 400 sell-side researchers, from 95 firms, who participated in the 2008 All-­America Research Team survey (Institutional Investor, October 2008) were asked to name the ­money management analysts they consider the best in nine industry categories, from Basic Materials to Telecommunications. Two of the nine categories had ties, resulting in a total of 11 ­winners.

T. Rowe’s Peter Bates shares top honors in Capital Goods/Industrials with Claude Staehly of Wellington Management Co., while Joseph Fath leads the Consumer category. Gabriel Solomon, in his first appearance on the Best of the Buy Side, captures the crown in Financial Institutions (see profiles below).

Fidelity Investments, with $1.4 trillion in assets under management, has two winners: Matthew Schuldt is the best in Basic Materials, and Peter Wright shares the winner’s circle in Technology with Robert Bowman of ­JPMorgan Asset ­Management.

Walter Donovan, president of the equity division of Fidelity Management & Research Co., with responsibility for the Boston-­based firm’s ­equity trading, research and portfolio management, says Fidelity increased its ­equity analyst head count over the past year, from 402 to 439 worldwide, and expanded its operations in Hong Kong, London and ­Tokyo. He declined to disclose the number of stocks his analysts ­cover.

The “explosion” in the number of newly listed public companies around the world, Donovan says, is fueling demand for experienced researchers able to find buying opportunities in these tumultuous times: “You need more people to turn over rocks,” he says.

Fidelity’s crosstown rival, Wellington Management, with $450 billion in assets under management, also has two analysts in this year’s survey: Ann Gallo, No. 1 in Health Care, and ­Staehly.

Mark Mandel, head of Wellington’s global industry research division, added four analysts in the past year, for a total of 54. With ten analysts stationed in Hong Kong, London and Singapore, the firm is able to track about 3,000 stocks, or roughly 90 percent “of the companies around the world that have investable floats of about, or over, $2 ­billion,” he says.

Having a global presence is essential not only because investors want a ­broader view of their portfolios, Mandel says, but also because ­many companies are expanding their international operations. Three of Wellington’s four analysts in ­Asia cover ­global conglomerates such as New York–based Colgate-­Palmolive Co., because “their growth is in that part of the world,” he explains. The fourth Asia-­based analyst covers ­technology.

Wellington also has three banking analysts in London who cover financial institutions across Europe, emerging markets and ­Asia.

This year’s other Best of the Buy Side winners are John Mansfield of SAC Capital Advisors, who makes his first appearance on the list, in Energy (see profile, below); Vincent Rivers of Pyramis Global Advisors (Fidelity’s institutional investment division), who is the favorite in Telecommunications; and Andrew Slabin of GLG Partners, on top in ­Media.