The good times are over for expat bankers in Hong Kong
August 13, 2019 Category China News Round-up, Weekly
As Hong Kong banks trim staff, prospects tighten for some expat bankers unless they learn Cantonese or Mandarin, find jobs in another sector or take a pay cut. As Deutsche Bank and other big banks reduce staff, expatriate financial employees who are made redundant and want to stay in Hong Kong may find it more difficult, according to headhunters. The job prospects are particularly tight for trading and banking positions tied to equities, as firms have begun reducing headcount against the backdrop of more uncertain financial markets and an investor pullback amid rising geopolitical tensions, including the U.S.-China trade war.
Deutsche Bank said in July that it plans to slash 18,000 jobs worldwide and close its equity sales and trading business globally, while HSBC said that it would lay off less than 2% of its workforce. Nomura cut jobs as part of an overhaul in April and Citigroup and UBS are also reportedly considering their own global cutbacks.
“The equities market has been very challenging this year. There have been cutbacks in trading staff, which means it is a saturated market for candidates out there,” said Ricky Mui, Managing Director of recruiting firm Robert Walters in Hong Kong. “Since there are fewer open vacancies, this means a more competitive market for jobseekers.” The wave of job cuts globally comes after a decade of steady employment growth in the financial services industry in Hong Kong. There were 236,116 people working in the finance and insurance sector, or about 7.7% of the overall workforce in Hong Kong, as of the end of the first quarter, the most recent sector data available, according to the city’s Census and Statistics Department. There were about 6,466 vacancies in the finance sector as of the end of March, up 6.2% from a year earlier.
Abimanu Jeyakumar, Director of financial services recruiter Selby Jennings in Hong Kong, said many financial firms in the city were increasingly looking for the “golden goose” – recruits who speak Cantonese and Mandarin, and were educated in the U.S. or Europe. That makes it more difficult for expats who only speak one language. “An overarching theme for expats here in Hong Kong is the localization and the regional focuses of a lot of businesses,” Jeyakumar said. There has also been an increase in hiring in mainland China as the financial markets open up there, versus positions that would have traditionally stayed in Hong Kong,the South China Morning Post reports.
The average package for a mid-level expat in Hong Kong last year was USD276,417, including salary and benefits, according to consulting firm ECA International. Private banks and wealth managers are now some of the highest in-demand jobs in Hong Kong, as banks and asset managers look to bolster their services for high-net-worth and ultra-high-net-worth clients in Hong Kong, mainland China and other parts of Asia.
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