31 August 2020 - 17:41Credit Suisse plans to double its headcount in China over five years as the firm accelerates its pursuit of the nation’s wealthy, seeking to move past a scandal that has engulfed once-favoured client and Luckin Coffee founder Lu Zhengyao.
“China is our strongest focus when it comes to headcount, and infrastructure growth compared to any country in the world,” Sitohang said. “The worst of Covid-19’s impact on the region’s business activity is behind us,” he said, referring to Asia. Credit Suisse is not alone in setting ambitious hiring targets for China and will have to compete with the likes of Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and others. Goldman Sachs plans to double its headcount to 600 by 2025, while Swiss rival UBS Group aims to do the same, taking its investment-bank staff to 400.
About 30 bankers at the joint venture were pushed out in July as Credit Suisse plans to recruit fresh talent, a person familiar said. Gottstein announced the revamp at the end of July by merging its advisory and trading business to generate Sf400m annually for reinvestment, which includes as many as 500 job cuts in Switzerland. The bank plans to deploy two-thirds of its overall capital into wealth management. Sitohang said he does not plan to cut any jobs on his turf, since the region’s workforce is “lean enough”.