Hope you’ve had a good first quarter of 2016. Here’s a brief update on the Hiring Market in Technology for Q1 2016
The market:
- We’ve had a lot of “gloom and doom” news floating around. It is public information that many of the Investment Banks like RBS and other European banks are massively reducing their footprint in the region. There’s news of hiring freezes all over and many of the banks that were hiring actively in 2015 are not really hiring as much in 2016. The US Investment Banks are also only making exceptional hires. Hence, as far as technology hires go, we’re looking at a slowdown with the traditional western Investment Banks. Having said that, there are still front office ‘Replacement hires’ that banks need to make, like roles on the Run the Bank (Support) side. Contracting roles also still exist but fewer than what we saw last year. Having said this, there is some demand in the High Frequency area from market makers and hedge funds (C++/Java)
- We see ambitious Chinese banks doing some volume hiring. These banks are generally playing “catch up” to the Western Banks as far as technology is concerned. A lot of the systems are vendor-based and not built in-house from the ground up. We have also seen interest in hiring in Hong Kong from firms headquartered in the Middle East and South East Asia
- Insurance is generally booming in the region. We see a lot of interest from top insurance firms trying to build new platforms to attain market share by investing more in digital / mobile technologies
Hot business areas:
- In Investment Banking, we see FX picking up steam again. The banks that are hiring have a pattern of hiring FX Support guys / developers (Murex, Java)
- Regulatory area: AML roles, Regulatory roles continue to make the list of “exceptional hires” at some of the banks which are otherwise not hiring
Types of roles in demand:
Banks in general:
- At a Senior Level, we see Cloud roles / Infrastructure roles as a popular pick. Also, roles in Cyber Security, IT Risk / Security and AML
- Junior-Mid Level roles in development (Java / .NET). Especially candidates who speak Chinese (Cantonese / preferably Mandarin)
- Infrastructure roles across all areas (Windows / Unix / Storage / Virtualization) are popular given the desire for banks to move things to the Cloud
Insurance firms:
- At a Senior Level, we see many roles in AML / Risk and Cloud platforms. Also, development managers (Java / C# / Mobile platforms) are in demand
- In the Junior-Mid Level space, we see all sorts of roles. J2EE / .NET / Oracle / BA roles and so on. The Insurance Sector in general is experiencing quite some growth
Hope you found this information useful. If you have comments or questions, please email us. Whether you’re looking for a role, looking to hire or just want more market information, we’re here to help.
Vince Natteri
Director, Pinpoint Asia
newsletter@pinpointasia.com
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