GF
Sector: Private Banking / Wealth Management
Demand for bankers set to sky-rocket in the GCC
Financial services firms in the GCC are set to increase their headcount by 30% in the next few years, and up to 50,000 more jobs could be created. A study by Hewitt Associates shows that banks in the UAE, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman and Jordan are laggards when it comes to recruiting enough people to cope [...]
Big hitters making the Middle East move
In the past, the Middle East has struggled to attract top bankers, but now international investment banks are moving them there in numbers. Citigroup The struggling US bank announced the appointment of Alberto Verme to head up its investment banking division in Dubai. Verme is one of Citigroup’s most senior bankers, currently global co-head of [...]
Pay pain for banks in the GCC
Pay in the Middle East is spiralling. It now makes up almost 60% of banks’ operating costs. A survey by consultancy Hewitt Associates suggests salaries in Oman and Qatar lead the way when it comes to eating into banks’ profits. But pay across the Middle East banking sector is becoming a problem – particularly when [...]
Are Arabs from Venus and Westerners from Mars?
There’s no shortage of Western bankers in Dubai. But culturally, are Arabs and Westerners planets apart? Maybe – Kwintessential, a consultancy which specializes in such things, says Arabs tend to be more tactile than Western businessmen: “Be prepared to be held, touched, kissed and felt. Recoiling from such behavior would seem cold.” On the other [...]
Is it still a man’s world?
Are more women in the Gulf breaking into top-level positions in financial services, or is it still a male-dominated industry? Figures from the US Equal Opportunity Commission paint a cosmopolitan picture of the industry state-side. In the banking/credit arena, women make up 48.6% of the workforce, whereas in the securities market – the sector with [...]
Bahrain’s private banking boost
Bahrain has created a new private banking licence to give a nudge to its wealth management industry. It’s liable to increase competition for staff. “The licence is aimed at encouraging international and leading regional banks to offer sophisticated wealth management services,” said Ahmed Abdul Aziz Al Bassam, the Central Bank of Bahrain’s director of licensing [...]
Islamic interest rises
Oil-fuelled wealth creation is driving high-octane demand for Islamic bankers in the private banking sector. Samar El Gazar, partner and managing director at Leaders Solutions, tells us international banks are running to catch up with local private banks offering Islamic products. Raed Sater, managing director at Edward W. Kelley & Partners, says that in the [...]
Have clients, will move
Private banks in the Gulf are eager to stock up with private bankers, but only if they come equipped with a raft of high net worth clients. “Demand for private bankers has been increasing in the past 18 months…. There is greater opportunity to put money here. The money from the oil boom is staying [...]
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