CCB brokerage unit to increase research team by 40%

The move is seen to increase the company’s competitiveness in wooing investors for financial services in China.

CCB International Securities Ltd., the brokerage arm of China’s second-largest bank, plans to expand its research team by as much as 40 percent to meet rising demand for analysis of Chinese stocks and economy.

The unit of China Construction Bank Corp. may hire as many as 20 people this year in the mainland and Hong Kong, Timothy Sun, managing director and co-head of research at the brokerage, said in an interview. That’s after an expansion last year that took staff strength to 50 from 10, he said.

CCB International joins rivals including UBS AG and ICBC International Holdings Ltd. in competing for talent as banks embark on a hiring spree to tap investors’ demand for financial services in the world’s second-biggest economy. The expansion plans are taking place as concerns about tighter monetary policies led to an 8.2 percent decline in the benchmark Shanghai Composite Index from its Nov. 8 high to Feb. 14.

“The recent decline in the market will not scale back hiring at CCBI’s research team,” Sun said. “Short-term volatility in the market will not deter its goal to establish one of the strongest research teams in the market.”

Customers in Australia, Singapore and the Middle East are demanding more analysis and trips into China, Sun said. There’s also increasing interest from Chinese fund managers under the qualified domestic institutional investor, or QDII, program, he said.

UBS, Switzerland’s biggest lender, aims to double the workforce at its China operations to as many as 1,200 people over the next five years, Yoon Chi-Won, the co-head of the company’s Asia-Pacific unit, said this week. South Korea’s Samsung Securities Co. plans to hire as many as 20 people in Hong Kong to bolster its Asian business.

View the full story in Bloomberg.