Barclays Wealth, the wealth-management unit of Barclays PLC, is planning to increase staffing in Asia by 50% by the end of next year, Chief Executive Thomas Kalaris said, but acknowledged that the talent pool was limited.
"Asia is growing faster than the rest of the world, in terms of clients, but it's still a smaller portion than Europe and the U.K. for us," Kalaris said. "Our focus is on hiring senior bankers, so we can put more resources on our three focus markets—greater China, India and Indonesia—but the key will be getting senior bankers."
He said the private-banking unit of Barclays has "well north of 100" private bankers in its offices in Hong Kong, Singapore and India.
"I see the growth of ultra high net worth clients in Asia, and I also see a definite increase in the number of private banks focused on that space," he said. "There is a lot of competition for bankers, and also there is a shallow pool of talent with a limited number of high-quality private bankers, but we are investing in wealth management. So bankers know we're committed."
He defined senior bankers in wealth management as those with at least 10 to 15 years' experience, who "have a specific set of relationships and are trusted."
Last year, Barclays said it was injecting £350 million ($550 million) into its wealth business to expand the division. In August, it posted a 33% decline in first-half pretax profit, amid a sharp decline in revenue at its key investment-banking unit, but said wealth management and Africa presented opportunities to rapidly increase revenue.
This story first appeared on WSJ.com.
Write to Nisha Gopalan at nisha.gopalan@dowjones.com
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