Citigroup, the world’s largest bank, is planning to add as many as 10,000 staff across its Asia divisions as part of a plan to double its presence in China and boost investment banking in the rest of the region.
The massive hiring plan comes less than 24 hours after reports on Wall Street suggested that the banking group was seeking to axe about 5 percent of its workforce, or 15,000 jobs, as part of a wider cost cutting plan.
The Asian job plans were revealed by Charles Prince, the Citigroup chief executive, during a trip to Beijing.
Citigroup plans to buy Bank of Overseas Chinese in Taiwan and Nikko Cordial, a Tokyo-based brokerage. Mr Prince said that the banking group is also planning to hire about 1,000 people this year to increase its corporate, consumer and investment banking businesses in China.
Mr Prince is under pressure to cut costs at Citigroup by about $1 billion (509,000) as the bank struggles to keep up with rivals such as Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase.