Chinese banking staff reap general pay rises in 2018
Chinese banks spent big on raising their staff’s pay in 2018, with China Merchants Bank, Ping An Bank and Bank of Ningbo leading the trend.
Among the 19 listed banks which have posted their annual reports so far, most reported raising wages.
The per capita salary of major state banks was 250,000 yuan (US$37,715) to 320,000 yuan and more than 400,000 yuan for joint-stock commercial banks.
China Merchants Bank, a Shenzhen-based joint-stock bank, took the lead in terms of the amount of pay, with its employees earning an average 585,000 yuan — about an 18-percent increase year on year.
It was followed by Ping An Bank and Bank of Ningbo, whose staff were paid 528,000 yuan and 484,000 yuan on average.
In 2018, most banks, big and small alike, devoted more to improve their staff’s benefits. Four of them raised their total salary expenditure by more than 10 percent, with the China Merchants Bank seeing the highest growth — 21 percent year over year.
Bank of Ningbo and Ping An Bank saw their expenditure on salaries rise 17.1 percent and 12.4 percent.
Wuxi Rural Commercial Bank, a much smaller lender, paid 10.3 percent more than a year ago to their employees.
Last year was a relatively good year for the banking industry, as listed banks reported general growth in revenue and profits.
But due to the application of financial technologies, it remained an irreversible trend for banks to downsize their teams, especially for large ones with redundant personnel, a report from STCN.com noted.
The report found that the top six state lenders cut their workforce by a total 28,000 in the past year — mostly receptionists, security guards and those with less skills.
In contrast, talent was in great demand in areas such as retail banking, information technology and compliance management.