China's megabanks ramp up employment despite falling profits

The Agricultural Bank of China has already hired 4,500 people.

Even as they deal with plunging earnings and ballooning bad debt, China’s four biggest state banks have kicked off their recruitment drive of fresh graduates to boost employment, reports Bloomberg.

The four biggest state banks led by Industrial & Commercial Bank of China kicked off their autumn campus hiring in August instead of in November as in previous years.

China Construction Bank also plans to add 16,000 graduates this year, up from 13,000 last year; whilst Bank of China will increase its hiring by 15% to more than 10,000, according to their advertisements.

Already, the Agricultural Bank of China has already hired 4,500 people during the spring round.

A record 8.7 million Chinese are graduating in 2020 and will have to compete with already thousands of displaced workers for limited job slots at companies.

Together, the four banks employ 1.6 million people and Construction Bank’s hiring plans alone approach the combined staff additions made by the largest US and European banks in this year’s first half. The lenders are mostly looking to hire for customer service, wealth management, and information technology, according to job ads on their websites.