European Compliance Hiring Market Outlook – Q1 2021

Compliance hiring activity accelerated in Q1 2021 across the European markets. Our London recruitment search team have seen an 18% increase in new roles and the EMEA team saw a massive 67% increase compared to the same period last year. All sectors of the Compliance and Financial Crime markets are busy with firms looking to hire at all levels.

2020 was a challenging year for many obvious reasons, but as we previously reported the Compliance and Financial Crime markets remained active both here in London and across EMEA.

The big change we have seen so far in 2021 is that the larger bulge bracket financial services groups are now back in the market looking to hire, predominantly at the AVP/VP levels. Most of the larger firms remained relatively quiet last year, with the exception of a few firms making strategic senior hires. 

Citi, Barclays, Morgan Stanley, SCB, JP Morgan, HSBC, Credit Suisse, and UBS have all been active in the first three months of the year.  Not all have been using agency support, relying on their direct sourcing models and LinkedIn, some having more success than others. It has been recently reported that 63% of hiring managers are worried about how to attract the top talent in a competitive market. Our teams target 100% of the candidate market, we access passive talent and use our extensive networks to recruit the finest expertise for our clients.

Outside of the larger firms we are seeing continued demand across Payments, FinTech, Alternative Asset Management, Private Equity, Brokerage, and Insurance. 

In short, our clients are actively looking to recruit, and we are supporting them, as always, by providing them with the strongest, most diverse candidates to solve their Compliance and Financial Crime needs.

Please do get in touch with Denis Spearman or any of the compliance and financial crime team to discuss your hiring needs or your career and how we can help you find a new role.