Citigroup, the biggest foreign banking group in Hong Kong by headcount, is ready to hire more wealth managers and give its private banking business a bump amid stiffer rivalry in the region, a top executive said. The US bank remains focused on taking its new hires to 1,000 for the business by 2025, after adding 10o last year, said Horace Yip, head of Citi Private Bank’s operations in Hong Kong. The Greater Bay Area, with an expanding pool of multimillionaires, has turned the region into a fertile ground of opportunities, he added. “The Bay area is definitely a growth engine for private banking business,” Yip said in a media interview. “Tax incentives, and other Hong Kong government’s efforts to promote family offices, will attract more wealthy families to invest here.” Wealth Management Connect scheme: here’s what you need to know about the scheme that excites your bankers The Bay area comprises Hong Kong, Macau and nine cities in southern Guangdong province. There were more than 452,000 millionaire families with an aggregate assets of 2.7 trillion yuan (US$424 billion), making it the wealthiest megalopolis in the world, according to a Deloitte and CPA Australia report in late 2020. Rivals HSBC, Standard Chartered and Bank of China (Hong Kong) have expanded their wealth management team in Hong Kong in recent years, despite pandemic chaos. The introduction of the Wealth Management Connect scheme last September has encouraged banks to grow their clientele to boost income squeezed by decades of near-zero rate policies worldwide. HSBC on track to hire more than 1,000 Asian wealth managers this year in US$3.5 billion bet on region HSBC last year said it would spend US$6 billion in Asia over a five-year period, to grow its business, including ramping up its wealth management operations, as it looked to future growth in China. Standard Chartered in February also said it would invest US$300 million in its China business. Citigroup, which has about 4,600 employees in Hong Kong or 2.1 per cent of its global direct staff, intends to hire another 100 private bankers this year, Yip added. Citigroup derived about one-fifth of its revenue from Asia in 2021, according to its latest financial report. Within the banking business, private banking generated about US$4billion or 18 per cent in 2021, while growth was static. Hong Kong lawmakers will discuss a bill offering tax incentives to family offices in the second half of this year as the city plays catch-up with the regional hub of Singapore. Yip believes that plan can be another catalyst to spur the wealth management industry. The need for alternative investment choices, such as private equity, hedge funds and currencies, has not been affected by Covid-19 movement restrictions or extreme market volatility caused by China’s crackdown on tech industry , or risks emanating from geopolitical events. At Citi Private Bank, net investment fund sales grew seven times in 2021 from a year earlier, Yip said. Investments in alternative assets by its clients rose last quarter by three times from a year earlier, while their foreign-exchange trading jumped by 20 per cent. “The border closure has reduced the level of personal contacts with our mainland China clients,” he added. “However, it has not stopped us from serving them via all types of online communication tools. While stocks are volatile, many private bank customers will opt for alternative investments to achieve better returns.”