Considering spending An3 abroad in Hong Kong at my American BB.
I was just wondering what it’s like working there. I know the culture is heavily influenced by the mainland, but if I decided to stay (at a desk not focused on the mainland), would it be significantly harder to progress than it would be back in New York as a non-Chinese speaker?
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I head that it was a nice place to work before the protests.
day-to-day life doesn't change much before or after the protests
in any case it's a great place to live for now because COVID is under control
can't say the same about NY or London
Ok Xi.
The intensity in Asia is quite different - you will realise that the technical requirements are much lighter but you spend more time doing bs client works.
HK chicks are cute thou, and probably the only place where chicks actually get turned on by where you work.
Are you kidding me? Chicks getting turned on by where you work hahaha
Low pay. Long hours. I think they have protected Sundays do to labor laws.
Make no mistake HK pays more than NY and London, especially after tax.
EY people care to chime in?
I’m an American in Hong Kong at a BB and have been here for 8+ years now.
If you are a single guy in your early to mid 20s there is zero reason for you not to do this, especially if you have never lived in Asia before. Some posters above have mentioned that the work is less “technical” and you will not learn as much but these are all things I personally would not worry about. The gain you will get from living and working in a foreign country will far outweigh any perceived or potential professional shortcomings.
All the things travel, night life things below are pre-covid, but even then the city generally has done okay in 2020 but bars and restaurants (takeaway post 6pm) are currently closed at 6pm every day.
Social scene and night life
The city is full of expats from all around world including EU, UK, Aus/NZ, and Asia and so anyone with even little bit of outgoing personality will easily create a circle of friends to continually hang out with. You can also meet locals HKers as well to diversify social circle, obviously a bit harder but definitely doable as I have a good mix of both expats and locals (who speak EN, as I don’t speak Canto). The girls here are pretty hot as well with a good mix of both western Caucasian and Asian girls. Asian girls tend to really like western guys (I’m obviously generalising) as I’ve seen some ugly ass white dudes with some smoke show Asian girls. The weather is great from Oct to to Mar but is hot and super humid in summers but it’s fine as you spend your weekdays in the office. Hiring a junks a big thing here to over summer as well where you and a group of friends hire a boat and cruise around the coast drinking and eating all day, it’s fantastic way to spend a Saturday day drinking and getting effed up with friends.
Travel
Pre-covid. I can’t stress this enough with how fantastic it is to live in HK for travelling. You have easy access to Mainland China, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, and all of South East Asia including Singapore, Philippines, Thailand (Bangkok is pure debauchery), Malaysia, Vietnam, Indonesia and I honestly can’t list all the countries around you have easy and cheap flights to. I’ve literally spent a Thur and a Fri hiking 13k foot mountain in Taiwan and then flew right to Philippines and spent my sat and sun surfing on some of the most amazing beaches in the world. Having easy access to these countries, on the cheap, and the authentic cuisine is just too good to pass up. You also open up yourself so much personally by getting out of your comfort zone in the States and learning to be uncomfortable in a foreign setting.
Professional (all this pertains to my experience at a BB)
I will admit that the hours in Hong Kong suck. Face time is a big issue here and is especially bad at the junior levels. Normal hours for most analyst and associates are 85 to 90 hours a week. There is a ton, I mean a TON of marketing and pitching and I think this is an endemic problem across all BBs. In NY, MDs tend to know their clients very well, have fostered these relationships over the years and are almost friends with the management team and the deals are so much larger with huge fees that the business model supports the ability of MDs to function this way. In Asia, banks are constantly ambulance chasing so many clients and many MDs barely know anything about their clients and so you end up pitching a shit ton to like everyone. The good thing through is that deals tend to be smaller, deal teams tend to be smaller and so junior folks are less of a cog in the machine and will often talk directly with mgmt of clients during a trade. For example, when I was an associate I held weekly project mgmt calls with the head of M&A for a workstream my team was running because my MD was too busy with other stuff and he only joined the call when we really needed his expertise. Also as a junior you end up doing a lot of business travel as many clients often like to a junior staff seconded on site so that’s also a nice little perk which you don’t see in NY.
COL
As others have already opined, flats in HK are tiny and overpriced. But you learn to live with it as you end up enjoying the experience of being out and about in either HK or another country. Western food is expensive as hell and cost 1.25x more in HK than you would spend in NY but if you go local (noodles and shit) you can end up saving a ton of money. In regards to taxes income taxes maxes at a MTR of 17% and capped at 15%, but as an American with worldwide taxes you will still pay federal taxes but as someone mentioned already, the first US$100k is tax free and the taxes you already paid to HK can also be deducted. So net net you will end up still paying less taxes than if you were in the states. I think my MTR was like 28% last year (vs 45% in States being in NYC).
In all, I highly recommend you take the plunge especially if your bank will support the move. The regional is highly dynamic with China still growing very quickly and countries like Vietnam, Thailand, and Indonesia continuing to drive growth in SEA.
Feel free to DM if you want to chat more about it, as you can tell I feel super passionate about this and I have grown tremendously both professionally and personally over past 8+ years of being here.
I've been working in Hong Kong with US BB for 10 years now. Offering my two cents here (wanderingwanchai has already touched some good points):
- If you are already analyst 2 in the US, you could try to ask for an accelerated promotion (subject to firm). Do you also have intention to stay in the same bank for associate and beyond?
- If you don't speak Mandarin, you are gonna hit a ceiling pretty quickly unless you work in a product group. It used to be the case when few local/Mandarin speaking people know really well on how to structure M&A or do acquisition financing, but over the years, the local talent pool in these product areas has grown tremendously and very competitively. Sooner or later you'll be facing a competition for VP/Director against a person who's equally skilled and knows the language and culture, and in particular when you are supposed to shoulder more responsibilities on client interaction and deal origination
- On average, many clients you will deal with aren't as sophisticated or professional as US/EU counterparts. So you may end up doing a lot of things that you don't think make much sense in a US context. That translates into all the differences you will experience in how pitch is done and how deals are executed. Well, that's just part of the cultural shock/difference anyways
- One really positive thing I wanna mention is that Hong Kong is not just about China - mainland. You will have exposure to other countries/markets in the region - Korea, Taiwan, South East Asia (a couple of different countries in that region), India/South Asia, and even Australia. The breadth of exposure is simply awesome (and in particular if you get to put on a business class flight (longer than 5 hours though) to visit these different countries. At the end of the day, Asia is very diversified, dynamic and arguably the fasted growing region globally, and it's certainly very exciting to be part of it.
- Hong Kong wise, it's a bit unfortunate in terms of the political situation and covid situation. It is what it is. For you, mostly things will be "as usual", as you are in the business of investment banking and making money. The city itself still very well managed, and has the strong backing (financially) from the mainland. With the US/China tension likely lingering around for the years to come, you'll continue to see a wave of existing US-listed Chinese companies coming back to list in Hong Kong, and many grown up Chinese companies raising financing or acquiring other businesses in Hong Kong/across the region.
Hope above helps.
Tossing it out there - seen some commenters talking about the fun things to do in HK "pre-protest". Let's not imply that the protestors are at fault for disrupting the day to day lives of expats. It's "pre-civil liberties crackdown".
Are you a mainlander? If not, that's a classic Mainland talking point lol.
To answer your question, I'm a Hong Kong/USA dual citizen. Thanks for your concern!