Banks Want Staff Back at the Office. There Aren't Enough Desks
By and Nicholas Comfort
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Five years after the Covid pandemic fueled an unprecedented boom in remote work, bank executives have become ever more vocal in their insistence that workers should return to the office.
In a growing number of cases, however, they don't have enough desks.
JPMorgan Chase & Co. has just signed up for thousands more in the UK and Paris. Spain's Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria SA is running short of office space in the UK for its growing corporate and investment banking teams.
And HSBC Holdings Plc, which touted its plans to slash space in the aftermath of the pandemic, now has a shortage that could run to as many as 7,700 desks in London. To cope, its in talks to lease a second new building a stone's throw from its current base, having previously agreed to vacate Canary Wharf in favor of a new and smaller global headquarters in the City of London in 2023.
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