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Goldman Sachs slows London recruitment as City doubts persist

US investment giant Goldman Sachs has reportedly halted its plans to relocate some of its global operations to London as a result of the continued uncertainty surrounding Brexit.

The financial firm, which is currently constructing a new £350m London HQ, had planned to uproot much of its global business and IT operations to the capital, according to the bank’s Chief Executive.

Speaking to Bloomberg TV in Davos yesterday, Lloyd Blankfein said that while certain benefits of doing business in London, such as its convenient time zone, would remain unchanged, the firm was now taking a more caution view of the City of London’s long-term prospects.

He said: “Operating our business to maximise our global potential, we were trying to get as much into the UK as we could. So if business needed to be done in the UK, it was always there.”

“We were on track to move more and more of our global activities – global ops, global technology – all those things made and more sense to operate out of [the] UK. Now we are slowing down that decision.”

The comments come as rumours continue to mount that Goldman could be set to move half of its 6,000-strong workforce out of London.

Meanwhile, HSBC boss Stuart Gulliver has said that 1,000 roles at the bank will move once the UK has left the European Union a claim echoed by Swiss bank UBS who are also set to move 1,000 of their staff out of the City of London.