By Esha Vaish
(Reuters) - Companies in Britain were beginning to hire new staff in areas such as finance, cybersecurity and digital markets, leading to "pockets" of wage inflation in the job market, recruiter Robert Walters (L:RWA) said on Thursday.
So far, staffing companies including Hays (L:HAYS) and Pagegroup (L:PAGE) have said British employers had frozen new hiring and were only replacing workers in jobs being vacated, because of uncertainty since the vote to leave the European Union.
Robert Walters said on Thursday hiring remained "somewhat cautious" in Britain, and particularly London, but in some occupations new hires were beginning.
Deputy CEO Giles Daubeney said companies were putting out "big mandates" in jobs such as risk, compliance and audit to cope with higher regulatory scrutiny. Cybersecurity, tech and digital marketing jobs were also getting filled.
"It's fairly early days, but in some disciplines where there is a real shortage of people, particularly finance, cybersecurity, digital markets, there aren't enough people to go around so obviously premiums are being paid," he told Reuters.
Daubeney said the wage inflation on some job offers had been 10 to 20 percent, although it was just in "pockets" so far.
"(Wage inflation) always starts in pockets and then it becomes the norm because people compare. Yes, it's in small pockets at the moment, but the fact that it's there at all is very encouraging," CEO Robert Walters said.
The Bank of England is looking at wage data and inflation for clues to determine the pace of monetary tightening. But Brexit may hit spending by customers and businesses and cause financial firms to move jobs to the EU to continue serving clients there.
Daubeney said one or two financial-services institutions were "still looking at possibly moving people to continental Europe" but nobody had pulled the trigger yet.
Robert Walters, which raised its profit forecast three times last year, on Thursday posted a record 44 percent jump in annual pretax profit to 40.6 million pounds for 2017, boosted by North American growth.
Daubeney said U.S. President Donald Trump's tax reforms had "put money back" into the economy and stimulated hiring, although the tech hub of San Francisco had been hurt by new "protectionist" measures.
Some foreign workers were unable to migrate to the United States, while some had decided against moving because they were worried their visas would not be renewed if they did, he said.