The first half of 2025 has seen a wave of staff layoffs and personnel restructuring at many banks. This is not just a short-term response to economic challenges but a clear sign of a comprehensive overhaul in their operating models, with resource efficiency and technology utilization playing key roles.

Banking is the most labor-intensive industry in the financial sector, where each institution's human resource structure always reflects its operating strategy and development priorities. In previous years, the main trend was still recruitment to expand networks and strengthen teams of tellers and salespeople in response to credit growth and market demand. However, in the first half of 2025, this has dramatically changed due to technological advancements involving Big Data and artificial intelligence (AI). As a result, fierce competitive pressure, combined with shifts in customer behavior, has forced banks to thoroughly review their human resource structures. By the middle of this year, the entire commercial banking system in Vietnam had begun a major overhaul of its human resources. Banks are dismissing many employees in traditional roles, especially those handling customer transactions, operations, and intermediary management. Meanwhile, some institutions are increasing hiring for roles related to technology, data, consulting, and customer care to support their long-term strategies. These changes align with the Government’s focus on science and technology development, signaling that banks are moving toward a more streamlined, efficient, and flexible digital banking model from the traditional approach. Banking personnel fluctuations in H1 For the first time in many years, the total number of employees in the banking industry has decreased. According to data from the financial statements published by 28 banks for the second quarter of 2025, the total number of workers in the system was 279,518, a drop of 2,857 from late 2024. This represents the largest decline in the first half of a year since the banking industry entered a period of rapid modernization and expansion. Notably, personnel fluctuations did not occur evenly across the system but varied significantly among banking groups. Of the 28 banks with available data, 13 reduced their staff, while the other 15 continued hiring. This demonstrates how human resource strategies differ based on each institution’s development goals, customer base, asset size, and technology adaptability. Some lenders are moving toward a more streamlined structure, drastically cutting their traditional workforce to cut costs and boost efficiency. Conversely, some banks are shifting personnel by laying off employees and recruiting new ones simultaneously, often reducing manual task roles and increasing staff for technology, data, and digital sales as the prevailing trend. State-run banks, the largest employers in the industry, added another 430 workers in the first six months of the year. With extensive networks serving both urban and rural areas, this group feels pressure to modernize and automate their systems, as the traditional operating structure has been in place for years. Some state-run banks have taken a cautious approach when making staff cuts in branches with few transactions, while increasing recruitment into their technology and digital customer care departments. Meanwhile, the group of banks specializing in corporate lending saw their workforce decrease by more than 700 employees compared to last year. At least five banks in this group experienced a significant drop in the second quarter of 2025, mainly due to post-merger restructuring and changes in their operating models, or pressure to improve efficiency as the corporate credit growth cycle slows down. Several banks had 100-200 fewer employees in the first half of the year. However, some lenders in this group have hired more workers for technology and data analysis, aiming to expand services for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and upgrade their risk management systems. This indicates that personnel changes among corporate lenders are not just about reducing staff, but also strategic adjustments to meet new market demands. Meanwhile, the retail banking group, which has experienced the fastest growth in recent years, has also seen the sharpest job cuts in the industry, with more than 2,400 employees laid off. In the second quarter of 2025 alone, some retail banks laid off 300-500 workers, mainly tellers and those responsible for personal credit. This is due to the decline in demand for personal credit and the shift in customer behavior toward online transaction channels, which gradually reduces the need for face-to-face contact at the branch. However, this group is also actively hiring for new roles such as data engineers, customer consultants, and AI engineers as part of their restructuring to prepare for a new growth model. Small-sized banks, whose total assets are worth less than VND150 trillion, have responded more flexibly. Most banks in this group now employ more staff than in late 2024. With limited resources, small lenders cannot make large cuts and invest in their systems simultaneously, so they have adopted a more relaxed and cautious approach. However, a notable commonality is that all small banks have outlined plans to invest in the digital banking ecosystem, including mobile applications, APIs, and AI technology. Personnel fluctuations among banks In the structure of operating costs that banks must cover, personnel expenses remain the largest. Therefore, reducing staff will help banks save significant sums. As banks listed on the stock exchange typically pay their employees between VND35 million and VND43 million per month, removing every 1,000 employees from their payroll can save several hundred billion dong in salaries, not to mention bonuses and benefits. In the state-run group, personnel costs generally focus on maintaining structural stability, with financial resources concentrated on key positions. After dismissing 191 employees, VCB now has 23,347 staff members, with a goal of streamlining traditional roles to reduce excess costs while maintaining high average salaries to retain top talent. Additionally, CTG has a workforce of 22,507 employees, after hiring 15 more, but its number of transaction points has decreased, helping reduce the costs of counter transactions and freeing up the budget for large-scale recruitment of technology personnel (targeting nearly 1,000 technology staff). Following a year of restrictions in 2024, BID has hired 606 more employees, expanding its staff to 26,675 in an effort to boost retail banking and digital transformation. The difference is most noticeable among banks specializing in corporate lending. LPBank has gained attention by cutting 1,986 staff members to a total of 9,203, which reflects the post-merger restructuring and the automation of processes originating from its postal network. In contrast, MB shows the largest increase in workforce in this group, hiring 468 additional employees, mainly in data and technical roles to grow its SME customer base and digital initiatives. Techcombank added 329 staff members, bringing its total to around 11,600, primarily to support roles involving data, information technology, and AI. There have been minimal changes at HDBank, which decreased by 15 employees to 10,577, similar to MSB, which added 215 employees to take the total to 7,201, OCB, which increased by 180 to 7,736, and SeABank, which decreased by 17 to 5,268. Banks that focus on consumer loans see the biggest fluctuations in personnel costs as digital transformation directly impacts their networks and sales teams. Sacombank, which has laid off 1,158 workers, now has 15,900 employees, each earning roughly VND41 million per month, enabling performance bonuses and helping optimize its cost-to-income ratio (CIR). VIB's workforce has decreased by 1,186 to 10,137, mainly by reducing its traditional sales staff and replacing it with digital/automatic approval channels. ACB has scaled down its payroll to 12,240 employees by removing 607 of them and shifted the budget from those departments not in direct contact with customers to frontline teams. Conversely, VPBank has increased its workforce by 677 to 15,680 to support VPBank NEO and retail banking, with personnel costs expected to rise by several billion dong annually, as part of growth investments for market share. TPBank, meanwhile, has reduced its staff by 144 to approximately 7,736, aided by adding over 500 robots to automate processes. This digital banking model allows the bank to keep costs low despite higher expenses for cybersecurity and data science teams. Since small-sized banks usually have fewer than 3,000 employees, their cost strategies tend to be cautious. Eximbank hired an additional 22 employees and now has a total of 6,619, with only a minimal increase in costs. ABBank has laid off the most workers in this group, reducing staff by 470 in some inefficient units to focus spending on appropriate personnel. Other lenders like BAB, BVB, NAB, and NCB now have between 80 and 200 more employees. With small staffs, every decision to add or remove a few dozen employees significantly impacts the report, but the total personnel costs for the entire group still represent a small portion of the system. The picture of personnel fluctuations in the first half of 2025 accurately reflects each banking group's strategy. Stabilizing and improving the quality of their technology staff is a priority for state-run banks. Those focusing on corporate lending are selectively increasing their investment in value-creating employees during their in-depth restructuring. Retail banks are making significant cuts to traditional roles to reduce their CIR, while investing heavily in the digital team. Small banks are lowering costs through gradual streamlining. These changes show that lenders are not only cutting expenses but also restructuring their personnel costs to align with the digital banking model developing in the new period.

(*) CFA

(**) UEL