Is a competitor trying to hit Plus500 when it's down by stealing its top talent? A job placement ad on the professional social network Linkedin seems to suggest that is the case.
An Israeli HR agency specializing in employee recruitment for Forex and binary options firms published an ad targeting Plus500 employees, saying in Hebrew that a London-based publicly listed firm is looking to recruit from inside Plus500, promising "a huge opportunity to upgrade yourself."
Finance Magnates contacted the HR agency and requested more information about the job opening. It appears that the job is situated in the same city as Plus500's Israeli offices, Haifa, Northern Israel, but the company behind the ad wishes to remain anonymous and the agency was not allowed to reveal more than that it was a publicly listed London-based company.
English Portion of the Ad
Plus500 is known for its advanced technical capabilities, relying on computer algorithms to handle online client acquisition rather than large call centers with account managers that most brokers use to get clients onboard. Considering this, a loss of some of its relatively small workforce might be seen by a competitor as an effective blow to Plus500 at a difficult time.
Only yesterday the troubled broker revealed that it hired about 40 new staff members in order to speed up the process of unlocking client accounts frozen due to lack of compliance with Anti-Money Laundering (AML) ) requirements.
There are, of course, many firms listed in London that might benefit from Plus500's employees' technological know how for automated client acquisition. However, in the forex and binary options industry the first names to come to mind with regard to London are IG Group, Playtech's Markets.com and maybe even TechFinancials. Furthermore, it might also be a firm from some other online industry, such as the gambling company 888 Holdings.
This is not the first time the practice of talent poaching has been used in the industry. Last year, FXTM placed a billboard in Cyprus right outside the office window of rival retail broker Easy Forex, encouraging employees to switch allegiances.
