Peregrine Held Back By Staff Costs

However, the increase was well the below the 147 per cent surge in turnover, to HK$77 billion, even after stripping out the effects of the HK$77.4 million exceptional gain in 1995 from the sale of Phileo Securities of Malaysia.

Philip Tose, chairman, said a sharp rise in business volume had led to higher costs, as the bank hired more staff in a market made expensive by the expansion of other houses such as Deutsche Morgan Grenfell. The hiring of additional staff, some of them directly from Wall Street, to improve management systems and controls was expensive, but absolutely vital