The fat salaries dished out in Hong Kong's financial services industry are slowly spreading to China.

It’s all down to competition for staff. As China’s employers compete for the small pool of experienced bankers in Hong Kong, recruiters say they have no choice but to cough up.

“A significant percentage of foreign banks in China are facing significant inflation of salaries that are not only reaching but exceeding international levels. Increases of 50-100% in salaries are now a common thing,” says Lionel Lee, assistant regional director for Asia at Ross Human Directions.

Investment bankers in corporate finance within top-tier US banks in China, for example, now have their base salary pegged at a rate very similar to that of their US counterparts. Some of Wall Street's biggest names are also said to be looking (and willing to pay) for individuals “to fuel the opening of branches”, and seven-figure bonuses are no longer out of the question.

“It is currently a candidate-driven market in China and in order to attract highly qualified and good candidates to join, an attractive salary package is a major part of the equation,” says Levina Poon, associate director of the banking division at Robert Walters in Hong Kong.

However, James Carrs, director of banking and financial services at Hudson in Hong Kong, says it’s foreign managers, rather than local bankers, who are usually the recipients of these hefty paychecks in China. “Definitely the foreign bankers because the local bankers are less demanding on the base,” he says.