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In recent years, the battle for technological talent seemed predetermined. The hi-tech industry, offering exceptional compensation packages, attracted the brightest minds, while the financial system lagged behind. Demand within the financial sector for software engineers, data scientists, and cybersecurity professionals continued to rise, yet financial institutions struggled to compete with the salaries offered by tech companies. While the financial sector enjoys a certain prestige, in practice, the wage gap between financial institutions, particularly banks and institutional investors on the one hand, and large technology companies and successful start-ups on the other, has remained significant.
Today, however, a window of opportunity has opened for a new balance of power. The AI revolution, combined with a wave of efficiency measures across the technology sector, is reshaping the landscape. Hi-tech companies are streamlining operations, reducing headcount, and replacing employees and workflows with AI-enabled solutions. The result is an oversupply of highly skilled, educated, and experienced technology professionals in development and data talent, which the financial sector has historically struggled to attract.
For the financial sector, and capital markets in particular, this shift is highly significant. Whereas institutions previously relied on outsourcing or incremental technological upgrades, they now have a genuine opportunity to strengthen their core technological capabilities by recruiting top-tier talent from the hi-tech industry. This extends far beyond isolated improvements, impacting the entire value chain: client services, operational processes, investment capabilities, risk management, and more. After years of difficulty competing with the hi-tech sector for software, cybersecurity, and data professionals, new possibilities are now emerging.
A service, operations, and technology revolution for the public’s benefit
Integrating high-quality technological talent into the financial sector can have a profound and lasting impact, from upgrading digital infrastructure to embedding innovation within operational and service processes that have remained largely unchanged for decades. These are far from cosmetic enhancements; rather, they represent a transformation that touches every point of interaction between the public and the financial system, enabling faster, more efficient processing, improved service quality, higher levels of automation, greater transparency, and enhanced data-driven decision-making. In capital markets, particularly in investment management, achieving real-time mark-to-market capabilities becomes significantly more attainable.
Despite a lingering perception in hi-tech circles that technological roles within financial institutions constitute a compromise, the reality is profoundly different. Systems that oversee trillions of shekels, anchored in advanced data analytics, algorithms, and rigorous risk management, elevate technological capability into a decisive and enduring strategic asset. The sector offers not merely intellectual rigor or the chance to refine core processes, but a singular context in which innovation, operational precision, and enduring impact intersect, enabling professionals to influence the functioning of major institutions and, ultimately, shape economic outcomes that reach every citizen, alongside far greater employment certainty than that typically found in start-ups.
More than sectoral competition: A shift benefiting the entire economy
The efficiency measures currently unfolding in the hi-tech sector should not be interpreted as a warning sign for the Israeli economy. On the contrary, technological adaptation is poised to drive higher productivity, lower consumer prices, stronger profitability, and sustained, broad-based economic growth.
This evolution allows the financial sector to close long-standing gaps. A partial reallocation of technological talent toward finance will strengthen capital markets, streamline the industry, and generate value for the public, while enhancing the safeguarding of savings and improving returns on long-term investments.
Amid the efficiency transformations unfolding in hi-tech, a clear opportunity has emerged: integrating high-quality technological talent into a sector that urgently needs it, deepening innovation, and building advanced infrastructures that will enable the financial system to become faster, more efficient, and more service-oriented. These steps will strengthen capital markets and ultimately benefit the public at large.
The writer is the CEO of The Investment Houses Association