National Bank of Canada said Wednesday it had asked staff to work remotely, if possible, making it the second large Canadian lender to return to work from home amid growing concerns over the Omicron coronavirus variant.
Canada‘s top health official Theresa Tam warned on Monday that COVID-19 cases in the country could rise rapidly in the coming days. That has led Canadian banks and financial firms to rethink return-to-office plans.
“A message was just sent to our employees asking them to work remotely if they can,” a spokesperson for Canada‘s sixth-biggest lender told Reuters in an email. “In the longer term, we are staying the course with our plan of reopening gradually, on a voluntary basis, with no set date.”
The decision impacts the bank’s nearly 20,000 staff in Canada.
The rapid spread of the Omicron strain has wreaked havoc with companies plans to return to normalcy.
Bank of Nova Scotia, Canada‘s third largest lender, said Monday it would pause its plan for employees working remotely to return to its Toronto head office starting on Jan. 17.
In the United States, JPMorgan <JPM.N> said Wednesday it was making its annual healthcare conference in San Francisco a “virtual” event. The decision came after major biotech firms like Moderna and Amgen said they would not attend in person.
New York and New Jersey are experiencing the fastest spread of Omicron in the United States, according to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
That is prompting banks and other financial firms based in New York City to be extra vigilant.
A source at one major U.S. bank headquartered in Manhattan said there was “heightened diligence” as a result of the Omicron variant. A number of staff were choosing to work from home out of caution ahead of the holidays, the source said.
Insurer Prudential has pushed back its return to office plan in the United States to January on a voluntary basis, a source with knowledge of the matter told Reuters on Wednesday. However, that decision was made prior to Thanksgiving, the source said.
Last week, Jefferies asked staff to work from home for the remainder of the year, due to a spate of COVID-19 cases. On Tuesday, JPMorgan told unvaccinated Manhattan staff to work from home.
Morgan Stanley Chief Executive James Gorman said Monday he expects COVID-19 to be an issue through the next year.
(Reporting by Noor Zainab Hussain and Manya Saini in Bengaluru; Writing by Matt Scuffham; Editing by Anil D’Silva, Mark Porter, Alexandra Hudson and Mark Heinrich)
