Frankfurt

EUROPE'S last global banks are caving in to pressure from regulators and preparing to tell investors just how much their aspirations will shrink.

"The European banks were too long holding onto the past and not realising that this change is for good - it's permanent," said Oswald Gruebel, a former chief executive officer of both UBS Group AG and Credit Suisse Group AG. "The main reason for reducing global investment banking is that with the capital requirements which the regulators put on these banks, you cannot make any decent return.''