Barclays cuts 50 senior dealmakers as firm-wide job cuts begin
BARCLAYS is dismissing roughly 50 senior dealmakers as part of the banking giant’s annual culling of staffers in its investment bank.
The cuts are part of a plan to trim headcount by about 300 people across the corporate and investment bank, according to sources familiar with the matter. That amounts to about 3 per cent of total headcount in the unit, which also includes Barclays’ trading operations.
In the technology investment banking team in San Francisco, California, three senior bankers and one junior banker were notified on Tuesday (Oct 3) that they were being let go, the sources said.
A spokesperson for Barclays declined to comment.
Barclays and its rivals have been contending with a prolonged slump in dealmaking and capital markets activity, as corporate chiefs remain on the sidelines amid higher interest rates around the world. For its part, Barclays’ investment banking fees dropped 15 per cent in the second quarter.
It warned in July that its profit margins were being squeezed by consumers repaying debt in the wake of high interest rates.
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Wall Street firms routinely conduct annual cuts based on performance to maintain their competitiveness and adjust businesses to shifting markets.
Goldman Sachs has been planning to begin its annual cut of underperforming workers. Citigroup has also dismissed hundreds of people across both investment banking and trading this year, including dozens of staffers last month.
“We always continually modulate and modify that workforce,” Barclays chief executive officer CS Venkatakrishnan said. “What you see at Barclays is no different than what you see anywhere else.”
The company has been investing the banking division after naming two new global co-heads of the business in January. That leadership shakeup led to an exodus of dozens of bankers. Barclays has hired more than 30 investment bankers and promoted another 20 bankers in various positions since then.
The reforms have so far had a modest impact. Barclays ranked sixth in LSEG’s global investment-banking league table for the first nine months of the year. It was seventh at this point last year.
Venkatakrishnan has also been seeking efficiencies across the British lender, so it can invest in businesses it believes have high growth potential, including wealth management, US credit cards and global payments.
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