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Thousands more City jobs to go at two major banks
Nick Goodway4 Dec 2008
Thousands more City workers face losing their jobs before Christmas as two of London's largest investment banks today announced massive cuts in their workforce.
Nomura, the Japanese bank which bought most of the London operations of failed Lehman Brothers, is proposing to cut 1,000 people in the capital.
Credit Suisse, based in Canary Wharf, is set to axe 5,300 jobs worldwide primarily in its investment banking division. Of these, 650 jobs will go in London.
But the biggest cuts could be yet to come with reports from the United States saying that Bank of America is set to treble the number of jobs it plans to cut to 30,000 after its recent takeover of the world's biggest stockbroker Merrill Lynch. That deal will be formally completed early in the New Year and is likely to lead to thousands more redundancies in London.
City recruitment firm Michael Page issued a profits warning today saying that the "loss of confidence is now more marked and has spread rapidly in November".
State Street, the massive US fund management business with offices in Canada Square, Docklands, is cutting 1,700 jobs around the world.
Carlyle became the first major private equity firm to shed jobs in the current financial crisis saying it will lose around 100 posts. UK venture capital firm 3i is also expected to confirm around 100 job losses today.
Financial analysts now believe that the present credit crisis will cost up to 100,000 jobs in the UK financial services sector with culls going right up to the level of senior director. Bonuses in the City are likely to be slashed hugely or cut altogether this year.
Nomura took on about 3,000 former Lehman staff when it bought the London operations of the bank in September. At the time it said it hoped to save a "significant proportion" of those posts. But today it announced it will shed up to 1,000 jobs and said: "This will ensure that the company remains competitive in the current market conditions, and establishes the right cost base going forward." After the takeover the bank now has two major offices in London. Nomura House in the City has room for just 1,700 employees while the former Lehman building on the waterfront at Canary Wharf used to house more than 5,000.
Credit Suisse said its job cull would see 650 people lose their jobs in London. The worldwide cutting of 5,300 employees means it will lose around 11 per cent of its total workforce. It will also lay off 1,400 contract workers who provide services such as IT and catering.
The bank said it had decided to accelerate its cost-savings plan in the light of recent conditions in financial markets. It added that this meant it would "substantially reduce the scale of its operations in more complex products and the exit of certain proprietary and principal trading activities".
These are the areas of investment banking largely responsible for the $1trillion of losses and write-downs across the financial services sector over the past 18 months.
Reader views (8)
Well these guys do pay an enormous amount of taxes to the state. Now that they are gone I wonder if Crash Gordon possibly has more troubles ahead...
- Jacqueline, Hampstead, London, 05/12/2008 11:08
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I pay around 30k a year tax which is more than enough thanks. Ive had this argument before on these issues and I still don't agree with people working for an unethical evil organisation such as banks. Ive also said before how is it that it is the lowest level roles losing their jobs as being banged on about by you Nicky, if they can dispose of them that easily then what did they actually do apart from being on a wage bill to justify the banks huge margins in the first place!! so get rid of some of the puppets working for the masters of the universe like admin people and IT support and then realise there is no-one to send the threatening letters out anymore, no support for the greedy bankers and noone supporting the IT network...Something somewhere doesnt add up does it?
- Dc, London, 05/12/2008 10:05
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"DC" what an completely ignorant comment - when will you realise that not everyone that works in banks are responsible for what's happenend to the economy and to say what you have said just illustrates how uneducated some poeple are when it comes to understanding the economy and the roles that banks play. Many people losing their jobs are back office clerks, admin assistants etc..there are not actually that many millionaire bankers amongst them I suspect..Don't be so ignorant and call everyone that works in banking a leech..I'm damm sure most of those imvolved have conteributed more through taxes than you could ever!
- Nicky, Central London, 04/12/2008 17:15
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Wrong people sacked. The decision makers who made the lousy decisions get to stay in their jobs but sack those who implemented their decisions.
- Once Again, Geneva Switzerland, 04/12/2008 15:18
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i work in the IT industry and for several years tried to get into investment banking, but is so clique that they wouldnt offer me a job, just as well!
- Raminder Bhalla, northolt, 04/12/2008 14:37
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Message to Roz, SERVE THEM RIGHT!!!!What do you expect, these leeches have caused misery for thousands and would glady chuck other people on the street at a missed mortgage payment and carry on penalising the public with extortionate fees. Sorry but I don't think any of these people will ever ever get any sympathy....Work for the devil and you eventually get stung THEY ALL CONTRIBUTE!!!!
- Dc, London, 04/12/2008 14:18
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Scary thing is that this is only the tip of the iceberg & start of the city financial workers cull. Most of the larger financial institutions are hanging onto their staff as long as possible in the hope that things turn around. They need highly qualified people when it does but as the downturn still has not even got close to the bottom more job pain for city staff is sadly a matter of when & not if!!
- P, London, England, 04/12/2008 13:05
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Just what people need to hear before Christmas! I hope there aren't going to be loads of 'serve them right' comments - the prosperity of the rest of the country over the last decade was founded on these workers: now Banking has collapsed everyone will see how few other sectors were there to fall back on.
- Roz, Chamonix, France, 04/12/2008 12:01
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