Barclays Bank’s prospective takeover of ABN Amro could see the loss of hundreds of jobs at the Dutch bank’s investment banking department as the company imposes 3 billion of cost cutting measures, according to a report in a British newspaper.
The level of cuts predicted by the Telegraph would represent more than double what analysts had expected.
News of the proposals comes after it has been widely predicted that Barclays’ current chairman Marcus Agius will be appointed deputy chairman of the new venture. It is thought that following the exclusive negotiations, Barclays will offer 60 billion euros for ABN Amro in the next couple of weeks, equivalent to 35 euros a share.
Barclays’ path to acquiring the bank had been cleared further this month following the news that Citigroup, which had been mooted to be considering a rival bid, is to advise on the deal, thus ruling it out from bidding itself.
However, there has been much speculation subsequently that Barclays’ high street rival Royal Bank of Scotland will lead a consortium to table a rival bid, thus enabling the bank’s assets to be divided up between them.