Big investment banks in Europe, including Nomura, Credit Suisse and UBS, are stepping up plans to cut jobs as they seek to adapt to a drastic slowdown in revenues and tighter regulation.
Bank executives, headhunters and analysts say that the cuts are shaping up as the deepest since the start of the financial crisis after a disappointing summer dashed hopes of a business revival.
One senior headhunter said many large investment banks will have “at least 20 percent” fewer staff in capital markets and M&A advisory business in Europe by the end of the year compared with late 2011.
“It [the market] has never been as bad as this. Bankers have long lost confidence in their banks but now they are also losing their self-confidence , their mojo,” a senior advisory banker said.
The Center for Economics and Business Research will soon revise upwards its previous forecast that 25,000 jobs in the City of London will be cut this year, according to the consultancy’s economist Rob Harbron. This would take the number of banking jobs in Europe’s main hub for investment banks below 255,000, a level last seen in 1996.
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