Barclays doesn't break out figures for the cash-equity business. The bank has been cutting costs at its Asia-Pacific operations, where it generated revenue of £776 million ($1.2 billion) in 2014, about 3 per cent of its total, compared with £12.4 billion in Britain. The bank employed 18,200 staff in the region at the end of last year, according to the bank's annual report. Other banks are also shutting businesses to focus on more profitable areas. Morgan Stanley is planning to cut as much as a quarter of its fixed-income staff after years of revenue declines and insufficient returns, the sources said. Standard Chartered, which makes almost all of its profit in Asia, said in November it would cut 15,000 jobs to help save $2.9 billion by 2018. Mr Staley told staff in October he would "complete the necessary transformation and repositioning of the investment bank to a less capital-intensive model" and restore a "collaborative" relationship with regulators. While the securities unit, headed by Tom King, contributes about a third of the bank's revenue, it has the lowest profitability of four units with a 2.7 per cent return on equity in 2014. Mr Staley, a former JPMorgan Chase & Co investment banker, inherited a strategy from his predecessor Antony Jenkins that involved cutting a third of employees at the division while reducing its share of total risk weighted assets to about a third from a half. Under existing plans, the bank was set to shed some 4500 positions by the end of this year, with a further 2500 job cuts in 2016. Mike Rake, who is stepping down as Barclays' deputy chairman at the end of the year, has said Mr Staley will prioritise the investment bank's advisory and execution operations in London and New York, which includes mergers and acquisitions, debt capital markets and equity capital markets.
Barclays is reportedly planning to cut an additional 20% of investment bank staff, with most of the losses expected in the Asia securities division which has operations in markets including Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore, and the global cash equities business. According to the unnamed source, this latest round of cuts would come on top of an existing programme to axe 7,000 jobs at the investment bank during 2016. Chief Executive, Jes Staley, who took over on 1st December, has been tasked with improving profitability at the investment bank which has been hit by rising costs tied to past misconduct and tougher capital requirements. A Barclays spokesperson said the bank is "constantly monitoring our opportunities in different geographies and businesses".