Cutting costs: Santander group chairwoman Ana Botin (Juan Manuel Serrano Arce/Getty) Santander is planning a cull of senior British staff as it scrambles to cut costs and boost flagging profit margins. City sources say Britain’s fifth-largest lender will sack scores of its highest-paid managers in the coming months. The cost-cutting drive follows a similar move by its Spanish parent, which is axing jobs in Madrid. Insiders at Santander UK said the cuts to the British business would not affect the lender’s branch network. It employs 20,000 staff and has almost 1,000 branches. Santander said the UK reductions were part of a greater “efficiency focus” ordered in Spain. In September, Ana Botin, group chairwoman, told investors in London that she planned to cut costs, boost earnings and strengthen capital to revive the bank’s depressed share price, which has plummeted by more than 40% to €3.05 over the past year . She plans to achieve €3bn of cost savings by 2018, while the bank
Santander Britain is considering axing some senior staff members in UK so as to free up cash for its digital expansion plans; it is also planning to cut back on its branch numbers in its home market, though it has no plans to further reduce branches in the Britain. High Street banks are increasingly under pressure to cut costs due to the impending launch of cheaper-to-run digital-only banks.