Job Fears Grow Following Firm Boss Interview

In an attempt to reassure shareholders who are concerned that the proposed takeover of Dutch bank ABN AMRO is simply not good for business, Bob said that Barclays was being conservative when estimating the investment banking cost and revenue synergies that will accrue following any deal. 'We are being conservative', Diamond told Reuters. 'We want to under promise and over deliver'. (In other words, despite all the claims that the human cost of the merger will be kept to 'a minimum', jobs will be aggressively culled as a sop to shareholders).

In another ominous utterance, Bob said that having a global M&A business isn't on the cards for BarCap, even if Barclays wins out with ABN. 'We've made the decision that our model works better without a global M&A business, because of the avoidance of conflict and it allows our financing and risk management business to flourish'. He said that a merger with ABN wasn't 'a path back (to a global M&A franchise). It's a niche business in certain geographies and certain businesses'.