CSFB Will Shed About 300 Employees As Bank Sees Synergies From Merger
A WSJ.COM News Roundup
LONDON -- Credit Suisse First Boston will lay off approximately 300 staff globally this week, including about 120 in London, following its merger with Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette, people familiar with the bank's plans said Tuesday.
The announcement of the layoffs could come as early as Wednesday. However, spokespeople for the bank, which is a unit of Credit Suisse Group, had no comment Tuesday.
The move follows the bank's shedding last week of five of its 130 research employees in London and the introduction of a hiring freeze.
Barclays Hires CSFB's Schaeffer to Head Its U.S. Debt Syndicate (Feb. 26)
CSFB May Slash up to 10% of Jobs In Its Investment-Banking Business (Jan. 18)
Switzerland Continues U.S. Invasion As Credit Suisse Agrees to Buy DLJ (Sept. 1)
CSFB last year agreed to acquire DLJ for about $12.4 billion. The bank has said before that staff would be shed globally due to the integration process with the acquired company.
The impending layoffs are seen from within the bank as a move to eliminate overlap from the merger, as well as a "quality move."
Since the tie-up was announced, CSFB has had some difficulties retaining key staff, old and new, and has lost several star employees, jolting the acquisition's progress.
Some senior DLJ staff didn't initially come on board, including Garrett Moran, formerly co-head of investment banking at DLJ, Herald Ritch, who was to have been a co-head of mergers, and Louis Friedman, head of media and telecommunications banking at DLJ.
In late November, star investment-banker Ken Moelis left to join the UBS Warburg unit of UBS AG and was joined by CSFB colleague James Neissa. About 30 members of Mr. Moelis's Los Angeles office have subsequently quit.
Last month, Barclays Capital, the investment-banking arm of Barclays PLC, named CSFB's managing director Andrew Schaeffer as its managing director and head of its U.S. debt syndicate.
Barclays Capital was poised to swoop for 40 senior bond executives from CSFB who were packed up and ready to start working for the rival, but CSFB persuaded them to stay by topping the compensation packages that Barclays had offered to woo the executives away in the first place.
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Hopefully they fire Tom Galvin and bring someone with better analysis. |
