Barclays has fired its chief executive Antony Jenkins.
Mr Jenkins will leave the bank next week. He will be replaced by its chairman, John McFarlane, until a new head is appointed.
Barclay’s deputy chairman Sir Michael Rake said a “new set of skills were required” at the helm of the group.
He was fired over the pace of cost-cutting at the bank and the size of its investment arm, according to the BBC.
He is being temporarily replaced by the new chairman, John McFarlane – who has only been in post since April – to clear the way for new leadership to accelerate changes at the business and inject more energy into its operations.
A long-running boardroom row over the future of Barclays’ investment banking side, the business that was built up by his predecessor Bob Diamond, was said to be behind Jenkins’ departure. McFarlane, though, was quick to say that the investment bank was a crucial part of the bank.
The group’s non-executive directors took behind-the-scenes steps through Sir Mike Rake, the most senior independent director, to remove Jenkins after a series of presentations to the board last month in which the current strategy was discussed.
McFarlane said there had been “rumblings” among the non-executives for some time and they had approached him with their concerns. Jenkins’ departure will be cushioned by a payoff of at least £2.5m – before bonuses. He was told last week and the board met on Tuesday night to ratifty his departure.
Barclays shares rose 3% to 260p, bolstered by McFarlane’s assertion that the bank would not need to tap shareholders for cash and despite forecasts by analysts at Bernstein that up to £6bn of fresh capital will be needed.
Sandy Chen, analyst at Cenkos, said: “There’s a new sheriff in town, and he’s got the board’s (and, we assume, the regulators’) backing to make sweeping changes. We have long advocated an aggressive pruning of the investment bank; the time for this, it appears, is now.”
Amid mounting expectations that the investment banking business will be restrained, McFarlane repeatedly stressed the importance of the operation, which was once the powerhouse of Barclays. It has been the focus of repeated rows over bonuses and scandals such as Libor and foreign exchange rigging.
Mr Jenkins was appointed as group CEO in August 2012.