eFinancialCareers

As the gloom surrounding Royal Bank of Scotland deepens, new chief exec Stephen Hester’s admission that the bank would have to “cut our cloth” has sparked fears that thousands of job cuts could be on the cards. Hester, who has joined the bank on a salary of £1.2m, has promised to cut costs, and the bank’s new strategic review is looking to focus on areas where it has a competitive... Read more

The HBOS merger saga continues. Only two of the top eight executives at the Scottish bank will join the senior management of the combined entity, which some are viewing as an indication of Lloyds TSB’s intentions for the rest of the work-force. Meanwhile, MSPs have backed calls to keep HBOS independent as fears over Scottish jobs and decision-making grow. The Scottish Parliament is in agreement that the government’s £37bn bailout (sorry,... Read more

Given that Scotland’s two largest banks are part-nationalised, it’s not surprising that the discussions regarding the future of jobs north of the border are the subject of a political barney. One of the clauses in the initial takeover document relating to Lloyds TSB's ingestion of HBOS was that the focus would be on retaining Scottish jobs and Scottish decision-making. With redundancies estimated at anything between 14,000 and 40,000, there’s reason... Read more

The 3,250 employees housed in Royal Bank of Scotland’s Edinburgh headquarters are understandably on tenterhooks at the moment. With the bank’s market value hitting a new low, and part-nationalisation on the cards, there is unease over what this new lack of independence might mean for jobs. RBS shares took a nose-dive on Tuesday after concerns over its ability to fund itself, and its links with the government’s £50bn rescue package.... Read more

In spite of the problems rocking Scotland’s banks, it seems Edinburgh’s appeal as a place to work remains in tact. Glasgow, however, has slid down the rankings in the latest Global Financial Centres Index (GFCI). There’s a caveat to add to the above statement, though – the cut-off point for the latest survey conducted by research firm Z/Yen, in association with the Corporation of London, was in July, which was... Read more

As the acquisition of HBOS by Lloyds TSB looks set to be a done deal, Scottish jobs are, for the time being, the most secure. But this hasn’t stopped employees sending out speculative CVs or industry players pushing for other options. One of the clauses in the formal takeover proposal of HBOS is that “the management focus is to keep jobs in Scotland”, sparking rumours that the bulk of the... Read more

The number of careers soon to be affected by job cuts in Edinburgh is on the up and financial services redundancies in the capital could soon hit 1,100. In July, a labour market report by Mackay Consultants predicted that up to 2,000 jobs could be lost in the financial services industry in Scotland, but with the preamble that these would be restricted to the slumping property sector. Now, consultancy Atisreal... Read more

Despite posting the second biggest loss (£691m) in UK banking history, analysts say Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) is unlikely to make any more redundancies than those already expected from the integration of ABN Amro’s capital markets division. This morning, RBS posted a pre-tax loss of £691m during the first half of this year after being pounded by sub-prime losses of £5.9bn. Sir Fred Goodwin, chief executive of RBS, said it had... Read more

Things are looking grim at Scottish giant HBOS. Not only are its cheeks burning from a £4bn rights issue that left 62% of shares on the underwriters’ books, but it has announced plans to axe 650 jobs in its business banking division over the next 18 months. What hope is there for Scotland’s out of work bankers? The job losses are likely to result from the merger of two... Read more

UK private bank Brown Shipley has set up an Edinburgh office and plans to expand aggressively over the coming 18 months. But is Scotland’s talent pool deep enough to support yet another new player? Brown Shipley has poached Graham Auld and Victoria Drysdale from Deutsche Tilney to run its Edinburgh office and says it has ambitious plans to expand north of the border. John Williams, the firm’s private client divisional... Read more

The indignity of it was too much for one politician to bear. Morgan Stanley, thinking of starting a Glasgow operation last year, was handed £6m by the government to make the move to Scotland. Then it turned out they would have set up here anyway. Fuming, Derek Brownlee MSP, Scottish Conservatives finance spokesman, spluttered: “You can only justify the use of taxpayers’ money to create jobs if they would not... Read more

Financial services professionals are no longer the most in demand in Scotland, but recruiters insist the market is as active as ever. The Bank of Scotland Labour Market Report acts as a barometer of employment in the country, and shows that the number of financial services jobs in Scotland fell slightly in May. In February, accounting and finance had the largest number of vacancies in Scotland. Now the sector ranks... Read more

Could the Scottish reputation for prudence encourage bankers burned by the credit crunch to seek solace north of the border? It seems doubtful, but Simon Thompson, chief executive of the Chartered Institute of Bankers in Scotland, seems to think it might be a possibility. Speaking at a conference recently, he said: “One of the big strengths of the Scottish financial services industry is our emphasis on prudence and professionalism. It's... Read more