Barclays Informally Gauged Interest for CEO Staley’s Role
Barclays Has Informally Gauged Interest for CEO Staley’s Role
(Bloomberg) -- Barclays Plc has reached out to potential candidates in recent months to gauge their interest in the bank’s top job, part of a long-term succession plan to replace Chief Executive Officer Jes Staley.
While there is no formal search currently under way, Barclays’s board has asked search firm Spencer Stuart to work on what is known as market mapping, which can be a prelude to kicking off a process, people familiar with the matter said, asking not to be identified because the deliberations aren’t public. A select group of global banking executives has been contacted to determine their preliminary interest in the role, the people said.
Staley, who became CEO in December 2015, could leave the bank as soon as next year, people with knowledge of the plan have previously said.
A Barclays spokesman said “there is no search under way.” A spokesman for Spencer Stuart in London declined to comment.
Barclays Chairman Nigel Higgins, who has backed Staley’s leadership, is under increasing pressure from an activist investor to replace the CEO. Edward Bramson’s Sherborne Investors stepped up his campaign against Staley this year after regulators questioned an account of his ties to Jeffrey Epstein, the deceased financier and sex offender. At the time, Barclays said its board believed Staley “has been sufficiently transparent with the company as regards the nature and extent of his relationship.”
Bramson had also been a fierce critic of Staley’s focus on investment banking, which had been a less profitable business than the bank’s other units.
“The choice of the next CEO is critical,” said Fahed Kunwar, a bank analyst at Redburn. “There remains investors who would like to see the investment bank wound down further.”
Staley has also faced regulatory scrutiny for his attempts to unmask a whistle-blower. He was personally fined but kept his job after a probe by the Financial Conduct Authority.
However, the CEO’s hand has been strengthened in the past few months. Barclays’s securities division, which is at the heart of Staley’s plan to drive growth, posted a 77% jump in first-quarter trading as the virus whipsawed markets, beating the average 30% gain at U.S. peers. Barclays, the third-largest U.K. bank by market value, is due to report second-quarter results later this month.
Barclays has one of the longest-serving CEOs in British banking, after a swath of senior changes in the past year. HSBC Holdings Plc tapped company veteran Noel Quinn as CEO in March, while Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc promoted Alison Rose to the top job last September. Lloyds Banking Group Plc said on Monday that CEO Antonio Horta-Osorio will step down next year after a decade in charge.
“Global banking executives with a blend of mainstream banking and bulge bracket investment banking leadership experience will be sounded out,” said John Cronin, analyst at Goodbody. UniCredit SpA CEO Jean Pierre Mustier and Standard Chartered Plc’s boss Bill Winters could be among the candidates, he added.
The bank’s shares have fallen more than a third this year, partly due to the economic onslaught of the coronavirus pandemic.
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