One day after Germany’s second largest lender confirmed reports of a massive restructuring when it announced it would lay off nearly 10,000 employees, or about 20% of its entire workforce while slashing the bank’s dividend for the rest of the year, the Dutch newspaper Het Financieele Dagblad reported that ING Groep, the largest Netherlands lender, will announce thousands of job cuts at its investor day on Monday.
The reorganization will result in more central management and may generate billions of euros in savings, the paper said cited by Bloomberg. Raymond Vermeulen, a spokesman for the Amsterdam-based bank, declined to comment on the report. The bank employs about 52,000 people, according to its website.
ING sees opportunities in Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and Poland, Het Financieele Dagblad said. The lender has doubts about its presence in Turkey, where it lacks scale, according to the report.
Chief Executive Officer Ralph Hamers has transformed ING into a bank focused on Europe and is seeking to expand lending to consumers and companies outside its home market as record-low interest rates and regulatory demands to bolster capital threaten to erode profit.
With all European banks struggling to generate profits under Europe’s NIRP policy which makes net interest margin-based revenue virtually non-existent, we expect many more banks will be forced to lay off tens of thousands of more high paying jobs in the months ahead, leading to further declines in consumption, which in turn will pressure Europe’s deflationary forces, even though earlier today Eurostat reported that inflation in the European Union rose to 0.4% in September, in line with expectations, and the highest since 2014.
via http://ift.tt/2dJTCMQ Tyler Durden