BrokerDealers Beware: Don’t Blab, Not Even on SnapChat

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rorycullinan

Lots has been said about bankers and broker-dealers blabbering via social media. The topic has helped to create plenty of compliance department angst across the brokerdealer universe. Now, thanks to the latest DealBreaker snapshot, one that also provides free advertising for social media app SnapChat, the folks here at BrokerDealer.com remind our industry audience: Think twice before you hit the ‘send’ or ‘publish’ button.

The chairman of Royal Bank of Scotland’s investment bank is leaving just weeks after messages he sent to his daughter were revealed, showing he was “bored” at work. Rory Cullinan, the RBS capo used photo-sharing app Snapchat to send images featuring captions that read: “Not a fan of board meetings xx”, “Boring meeting xx” and “Another friggin meeting”. The pictures then ended up being posted on Instagram around Father’s Day last year by the investment banker’s daughter, but only revealed in a national newspaper early this month. Mr Cullinan’s daughter had uploaded the photos with the message: “Happy Father’s Day to the indisputable king of Snapchat.” Mr Cullinan drew heavy criticism for not taking his role seriously.

For the full story, please visit DealBreaker.com

Royal Bank of Scotland to Cut Significant Percent of Employees

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Royal Bank of Scotland

Brokerdealer.com blog update is courtesy of The Economic Times.

The Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) with over 700 branches with most mainly in the UK and Ireland have announced massive job cuts to their investment banking division. 

Britain’s state-rescued Royal Bank of Scotland will axe up to 14,000 jobs by 2019 in a retreat from investment banking, the Financial Times reported Wednesday.

The daily business newspaper, which cited people familiar with the matter, said the lender could shed as much as 80 percent of its investment banking division, which employs a total of 18,000 people.

A spokeswoman for RBS, which is about 80-percent state-owned, declined to comment on the press report.

The Edinburgh-based bank had already announced last week that it would end investment banking in the Middle East and Africa and “significantly” reduce its presence in Asia and the United States after posting its seventh successive annual loss.
Losses after tax totalled £3.47 billion ($5.40 billion, 4.74 billion euros) last year after a £4.0-billion writedown on Citizens bank, part of its US operations.

The performance was however much better than in 2013 when RBS had posted an annual net loss of almost £9.0 billion. Stripping out the writedown and other items, RBS recorded an operating profit of £3.5 billion for 2014.