Barclays cuts 150 investment bank jobs under cost-cutting plan

LONDON (Reuters) - Barclays Plc (BARC.L) is cutting about 150 staff from its investment bank as part of the British bank's attempt to cut costs and improve profitability in the business, a person familiar with the matter said.

Affected staff, which included managing directors, were told this week, the source said on Friday.

Barclays last year said it would cut about 7,000 investment banking staff by the end of 2016. It cut about 2,500 in 2014 and expects to cut a similar amount this year and next, and this week's redundancies are part of that.

It was not clear in what areas most of the cuts would be.

New chairman John McFarlane this week said the investment bank remained a core part of the bank and he was pleased with an improvement in its return on equity this year, but he said it would continue to scale back in areas where it is not strong.

Analysts expect more cuts in trading activities to allow capital to be diverted to higher-returning advisory and underwriting activities.

(Reporting by Steve Slater; editing by Jason Neely)