Barclays plans 5,000 job cuts by end of 2026

Barclays plans to cut about 5,000 jobs by the end of 2026, as the British bank uses technology and artificial intelligence to simplify operations and reduce costs. The cuts amount to roughly 5% of its global workforce, which stood at about 93,000 at the end of 2025. The bank said about 1,000 positions had already been eliminated in the first half of 2026. It expects the remaining reductions to be completed by the end of the year. About 60% of the planned cuts involve support functions, including developer roles, according to Barclays. The announcement accompanied the bank’s third-quarter results. Barclays reported pretax profit of £2.3 billion for the quarter, up 12% from £2.1 billion a year earlier. Group income rose 3% to £7.4 billion. Equities revenue increased 47%, while income from fixed-income trading fell 19% to £1.01 billion. Chief Executive C. S. Venkatakrishnan said technology investment and simplifying processes had driven most of the efficiency gains. He described AI as having a role in improving productivity, while saying it was not the sole source of the changes. The bank has not given a breakdown of how many planned job reductions are directly attributable to AI...