160 jobs go at WestLB and UBS Warburg

The German bank's job losses are across the board in equities and corporate finance and are broadly in line with earlier City of London estimates.

Confirmation of the cuts came amid speculation that a tug of war is taking place over WestLB's highly-rated health care team. The team was rumoured to be joining rival broker Collins Stewart, which lost Andrew Richmond, its own top health care analyst, some months ago. The team was then thought to be staying at WestLB Panmure after all. Neither broking firm would comment.

The broking subsidiary of the German bank has had a torrid time, even managing to lose money when rivals were highly profitable. As Financial News disclosed in March, Westdeutschelandesbank, the parent, wrote off 70m (€110m) against the value of WestLB Panmure after an 'impairment review' of the broking offshoot.

Meanwhile, UBS Warburg last week cut jobs in its corporate finance operations in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (Emea), although it hopes to find the bankers roles elsewhere in the bank.

The cuts, some 6% of the staff, were spread across all sectors and consisted of senior and junior bankers.

Some of the bankers leaving UBS Warburg's corporate finance department may be kept on in other parts of the organisation, such as research or sales trading. The more senior bankers, or those working in continental Europe, might also be offered positions in private banking. UBS is trying to build its private banking operations in France, Germany and Spain.

Chris Brodie, head of European corporate finance at UBS Warburg, said: 'I would be very hopeful that in two weeks time we will have found a home for most of them elsewhere within the UBS group.'

The cuts were part of an annual assessment of the bank's staffing levels, but were also to some extent in response to the dramatic slowdown in business felt across the investment banking sector. Low volumes of M&A activity and equity issuance have forced many banks to slash their payrolls.