By Lars Mucklejohn
Barclays shares fell as much as 4.5 per cent in London on Tuesday morning after Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund cut its stake in the bank by half.
The Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) last night launched a share sale for £510m, slashing its stake in the lender from five per cent to 2.4 per cent.
The QIA is Barclays’ second largest shareholder after asset management giant Blackrock.
The state-backed fund put 362m shares up for sale last night, Bloomberg first reported – around 45 per cent of its total stake of 810m. The QIA owned more than one billion shares at its peak.
The stock was offered at 141p, a small discount to its 142.98p closing price on Monday.
Barclays announced in October that it was looking to cut costs following weak results in the third quarter.
Employee union Unite claimed last week that the bank would cut 900 jobs by the new year, on top of 450 previously revealed in September.
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Chief executive C.S. Venkatakrishnan is due to provide an investor update in February which will reveal more details about the cost-cutting strategy, which could reportedly involve as many as 2,000 layoffs.
Venkatakrishnan is trying to boost the bank’s share price, which has lagged behind peers and fallen almost 15 per cent this year.
Barclays’ share price has halved since Qatar first took a £4bn stake in 2008, helping the bank avoid a bailout during the financial crisis.
City A.M. has approached Barclays and the QIA for comment.
