Barclays Plc announces full-year profit decline, misses analysts’ estimates

Barclays Plc posted a full-year profit that missed analysts estimates. Chief Executive Officer Antony Jenkinss complete makeover of Britains second-biggest bank was impaired by litigation and compensation charges.

Barclays Plc, which is a global financial services provider engaged in retail banking, credit cards, wholesale banking, investment banking, wealth management and investment management services, made a statement today, explaining that its 2013 adjusted pretax profit was 5.2 billion pounds (8.5 billion dollars). This was below 2012s 7.05 billion pounds and also trailed analysts predictions for a 5.4-billion-pound adjusted pretax profit. None further details were provided by Barclays Plc in its statement.

About 5.8 billion ponds were raised from investors by Barclays in a rights offering last year in order to soothe regulators concerns about the capital strength of the bank. Its Chief Executive Officer – Mr. Jenkins is seeking to remove 1.7 billion pounds of costs by 2015 through lay-offs, including cutting hundreds of positions at the investment banking operation.

One of the banking analysts working for Oriel Securities in London – Vivek Raja, said for Bloomberg: “It’s difficult to say because of a lack of detail, but if the miss is because of costs to achieve Jenkins’s overhaul plan, then we will take that as a positive. Barclays would be accelerating the program and that should quell concerns about capital and the balance sheet.”

Ian Gordon, who is an analyst at Investec Plc said in a note to investors, cited by Bloomberg: “Any marginal disappointment against wider sellside expectations will have come within Barclays Capital, the investment banking unit.” Mr. Gordon also said that the unit in question probably caused the amount of a “cost overrun”.

The Chief Executive Officer of Barclays Plc – Mr. Antony Jenkins is currently trying to restore trust in the bank. In January he announced that a 330 million-pound charge would be taken relating to penalties and lawsuits in the fourth quarter. One day ago, the bank revealed that it was having some negotiations with regulators concerning a possible criminal leak of client account information.

Barclays Plcs shares were up by 1.25% by 14:06 GMT in London to trade at 275.10 pence, marking a one-year change of -0.26%. According to Financial Times, the 24 analysts offering 12-month price targets for Barclays Plc have a median target of GBX310.00, with a high estimate of GBX364.00 and a low estimate of GBX203.22. The median estimate represents a 14.10% increase from the last close at GBX271.70