Laurentian Bank cuts nearly 50 jobs, quits equity research
Laurentian Bank of Canada is cutting more jobs in an overhaul of its strategy that includes exiting the equity research business.
“Today we announce a further reduction in our workforce. These decisions are never easy to make, but they are necessary at this time,” chief executive Eric Provost said Wednesday in a memo to employees seen by Bloomberg. “We sincerely appreciate the contributions of our departing colleagues and wish them the best.”
The memo did not say how many employees were affected, but it was close to 50 roles across the bank, according to a person familiar with the matter, speaking on condition they not be identified because they aren’t authorized to speak publicly about it.
Laurentian told clients in a note that it was suspending research coverage on about 80 companies, a list that includes many small-cap mining and resource firms.
The Montreal-based bank, which had 3,000 employees as of the end of October, announced a strategic review in December and said at the time it was cutting about two per cent of its staff.
“Since December, we have been working hard on revamping our strategic plan to position Laurentian Bank for success in the future,” Provost told employees, adding that the bank would share more details during an investor event on May 31.
Canada’s eighth-largest lender has been seeking cost savings and trying to simplify its business following a tumultuous 2023, during which it failed to find a buyer after putting itself up for sale and later replaced its CEO Rania Llewellyn amid a days-long system outage.
The bank is now trying to “simplify the entire organization to increase our efficiency,” Provost said in the memo. Merick Seguin, a spokesperson for the bank, said the company is “making sure
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