Scandal-hit Barclays bank axes chief executive

Troubled British bank Barclays, plagued by the forex and Libor rigging scandals, announced Wednesday that it has fired chief executive Antony Jenkins.

Barclays management has "concluded that new leadership is required" to accelerate an overhaul of the beleaguered group, it revealed in a statement on the surprise decision.

"I reflected long and hard on the issue of group leadership and discussed this with each of the non-executive directors," said deputy chairman Sir Michael Rake.

"Notwithstanding Antony's significant achievements, it became clear to all of us that a new set of skills were required for the period ahead."

Jenkins replaced Bob Diamond in July 2012 -- who himself was forced to resign after the damaging Libor rate-fixing scandal.

The retail banking veteran had vowed to bring a new culture of decency to Barclays, and oversaw drastic restructuring that shrank its investment bank.

Barclays was fined £290 million by British and US regulators in 2012 for attempted manipulation of Libor and Euribor interbank rates 2005 and 2009.

Jenkins has struggled to restore the group's damaged reputation which was also tarnished by forex rigging.

"In the summer of 2012, I became group chief executive at a particularly difficult time for Barclays," Jenkins said in Wednesday's statement.

"It is easy to forget just how bad things were three years ago both for our industry and even more so for us."

Under Jenkins, Barclays slashed more than 19,000 jobs, but the group has struggled to recover from the Libor fallout.

In another damaging blow, Barclays was slapped in May with a $2.4 billion (2.2 billion euro) fine by US and UK regulators for foreign exchange market manipulation.

Six major global banks, including Barclays and British peer Royal Bank of Scotland, were fined a total of almost $6 billion, mostly for rigging the foreign exchange market.

Barclays added Wednesday that chairman John McFarlane has been appointed executive chairman until a successor to Jenkins is found.