Barclays CEO Looks to Placate Investors With Strategy Tweaks

  • Venkatakrishnan backs investment bank yet pares capital share
  • Shares had best day in over three years as new goals revealed

C.S. Venkatakrishnan

Photographer: Hollie Adams/Bloomberg
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For the better part of a year, Barclays Plc’s boss C.S. Venkatakrishnan has been reviewing his firm’s strategy. It turns out, pruning around the edges was enough.

In a four-and-a-half-hour investor call on Tuesday, the bank’s chief set out why he was resisting pressure from some shareholders to make a major strategic change, such as the often-floated idea of spinning out the investment bank.