Bank of Cyprus cuts staff by 300 in Greece

BANK OF CYPRUS (BoC), the island’s biggest lender, said yesterday it has cut staff in Greece by 300 people through a voluntary exit programme expected to reduce its payroll by some 12 per cent per year.
The lender, forced to seek state support after incurring heavy losses from its exposure to Greek debt, said it has also cut its branch network by 11, bringing the total number down to 177.
“Further cuts in the network are scheduled in 2013,” BoC said.
BoC said the latest departures will cut staff down to 2,650 from 3,077 at the beginning of 2012.
The bank’s current payroll is €110 million per year.
Beyond the losses from a write-down to Greek sovereign debt, in the past year, BoC has also suffered from ever-increasing provisions for bad debts due its exposure to the neighbouring country’s economy.
The lender said it has managed to cut its Greek loan portfolio by €500 million since June 2012, while deposits rose by about a billion “contributing thus to a significant increase in the group’s cash flow”.
In September last year, BoC said it had around €10 billion in loans in Greece.
BoC requested state assistance to the tune of €500 million late in June last year after failing to raise the necessary capital to meet a regulatory shortfall.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.