Barclays Plc (BARC) named Antony Jenkins as its chief executive officer, promoting the head of its consumer banking business as the U.K. lender recovers from the Libor scandal that forced out former CEO Robert Diamond. Jenkins, 51, becomes CEO immediately, Britain's second- largest lender said in a statement today. “Antony stood out among a very competitive field of internal and external candidates because of his excellent track record" and “intimate knowledge of Barclays's portfolio," outgoing Chairman Marcus Agius said in the statement. Barclays is replacing its most senior managers, including Diamond and Agius, after politicians, shareholders and regulators accused the bank of having a culture of aggressively interpreting regulations and failing to stop wrongdoing. Diamond resigned last month after the bank was fined 290 million pounds ($459 million) in June by U.S. and U.K. regulators for attempting to rig the London interbank offered rate. “I would have preferred an external candidate, but of all the internal candidates this was the best appointment," said Gary Greenwood, a Liverpool, England-based analyst at Shore Capital Group Ltd. with a hold rating on the stock. “I like the fact that he's a retail banker." Shares of Barclays fell 1.1 percent to 184.3 pence at 8:05 a.m. in London trading. SFO Probe One of Jenkins's first tasks will be to deal with a criminal probe by the U.K. Serious Fraud Office, which prosecutes bribery and white-collar crime, into fees the bank paid in 2008 to Qatar's sovereign wealth fund as the lender sought money to avoid a government bailout. “Barclays is a strong universal bank," Jenkins said in the statement. “We have made serious mistakes in recent years. We have much to do." The Oxford University graduate has been head of retail banking at Barclays since November 2009 after being promoted from CEO of Barclaycard, the bank's credit-card division, which he joined in 2006. Born in Stoke-on-Trent, England, Jenkins began his career at Barclays in 1983 before moving to Citigroup Inc. in 1989, where he worked in London and New York. He will be paid a salary of 1.1 million pounds a year and receive incentive pay of as much as 2.5 times his salary, Barclays said in a statement. He will also be entitled to share awards as part of the bank's long-term incentive plan that could amount to four times his salary in any one year. Agius is being replaced as chairman by David Walker, a former Bank of England executive director and investment banker at Morgan Stanley, in November. Jenkins' “track record, familiarity with the group and vision for the future are all highly compelling," Walker said in the statement. Bloomberg
