Barclays Plc

Barclays Plc is a holding company listed on the London, New York and Tokyo Stock Exchange. Globally; Barclays PLC is the largest bank in the world by total assets ($1.59 trillion).

The bank's headquarters are at One Churchill Place in Canary Wharf, in London's Docklands, having moved there in May 2005 from Lombard Street in the City of London.

Barclays' U.S. headquarters are in New York on Park Avenue.

Barclays PLC is a global financial services provider operating from the following locations:-

  • United Kingdom
  • Europe
  • United States
  • Middle East
  • Latin America
  • Australasia
  • Asia
  • Africa

Barclays History

  • 1905 - 1916 - Acquisitions of small English banks extends the branch network

  • 1918 - Barclays amalgamates with the London, Provincial and South Western Bank

  • 1965 - Barclays establishes a US affiliate, Barclays Bank of California in San Francisco.

  • 1966 - Barclaycard launched, the first credit card in the UK

  • 1967 - Barclays unveils the first ATM cash machine

  • 1969 - acquisition of Martins Bank

  • 1986 - Barclays sells its South African operations under the Barclays National Bank name due to protests against Barclays involvement in a country that was under apartheid at the time.

  • 1986 - buys de Zoete & Bevan and Wedd Durlacher to form BZW, to take advantage of Big Bang on the London Stock Exchange

  • 1988 - Barclays sells Barclays Bank of California to Wells Fargo Bank, N.A.

  • 1996 - buys Wells Fargo Nikko Investment Advisors (WFNIA) and merges it with BZW Investment Management to form Barclays Global Investors

  • 1998 - BZW business broken up, parts sold to Credit Suisse First Boston. Retains debt business which forms the foundation of what is now Barclays Capital.

  • 1999 - In an unusual move as part of the trend at the time for free ISPs Barclays launched an internet service called Barclays.net. This entity has since been taken over by British Telecom in 2001.

  • 2000 - acquisition of Woolwich Plc (formerly the Woolwich Building Society)

  • 2003 - Barclays buys American credit card company Juniper Bank from CIBC, re-branding it as "Barclays Bank Delaware". Acquisition of Banco Zaragozano, the 11th Spanish bank.

  • 2005 - Barclays seals £2.6bn takeover of Absa Group Limited, South Africa's largest retail bank, acquiring a 54% stake on July 27

  • 2006 - Barclays purchases HomEq servicing corporation for $469 million in cash from Wachovia Corp.

  • 2006 - Barclays announces plans to re-brand Woolwich branches as Barclays, migrating Woolwich customers onto Barclays accounts and migrating back-office processes onto Barclays systems. The Woolwich brand will be used for Barclays nmortgages.

  • 2007 - Barclays announced it purchased naming rights to the 18,000-seat arena in Brooklyn, New York, where the Newn Jersey Nets plan to relocate.

  • 2007 - Barclays agrees to purchase Equifirst Corporation from Regions Financial Corporation for $225 million.

Constituents of the Barclays Group

  • Mercers Debt Collection Agency Barclays Bank Delaware (formerly Barclaycard US, originally Juniper Bank, acquired 2003)

  • Barclays Retail Bank - UK clearing bank

  • Barclays Business Bank - UK bank

  • Barclays Wealth - Stockbrokers, Offshore and Private bank

  • Barclays Private Clients International Ltd. - subsidiary based in the Isle of Man with branches in the Channel Islands

  • Barclays Private Equity

  • Barclaycard - Global credit card business

  • Barclaycard US - Separate from the Barclaycard global operation, this is the corporation's US credit card operation (formerly known as "Juniper Bank.)" Issues branded credit cards such as US Airways, Midwest Airlines, and Frontier Airlines MasterCard, as well as Airtran Airways Visa card.

  • Barclays Capital - Investment bank

  • Barclays Global Investors - Investment management company

  • Woolwich plc - UK mortgage brand

  • Barclays Africa - To be transferred to ABSA (South Africa)

  • Barclays Spain

  • Barclays Portugal

  • Barclays France

  • Absa Group Limited (South Africa)

  • FIRSTPLUS Financial Group PLC

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