Barclays crushes Bramson’s crusade to muscle onto board

US activist investor Edward Bramson on Thursday admitted defeat in his bid to get a seat on the board of Barclays before his showdown with the bank at its annual meeting had even begun.

Early signs were that he had spectacularly failed in his bid to shake up Barclays and slash back the historic British lender’s investment bank.

“We know we haven’t won the majority of the vote,” Bramson said outside the bank’s meeting at the QEII centre in Westminster. He said it was premature to discuss his next move.

The secretive Bramson had built a stake in Barclays of 5.5% via his Sherborne investment vehicle. Though the exact numbers had not been released by the time the Standard went to press, early soundings from investors suggest he fell a long way short of the 50% target he needed for investors to back him.

Some said he got as little as 10% backing from investors, including his own 5.5%.

The defeat marks humiliation for Bramson, who had sought to overturn a strategy put in place by chief executive Jes Staley.

Bramson thought Barclays’ investment banking operations were a drain on capital and sought a place on the board to push his case.

But Barclays argues that the investment bank was beating Wall Street rivals and remains a vital part of the bank’s future success.

Investors had already been openly sceptical of Bramson, while offering some support for his basic idea.

David Cumming at Aviva Investors earlier said: “We have some sympathy with the concerns he’s raised… mainly around the performance of the investment bank and cost control.

“The issue we have is that he’s been pretty successful in terms of critiquing aspects of Barclays performance, but hasn’t really offered a credible alternative strategy.”

The board had strongly opposed Bramson’s appointment and his own investors may question the £7 million he has been paid in management fees to orchestrate the shake-up of Barclays. The shares rose 2p today to 166p, still well below his 190p buy-in price. One observer said: “He worked at this for months and he just lost by miles.”

Bramson’s investment was a complex affair — based on a loan from Barclays’ rival, Bank of America Merrill Lynch — which operated as a derivative that protected him somewhat from a fall in the share price.