The administrators of Lehman Brothers’ European division have cut 750 jobs at the firm with immediate effect.

PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, said the move came “despite exhausting all avenues” to save the posts.

The vast majority of the cuts will be made in London, where the firm employed about 5,000 people.

Lehman Brothers, the fourth-largest investment bank in the US, filed for bankruptcy as it was hit by the credit crunch and could not be rescued.

The jobs will go from the firm’s European fixed income and personal investment management units, after a buyer could not be found.

‘Maximising value’

“It is extremely disappointing that despite exhausting all avenues these jobs could not be saved,” said PwC partner Tony Lomas.

“We continue to be focussed on maximising the value of recoveries for creditors, whilst minimising the impact on other stakeholders as much as possible.”

Shortly after the collapse, Barclays bought Lehman’s US investment banking unit for £250m.

And last week Japanese bank Nomura said it was buying some of Lehman’s European and Middle Eastern operations for an undisclosed sum.

Under the deal announced last week, Nomura will acquire the equities and investment banking businesses from the US bank which filed for bankruptcy protection in mid September.

The Japanese bank said it expected to save the jobs of a “significant proportion” of the 2,500 Lehman staff in those businesses.

The Nomura deal does not include any of Lehman’s trading assets or liabilities, Nomura said.

It is also going to acquire Lehman’s assets in Asia.

News reported by The BBC

The European administrators of failed US investment bank Lehman Brothers have filed a court order in New York demanding $8bn (£4.4bn) be returned from the US to London.

A PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) spokesman said the money was needed to pay creditors, salaries, property bills and other day-to-day expenses.

Lehman’s European headquarters, where 4,500 staff worked, is based in London.

PwC is currently trying to find buyers for various parts of Lehman Europe.

‘No redundancies’

Before it went into administration last Monday, Lehman Europe frequently transferred money from its London HQ to its parent company in New York, said the BBC’s Joe Lynam.

“The money was usually kept overnight – earning interest – before being sent back to London.”

But, as the bank neared its end last Sunday, that did not happen and Lehman Europe found itself down by $8bn, having formally requested the money earlier in the week, our reporter said.

PwC also said it was hopeful of finding a single buyer of Lehman’s (European) equities group and investment banking businesses, which employ 1000 specialist staff.

“Who ever buys these groups will have to take on staff liabilities,” said Dan Schwarzmann, a PwC administator.

He added that PwC was hopeful that there would be no redundancies in these businesses, but could not rule it out.

Lehman’s demise sent shock waves through global markets, undermining confidence in the financial system.

Tighter regulation

The UK prime minister said that international regulation of the financial system must be brought up to date in the wake of the recent turmoil.

Gordon Brown told the BBC: “We’re in a new economy, a global financial economy, the world is changing very fast, but the governance of the global financial system has not caught up with it and that’s what’s got to change.”

The global financial impact of the demise of Lehman Brothers is still emerging as firms worldwide state their degree of exposure to the bankrupt firm.

In Hong Kong, angry investors marched to government offices on Sunday calling for action after losing money on investments linked to the failed investment giant.

Last week, UK bank Barclays snapped up some of the core assets of the Wall Street giant, including its New York headquarters, for $1.75bn.

News reported by The BBC

The financial impact of the demise of Lehman Brothers is emerging as firms worldwide state their degree of exposure to the bankrupt firm.

Three Chinese banks have some $297.4m (£166.1m) in Lehman Brothers bonds, state media and local reports said.

Swiss Life said it had exposure of $20m Swiss francs (£9.9m) and Swiss Re had exposure of 50m Swiss francs.

German bank KfW transferred 300m euros (£237m) to Lehman after it collapsed on Monday, local media reported.

However, a spokesperson for KfW said the transfer had been done in error.

“There was an erroneous swap payment on Monday… for reasons for which are being investigated internally”, the company told the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper.

Lehman Brothers collapsed after seeing billions of dollars of losses in the US mortgage market.

UK deal

Of China’s exposure, Industrial & Commercial Bank said it owns Lehman bonds worth $151.8m, according to the Xinhua agency, while Bank of China has $75.6m in bonds and China Merchants Bank had $70m in Lehman bonds.

Meanwhile, UBS said on Tuesday that its exposure to Lehman Brothers was less than $300m.

But Japanese firms’ total Lehman exposure was far greater at 440bn yen (£2.3bn), according to an earlier Kyodo news report.

Bank of Japan governor Masaaki Shirakawa that while Lehman’s collapse would harm Japanese firms, those hit had enough funds to cover losses.

“I am not concerned that the recent events will destabilise the financial system in Japan,” he said.

The news comes as UK bank Barclays has acquired certain core assets of Lehman Brothers for $1.75bn.

Barclays bought Lehman’s North American investment banking and trading unit for $250m, and paid $1.5bn for its New York headquarters and two data centres.

The administrators, PricewaterhouseCoopers, said it had a keen interest in developments with Lehman Brothers in the US.

The administrator said that all UK employees at Lehman still attending work will be paid by the end of the month.

News reported by The BBC