Sovereign Bank announced to employees Thursday that it is cutting 950 positions, including 265 in Massachusetts. The job cuts were effective immediately, a spokesman said.
A bank spokesman said the cuts are across Sovereign’s entire 10,700-person operation, and include customer facing positions as well as back office and administrative staff. The bank, officially headquartered outside of Philadelphia but run from its executive offices in Boston, has 3,200 employees in Massachusetts.
Affected employees will be given “appropriate severance” based on their positions and tenure with the company, said Sovereign spokesman Andrew Gully. He said the cuts were administered by Sovereign executives, including the bank’s Boston-based CEO Gabriel Jaramillo, and were not ordered by its new parent Banco Santander.
Santander acquired Sovereign in January. Shortly thereafter, Santander announced plans to drastically overhaul Sovereign — namely to replace its then CEO Paul Perrault and to reduce the bank’s risk-weighted assets by $10 billion.
The move ended Perrault's brief tenure at the bank, as his first day on the job was Jan. 5.
Perrault replaced embattled CEO Joe Campanelli, who was ousted last year after the bank incurred heavy losses from bad loans and soured investments.
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