After Auchan and Michelin at the beginning of November, it was the turn of Crédit commercial de France (CCF) on Wednesday to announce a plan for major job cuts in France. The bank plans to reduce its workforce by a third over the next two years, with 1,400 fewer employees, and to close more than 80 branches. At the end of the employment protection plan (PSE) announced this Wednesday during a CSE, there should remain 2,500 employees and 151 agencies, compared to respectively 3,900 employees and 235 agencies today.
This “profound transformation project” aims to “rediscover the path to sustainable growth”, explains the bank, controlled by the American fund Cerberus, in a press release. She believes that this plan, a draft of which was presented to employees at the beginning of October, should restore balance in 2026 and generate profits from 2027. Even if the orders of magnitude in terms of job cuts and agencies were known, “there is still astonishment on the part of the employees” in the face of the “scale” of the plan, explains Bruno Ronsin, elected CFTC. “Incomprehensible […] Nothing justifies a plan of this magnitude! », Reacted the FO union in a press release, deploring the figures which were “staggering and above all difficult to justify”.
“A very difficult transition phase”
The unions are now entering a phase of negotiations which will continue until the middle of next year. For the remaining employees, a “very difficult transition phase is also expected with management which wishes to maintain the current GNP (net banking product, equivalent of turnover for the sector) until 2027”, underlines Bruno Ronsin. “A constructive social dialogue is underway,” assures management, which plans three successive waves of departures: one in 2025 and two in 2026.
The CCF was resurrected at the beginning of January by the company My Money Group (MMG), controlled by the American fund Cerberus, after the purchase of the retail banking network in France of the British banking giant HSBC and its portfolio of 800,000 customers, which was spread over almost three years. Cerberus is not its first attempt in the banking sector, since it paid 3.2 billion euros in 2007 to acquire the former Austrian union bank Bawag. Its ambition is to create a “heritage French bank on a human scale” aimed at a clientele of professionals, liberals and independents, such as lawyers or doctors, with assets of 50,000 euros or more.
