LONDON - Chris Lucas, the chief financial officer of Barclays, announced on Wednesday that he was leaving his position at the bank earlier than expected due to ill health.
Mr. Lucas, 52, said in February that he had planned to leave the bank, and Barclays has appointed Tushar Morzaria, a JPMorgan Chase executive, to take over as chief financial officer. Mr. Lucas will now step down on Aug. 16.
Mr. Morzaria will start his new role at Barclays on Oct. 15, and Peter Estlin, Barclays’ financial controller, will be the firm’s acting chief financial officer in the interim, according to a statement form the bank.
The senior executive change at the British bank comes less than a month since Barclays announced it planned to raise £5.8 billion, or $9 billion, from investors in a rights issuance of stock to increase its capital reserve.
British regulators have demanded that local financial firms hold more capital to protect against future shocks, and improve their so-called leverage ratios, a measure of how much borrowed money a bank uses.
Mr. Lucas had been the only senior executive to retain his job following the $450 million settlement with American and British authorities last year related to the manipulation of the London interbank offered rate, or Libor. The firm’s former chief executive, Robert E. Diamond Jr., and chairman, Marcus Agius, both stepped down in the aftermath of the settlement.
“Whilst I had hoped to be able to continue working until early next year, it is now clear to me that with my health as it is this will no longer be possible,†Mr. Lucas said in a statement on Wednesday.
Barclays’ chief financial officer remains one of four former and current employees at the British bank that are being investigated in connection to a capital raising from Qatari investors in 2008. His departure is not connected to the ongoing investigations.
American and British authorities are still investigating the legality of payments to Qatari investors as part of a rescue fund-raising deal for the bank in the 2008 financial crisis. Last month, Barclays said it was contesting the undisclosed preliminary findings of the British investigation.
The departure of Mr. Lucas, who had held the chief financial officer position at Barclays throughout the financial crisis, is part of the changing of the guard at many of Britain’s largest financial institutions.
Along with Barclays’ new chief executive, Antony P. Jenkins, who started his role last August, the head of part-nationalized Royal Bank of Scotland, Stephen Hester, also is stepping down later this year.
