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Recapitalized Banks To Fire Workers, Close Branches

FA18B951C77FC65E2AC6E049AEDC7B7BThe first order of business for Greek banks who are getting 50 billion euros ($65.5 billion) in free money from the government in a recapitalization will be firing workers and closing branches.
It is estimated that in the first phase will start in September and last for six months, some 4,000 to 5,000 bank employees will be fired and around 400 to 500 branches will close.
This process will continue also in the next period, according to the circumstances, as it is estimated that the goal  is for a reduction of 25 to 30 percent to take place in two years to a workforce that now numbers 56,000 workers and 4,100 bank branches.
Four systemic banks are already ready to implement the new programs of voluntary exit from September on which will also include sabbatical programs.
However, in some cases, such as in Agricultural Bank of Greece (Piraeus Bank Group), it is estimated that due to retirement around 2,000 people will leave their work, cutting the overall firings for now to about 2,000-3,000.
Prime Minister Antonis Samaras met with the heads of the four biggest banks recently and urged them to lend the money they are getting from the government instead of stashing it in their vaults but they are free to do with it what they want. At the same time, banks are relentlessly hounding Greeks who’ve suffered pay cuts, tax hikes and slashed pensions to pay their loans, credit cards and mortgages in full.
Samaras’ New Democracy Conservatives and his coalition partner the PASOK Socialists owe banks 250 million euros ($327.8 million) but aren’t paying and have also stymied a bill that would provide similar relief to indebted Greeks put in that position by their government. The banks were pushed toward insolvency when former finance minister Evangelos Venizelos, the current PASOK leader who is Samaras’ Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, imposed 74 percent losses on investors, also destroying the Cypriot bank sector.

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