Morgan Stanley cuts jobs, plans retail bank launch

In addition to the 10 percent job excision earlier this year, Morgan Stanley intends to cut another 10 percent across is institutional securities business and almost 10 percent in its asset management business. This is hardly surprising. But the company is not in slash-mode across the entire company. While it intends to downsize in prime brokerage, proprietary trading, principal investments and commercial real estate origination, it plans to build up areas such as foreign exchange, commodities and investment banking, reports the AP. The biggest new area of investment will be retail banking and the world is anxiously awaiting more specific plans. Morgan Stanley just hired Cece Sutton as president of the retail banking and Jonathan Witter as COO of retail banking. Both come from Wachovia. The firm has 500 branch offices, but some will likely be part of an acquisition. 

For more:
- here's the AP story via the Washington Post
- here's more the retail bank hires

Related Articles:
Morgan Stanley news from FierceFinance
How bad will the Wall Street job cuts be?