Bloomberg Barclays Plc has been exploring a potential merger with rival banks including Standard Chartered Plc, as part of wide-ranging contingency plans being weighed by senior board members following pressure from an activist investor, the Financial Times reported. Chairman John McFarlane was at least theoretically keen on the idea of combining with Standard Chartered, and was supported by Deputy Chairman …

Bloomberg Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce is no longer an outlier on mortgages. CIBC has scaled back its rapid expansion of Canadian home loans, bringing it more in line with the industry and ending a two-year streak of outpacing the nation’s other big banks. Mortgage balances rose 6 percent to C$208.2 billion ($161.6 billion) in the fiscal second quarter from …

Bloomberg Wells Fargo & Co.’s foreign-exchange business cut 22 salespeople, according to a person briefed on the matter, the latest casualties of a slump in market activity. Affected employees worked in locations including St. Louis and Atlanta, where the bank is consolidating operations elsewhere, the person said. Some staff are being moved to other offices, while others leave the company, …