Restructuring events
European Restructuring Monitor (ERM)
The restructuring events database contains factsheets with data on large-scale restructuring events reported in the principal national media and company websites in each EU Member State. This database was created in 2002.
West LB Bank, the savings bank of the federal state of North-Rhine Westphalia (NRW), will be defragmented and closed by 1 July 2012. Out of a range of activities, only transnational financial activities shall be transferred to a new, small bank still to be established.
WestLB employed a workforce of 4,200 at the end of 2011. Out of these, 1,500 jobs shall be cut until December 2012. Another 1,700 jobs shall go until 2016. By that time, transnational financial activities shall be transferred to a new bank still to be established, which in 2016 shall employ a total workforce of 1,000.
WestLB is owned by the federal state NRW and is the first bank of this type that will go through a defragmentation process in order to fulfill the requirements of the European Commission. The bank, which received a EUR 58bn public guarantee during the financial crisis last years, applied to the EU for further subsidies while fulfilling the requirements, but the application was rejected.
Eurofound (2012), WestLB, Closure in Germany, factsheet number 73322, European Restructuring Monitor. Dublin, https://apps.eurofound.europa.eu/restructuring-events/detail/73322.