Barclays has executed a rapid exit from the Australian market, as the investment bank seeks to cut costs by slashing jobs across the Asia-Pacific region.
Local staff were on Thursday told the bank would be quitting the Australian market, effective immediately, and about 80 staff are expected to lose their jobs. 
The withdrawal, alongside the bank's exit from other markets in Asia, is part of push by newly installed chief executive Jes Staley to focus more on the bank's most profitable lines of business.
About 230 jobs are expected to be cut across the Asia Pacific region, with operations also set to be closed in Taiwan, South Korea and Malaysia, according to reports.
Investors were awaiting a formal announcement in London at the time of publication.
The bank was also closing entire lines of business across Asia including cash equity research, sales and trading, and convertible bond trading, as part of plans to cull more than 1000 jobs globally, the Financial Times reported.
The bank's Hong Kong office did not confirm or deny the cuts when contacted by Fairfax Media on Thursday. "We are constantly monitoring our opportunities in different geographies and businesses over the cycle. If any firm decisions are made, we will provide an update," a spokeswoman said.
The Barclays exit follows the withdrawal of Canada's GMP from the local market and Commonwealth Bank of Australia's decision last month to shut its institutional equities division and capital markets business. Malaysia's CIMB retreated from Australia last year and Nomura dismantled its local institutional equities franchise.
Barclays UK rival Royal Bank of Scotland, under Australian chief executive Ross McEwan, has also wound down its presence in Australia.
CLSA banking analyst Brian Johnson said new regulation was constraining the activities of the global investment banks. "If you are a big bank, you now have scale disadvantage because you have to hold more capital," he said. "Basel [regulations] bite at a group level and at a country level. So the bank raising deposits in one country and taking that liquidity and helping fund activities in another country becomes more difficult."
Mr Johnson said the large investment banks were being forced to put more capital aside to support their trading businesses at a time when banks were also forced to increase their holdings of government bonds, which reduced trading volumes.
Foreign banks are also retreating from more peripheral markets because the wave of global liquidity has squeezed the margins in institutional banking, a trend that has also affected Asia-focused ANZ Bank. The global rout on sharemarkets has also added to the urgency for banks to reassess their markets and business lines.