Wall Street's shrinking workforce in one chart

Wall Street's workforce is shrinking.

Front-office headcount at investment banks across the Street has dropped 21% over the past five years, according to the data-analytics firm Coalition.

Total headcount in the first quarter of 2016 was down 2% from the same period a year ago.

Fixed income, currencies, and commodities, or FICC, trading businesses saw the biggest staffing declines in the first quarter, dropping 5% to 18,300 people from 19,200 last year.

Coalition

Equities trading headcount dropped 1% to 18,800 people in Q1, down from 19,000 the year before, while investment banking headcount came in at 17,700, down 1% from 17,900 in the year-ago quarter.

Fixed income has also seen the largest headcount decline over the longer term. It's down 32% over the past five years, while equities headcount is down 12% and investment banking headcount is down 14% over the same period.

Revenues in the fixed income division were down 28% year-on-year in the first quarter, and down 49% over the five-year period, according to Coalition.