JPMorgan Chase Begins About 1,000 Layoffs While Continuing to Hire

JPMorgan Chase reportedly began a round of layoffs that is expected to affect fewer than 1,000 employees.

The bank began notifying the affected employees last week and will continue to do so through the end of February, Reuters reported Wednesday (Feb. 12), citing unnamed sources.

It plans to make several more rounds of cuts by the end of the year, according to the report.

A JPMorgan Chase spokesperson told Reuters, per the report, that the layoffs are part of the “regular management of the business,” the bank will try to relocate the impacted employees, and it continues to hire in many areas, with 14,000 open positions.

JPMorgan Chase had 317,233 employees at the end of 2024, according to the report.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday (Feb. 7) that the financial activities sector was among several sectors that saw little change in employment in January.

When reporting its fourth quarter earnings results in January, the bank said it saw continued momentum in consumer spending, with increased credit and debit card use, and an improvement in business sentiment, with balance sheets at small businesses being healthy.

“The U.S. economy has been resilient,” JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon said in a Jan. 15 earnings release. “Unemployment remains relatively low, and consumer spending stayed healthy, including during the holiday season.”

In an earlier earnings report released in the fall, JPMorgan Chase said its active mobile customers were up 7% year over year to 57 million and, at the same time, the bank is on track to open 500 new branches over the next few years.

It was reported Jan. 31 that although several factors suggest the banking sector should be optimistic — interest rates are steady to declining, inflation is under 3% and there is a new, relaxed attitude to regulation in Washington — many lenders still have lukewarm expectations for a big part of their business: loaning money.

Wednesday’s Reuters report said JPMorgan Chase expects Wall Street dealmaking and fundraising activity to pick up this year, though some companies are being slower to act as they wait to see what happens with the nation’s economic policies.