Last year, the six major banks in the United States laid off over 10,000 employees, reaching a new high in the past 10 years

Last year, major US banks collectively laid off over 10,000 employees, a figure that marked a new high in the past decade. Facing cost pressures, the management began to target the main expense item - labor costs.

Bloomberg reported that the data showed that the total number of employees of the six major US banks - JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs Group, and Morgan Stanley - was approximately 1.09 million as of the end of December. This represents a decrease of about 10,600 compared to a year ago, reaching the lowest level since 2021. The last time such a large-scale layoff occurred was in 2016, when the number of employees decreased by approximately 22,000 compared to the previous year.

Currently, the key word on Wall Street is "efficiency". During the pandemic, mergers and acquisitions on Wall Street were very active, and banks significantly expanded their staff. However, since 2022, transaction activities have sharply declined, and layoffs have followed. Recently, the focus of discussion has further shifted to: How will artificial intelligence (AI) replace some human labor?

The bank that carried out the largest round of layoffs last year was Wells Fargo. Chief Executive Officer Dave Foley has been actively leading the company's restructuring. By the end of the year, the number of Wells Fargo employees had decreased by more than 12,000 compared to a year earlier, dropping to approximately 200,000, the lowest level since before the 2008 financial crisis when it acquired Wachovia.

Schaff disclosed during a teleconference on Wednesday (January 14th) that the company has been reducing its workforce for 22 consecutive quarters and stated that this trend will continue in the future.

The Citigroup, which is also in a transitional period, had its workforce reduced by approximately 3,000 people by the end of last year compared to the end of 2024. It is reported that Citigroup will further cut about 1,000 positions this week.

However, some banks have taken the opposite approach and increased their staff numbers. Take Goldman Sachs as an example. Its staff count rose by 2% last year to 47,400, and it attributed the 11% increase in total costs for the year to the rise in salary expenditures. Morgan Stanley also saw its staff number increase by approximately 2,500 at the end of the year, despite the company having laid off about 2,000 employees in March.

Morgan Stanley's Chief Financial Officer, Yasay, said on Thursday (15th): "The skill structure is constantly changing. We will assess the types of talents that different departments and teams actually need." As for whether there will be further layoffs in the future, she said, "There is nothing to discuss at the moment."

JPMorgan Chase has expanded rapidly over the past five years and is still hiring in 2025, but the growth rate has dropped to the lowest level since the pandemic.

American banks are relying more on natural attrition to reduce their size. Chief Executive Officer Moynihan said on Wednesday that the bank expects its staff numbers to decline this year, "We can choose not to recruit anymore and let the total number of employees naturally decrease."