Top Firm Said To Be Cutting Thousands

CNBC reports that it has learned that Merrill Lynch is going to lay off between 10 - 15% of its non-broker (financial adviser) workforce beginning in May. According to its website, Merrill currently emplys 64,200 staff, 15,930 of whom are financial advisers.

Merrill reported a fourth-quarter loss of $9.8bn and is thought to be looking at write-downs of between $2bn and $8bn for the first period (analyst estimates). CNBC says that Merrill doesn't plan to make a formal announcement about the impending job cuts, but will quietly go about letting staff go. The news agency also says that the current round of layoffs at Lehman Brothers are likely to eventually total some 2,800 rather than the 1,400 originally thought.

The Financial Times reports that WestLB is to 'retrench' its global operations as it tries to rein in costs following yet another troubled year. Although nothing has yet been firmed up, the firm is thought likely to reduce staff numbers in Germany and abroad by around 20%. Redundancy plans will be finalised next month. The German bank posted a $2.3bn pre-tax loss last year after US subprime lending-related writedowns and some trading problems.

Finally, The International Herald Tribune reports that students on campus throughout the US (and at business schools) are worrying that the jobs that they have in the bag with Wall Street firms may end up being pulled as firms struggle to rein in costs. The newspaper quotes 25-year-old Matthew Fink, currently studying at Columbia Business School, who said: 'Positive thinking. Positive thinking. That's what I tell myself. You hear about Bank of America, Citigroup, Merrill Lynch, Lehman, Bear. Every day one of them is the lead story in the news. And that's where many of us have jobs. You just have to hope for the best'. (Ed's note - Gotta tell you. There's no such thing as Santa Claus, Matthew, and a proper assessment of the power of positive thinking over time has revealed that it actually doesn't work!).