Six major Wall Street banks lay off 10,000 people, AI reshaping the workforce landscape

The six major Wall Street banks’ annual report Form 10-K submitted to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission shows that, as of the end of December 2025, they employed over 1.09 million people, a decrease of about 10k from a year earlier, reaching the lowest level since 2021.

Text | Researcher Gu Xinyu from “Caijing”

Editor | Zhang Wei

As the first quarter of 2026 quickly passes, Wall Street’s layoffs have not slowed down.

Wells Fargo has laid off employees in multiple U.S. states: 112 in North Carolina, a total of 91 in Iowa, and 45 in Illinois. The CEO of Wells Fargo stated that the bank has been reducing staff for 22 consecutive quarters.

JPMorgan Chase has cut over 250 employees in New Jersey; Citibank announced in a statement in January 2026 that it will continue to reduce its workforce in 2026; and CEO Brian Moynihan of Bank of America said in January 2026 that the primary goal of increasing operational leverage is to “adjust the number of employees” through excellent operations and the application of new technologies such as artificial intelligence.

Additionally, media reports indicate that Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs are also laying off staff: the former about 2,500 people, mostly implemented in March 2026; the latter plans to cut a small number of underperforming employees in April 2026.

The six major Wall Street banks’ annual report Form 10-K submitted to the SEC shows that by the end of December 2025, their employee count had decreased by about 10k from a year earlier, reaching the lowest level since 2021.

Professor Hu Jie from Shanghai Jiao Tong University’s Shanghai Advanced Institute of Finance and former senior economist at the Federal Reserve said that from an economic cycle perspective, the more difficult period has gradually passed. If not for the recent uncertainties caused by the US-Iran conflict, the global economy would generally be improving, with inflation and pandemic impacts also largely receding. From a purely cyclical view, there should not be significant layoffs or less-than-ideal employment growth. Therefore, the adjustments triggered by the impact of artificial intelligence should be the main reason.

Financial reports show that in 2025, the net profits of Bank of America, Citibank, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, and JPMorgan Chase all grew by more than 8% year-over-year. JPMorgan Chase’s net profit declined by 2.4% year-over-year; excluding major projects in 2024 (net profit of $58.5 billion, adjusted to $54 billion after exclusion), the net profit in 2025 increased by over 5% year-over-year.

Layoffs Continue

Since the beginning of 2026, the six major Wall Street banks have continued their layoffs.

Media reports indicate that Goldman Sachs plans to cut a small number of underperforming employees in April 2026. A Goldman Sachs spokesperson stated: “For a publicly listed company, regular and ongoing personnel management is not unusual. We have been evaluating performance and talent across all business units.”

Notably, Goldman Sachs has an annual “Strategic Resource Assessment” (SRA), which typically results in a reduction of 1% to 3% of its global workforce. In some years, the scale of layoffs can be larger.

Also in 2026, Wells Fargo has been conducting layoffs across U.S. states. A notice filed with North Carolina’s Department of Commerce under the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (WARN) on February 3, 2026, shows that the bank notified 112 employees of layoffs, effective April 4, 2026. Most of these employees are in operational support roles, including 106 from the Chief Operating Office, such as loan service representatives, loan processing specialists, quality assurance administrators; and 6 from consumer banking, loans, finance, and technology units, including fraud and claims operations advisors, senior technical business systems advisors.

In Iowa, Wells Fargo submitted four layoff notices in 2026. According to the Iowa Workforce Development’s updated WARN records on March 11, 2026, the bank notified 33 employees on January 20 (laid off on March 20), 49 employees on February 3 (laid off on April 4), 2 employees on February 17 (laid off on April 18), and 7 employees on March 3 (laid off on May 2), totaling 91 people.

Additionally, according to official filings under Illinois’ WARN Act, Wells Fargo plans to lay off 45 employees in the state from February to April 2026.

In January 2026, Wells Fargo CEO Charles Sharf revealed during the Q4 2025 earnings call that the company had reduced staff for 22 consecutive quarters, with total employee numbers down more than 25% since Q2 2020. CFO Michael Santomassimo stated that Wells Fargo still has opportunities to “further streamline the company” and “improve efficiency.”

JPMorgan Chase also continued layoffs in 2026. According to the WARN notices filed with New Jersey’s Department of Labor and Workforce Development, the bank submitted notices in February and March 2026, laying off 120 employees (effective May 2026) and 134 employees (effective June 2026), respectively. Meanwhile, media reports indicate Morgan Stanley has cut about 3% of its staff, approximately 2,500 employees.

Most layoffs occurred in March 2026. The affected employees work in the bank’s investment banking and trading, wealth management, and asset management divisions. Some of those impacted are involved in issuing mortgages to wealth management clients. The layoffs are related to business restructuring, regional focus adjustments, and individual performance, covering both U.S. and overseas locations.

Morgan Stanley’s 2025 Form 10-K states that the bank has an “annual employee performance review process,” which includes evaluating employees’ behaviors in risk management practices and alignment with company expectations, with related conclusions incorporated into performance assessments, compensation, and promotion decisions.

Citibank also stated in a January 2026 announcement that it will continue to reduce its workforce in 2026. Citibank explained that layoffs reflect ongoing adjustments to ensure staffing levels, office locations, and skills meet current business needs; “efficiency gains from technology”; and progress in transformation efforts, which are nearing their target.

At the January 2026 Q4 earnings call, Citigroup CFO Mark Mason also said that the bank has been laying off staff in recent years and expects this trend to continue. He revealed that total severance pay in 2025 was about $800 million.

Since 2023, Citigroup CEO Jane Fraser has been pushing forward a comprehensive transformation plan aimed at cost-cutting, regulatory compliance, and profit enhancement.

In the January 2026 Q4 earnings call, Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan stated that the primary way to increase operational leverage—making revenue grow faster than expenses so that more income translates into profit—is to continue optimizing operations and applying new technologies like AI.

The Impact of Artificial Intelligence

According to annual Form 10-K filings submitted to the SEC by JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Citibank, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley, the six Wall Street banks employed over 1.09 million people as of December 2025, a decrease of about 10k from a year earlier, reaching the lowest level since 2021.

It is noteworthy that the overall performance of these Wall Street giants remains positive. Financial reports show that in 2025, net profits for Bank of America, Citibank, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley all increased year-over-year by approximately 13%, 12.8%, 8.2%, 20%, and 25.9%, respectively. JPMorgan Chase’s net profit in 2025 declined by 2.4% year-over-year; excluding major projects in 2024 (net profit of $58.5 billion, adjusted to $54 billion after exclusion), the net profit for 2025 increased by about 5.6% year-over-year.

Hu Jie believes this indicates that layoffs are not necessarily a forced response to poor management but a proactive choice.

“The more fundamental reason behind this is the change in cost structure and work efficiency brought about by AI. Whether profitable or not, this trend is forcing companies to act quickly, and this process will continue,” Hu Jie said.

JPMorgan CFO Jeremy Barnum also stated during the Q3 2025 earnings call that, although difficult to quantify precisely, AI has indeed improved productivity. Instead of proving how much money AI has saved, JPMorgan is controlling employee growth to “strive for expense growth to be lower than it might otherwise have been.” JPMorgan expressed strong resistance to reactions like “hiring more people reflexively for any specific need.”

Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan also pointed out during the Q4 2025 earnings call that today, in consumer banking alone, virtual financial assistants handle workloads equivalent to thousands of employees daily, providing high-quality service without additional staffing. The bank’s future direction is to gradually reduce total staff over time. To keep the employee count stable, considering a turnover rate of about 7% to 7.5%, Bank of America needs to hire over 1,000 people each month. They can also let natural attrition reduce the workforce without hiring.

Wells Fargo CEO Charles Sharf openly stated in December 2025 at the Goldman Sachs 2025 U.S. Financial Services Conference that AI will lead to a reduction in future employee numbers, though not necessarily in 2026. He pointed out that AI has brought tangible efficiency improvements to Wells Fargo. For example, generative AI has increased coding efficiency by 30% to 35%.

Meanwhile, several of the six major Wall Street banks have indicated that hiring will slow down in 2025 and beyond.

In October 2025, Goldman Sachs mentioned in an internal memo that the bank is focusing on how to use AI to transform specific workflows, including sales support, account opening processes, loan procedures, regulatory reporting, and vendor management. This also provides a reference for Goldman Sachs’ long-term plans.

Goldman Sachs further stated that they need “to put the best talent in the right positions,” even if business performance is good, and that they have a responsibility to carefully review operations to prepare for future growth.

The memo shows that, as part of this broader responsibility, Goldman Sachs limited overall employee growth by the end of 2025 and also implemented limited job cuts across the company.

Charles Sharf said that Wells Fargo considers “natural attrition as their friend,” meaning that when employees leave due to retirement, resignation, or other natural reasons, the company no longer recruits to fill those positions, thereby reducing the overall workforce.