--- title: "Global Banks Reach \"Consensus\": Layoffs Inevitable as AI Spreads, Especially in Middle Office and Entry-Level Roles" type: "News" locale: "en" url: "https://longbridge.com/en/news/288992063.md" description: "CEOs of investment banks including JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, and STANCHART have all stated that layoffs are inevitable. Major banks are cutting junior analyst recruitment by up to two-thirds, narrowing the entry path for fresh graduates. Currently, AI deployment remains focused on specific use cases, and full replacement is still premature. However, the overall industry trend has shifted from workforce expansion to technological efficiency gains" datetime: "2026-06-08T02:44:38.000Z" locales: - [zh-CN](https://longbridge.com/zh-CN/news/288992063.md) - [en](https://longbridge.com/en/news/288992063.md) - [zh-HK](https://longbridge.com/zh-HK/news/288992063.md) --- # Global Banks Reach "Consensus": Layoffs Inevitable as AI Spreads, Especially in Middle Office and Entry-Level Roles Senior executives at major global banks are forming a rare consensus on the issue of artificial intelligence replacing human labor—layoffs are inevitable, with middle-office functions and entry-level positions bearing the brunt. The employment landscape in the financial industry is facing structural reshaping. On June 7, Bloomberg reported that JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon explicitly stated last December that AI "will eliminate jobs"; Citigroup CEO Jane Fraser said some roles "will no longer be needed"; and Goldman Sachs President John Waldron compared employees to an "assembly line of human labor," implying high potential for automation. Standard Chartered PLC CEO Bill Winters was even more blunt: **"This is not cost-cutting, but in some cases, replacing low-value human capital with financial capital and investment capital."** However, he later apologized for these remarks. These statements have caused widespread unease among industry insiders. David Parsons, an employment lawyer at Mishcon de Reya, pointed out that **although executives like Dimon and Barclays CEO CS Venkatakrishnan have spoken about retraining and upskilling employees, it remains unclear how this commitment will be implemented in practice.** Meanwhile, major banks are reducing the scale of junior analyst recruitment, and the channel for fresh graduates to enter the financial industry is narrowing. ## Executive Consensus: Middle Office and Entry-Level Roles Most Vulnerable Among various job categories, middle-office functions are considered to face the most direct impact. "It can be said that the middle office is vulnerable," David Parsons stated. "What distinguishes this wave of automation is that it affects higher-level positions." According to reports, an investment banking professional working in the UAE revealed that he temporarily used Microsoft Copilot to help prepare presentation materials before a client meeting, jokingly suggesting that he might no longer be needed in the next five to ten years. Debasish Patnaik, Senior Partner and Head of QuantumBlack, the AI consulting arm of McKinsey, disclosed that **major banks are cutting junior analyst recruitment by as much as two-thirds, while approximately 62% of AI talent is being recruited from this pool of fresh graduates.** He pointed out that **although the scale of fresh graduate recruitment "will shrink," banks are unlikely to completely abandon this group—"Banking is an apprenticeship industry; today's junior analysts are tomorrow's Managing Directors. High-level judgment cannot be replicated through lateral hiring."** ## AI Implementation: Focused on Specific Use Cases, Full Replacement Still Premature Currently, AI deployment at major banks remains focused on specific functional scenarios rather than comprehensive rollout. Antony Jenkins, former Barclays CEO and founder of 10x Banking Technologies, stated: > "We will not see an omnipotent bank operated by agent-based AI; in the coming years, we will see more implementation of specific use cases." Citigroup is launching a wealth management virtual assistant based on conversational AI, which can provide multilingual financial advice to customers, covering scenarios such as certificate of deposit maturity handling and children's education fund management. Barclays is using AI to monitor customer service calls to improve efficiency rather than cut jobs—the bank disclosed in February that since the project launched last October, generative AI has completed summaries for over 8 million customer service calls. Digital bank Revolut recently launched an in-app AI assistant, AIR, providing users with spending classification analysis and card control features. **In the recruitment process, some job seekers have already begun preparing specifically for AI screening software.** However, Tom Lakin, Global Head of Future Work at recruitment firm Robert Walters, believes that the large-scale adoption of AI in bank recruitment interviews is limited because the associated risks cannot be ignored—at least one screening software company removed its facial analysis feature in 2021. ## Pressure on Fresh Graduates, Some Banks Maintain Recruitment Plans For fresh graduates intending to enter the financial industry, the employment situation has clearly tightened. Timothy Lee, a student at the University of Warwick and head of the university's Business and Finance Society, stated that bank recruitment scales continued to expand before the pandemic. **"When banks perform well, they hire more people, but now they no longer need to."** Another University of Warwick student, Andre Bonnick, said he is considering pursuing a master's degree to gain more time for job hunting. **However, some banks are still proceeding with their recruitment plans.** Bank of America stated that it will welcome 2,000 summer interns and another 2,000 full-time new employees across eight business lines this month as planned. However, the bank also stated that its goal is to keep the total number of employees unchanged and leverage AI to improve operational efficiency—a statement that itself reflects the industry's overall orientation: replacing workforce expansion with technological efficiency gains. ### Related Stocks - [02888.HK](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/02888.HK.md) - [C.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/C.US.md) - [STAN.UK](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/STAN.UK.md) - [GS-D.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/GS-D.US.md) - [GS-A.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/GS-A.US.md) - [JPM.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/JPM.US.md) - [GS.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/GS.US.md) - [GS-C.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/GS-C.US.md) - [JPX.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/JPX.US.md) - [BCS.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BCS.US.md) - [MSFT.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/MSFT.US.md) - [BAC.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BAC.US.md) - [JPM-M.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/JPM-M.US.md) - [JPM-C.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/JPM-C.US.md) - [JPM-D.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/JPM-D.US.md) - [JPM-L.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/JPM-L.US.md) - [8634.JP](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/8634.JP.md) - [JPM-K.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/JPM-K.US.md) - [JPM-J.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/JPM-J.US.md) - [C-R.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/C-R.US.md) - [W4VR.SG](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/W4VR.SG.md) - [BARC.UK](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BARC.UK.md) - [BAC-Q.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BAC-Q.US.md) - [BML-L.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BML-L.US.md) - [BAC-L.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BAC-L.US.md) - [BAC-K.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BAC-K.US.md) - [BML-H.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BML-H.US.md) - [BAC-N.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BAC-N.US.md) - [BAC-E.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BAC-E.US.md) - [MER-K.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/MER-K.US.md) - [BAC-O.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BAC-O.US.md) - [BML-G.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BML-G.US.md) - [BAC-M.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BAC-M.US.md) - [BAC-B.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BAC-B.US.md) - [BML-J.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BML-J.US.md) - [BAC-S.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BAC-S.US.md) - [BAC-P.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/BAC-P.US.md) - [8648.JP](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/8648.JP.md) ## Related News & Research - [Citigroup Inc. $C Position Increased by Vise Technologies Inc.](https://longbridge.com/en/news/288930180.md) - [JPMorgan, Citi-backed consortium plans to launch tokenized deposit network in early 2027: WSJ](https://longbridge.com/en/news/288800211.md) - [Ramp raises $750M at $44B valuation as investors hunger for fintechs with an AI story](https://longbridge.com/en/news/288743237.md) - [Harvest Fund Management Co. 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