Rhode Island financial jobs could be affected by layoffs

Posted on September 17, 2011

Many are wondering if the Bank of American layoffs could affect Rhode Island financial jobs.

The bank said that a restructuring plan to offset major losses will result in the trimming of 30,000 jobs.

According to a press release, Bank of America’s Project New BAC is key to the company’s strategy of focusing all of its resources on serving individuals, companies, and institutional investors.

The first result of New BAC was the recently announced management reorganization, removing a layer of management and streamlining the company by aligning its businesses with the customer groups.

This reorganization follows on work that started in January 2010. The company continues to sell non-core business units and assets that don’t support its strategy, thereby strengthening the balance sheet, and improving capital and liquidity.

Bank of America is nearing the end of the first phase of a comprehensive review of its consumer businesses and support functions. As the company implements the thousands of decisions from Project New BAC over time, it intends to become a more focused, leaner, and more efficient company, providing all of its customers and clients with the best financial services, generating strong revenues, carefully managing expenses and risks, and delivering long-term value for shareholders.

Bank of America’s goal is not a given number of job reductions, but rather implementation of New BAC decisions. As the decisions are implemented, employment levels in the areas under review during Phase I are expected to be reduced by approximately 30,000 jobs over the next few years. The company expects that attrition and the elimination of appropriate unfilled roles will be a significant part of the anticipated decrease in jobs.

Full implementation of approved ideas in Phase I is expected to lead to net expense reductions of $5 billion per year by 2014, on a baseline of $27 billion in annual expenses for the areas the company reviewed.

New BAC Phase II is scheduled to begin in October and continue through March 2012, and cover those businesses and operations that were not reviewed in Phase I.

The move will affect other areas, including financial jobs in Fayetteville.