JPMorgan and Chase, the world’s largest bank by market capitalisation has now taken a bold stance on staffing as AI continues to transform Wall Street. As reported by CNBC, JPMorgan CFO Jeremy Barnum has revealed that the bank managers have been told to avoid hiring new employees unless it is absolutely necessary. The company came on to this decision as it is accelerating its deployment of AI across operations. “We have a very strong bias against having the reflexive response to any given need be to hire more people,” Barnum told analysts during the bank’s third-quarter earnings call.Despite reporting a 12% year-over-year profit increase to $14.4 billion, JPMorgan’s headcount increase by just 1%, underscoring the bank’s commitment to leveraging AI for efficiency rather than expansion.

AI’s expanding role in banking

As reported by CNBC, JPMorgan is integrating AI into every aspect of its business starting from client interactions to back-office processes. The bank is working on mirroring the moves of tech giants Amazon and Microsoft, who have already warned employees to brace for AI-driven changes.JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon also recently acknowledged that AI will eliminate some jobs, but the affected employees will be retrained. Still, the bank expects operational and support staff to shrink by at least 10% over the next five years, even as business volumes grow.

Goldman Sachs echoes the shift

The CNBC report also adds that the rival bank Goldman Sachs is also reorganising around AI. Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon has told the employees that this week the bank will “constrain headcount growth” and lay off a limited number of staff as it retools operations to improve speed, agility, and productivity.The memo shared by Solomon talked about a multi-year AI transformation focused on client onboarding, sales, and internal decision-making. While Goldman’s overall headcount is still rising, the message was clear: AI is now central to how Wall Street thinks about workforce planning.