国际英语新闻：JPMorgan to slash 12,000 jobs

NEW YORK, Feb. 26 (Xinhua) -- JPMorgan Chase & Co. said Thursday it will eliminate about 12,000 jobs as part of its takeover of the failed Washington Mutual.

    Chief Executive Jamie Dimon said the cut was a precautionary move to ensure that the company has financial flexibility should economic conditions worsen. The move will save the company about 5 billion U.S. dollars per year.

    JPMorgan acquired the assets of Seattle-based WaMu, the largest bank ever to fail in U.S. history, at the end of September.

People walk past the JPMorgan Chase & Co building in New York, March 17, 2008

    JPMorgan's decision came followed the release of the Labor Department's worse-than-expected job data.

    The government said Thursday that first-time requests for unemployment benefits jumped to 667,000 from the previous week's figure of 631,000 and the number of Americans continuing to receive unemployment benefits has topped 5.1 million.