JPMorgan cuts Bear's headcount

8 September 2008

More than half of the UK lawyers at US investment bank Bear Stearns have been ;axed ;since ;the ­collapsed bank was taken over by JPMorgan.

Out of 23 lawyers in ­London’s legal department, only 10 were offered new positions by JPMorgan, with nine accepting.

Former Bear Stearns UK head of legal Bill McGowan is understood to have quit the day before the bank imploded. He has since joined independent fund manager Gartmore as ­general counsel.

JPMorgan declined to comment on the job cuts.

More than half of Bear Stearns’ employees were laid off after the fire-sale takeover by JPMorgan in March, and many have recently started new jobs after completing a period of gardening leave.

Last ;week ;Bingham McCutchen recruited two former Bear Stearns lawyers, Kenneth Kopelman and Gerard Russello, in New York (TheLawyer.com, 3 September), while in the UK Sonya Van de Graaff joined Brown Rudnick’s London office (TheLawyer.com, 4 September).

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