(Reuters) – BlackRock Inc is cutting up to 500 jobs, Insider reported on Wednesday, citing a memo, as Wall Street continues to downsize in the face of high interest rates that have raised the risk of a recession.
The world’s largest asset manager had 19,900 employees as of Sept. 30, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Earlier in the day, Goldman Sachs also began laying off staff in a sweeping cost-cutting drive, a source familiar with the matter told Reuters.
The Insider report comes a month after BlackRock Chief Financial Officer Gary Shedlin said the firm was freezing most hiring and reducing expenses due to short-term performance challenges.
The company is expected to post a 22.4% drop in fourth-quarter profit to $8.09 per share when it reports results on Friday, according to Refinitiv estimates.
New York-based BlackRock will be notifying staff on Wednesday about whether they were going to be laid off, after its human resources department alerted employees’ managers on Tuesday, the report said.
The company did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.
(Reporting by Niket Nishant and Mehnaz Yasmin in Bengaluru; Editing by Devika Syamnath)
