April 05, 2004

NEW YORK - Bank of America Corp. on Monday said it plans to cut 12,500 jobs as a result of its $48 billion purchase of FleetBoston Financial Corp.

Chief Executive Kenneth Lewis has targeted $1.6 billion of cost savings from the merger. The cuts will take place over the next two years, and about 30 percent of them will come through attrition, the bank said.

Charlotte, North Carolina-based Bank of America on April 1 completed its purchase of Fleet. The purchase created the No. 3 U.S. bank, after Citigroup Inc. and J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., once the latter buys Bank One Corp..

Bank of America has about $938 billion of assets, 5,700 banking offices in 29 states and Washington, D.C., and about 36 million customers.

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