Wells Fargo & Co has laid off 15 employees in its wealth management business in the Carolinas as part of an efficiency program.

The cuts to wealth management form part of a reorganization of that business as a result of Project Compass, a drive to trim quarterly expenses at the bank by $1.5 billion by the final quarter of 2012.

The Carolinas account for some 500 employees at Wells Fargo, which is headquartered in San Francisco. In total, the firm employs some 275,000 people.  

The bank is not the only one to be examining its cost base, with UBS announcing yesterday it is shedding 3,500 jobs through a combination of redundancies and attrition. Around 45 per cent of these will be at the Swiss firm’s wealth management business. Meanwhile, HSBC is axing around 30,000 jobs, equivalent to a tenth of its workforce.

"As many companies do from time to time, Wells Fargo Wealth Management has recently made a number of changes to its internal structure in order to streamline operations and position the organization to more effectively meet the clients' needs," spokesman Josh Dunn said, according to the Charlotte Observer.

Wells Fargo reported a second-quarter profit of $3.9 billion, or 70 cents a share, up from 55 cents a year earlier. The results were aided by a decline in loan losses. Second-quarter expenses had fallen by 2 per cent from a year earlier to $12.5 billion.

At the firm’s wealth, brokerage and retirement division net income rose to $333 million in the three months to 30 June this year from $270 million a year ago, although the latest quarterly results represented a small dip from $339 million in the quarter ending 30 March.