JPMorgan is set to close its offices in Bermuda with 27 staff affected by the move as the company seeks to streamline its operations, The Royal Gazette can reveal.

A spokesman for JPMorgan said the company would be transitioning its Bermuda Hedge Fund Services operations to the firm's existing locations in Boston and Cincinnati and many of the employees impacted in Bermuda had been offered jobs in either place.

He said the company, which has been based on the Island for approximately five years, expected to complete the move by October and it was part of a larger strategy to create centres of excellence that leverage expertise and resources.

JPMorgan Chase & Co. — one of the great names of US banking — posted a 36 percent jump in second-quarter profit earlier this month, surpassing analysts' expectations, as strength in investment banking offset higher credit losses.

Last month, the Gazette reported that Citigroup made 15 of the staff in its Bermuda offices redundant as part of a series of job cuts worldwide as the economic downturn continued to hit the Island's fund services industry hard.

In January, Butterfield Fulcrum Group axed some 30 staff from its Bermuda office due to the impact of the global economic crisis, in addition to around 25 other redundancies from its Cayman Islands operation.

The net asset value of investment funds on the Island dropped by almost $80 billion during 2008, according to Bermuda Monetary Authority statistics. Declining asset values and soaring redemptions combined to make it a miserable year for the funds industry.