Job losses expected at financial firms

Bank of America expects to take a hit of around $7 billion in losses over four years from its acquisition of a troubled Merrill Lynch, it said yesterday, in a plan that could result in thousands of layoffs. Job losses could also mount at many other financial service companies, after Monday gave the New York Stock Exchange one of its worst days of trading since September 11, 2001, which included a 4.4 percent decline in the Dow Jones industrial average. Shares of American International Group, one of the world’s largest insurers, dropped 60 percent after the company borrowed $20 billion from its own subsidiaries, a move allowed by government regulators in an effort to curb ripple effects throughout Wall Street.