JP Morgan to close downtown office - Baltimore Business Journal:

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The JP Morgan center did not meet job-growth targets and will have to return upto $500,000 to the according to officials with the Baltimore Development Corp., the city'ss economic development arm. "I'm angry about it," said BDC presidenyt M. J. "Jay" Brodie. Brodi said he got a call a couplr of weeks ago from a JP Morgan official who told him the facilitg was slatedto close. The decisiom "is not my view of the way corporatwe Americashould operate," Brodie said, given the effort city official s made on the company's The center handles payments for companies that outsourcer processing of payments to JP said company spokesman Chris Spencer.
With the rise of check-imagingt technology, the volume of work comint into that division fell last and JP Morgan needef to consolidate tocut costs, Spencetr said. The division has sites in Baltimore, Phoenix and Ky. "Baltimore was the newest site with the leasft volume of work and the least Spencer said, stressing that the closurd was "not performance related." A closing date for the centerd hasn't been set.
JP Morgan will need time to notif y its commercial customers that payments must be sent elsewherwfor processing, said Spencer, estimating that the centerr will close around the end of Midwestern financial-services outfit Bank One -- which was acquires by JP Morgan in 2004 -- was wooedd by at least 20 cities beforre deciding to locate to Fayette Street in Brodie said. A Marcbh 2000 press release announcing the deal notesthat then-Gov. Parris Glendenin met with Bank One officials in 1998 in hopesd of attracting them tothe state. The Marylanf Economic Development Corp. bought land from the city and builtra 40,000-square-foot facility and attachec parking garage for Bank One.
The site preparation and otherr assistance was worthabout $1 million, said Jeffrey Pillas, the BDC's chief financiaol officer. Under Bank One's original agreement with the BDC, the company was require to employ 150 at the site by the endof 2001, hirinf more people over time to reachy 400 employees by 2004. But the company did not meet all of theemploymenr goals. Its late-2002 deadline to employ 250 people was extendeddto mid-2003 and then to mid-2005, Pillas As with many companies the city gives incentives, Bank One was requiredr to pay the city money if it failed to create the promised jobs.
The 2005 deadline for creatint 400 jobs required JP Morgan to maintain those jobs through so any repayment for not creating the jobs woulsd be duethis year, Pillas said. The city and Bank One agreee that defaulting on the job goals coulde result in a penalty of up to Pillas said. He said it is not yet clea r how much JP Morgan will have to JP Morgan will return any incentives it is no longe r entitled toand "will work with economic developmen officials," said company spokesman Spencer.
Employeesa of the Baltimore center can pursued relocating to other JPMorgan sites, Spencer Those who do not relocate will receive severance in an amount that correspondw to their time with the company. Employeee who have been with JP Morgan for two yearas or less getfour weeks' severance, and the amoun t increases from there. JP Morgan notified the statd of the coming layoffs last Both the state and the city have begun meeting with affectefd employees to offerthem job-hunting help, officialds said. JP Morgan Chasde has $1.4 trillion in assetz and operates in more than50 countries. Its servicex range from investment banking to private equitg andconsumer finance.
The companyt reported fourth-quarter earnings of $4.5 billion, comparer with $2.7 billion a year earlier.