Stephen Squeri, chairman and chief executive officer of American Express Co., speaks during an Economic Club of New York event in New York, US, on Thursday, Nov. 10, 2022.<\/p>\n
Stephanie Keith | Bloomberg | Getty Images<\/p>\n
American Express<\/a> is cutting thousands of employees as the leading credit card company prepares for artificial intelligence to take over more of its internal processes.<\/p>\n Amex is eliminating 5% of its global workforce and taking a $336 million restructuring charge, CEO Stephen Squeri told analysts Friday on the company’s third-quarter earnings<\/a> call. The firm had almost 77,000 employees at the end of 2025. <\/p>\n Chief Financial Officer Christophe Le Caillec told CNBC in an interview that the restructuring was to make American Express “leaner, more agile, and also to prepare for AI.”<\/p>\n “You don’t want to automate processes that are not optimally structured,” Le Caillec said. “So what we’re doing here is to reduce layers and increase spans of controls, so that we can automate and take advantage of AI in the coming quarters and the coming years.”<\/p>\n The Amex announcement reflects a broader trend across financial services, where banks are working to replace repetitive roles with AI automation. On Thursday, Barclays confirmed plans<\/a> to trim 5,000 jobs \u2014 also roughly 5% of its staff \u2014 in another tech-driven cost initiative. The moves come even as the sector is enjoying robust profits from growing consumer spending and resilient credit.<\/p>\n During the analyst call, Squeri said that the charge was to improve the company’s efficiency.<\/p>\n “We’ve got good momentum, but to accelerate innovation and win over the next few years, we needed to become [a] more agile and efficient organization,” Squeri said.<\/p>\n ‘Run rogue’<\/p>\n Squeri devoted a 10-minute section of his prepared remarks to his views on AI, focusing mainly on how it will be used to personalize experiences and offers for Amex cardholders.<\/p>\n While the CEO emphasized the need to meet customers’ desires to use AI,<\/a> including agents, he added that Amex is “not going to let assistants run rogue through our system.”<\/p>\n “We need to protect our customers [and] merchants, and we’re only going to allow agents to access our systems that are either approved through API or MCP channels,” he said, citing two ways to securely connect outside platforms with Amex systems.<\/p>\n Amex posted quarterly results that topped Wall Street profit expectations. Adjusted earnings per share were $4.68, topping the $4.48 average estimate of analysts, according to LSEG.<\/p>\n