Laurentian Bank to cut 300 jobs

The Laurentian Bank of Canada announced late Wednesday afternoon it willcut 300 jobs asit merges 50 branches over the next 18 months.

The announcement was made while managersmet with hundreds of employees at thePalaisdescongrs in Montreal.

The bank says the majority of jobs to disappear will becut through attrition, not through layoffs.

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Bank presidentFranoisDesjardinssaid in a statement that the operations of traditional banking are "outdated."

As of July 31, there were148 branches and 3,631 full-time employees under the Laurentian Bank'sbanner.

In August, the bank'sadministration announced that by 2018, it willmove its head offices from McGill College Avenue to E-Commerce Placein downtown Montreal as a cost-saving measure.