French banking group Credit Agricole could cut up to 2,500 jobs around the world, mainly at its Cacib investment bank, press reports in France said yesterday.

According to sources quoted by newspapers, including Les Echos and Le Figaro, the company is planning to cut between 1,000 and 2,500 positions, mainly at Cacib, which has offices in about 50 countries.

On Tuesday, union sources had said they expected “several hundred” jobs to be cut at Credit Agricole, which last month reported a 65 per cent drop in net attributable quarterly profit.

Like other French banks, Credit Agricole has been hit by its exposure to Greek sovereign debt amid the eurozone debt crisis and last month revealed a 60 per cent write-down of its holdings of Greek bonds.

The Moody’s agency earlier this month downgraded its credit rating on Credit Agricole’s long-term debt by one notch to Aa3, as it also announced downgrades on two other leading French banks, BNP Paribas and Societe Generale.

Credit Agricole, one of the biggest banks in Europe by capitalisation, employs 160,000 people around the world, a third of them outside France, while Cacib employs about 15,000 people globally, including 4,600 in France.