Staff at the Internet bank First-e, a subsidiary of the Dublin-based holding company Enba, have been told that the company is seeking about 90 job cuts.
An official announcement detailing which sections of First-e's business will be affected by the redundancies is expected before the end of the week.
The job losses follow on from the group's recent decisions to pull out of a lease on a 177,000 sq ft facility in south Dublin and cancel a major television advertising campaign in the UK.
First-e, which employs 470 people in Dublin, is conducting a major review of its business and is understood to be finalising a €70 million (£55.1 million) cost-cutting plan.
This plan could represent as much as a 70 per cent cut in the bank's budget going forward, according to company sources.
At a meeting earlier this week staff were told that an estimated 90 people would be made redundant. It is understood a further 120 contract jobs are likely to be lost following the review.
A First-e source told The Irish Times yesterday that morale was extremely low at the Internet bank and staff were concerned that management had not acted quickly to reassure them about job losses and redundancy payments.
"People moved from big banking jobs to come here because it was not a start-up; it was an up and running operation," the source added.
The job cuts reflect a growing squeeze on the cash reserves of dot.com companies and Internet banks as investors become increasingly nervous about technology companies' cash burn rates.
As previously reported, some 30 staff involved in developing lending products for First-e have already been told they will lose their jobs.
These lending products were never implemented by the bank, which has yet to add a lending facility to its services.
According to staff at First-e, an attempted management buyout by the section concerned, which was backed by venture capital funds, was at first encouraged and later rejected by the bank.
It is expected that other sections of the Internet bank will be told tomorrow how the job cuts will affect them.
Meanwhile, it emerged yesterday that as part of its cost-cutting plan First-e has scrapped a multimillion-pound television advertising campaign just a fortnight before it was due to be screened in the UK.
The Internet bank is likely to face large cancellation fees as a result of the late notice given to its advertising agency, London-based Fallons.
A company spokesman refused to comment last night on any of the issues surrounding the ongoing review. He said the review would be completed shortly.
First-e the Internet bank was created following a co-operation agreement between First-e group plc and the French bank, Banque dEscompte.
The company agreed this year to a takeover by Spain's Uno-e, a bank that is jointly owned by Terra Networks and Banco Bilboa Vizcaya Argentaria. The merger has yet to get regulatory approval.
