As celebrants dressed in green assembled in the heart of Manhattan for the annual St Patrick's Day parade, a lonely crowd of traders and support staff huddled in the cold outside Bear Stearns' headquarters to drag deeply on cigarettes - and mourn.

The stunning sale of their bank on Sunday night to JPMorganChase for a bargain price of $2 a share will almost certainly be followed by job cuts across Wall Street, with many of Bear's 14,000 workers among those likely to be cut loose.

"Everyone is just stunned. It's like a funeral in there," said one member of Bear's fixed-income division.

In addition to losing their jobs, Bear employees, who own about one-third of the bank's shares, have seen their nest eggs crushed.

Another member of the fixed-income division said he had been forced to wire cash into the bank to cover margin calls on his considerable holding of Bear shares. "There are a lot of guys in there who aren't rich any more," he said.

JPMorgan has yet to say how many of Bear's workers will be let go but people close to the bank have said there will be significant layoffs.

Analysts estimate that tens of thousands of other jobs could be cut on Wall Street as the turmoil in the global credit markets plays out and traditional sources of revenue disappear.

JPMorgan covets Bear's prime brokerage and certain other businesses but will move quickly to eliminate overlaps in equities, advisory and other areas.

JPMorgan has made no decision on what to do with Bear's soaring headquarters at 383 Madison Avenue but could decide to sell it in the short term for a big profit.

Lehman Brothers' bankers were also suffering on St Patrick's Day. Shares in the company, which also has a high level of employee ownership, were down 37 per cent in midday trade.

Staff arriving at Bear Stearns's headquarters yesterday were welcomed to work by a two-dollar bill stuck to the revolving doors - a spoof on the bargain-basement price per share that JPMorgan Chase paid.

A hopeful Coldwell Banker real estate agent was hawking cheap apartments to employees who saw the value of their stock options go up in smoke.

"The valuation is virtually nothing," said a Singapore-based Bear Stearns employee. "It is indeed rock bottom. We have tanked. It's very, very sad. Everyone is in mourning."

"I've been at Bear for 11 years and I want to vomit," said another employee, who described himself as a partner.

- (FT Service/Bloomberg)