Jobs could be cut within weeks at the newly formed Thomson Reuters, it emerged yesterday as the company made its stock market debut in London, New York and Toronto.

Its first day of trading came amid the global economic downturn and widespread job losses across the financial services sector.

The shares, which opened in London at £17.00, closed at £15.60. Concerns over the global economy are thought to have provoked the fall. Some analysts were dubious about demand for Thomson Reuters' financial data services, with key clients reducing staff levels.

A misunderstanding over the opening price caused confusion. On some traders' screens the shares appeared to have fallen much more than they had. The confusion stemmed from the closing price in Canada of $36.20 being converted to £18.20, which was viewed by some as an opening price. Thomson Reuters and the London Stock Exchange both said that they were not to blame.

Sources confirmed that jobs would be lost and the axe could start to swing shortly. Thomson Reuters is due to report its first-quarter results on May 1, when it hopes to receive more detail about the phasing of the integration process and guidance for this year.

A large number of redundancies is unlikely because there is no significant overlap between the two companies but cutting the workforce by 5 per cent would still mean 2,500 job losses.

The company plans to reduce costs by $500 million (£252 million) by the third year after the merger but some analysts have predicted that cost savings could be higher.

The merged company hopes that its portfolio of products, which range from financial to legal and healthcare, will help it to overcome economic concerns.

Thomson Reuters, headed by Tom Glocer, the former Reuters chief executive, sells electronic news and data to traders, fund managers and analysts, as well as databases and other information to lawyers, accountants, scientists and the healthcare industry.

The company marked its debut by announcing that it might buy back up to $500 million worth of its shares over the year. The new company has annual revenues of $12.5 billion and a staff of 50,000.

ABN Amro, the broker, began coverage of the enlarged group with a “sell” rating and a price target of £15.00. ABN gave warning that it expected a material slowdown in the market data arm of the business which accounts for 60 per cent of revenues.

Jonathan Helliwell, an analyst at Cazenove, said: “Uncertainty about the half of the business exposed to financial markets may hold the stock back near-term, in our view, particularly given a high near-term valuation and potential stock flow-back arising from the deal.” However, he drew attention to the group's strong global positions across a number of information publishing sectors, strong cashflow and balance sheet and its proven management track record.

Collins Stewart has downgraded its previous “hold” recommendation on Reuters to a “sell” for Thomson Reuters at a target of £14.20.

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