BP (US) is planning to slash thousands of jobs in an effort to reduce costs amid pressure on its performance.

Int'l Business News learned that BP's CEO Murray Auchincloss informed employees on Thursday that the company would cut 4,700 full-time and 3,000 contract jobs to reduce costs. Auchincloss wrote in an email to BP employees: "I understand and recognize that this brings uncertainty for each person who may be at risk of losing their job, and it will also impact colleagues and teams."

Earlier, BP expected Q4 performance to be under pressure. BP said on Tuesday that its fourth-quarter performance would be affected by lower oil and gas production, refining profits and trading.

In the trading update, BP said it expects fourth-quarter upstream production to be below the 2.4 million barrels of oil equivalent per day reported in the third quarter. BP said its average Brent crude oil price in the quarter was US$74.73 per barrel, lower than US$80.34 per barrel in the third quarter, while its refining market average margin fell to US$13.10 per barrel, down nearly US$3.5 per barrel from the previous quarter.

The company also said that the decline in refining margins, along with the impact of turnaround and maintenance activities, would result in a decrease in profits of up to US$300 million from the previous quarter, and the profits of the oil production and operations segment would further decrease by US$200 million to US$400 million.