J.P. MORGAN boss Jamie Dimon says the company could relocate as many as 4,000 jobs from the UK to Europe in the event of Brexit.

The chairman and CEO of the world’s sixth largest bank was visiting the firm’s Bournemouth office to team up with Chancellor George Osborne in pushing for a ‘remain’ vote in the EU referendum later this month.

Mr Dimon said a vote to leave the union in the referendum later this month would result in "years of uncertainty" and could see his company "reorganise" it's UK business model with the loss of jobs.

The company is Bournemouth’s largest private sector employer with 4,000 staff based at its Chaseside complex.

Mr Dimon said the town and the UK in general would become less attractive to his company if, as a result of Brexit, the nation lost its ‘financial services passport’ access to European markets, resulting in "years of uncertainty".

“Even the best outcome in my opinion will change the laws on how we could serve our clients around the EU,” he said.

“Today we can serve them here, after a Brexit we can’t do it all here. We would have to start planning for that.

“I don’t know the exact numbers, 1,000, 2,000, it could be 4,000 jobs around the UK.”

He told an audience made up of the firm’s Bournemouth employees that the company would “take care of [its] staff”, but added “when you vote you should be thinking about something like that.”

Also, he said: “I am proud of what you do here for our clients and the philanthropic work we do. I am mostly proud that when times are tough J.P. Morgan never left.

“We didn’t leave Ireland, we didn’t leave Argentina. We wanted to continue with our business there.”

The Chancellor said: "What you do here, every day you trade close to a trillion dollars through Bournemouth.

"You make a massive contribution to the British economy."

He said services accounted for 80 per cent of the British economy.

“The EU is a massive economic opportunity for Britain, a massive economic opportunity for our services industry," he said.

“You can base your business here and can do banking and financial services across the EU, across a market of 500 million consumers.

“If we quit the EU there would be a big economic price to be paid. That is not just my view or the view of the Treasury but the view of almost every independent expert who has looked at this issue.”