PayPal Holdings, a payments firm, plans to cut about 2,500 jobs, or 9% of its global workforce, this year. The statement was revealed via a letter to staff from CEO Alex Chriss.
The newly appointed CEO Chriss said, “The decision was made to “right-size” the company through both direct cuts and the elimination of open roles throughout the year. The staff that will be affected are expected to be notified by the end of the week.”
It’s reported that the company has grappled with intensified competition from rivals such as Apple, Zelle, and Block. Alex Chriss, who took on the CEO role last year after his tenure at software company Intuit, is strategically guiding PayPal toward growth amidst a challenging and competitive landscape.
Expectations among investors for a positive influence from Chriss’s leadership were high, especially considering the company’s share price had declined by over 20% in the previous year.
Last year, the company also cut off 2,000 jobs, or 7% of its workers, due to it facing “the challenging macro-economic environment”.
In November, the company released its first earnings report under the new CEO, exceeding analysts’ projections and fostering optimism among investors that the company’s turnaround was gaining momentum.
Attempting to stay ahead in the market, the company recently unveiled new AI driven products and a one-click checkout feature. During the PayPal First Look keynote, Alex Chriss, revealed an entirely new PayPal checkout experience that radically speeds up checkout for consumers and helps merchants convert transactions like never before.
Tools like Fastlane, a dramatically faster and smarter guest checkout experience; Smart Receipts, giving customers AI-personalised recommendations from merchants to keep them coming back; the PayPal advanced offers platform so merchants can provide relevant, personalised, real-time offers to consumers and drive more sales; a reinvented PayPal consumer app giving shoppers new ways to earn cash back and more reasons to use PayPal; and, Venmo’s enhanced business profiles, so small businesses can find and engage new customers, and grow their businesses.
Moreover, the effort coincides with a prevailing trend in the technology sector, marked by the actions of numerous industry giants, including Meta, Amazon, Microsoft, Google, and TikTok, who have announced a total of 25,000 job cuts in the past month alone.
According to the Layoffs.fyi website, which tracks technology industry job cuts, more than 260,000 jobs were cut off in the sector in 2023.
