PayPal to lay off 2,000 employees in coming weeks, about 7% of workforce

PayPal on Tuesday announced plans to lay off 2,000 employees, or around 7% of its workforce, according to a release posted to the company’s website.

President and CEO Dan Schulman wrote in the release that PayPal is working to address the “challenging macroeconomic environment.” He said the company has made progress focusing resources on core priorities and rightsizing its cost structure, but that there is more work to be done.

“Change can be difficult – particularly when it includes valued colleagues and friends departing,” Schulman wrote about the layoffs. “We will face this head-on together, drawing on the unparalleled scale of our global platform, the strategic investments we have made to strengthen our core capabilities, and the trust and loyalty of our customers.”

PayPal stock notched up on the news and is now up more than 2% for the day.

The company’s layoffs announcement marks the latest round of job cuts in the tech industry, as Workday also announced plans to cut 525 jobs Tuesday. Earlier this month, Google announced plans to lay off more than 12,000 workers, Microsoft announced plans to cut 10,000 employees and Salesforce announced plans to lay off 7,000 workers.

In its third-quarter earnings report, PayPal beat on earnings and revenue expectations, but shares slid after the company’s Q4 revenue estimate came in behind analysts’ expectations. But PayPal raised EPS guidance for the full fiscal year, saying it’s benefited from “ongoing productivity initiatives.”

During a call with analysts after the company’s Q3 earnings report, acting CFO Gabrielle Rabinovich talked about the company’s projections for 2023.

“We’re operating in an environment where we think we’re going to continue to have inflationary pressures, where real wage growth is going to continue to be negative for a period of time, where discretionary spend will be under pressure,” Rabinovich said. “We’re navigating that environment as best we can, and we’ve taken into consideration that range of outcomes on volume growth and on revenue growth as it relates to what we think we can deliver from an operating margin and EPS standpoint.”

PayPal is slated to report fourth-quarter earnings after the bell on Feb. 9.