Mish Shedlock: Huge Layoffs Including Thousands at Amazon and FedEx in Peak Shipping Season
Amazon Layoffs
Amazon Set to Lay Off Thousands of Corporate Workers
The layoffs come as Amazon is undertaking a broad review of costs, The Wall Street Journal reported last week. That review has focused on the devices unit, which the Journal reported has lost $5 billion annually in some recent years.
The layoffs could affect about 10,000 employees, though that number could change, the person said. The cuts are being made as team by team decisions, they said. The cuts would represent less than 1% of Amazon’s global workforce, which exceeded 1.5 million people at the end of September, including hundreds of thousands of workers at its warehouses.
Facebook Layoffs
Facebook Parent Meta Announces Layoffs of 11,000 Staff
Meta Platforms Inc. said it would cut more than 11,000 workers, or 13% of staff, embarking on the company’s first broad restructuring as it copes with a slumping digital-ad market and plunging stock price.
Redfin Layoffs
Redfin Shuts Home-Flipping Business, Lays Off 13% of Staff in Slumping Housing Market
Real-estate company Redfin Corp. laid off 13% of its staff on Wednesday and closed its home-flipping unit, saying the operation was both too expensive and too risky to continue.
The Seattle-based company, which operates a real-estate brokerage and home-listings website, said the decisions were made because it is predicting that the real-estate market is going to be smaller next year and its home-flipping business is losing money. It previously laid off 8% of its workforce in June of this year.
Saleforce Layoffs
Saleforce Confirms it has Laid Off Hundreds of Employees
Salesforce laid off hundreds of people this week as the onslaught of tech cutbacks continued unabated. The company would not share an exact number, but said it was less than a thousand, and the people involved were informed yesterday, according to a person close to the company.
Stripe Layoffs
Consider Stripe’s CEO Patrick Collison’s Email to Stripe Employees on November 3.
Today we’re announcing the hardest change we have had to make at Stripe to date. We’re reducing the size of our team by around 14% and saying goodbye to many talented Stripes in the process. If you are among those impacted, you will receive a notification email within the next 15 minutes. For those of you leaving: we’re very sorry to be taking this step and John and I are fully responsible for the decisions leading up to it.
FedEx Layoffs
Please note FedEx Freight Enacts Furloughs as it Faces Volume Decline
FedEx Freight confirmed Saturday it is enacting furloughs in some U.S. markets. The move is due “to current business conditions impacting volumes,” the LTL said in an emailed statement.
Other carriers like Werner, J.B. Hunt and Knight-Swift are also adjusting in the face of economic uncertainty and what is expected to be softer holiday demand.
“While peak season this year is underwhelming thus far, it will only hasten the capacity correction that is already underway,” Werner CEO, President and Chairman Derek Leathers said on a Nov. 3 earnings call.