Avatar for Mark Zuckerberg, chief executive officer of Meta Platforms Inc., speaking during a virtual Meta Connect event in New York, US, on Tuesday, October 11, 2022.
Michael Nagle | Bloomberg | beautiful pictures
Facebook parents Meta could begin large-scale layoffs as soon as Wednesday, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal.
The layoffs are expected to affect thousands of employees, the report said, and the move will mark the first major headcount reduction in Meta’s history. At the end of September, the company reported that it had more than 87,000 employees.
A spokesperson for Meta declined to comment and referred CNBC to Zuckerberg’s comment on the company’s latest earnings call last month.
“In 2023, we will focus our investments on a handful of high-priority growth areas,” Zuckerberg said at the time. “That means some teams will grow meaningfully, but most other teams won’t change or shrink over the next year. Overall, we expect to end 2023 with a solid finish. about the same size or even a slightly smaller organization than we are today.”
Meta stocks have plummeted 73% this year, to their lowest level since early 2016, and the social media giant is now the worst performer in the S&P 500 in 2022.
Jonathan Vanian of –CNBC contributed to this report.
