PayPal Holdings has announced plans to eliminate more than 4,500 jobs, roughly 20 percent of its global workforce, as newly appointed chief executive Enrique Lores launches an artificial intelligence-driven overhaul aimed at repositioning the payments giant as a technology-first company.
Lores, who took over as PayPal chief executive in March 2026 after predecessor Alex Chriss stepped down following weak fourth-quarter 2025 results, used the company’s first-quarter earnings call this week to lay out the most sweeping strategic reset in PayPal’s recent history. With around 23,800 employees at the end of 2025, the planned 20 percent reduction could eliminate more than 4,500 roles over the next two to three years.
The restructuring is expected to generate at least $1.5 billion in cost savings over the same period, with the proceeds reinvested into modernising the company’s technology infrastructure. Lores characterised the layoffs not as a response to poor performance but as the removal of organisational layers that have slowed execution. He told investors on the earnings call that PayPal must recommit to the fundamentals, including “becoming a technology company again.”
PayPal reported first-quarter 2026 revenue of $8.35 billion, up 7.2 percent year over year, with adjusted earnings per share of $1.34 beating analyst estimates of $1.27. However, net income dropped 14 percent, and the company guided softly for the second quarter.
The technology reset centres on three priorities: modernising PayPal’s underlying infrastructure, accelerating the shift to a cloud-native architecture, and aggressively adopting artificial intelligence (AI) in development processes. To coordinate the effort, Lores announced a dedicated “AI transformation and simplification” team reporting directly to him, tasked with redesigning core processes across the company function by function.
Executives stated that AI adoption will extend beyond software development into areas such as customer service, support operations and risk management. The admission that PayPal has not yet fully embraced AI internally drew attention, given that rivals and consumer technology firms have accelerated adoption considerably over the past year.
Venmo, PayPal’s consumer payments app, provided one of the few bright spots in the quarterly results, with total payment volume growing 14 percent in Q1 2026, while PayPal-branded online checkout volume increased by only 2 percent. The divergence underscores where consumer appetite is shifting and likely informs Letshego’s decision to reorganise around three distinct segments: checkout solutions and PayPal, consumer financial services including Venmo, and payment services and cryptocurrency.
The restructuring unfolds against a broader wave of fintech job cuts. Coinbase announced a 14 percent workforce reduction the same week, while Block indicated plans to cut nearly half of its employees.
