Amazon (AMZN) shares moved firmly lower Monday following a report from the New York Times that suggested the world's biggest online retailer is planning to lay off around 10,000 people.
The Times reported that the layoffs could begin as early as this week, with a likely focus on the group's devices, retail and human resources divisions. The cuts, the largest in Amazon history, would represent around 3% of its global workforce.
Last week, The Wall Street Journal reported that Amazon, which became the first public company is history to shed more than a $1 trillion in market value earlier this week, will being a cost-cutting review lead by CEO Andy Jassy over the coming months, with a focus on its voice-assistant Alexa business.
Amazon issued a disappointing holiday revenue forecast in late October, and unveiled slowing growth in its lucrative Web Services business, both of which clouded a better-than-expected third-quarter earnings report.
Jassy told investors at the time that while he was "encouraged" by the third quarter progress, "we recognize there's still a lot of opportunity to continue to improve productivity and drive cost efficiencies throughout our networks."
"We have identified initiatives that the teams continue to work hard on, and we expect to see further improvement in the quarters ahead," he added.
Amazon shares were marked 2.33% lower in late morning Monday trading to change hands at $98.44 each, extending the stock's six-month decline to around 11.2%.
Earlier Monday, Apple (AAPL) CEO Tim Cook said the tech giant has slowed some of it hiring into the final months of the year, adding to pressure on tech sector jobs that reflect growing concern for the health of the global economy.
In an interview with CBS Mornings that is scheduled to air tomorrow, Cook told the broadcaster that while it will continue to hire, it will make targeted additions to its estimated global workforce of around 165,000.
Cook's indication for muted higher echoes that of ad giant Google (GOOGL), which said its fourth-quarter headcount additions would be "significantly lower than Q3", and Microsoft (MSFT), which forecast only "minimal" headcount growth over the final three months of the year.
Meta Platforms (META), meanwhile, unveiled plans last week to slash more than 11,000 people from its global payroll, the biggest reduction in company history, as it grapples with mounting losses in its metaverse project and a pullback in ad spending that continues to hit sales at its flagship Facebook division.
