Etsy beat Wall Street on revenue, raised its outlook, and told investors it would buy back $2bn of its own shares. Then it said it was cutting 12% of its staff.
The craft marketplace announced a restructuring on Wednesday that removes roughly 220 roles, most of them in product and engineering, CNBC reported. That leaves about 1,600 employees. Etsy expects the work to finish by the end of the third quarter, at a cost of around $35m in severance and related charges.
Chief executive Kruti Patel Goyal was blunt about the framing. The cuts are “not a cost cutting move,” she wrote in a shareholder letter. They are meant to help the company “move faster and execute with even greater focus” while business is strong.
A growth layoff, not a rescue
The numbers back the momentum, up to a point. Second-quarter revenue was $668.3m, ahead of the $646.7m analysts expected. Gross merchandise sales reached $2.6bn, up 7.5% on the year, a third straight quarter of growth. Etsy raised its full-year sales outlook to mid-single-digit growth.
