Corporate America Focuses on Cost Cuts and Layoffs — Not Growth
- First-quarter results show a strong shift toward efficiency
- Earnings calls have fewer mentions of ‘spending on hiring’
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Wall Street’s worries about Corporate America’s dwindling profit margins appear to have made their way to the C-suite based on earnings reports so far this quarter.
A few themes are already becoming clear: Cost and job cuts are in, spending and expansion are out. Fears of the impact of rate hikes and a looming economic slowdown have US conglomerates rushing to divert to efficiency from growth mode, and the shift is starting to show up heavily in their financial results.