Recruit Holdings Co. Ltd., one of the largest global staffing firms, updated portions of its guidance for its fiscal year ending March 31. The updated guidance takes account recently announced layoffs at Indeed and Glassdoor.
While revenue guidance for the full fiscal year is unchanged at 3.43 trillion Japanese yen (US$25.89 billion) for the full fiscal year, the Tokyo-based company lowered its forecast for basic earnings per share to 169.50 (US$1.28) from 181.69 yen.
In addition, the company announced new guidance for operating income, which is forecast to fall 10.0% year over year to 341.00 billion yen (US$2.58 billion). It hadn’t previously announced guidance for operating income.
Also, Recruit forecast profit before tax of 362.00 billion yen (US$2.74 billion) for the full fiscal year, down 5.4% year over year. Profit attributable to owners of the parent company is forecast to fall 9.0% to 270.00 billion yen (US$2.04 billion).
The company also announced it expects to record a restructuring charge of 18.0 billion yen (US$136.1 million) in its fiscal fourth quarter related to severance benefits and associated costs. In addition, the company expects to record a one-time charge of approximately 12.0 billion yen (US$90.7 million) for impairment losses in relation to software in its “matching and solutions” segment (nonstaffing publishing operations and some recruiting operations) and in its staffing segment.
Recruit noted workforce reductions among companies in its “HR technology” segment, which includes Indeed and Glassdoor.
On Wednesday, Indeed announced it was laying off 2,022 workers, or 15% of its global workforce. It reported that the job market is cooling.
Glassdoor also announced it was laying off 140 people, or approximately 15% of its workforce.
Recruit expects the effect of the workforce reduction in its HR technology segment to be approximately US$500 million in annualized costs savings.