PayPal just executed one of fintech's fastest CEO turnarounds. The payments giant ousted Alex Chriss after barely 16 months on the job, naming HP's Enrique Lores as his replacement following a brutal earnings miss that sent shares plummeting 17.9% in premarket trading Tuesday. The board didn't mince words - Chriss's execution "was not in line with expectations" as the company missed Q4 revenue targets and shocked Wall Street with a forecast calling for profit declines instead of growth.
PayPal just hit the eject button on its CEO strategy. The company announced Tuesday it's replacing Alex Chriss with HP CEO Enrique Lores after a disastrous earnings report that laid bare the fintech giant's struggles to keep pace with a rapidly evolving payments landscape.
The timing tells you everything. Chriss joined PayPal in September 2023 from Intuit, brought in to revitalize a company that had lost its mojo as newer players like Stripe and Block ate into its market share. Sixteen months later, he's out. CFO and COO Jamie Miller takes over as interim CEO until Lores officially starts March 1.
PayPal's board didn't sugarcoat the decision. In its official announcement, the company stated the leadership change came because its "pace of change and execution was not in line with the Board's expectations" given broader market trends. That's corporate-speak for: we're falling behind and needed to act fast.
The catalyst? PayPal reported fourth-quarter revenue and profit that missed analyst expectations, with consumer spending dipping amid what the company characterized as a cost-of-living crisis and softening labor market. But the real shocker came in the forward guidance - PayPal forecast a decline in full-year profit when Wall Street had broadly expected growth. Investors fled, sending shares down nearly 18% before markets even opened.
Lores brings a different pedigree to the role. He spent over six years running HP, navigating the hardware giant through supply chain chaos and the shift to hybrid work. He's also been chair of PayPal's board since July 2024, giving him an insider's view of the company's challenges. In a statement, Lores acknowledged the existential pressures facing PayPal: "The payments industry is changing faster than ever, driven by new technologies, evolving regulations, an increasingly competitive landscape, and the rapid acceleration of AI that is reshaping commerce daily."
