“Some of you may die… but that’s a sacrifice Claude’s willing to make…” -Pinterest CEO Bill Ready

It seems as if Claudebot hype has made its way into the corporate circles pretty quickly… and Pinterest is wasting no time to toss desks out of the office window.

The depressed mood board maker announced it's laying off less than 15% of its workforce and shrinking office space in a move it’s calling a “resource reallocation” toward artificial intelligence. 

Translation: the stock is getting smoked like a brisket, payroll is the scapegoat, and the office is about to be overrun by AI-bro vibecoders. “Claude, transform our dying mood-board app into one that rivals the likes of Instagram, X, and TikTok. While you’re at it save our stock price. Make no mistakes.”

Based on its roughly 4,600-4,700 employees, that puts as many as 700 people on the chopping block. The company expects to take $35-$45 million in restructuring charges, which is CFO-speak for severance checks, broken keycards, and an insufferable amount of LinkedIn posts starting with “After an incredible journey…”

Naturally, the stock did not clap.

Shares slid toward a nine-month low, extending a brutal stretch where Pinterest has managed to fall nearly 27% over the past year. (Stop, stop, it’s already dead.)

(Source: Reuters)

And just to really rub it in, this AI workforce purge comes only months after the stock got obliterated (-22%) in a single session following a weak holiday-quarter outlook. Which made it easily its worst day in three years. A chart reminiscent of the Hawk Tuah girl’s crypto pump and dump.

Now, as for how leadership is attempting to narrate their way out of this mess…

Pinterest says it’s “prioritizing AI-powered products and capabilities,” including visual search, personalization, and shopping tools like its Pinterest Assistant… which management insists has turned the platform into an AI-powered shopping assistant for 600 million users (sure, Jan).

Unfortunately, advertisers still seem more interested in platforms where 40-year-old cat ladies aren’t planning farmhouse weddings they’ll never have.

That’s the real problem here.

Pinterest’s ad business has been fighting for oxygen while marketers chase faster dopamine hits on TikTok and Instagram. Now with all that said, engagement and users exist. Unfortunately, the revenue growth story keeps showing up late with excuses.

So what’s the solution?

Cut costs. Shrink offices. Invoke AI. Promise reinvestment “in key strategic areas.” And most importantly, hope investors forget the last earnings call.

To be fair, Pinterest isn’t alone. Nearly 55,000 U.S. layoffs last year were conveniently blamed on AI. And plenty of experts think a chunk of this is just AI-washing… stapling a futuristic label on plain old belt-tightening.

But perception matters.

Right now, the perception is this: Pinterest is slimming down not because it’s strong… but because it has to be.

Sure, AI might eventually help the platform surface better products, smarter ads, and more relevant content. Or it might just automate the same slow-growth business at a slightly lower cost.

Wall Street doesn’t care which story you tell.

It cares which one shows up in revenue.

And until Pinterest proves AI can do more than replace employees and conference rooms… investors may keep scrolling right past this one.

At the time of publishing this article, Stocks.News holds positions in Meta and Google as mentioned in the article.