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Fintech startup Robinhood is cutting hundreds of jobs while insisting that its business “has never been stronger.” Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev is framing the latest layoffs as a proactive cultural and structural reset toward a “high-performance” organization. 

Robinhood said earlier this week that it plans to cut about , about 290 roles, as part of a broader move to “flatten” its organizational chart and strip out management layers. In a memo to employees viewed by , Tenev said the company is reducing headcount to avoid becoming a “heavily-layered organization.”

“We must be a lean, hyper-focused team where every single individual is empowered to make a massive impact,” Tenev wrote in the memo. “Our execution is strong today, but our ambitions require us to continuously raise our own bar.”

Robinhood notified affected employees on Tuesday. The company did not specify which teams were affected in the memo. 

Regulatory filings viewed by show that Robinhood expects to spend about $20 million in restructuring charges for severance and benefits, plus around $8 million in share-based compensation tied to the cuts. The company plans to recognize these charges in the second quarter and close a “small number” of remaining open roles. 

According to with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Robinhood had about 2,900 full-time employees at the end of last year. 

The Great Flattening

Robinhood is part of what some observers call the “” in tech, where companies use reorganizations to collapse hierarchies and move faster. Several companies, including Google, Microsoft and Meta, have cut jobs in recent years in an effort to make their organizations flatter. 

Robinhood emphasized that its financial position is solid and it continues to see record trading activity. The memo shows that inside the company, the rhetoric is about “talent density” and an “elite performance bar.” Tenev told employees that his goal is to maximize the concentration of top performers and define culture by “absolute elite performance” and “superlative commitment” to customers. 

That framing places Robinhood in a growing camp of tech and fintech companies that pitch layoffs as an upgrade. For example, Block, the fintech startup led by Jack Dorsey, cut 40% of staff earlier this year to streamline operations and refocus on core growth areas. The layoffs hit multiple teams as Block sought to reduce costs and simplify its structure. 

“We’re not making this decision because we’re in trouble. Our business is strong,” Dorsey wrote in an announcement post on X. “Something has changed. We’re already seeing that the intelligence tools we’re creating and using, paired with smaller and flatter teams, are enabling a new way of working.” 

Robinhood said in the memo that it will continue “hiring strategically,” investing in “top-tier talent” and adopting “frontier technologies.” Tenev acknowledged that “it can be painful to say goodbye to teammates” and described those leaving as “good people,” promising severance and support. 

Robinhood had a market capitalization of at the time of writing.