The Trial Balance is CFO.com’s weekly preview of stories, stats and events to help you prepare.
Part 1 — Block CFO lays out plan for $2 million gross profit per employee
Block’s decision to cut roughly 4,000 jobs, about 40% of its workforce, despite strong financial performance, has intensified discussion across the technology sector about artificial intelligence and workforce productivity.
The parent company of Square and Cash App reported Q4 gross profit of $2.9 billion, up 24% year over year. Shares rose nearly 20% following the earnings release and news of the workforce reduction.
The cuts were part of a larger strategic plan, according to Block CFO and COO Amrita Ahuja.
“We believe that it is actually from a position of strength that we have the ability to take an action like this with confidence and execute on it in a way that continues to deliver for our customers and stakeholders,” Ahuja told Fortune in an interview last week.
“This is a two-year journey for us,” Ahuja said. “This was not an overnight decision.”
A central element of that transformation has been the company’s internal use of artificial intelligence. Block has built an internal AI agent, “Goose,” that sits on top of large language models and automates tasks such as drafting communications, executing workflows and supporting product development. Some analysts have questioned whether Block’s cuts are truly the result of AI-driven productivity gains or are instead a market correction from a hiring spree during the pandemic.
The tools are already influencing how work is completed inside the company. Ahuja said developer output has increased as engineers rely on AI tools to push code and product features to production more quickly. In one example, a risk underwriting model that previously took an entire quarter to build was completed in a fraction of the time.
Productivity metrics have also shifted during that period, as Ahuja pointed to the company’s gross profit per employee metric.
Ahuja told Fortune that Block generated roughly $500,000 in gross profit per employee in 2019. The figure remained relatively stable during the company’s hiring expansion in the early 2020s, and more recently rose to about $750,000 in 2024 and roughly $1 million in 2025. She also said that if the company meets its updated projections, gross profit per employee could reach approximately $2 million in 2026.
Block raised its financial outlook at the same time it announced the layoffs. The company now expects gross profit to grow 18% year over year and profits to increase 54%.
Productivity metrics are receiving renewed scrutiny as companies evaluate how automation and AI affect staffing levels and output. The American Productivity and Quality Center shows the median company generates about $310,000 in revenue per employee, with organizations in the 75th percentile averaging roughly $564,706 per employee.
Cost metrics are also gaining attention inside finance organizations as automation takes shape in the finance function. The APQC also found that personnel cost per finance function employee spending typically ranges from about $51,000 to more than $121,000 per finance employee, depending on staffing models, compensation levels and the amount of manual work performed across finance processes.
Automation and artificial intelligence are increasingly viewed as tools for managing those costs while maintaining output. Analysts have suggested that AI could enable organizations to expand productivity without adding equivalent headcount, shifting the relationship between labor costs and business performance.
Block CEO Jack Dorsey said on X that the company “over-hired during COVID” and referenced the rapid expansion of the business into lending, banking and buy now, pay later services during that period. After the layoffs, the market responded positively with share prices rising over 20%, indicating that the possibly inevitable AI-induced layoffs may trigger a bit of bad press but a hefty boost in share price and investor confidence in the midst of a shaky labor and investor market.
The market reaction has also drawn attention to workforce productivity metrics. As automation continues to reshape corporate workflows, measures such as profit per employee and revenue per employee, along with other indicators used to evaluate labor productivity, may receive increasing scrutiny as companies assess staffing levels and operating efficiency. In networking groups, mid-market CFOs, too, have said they’re performing careful evaluations of their workforces and AI tools before making drastic cuts.
Part 2 — This week
Here’s a list of important market events slated for the week ahead.
Monday, March 9 — None scheduled.
Tuesday, March 10
Wednesday, March 11
- Consumer price index, Feb.
- Core CPI, Feb.
- Treasury budget, Feb.
Thursday, March 12
- Initial jobless claims
- U.S. trade deficit, Jan.
- Housing starts, Feb.
Friday, March 13
- GDP Q4 first revision
- Personal spending, Jan.
- PCE index, Jan.
- Core PCE index, Jan.
- Durable goods orders, Jan.
- Job openings, Jan.
- University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment, March preliminary
Part 3 — Weekly listen: Argenx CFO Karl Gubitz on life after profitability
Global immunology company Argenx CFO Karl Gubitz said profitability has given the biotech more flexibility, while its approach to scaling remains focused on capabilities rather than headcount.
On a recent episode of the De CFO Podcast, Gubitz said the company aims to “scale capabilities, not scale the organization.” As Argenx moves into its next phase of growth, he said the company relies heavily on external partners to support key finance activities. “Let’s keep it outside the company, let’s keep it flexible and let’s work with our partners,” he said, noting the company’s three-person tax team supports operations in more than 20 countries through outside partnerships.
That model extends across finance operations. Gubitz said internal audit and statutory accounts are “100% outsourced,” tax work is largely outsourced and even forecasting and revenue modeling infrastructure is built and maintained externally. The goal, he said, is to “capitalize on the opportunities of digitization and now looking forward to trying to capitalize on AI and really try to keep the company as small as possible.”
Hiring decisions follow the same discipline. With roughly 1,800 employees supporting a company with a market capitalization of around $50 billion, Gubitz said that Argenx is taking a deliberate approach to expanding headcount. “We haven’t hired [that many] people yet,” he said, explaining that leadership is evaluating which roles are necessary as AI and digital tools reshape how work gets done.
Gubitz also described how profitability changes the company’s financial posture. “We don’t have to go back to the street like we used to every year to ask the street to raise funds,” he said, adding that revenue from commercialization now supports long-term investments and operational stability.
