Layoffs in January have been the very best to start out a yr since 2009, Challenger says – Worldwide Dispatch

Layoff plans hit their highest January complete because the international monetary disaster whereas hiring intentions reached their lowest because the identical interval, outplacement agency Challenger, Grey & Christmas reported Thursday.

U.S. employers introduced 108,435 layoffs for the month, up 118% from the identical interval a yr in the past and 205% from December 2025. The overall marked the very best for any January since 2009, whereas the financial system was within the closing months of its steepest downturn because the Nice Melancholy.

On the identical time, corporations introduced simply 5,306 new hires, additionally the bottom January since 2009, which is when Challenger started monitoring such knowledge. The disaster recession formally led to March 2009.

With the current narrative centering on a no-hire, no-fire labor market, the Challenger knowledge means that the layoff a part of the equation could possibly be stepping up.

“Usually, we see a excessive variety of job cuts within the first quarter, however it is a excessive complete for January,” mentioned Andy Challenger, office skilled and chief income officer for the agency. “It means most of those plans have been set on the finish of 2025, signaling employers are less-than-optimistic in regards to the outlook for 2026.”

To make certain, if employers are stepping up plans to furlough employees, it hasn’t been displaying up a lot in official authorities knowledge.

Nonetheless, preliminary jobless claims for the week ended Jan. 31 totaled a seasonally adjusted 231,000, the very best since early December although the spike doubtless had one thing to do with a brutal winter storm that hit massive components of the nation. The longer-term development nonetheless was at its lowest since October 2024.

Some high-profile layoff bulletins have boosted fears of wider harm within the labor market. Amazon, UPS and Dow Inc. lately have introduced sizeable job cuts. Certainly, transportation had the very best degree from a sector standpoint in January, due largely to plans from UPS to chop greater than 30,000 employees. Know-how was second on the again of Amazon’s announcement to shed 16,000 principally company degree jobs.

Deliberate hiring dropped 13% from January 2025 and was off 49% from December.

Challenger knowledge additionally will be risky and never correlated to official statistics. Nonetheless, filings with the Labor Division in January underneath Employee Adjustment and Retraining Notification laws point out greater than 100 corporations have given discover of serious layoffs.

In a separate report Thursday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that job openings fell sharply in December to six.54 million, a slide of 386,000. The lower in out there positions put the ratio of obtainable jobs to unemployed employees at 0.87 to 1, down from greater than 2 to 1 at its peak in mid-2022.

On Wednesday, ADP reported that non-public employers added simply 22,000 jobs in January.