$PG Announces a Pink Slip Program Above the Current 10% Reduction by 2016, Company May Also Increase Share Buyback Plan

“CINCINNATI (Reuters) – Procter & Gamble plans to trim more non-manufacturing jobs through 2016, on top of a 10 percent reduction target it should meet this year, as the largest household-products maker tries to reinvigorate what has become a sluggish organization.

P&G also said it may increase stock repurchases to $6 billion from $4 billion.

P&G remains on track to eliminate about 5,700 non-manufacturing jobs by the end of the current fiscal year that will end in June. It now plans to reduce another 2 percent to 4 percent of its non-manufacturing jobs each year during fiscal 2014, 2015 and 2016.

“These are all continued steps in the right direction, but we wish they had taken bolder ones like even more aggressive cost-cutting,” said Sanford Bernstein analyst Ali Dibadj, who was attending P&G’s bi-annual analyst meeting in Cincinnati on Thursday.

Shares of P&G, a component of the Dow Jones industrial average <.DJI>, were down about 44 cents at $66.08 in late morning trading on the New York Stock Exchange.”

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