To be completely fair, it is one of those situations where the damage is done and layoffs are probably one of the best options for the company from a completely

To be completely fair, it is one of those situations where the damage is done and layoffs are probably one of the best options for the company from a completely financial point of view. He messed up and as such, there are consequences. With that said, seems like admittance of this level of error at a leadership level should be grounds to lose your job and be replaced, so the CEO should also be replaced in this process. I realize there are stability issues where you need to bring someone else in and catch them up to speed before doing this since the role likely requires a lot of contextual awareness but none the less, that process should be (but almost certainly isn't) underway at most these organizations. If anyone not in the c-suite made these levels of errors and clearly admitted to them, they'd be gone yesterday.