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Stocks give up early gains — Here's why a busy week of earnings is good news for investors 2024-04-15 19:21:00+00:00 - Every weekday, the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer releases the Homestretch — an actionable afternoon update, just in time for the last hour of trading on Wall Street. (We're no longer recording the audio, so we can get this new written feature to members as quickly as possible.) Markets wobbly: After a weak attempt at an oversold bounce in the morning, pressure in the market picked up steam midday and stocks fell into the red as investors remained worried about what could come next following the events in the Middle East over the weekend. Ongoing concerns about sticky inflation and higher interest rates clouded the picture, too. There is nothing markets hate more than uncertainty, which is why stocks struggled to hold onto their early gains. Earnings in focus: The good news is we're about to head into earnings season, giving us the opportunity to hear directly from management teams and get their thoughts about how current events and the economic crosswinds impact their companies, if at all. Earnings season is when great companies with solid fundamentals and upbeat outlooks can separate from the pack, which is why doing the homework this time of year is so important. Including Monday, approximately 40 companies in the S & P 500 and six Dow Jones Industrial Average components are scheduled to report this week. Up next : Morgan Stanley reports before the opening bell Tuesday. Great quarters from Goldman Sachs and Charles Schwab bode well for Morgan Stanley, but the Club holding needs to ease concerns about the probe into its wealth management business and get this segment back on track after a couple of lackluster quarters in a row. Sector scorecard : Nearly all 11 sectors in the S & P 500 were solidly lower, as of roughly 2:15 p.m. ET. The lone exception is health care, which is hovering around the flatline. The sector has spent time both in the green and slightly in the red. The group is being supported mostly by beaten-down insurance stocks, though some of our companies in the sector such as drugmaker Eli Lilly were slightly positive. Abbott Laboratories is essentially flat on the session. It's not exactly a shock to see health care holding up better than other sectors, though, because it has some defensive growth characteristics. (See here for a full list of the stocks in Jim Cramer's Charitable Trust.) As a subscriber to the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer, you will receive a trade alert before Jim makes a trade. Jim waits 45 minutes after sending a trade alert before buying or selling a stock in his charitable trust's portfolio. If Jim has talked about a stock on CNBC TV, he waits 72 hours after issuing the trade alert before executing the trade. THE ABOVE INVESTING CLUB INFORMATION IS SUBJECT TO OUR TERMS AND CONDITIONS AND PRIVACY POLICY , TOGETHER WITH OUR DISCLAIMER . NO FIDUCIARY OBLIGATION OR DUTY EXISTS, OR IS CREATED, BY VIRTUE OF YOUR RECEIPT OF ANY INFORMATION PROVIDED IN CONNECTION WITH THE INVESTING CLUB. NO SPECIFIC OUTCOME OR PROFIT IS GUARANTEED. Every weekday, the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer releases the Homestretch — an actionable afternoon update, just in time for the last hour of trading on Wall Street. (We're no longer recording the audio, so we can get this new written feature to members as quickly as possible.)
Peloton quietly drops unlimited free app membership because it failed to bring in paid subscribers 2024-04-15 19:08:00+00:00 - A stationary bicycle inside of a Peloton store is pictured in the Manhattan borough of New York City, U.S., January 25, 2022. Peloton has quietly removed its unlimited free-membership tier on its fitness app less than a year after it debuted because the initiative was failing to convert users into paid subscribers, the company said. Peloton dropped the free option for new users, once a key part of the business's growth strategy, within the past few weeks. People who signed up for the company's unlimited free membership before it was removed will continue to have access to it, Peloton said. New users who are looking to work out with the company's app now only have access to two tiers that cost $12.99 a month or $24 a month, with the option of a seven-day free trial. Last May, Peloton debuted a splashy rebrand that billed the business as a fitness company for all, and put its digital app at the center of its marketing campaign. The rebrand brought a new, tiered app strategy that included the unlimited free-membership option and two other paid levels that all had varying levels of content. The rebrand came as CEO Barry McCarthy looked to transform Peloton from one focused on its hardware to a business that was equally as invested in its app. As sales steadily declined at the company, he was working to capture new customers who may have been intrigued by the brand but weren't willing to shell out thousands for its equipment. McCarthy, a former Netflix and Spotify executive, had long wanted a free tier on the company's app. He had bet that free users would fall in love with Peloton's content and then spring for a paid membership, which comes with a far wider variety of classes, after they tried the app and decided they wanted more. The bet appears to have been a bust. McCarthy told investors in November that the relaunch had been "less successful at engaging and retaining free users and converting them to paying memberships" than the company had expected. Soon after, the unlimited free tier was no longer available. During a Morgan Stanley conference in March, finance chief Liz Coddington said the company "quickly" learned that the free tier was "cannibalizing" efforts to convert free-trial members to paid subscribers, which led the company to shift to a free-trial model. "It's important to know that our app is still a work in progress. We still have a lot of opportunities to improve it," said Coddington. "What we found is that we need to figure out ways to better engage them during the trial period, that they convert to paid and then also keep them engaged over time, so that they will retain at a higher rate. … When we do that, we believe that our marketing efficiency will improve, both because we'll have better retention and better conversion rates." While app subscribers declined during Peloton's fiscal second quarter ended Dec. 31, Coddington said the company still "believe[s]" in its app strategy and it remains "an important part of the business." Shares of Peloton fell more than 6% Monday and were down more than 45% this year, as of Friday's close. The company's market cap has shrunk to about $1.2 billion, a fraction of the $47 billion it was worth at the height of Peloton's success during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Arizona abortion ban shows the dangers of reviving ‘zombie laws’ 2024-04-15 19:03:47+00:00 - Struggles over reproductive rights ratcheted up last week after the Arizona Supreme Court upheld a near-total ban first put in place in 1864. Vice President Kamala Harris wasted no time in visiting the state, a major battleground in 2024, to proclaim that former President Donald Trump wanted “to take America back to the 1800s.” But history suggests that when this ban goes into effect, the state’s residents will experience much more stringent restrictions than did Arizonans 160 years ago. As conservatives consider reviving other “zombie laws,” Arizona’s experience is a warning to the rest of the country. The 1864 ban was part of a wave of laws criminalizing abortion introduced at the behest of the American Medical Association. Led by Harvard Medical School professor Horatio Storer, the AMA argued that life began at conception — and that without stricter abortion laws, married women would have sex for reasons other than procreation and make marriage no different from prostitution. Arizona was one of many states and territories that introduced such laws in the late 19th century. The number of abortions performed across the country seems to have increased in the late 19th century after laws like Arizona’s passed. On paper, Arizona’s law is sweeping, allowing for an abortion only when a patient’s life is at risk. In practice, in the 1860s, physicians still had real discretion about when to intervene. Though precise figures are hard to come by, maternal mortality rates in the United States at the time appear to have been astronomical. Any physician who wanted to claim a patient’s life was at risk would have had little trouble convincing anyone. The historian Leslie Reagan has shown that one of the most common justifications for life-saving abortions in the era was excessive vomiting. That could be life-threatening, to be sure, but physicians were left with real discretion about when, in these circumstances, a patient was at risk. And patients who wanted abortions for other reasons might have been able to convince a sympathetic physician to help. Then there was the simple fact that identifying an early pregnancy was challenging. Before the late 19th century, physicians sometimes listened for fetal cardiac activity to identify a pregnancy — something that did not often yield a definitive result until the fourth month of pregnancy. By the end of the century, somewhat more reliable tests were available, but almost no doctors were willing to use them because they required examining a woman’s cervix, uterus or vagina, all of which were viewed as improper at the time. That meant that knowing early on when someone was pregnant was anything but easy. It was not any simpler to tell whether drugs marketed for “female troubles” acted to regulate menstrual periods, prevent conception, or terminate a pregnancy — or were simply snake oil remedies. Unsurprisingly, then, laws like Arizona’s were not always strictly enforced. The number of abortions performed across the country seems to have increased in the late 19th century after tough laws like Arizona’s passed. Physicians — who were the ones behind the movement for new criminal laws — retained or even expanded their discretion in interpreting the law. Prosecutions were rare unless a patient died during an abortion. Arizonans in 2024 live in a different world. By the 1930s, prosecutors opposed to abortion were no longer willing to buy that most abortions could be life-saving, arguing that cesarean sections and the availability of antibiotics had made pregnancy much safer. The modern anti-abortion movement has taken things a step further, arguing that there is no such thing as a life-saving abortion — and that when a patient’s life is at risk, that procedure is not an abortion but a maternal-fetal separation. Very few patients, if any, would qualify for a life-saving abortion in the eyes of a prosecutor who opposes abortion. It is dangerous in 2024 to assume that zombie laws will not come back to life. And today, physicians don’t have the kind of discretion their 19th-century counterparts did. Pregnancy tests are reliable within a short window of a missed period. And then there’s the stigma surrounding doctors who perform abortions. For decades, the anti-abortion movement has demonized what it calls “abortionists,” arguing that physicians are motivated by money and determined to exploit any exception, no matter how narrow, to perform abortions on demand. And since the Supreme Court reversed Roe in June 2022, physicians themselves have been cautious, refusing to invoke exceptions when guessing wrong could cost them their medical licenses and their freedom. In 1864, a life exception created a real opening for some patients. Today, such an exception will not likely make any difference. The enforcement of Arizona’s ban offers a powerful lesson about the revival of zombie laws. Other states have old abortion laws on the books. Still others have never repealed laws banning same-sex marriage or intimacy, or sex outside of marriage. Perhaps most powerfully, conservatives are looking to a federal law, the Comstock Act, which has been on the books since 1873, to create an abortion ban that voters would never choose to enact. The Comstock Act has been enforced in recent years in cases involving child pornography but has not applied in cases of abortion for decades. And the Comstock Act is an obscenity law, intended not to protect fetal life but to discourage illicit sex. That hasn’t stopped former Trump officials from reinventing the Comstock Act as a ban on receiving or mailing abortion-related items — and arguing that a Trump Department of Justice could start enforcing the law against abortion providers and drug companies, even in states that protect reproductive rights. Given Trump’s attempts to defuse abortion as a political issue, it may be hard to believe that he would really bring back a zombie law that voters would despise. But Trump himself has not been willing to answer direct questions about whether his Justice Department would enforce the Comstock Act, even as his allies promise that he will wield the law as an abortion ban. It is dangerous in 2024 to assume that zombie laws will not come back to life, as Arizona voters now know all too well. If some conservatives have their way, Arizona’s law will be just the beginning.
U.S. stamp prices are rising, but still a bargain compared with other countries 2024-04-15 18:05:00+00:00 - Americans who are frustrated with the ever rising cost of postage may be surprised to learn that mailing a first-class letter costs significantly less in the U.S. than in other parts of the world. The U.S. Postal Service — which has already raised the price of stamps twice this year, bringing the cost of sending first-class mail to 73 cents — tried to cushion word of the latest increase by noting that postage costs at home "remain among the most affordable in the world." It's a safe assumption that the Postal Regulatory Commission will approve the sixth price hike since January 2021, with the five-cent increase then schedule to take effect on July 14. Still, folks may not realize what a relative bargain postage in the U.S. is, at least when compared to mailing costs around the world. The U.S. ranks No. 5 in a listing of postage costs in a list of 30 countries, according to the USPS' Office of Inspector General. The agency found that the cost of a stamp in the U.S. had risen a total of 26% — from 36 cents to 50 cents — over a five-year period from June 2018 to June 2023 — far less, on average, than in the other countries it looked at. U.S. stamps also cost the least of the 31 postal services when the numbers were adjusted for purchasing power parity, a metric incorporating a country's productivity, economic growth and cost of living. That adjusted-cost analysis had Italians paying $4.48 for a single first-class stamp as of June 2023, making 63 cents for a First Class Forever stamp appear quite the bargain indeed. The nominal price of an Italian stamp came to $2.96 — the priciest of the 31 nations listed. The USPS' latest postage hike comes as the agency, which in November reported a $6.5 billion loss for fiscal 2023, tries to streamline. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy is scheduled to appear before a Senate hearing on Tuesday to talk about the agency's operations.
Britishvolt ‘gigafactory’ site to be sold for £110m to US private equity firm 2024-04-15 17:55:00+00:00 - The site in north-east England previously owned by the failed battery startup Britishvolt is to be bought for £110m by a US private equity firm, which plans to build one of Europe’s largest data centres. Blackstone Group is to buy the 95-hectare (235-acre) site near Cambois in Northumberland to take advantage of its links to renewable energy, according to the receivers for one of the Britishvolt companies. The receivers did not disclose the amount paid for the site, but Northumberland county council documents show the local authority will create a £110m “growth and investment endowment fund” as a result of the deal. Britishvolt burst on to the scene in 2019, promising to build batteries to power Britain’s electric cars. The company garnered the support of the then prime minister, Boris Johnson, and a promise of £100m in government subsidy, before collapsing in early 2023. The site formerly housed Blyth power station, a pair of coal-fired units. The receiversBob Maxwell and Julian Pitts of Begbies Traynor Group said Blackstone planned to turn the site into “one of the largest data centre facilities in western Europe”. Analysts expect demand for data centres to continue to grow rapidly as households and businesses stream and send ever more digital content and information, and demand for cloud internet services and artificial intelligence also increase. The deal will secure the future of a large brownfield site in a relatively deprived part of the UK. It will also be able to make use of local green-power generation including from offshore wind. However, it is also likely to end the dream of securing thousands of jobs at the site, which had been the hope of the council. It had retained an option to buy back the site for £4m, the price Britishvolt paid, if the owners failed to build a gigafactory. The startup had promised to bring as many as 3,000 jobs to the region with an ambitious plan to build a second car battery “gigafactory” in the north-east of England that rivalled the Chinese-owned AESC plant in Sunderland. Britishvolt managed to win tens of millions of pounds of investment from the FTSE 100 companies Ashtead and Glencore, as well as Tritax, a property investment arm of the asset manager abrdn. However, the project floundered as Britishvolt spent heavily on developing its own battery technology, and failed to secure the orders it needed to unlock further funding. Construction at the site started, but the Guardian revealed that it was put on “life support” in the summer of 2022. skip past newsletter promotion Sign up to Business Today Free daily newsletter Get set for the working day – we'll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morning Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy . We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. after newsletter promotion Maxwell of Begbies Traynor said of the Blackstone deal: “From a difficult situation, the future sale will ensure a very bright future for the site. This transaction ensures that a well-funded and respected new owner can bring the enterprise and employment to the site that it deserves, and will be a huge boost for the whole region. “Its scale and location make it perfect as the location for a European data hub, and the plans put forward will hopefully kickstart an entire tech industry cluster in the north-east from the site.”
'This is make or break' — students are still waiting on financial aid days ahead of National College Decision Day 2024-04-15 17:54:00+00:00 - Few college admission cycles have been as hard on students as this one. National College Decision Day — the deadline most schools set to decide on a college — is just two weeks away. But many college hopefuls are still unsure of where they stand financially, as problems persist with the new Free Application for Federal Student Aid. "This is make or break for students," said Ellie Bruecker, interim director of research at the Institute for College Access and Success. "We are really concerned about high school seniors having to make decisions about where to go to college — or whether to go to college — with such limited information." More from Personal Finance: FAFSA 'fiasco' could cause decline in college enrollment Harvard is back on top as the ultimate 'dream' school More of the nation's top colleges roll out no-loan policies In ordinary years, financial aid award letters are sent around the same time as offers of admission in early spring, giving students a month or more to make informed enrollment decisions ahead of National College Decision Day on May 1. For most students and their families, the college they choose hinges on the amount of financial aid offered and the breakdown between grants, scholarships, work-study opportunities and student loans. However, this year, those award letters have been significantly delayed, as the Department of Education works to resolve ongoing issues with the new form. Even some applications submitted early now have to be reprocessed due to problems with applicants' tax data.
New rules for Pregnant Workers Fairness Act include divisive accommodations for abortion 2024-04-15 17:49:47+00:00 - NEW YORK (AP) — Workers are entitled to time off and other job accommodations for abortions — along with pregnancy-related medical conditions like miscarriage, stillbirth and lactation — under the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, according to finalized federal regulations published Monday. The regulations provide guidance for employers and workers on how to implement the law, which passed with robust bipartisan Congressional support in December 2022 but sparked controversy last year when the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission included abortions in its draft rules. The language means that workers can ask for time off to obtain an abortion and recover from the procedure. The EEOC says its decision to keep the abortion provisions in its final rules despite criticism from some conservatives is consistent with its own longstanding interpretation of Title VII, as well as court rulings. The federal agency added that the new law does not obligate employers or employer-sponsored health plans to cover abortion-related costs, and that the type of accommodation that most likely will be sought under the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act regarding an abortion is time off to attend a medical appointment or for recovery, which does not have to be paid. The act requires most employers with 15 or more employees to provide “reasonable accommodations” for a worker’s known limitations related to pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions — including fertility and infertility treatments in some cases — unless the accommodation will cause the employer an undue hardship. The EEOC’s regulations, which will be used as a framework to enforce the law, will go into effect on June 18. Labor advocates hailed the new law as especially important for women of color who are most likely to work in low-wage, physically demanding jobs but are often denied accommodations for everything from time off for medical appointments to the ability to sit or stand on the job. Major business groups also supported the law, citing the need for clarity about the accommodations that employers are required to give pregnant workers. “No one should have to risk their job for their health just because they are pregnant, recovering from childbirth, or dealing with a related medical condition,” said EEOC Chair Charlotte A. Burrows on Monday. But Republican lawmakers and anti-abortion activists denounced the EEOC’s inclusion of abortion after the agency first released its proposed rule in August for a monthslong public commentary period. Abortion rights proponents, meanwhile, applauded the provision as critical at time when abortion rights have been curtailed in many states following the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. The EEOC is composed of three Democratic commissioners and two Republican commissioners. Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, the lead Republican sponsor of the Pregnant Workers Fairness Law, accused the Biden administration on Monday of “shocking and illegal” disregard of the legislative process to promote a political agenda. The Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative Christian legal organization, said the Biden administration was trying to “smuggle an abortion mandate” into the law. But in comments submitted to the EEOC, the American Civil Liberties Union applauded the agency for “recognizing that abortion has for decades been approved under the law as a ‘related medical condition’ to pregnancy that entitles workers to reasonable accommodations, including time off to obtain abortion care.” The EEOC said it had received 54,000 comments urging the commission to exclude abortion from its definition of medical condition related to pregnancy, but it also received 40,000 comments supporting its inclusion. While the commission said it understood that both sides were expressing “sincere, deeply held convictions,” it cited numerous federal cases that it said supported its interpretation that abortion is a pregnancy-related condition deserving of protection. The new rules include extensive details on the types of accommodations that pregnant workers can request, from temporary exemption from jobs duties like heavy lifting to considerations for morning sickness. Women’s right advocates had campaigned for years for the law, arguing that the 1978 Pregnancy Discrimination Act offered inadequate protection for pregnant workers. The 1978 law, which amended Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, prohibited discrimination on the basis of pregnancy and marked a major shift for gender equality at time when pregnant women were routinely denied or pushed out of jobs. But in order to receive workplace accommodations, pregnant women had to demonstrate that co-workers had received similar benefits for comparable needs, since the act stated only that pregnant workers must be treated similarly to other employees, not that they deserved special consideration. That put a burden of proof that many women found impossible to meet, forcing them to work in unsafe conditions or quit their jobs, according to A Better Balance, one of the most vocal advocates for the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act. The new law makes clear that that pregnant workers are entitled to accommodations to keep doing their jobs, mirroring the process for workers with disabilities. It places the burden on employers to prove “undue hardship” if they deny requests for modifications. The EEOC typically handles between 2,000 and 4,000 pregnancy discrimination charges a year, many involving denial of workplace accommodations. A study conducted by A Better Balance found that in two-thirds of pregnancy discrimination cases that followed the 2015 Supreme Court ruling, courts determined the employers were allowed to deny accommodations under the Pregnancy Discrimination Act. In a prepared statement, A Better Balance Co-President Dina Bakst applauded the EEOC “for issuing robust final regulations that appropriately recognize the broad scope of the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act.” ____ The Associated Press’ women in the workforce and state government coverage receives financial support from Pivotal Ventures. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.
Union settles extended strike with Pittsburgh newspaper, while journalists, other unions remain out 2024-04-15 17:36:12+00:00 - PITTSBURGH (AP) — The union that represents a Pittsburgh newspaper’s truck drivers, one of five unions that have been on strike for 18 months, has approved a new contract with the paper’s owners. Four other unions, including one representing the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s journalists and other newsroom employees, have not settled. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette said the remaining members of Teamsters Local 211/205 voted unanimously to accept a labor dispute settlement agreement and dissolve their union at the newspaper. Details of the agreement were not disclosed, but the newspaper reported that it substantially resolves all strike-related issues and health care, including any outstanding National Labor Relations Board actions. The newspaper declined further comment on the matter. Four other unions at the Post-Gazette — including the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh, which represents reporters, photographers and other newsroom employees — are not part of the settlement and remain on strike. The Communications Workers of America represents the other Post-Gazette workers still on strike, including the mailers, advertising staff, and the journalists at the Pittsburgh Newspaper Guild. CWA officials said they were disheartened by the Teamsters’ settlement. “It’s beyond disappointing that the Teamsters would abandon their fellow strikers at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette,” said NewsGuild-CWA President Jon Schleuss said in a statement posted on the union’s website. “We stood with the Teamsters: in the cold, in the rain, in the snow, and in the face of violent scab truck drivers and aggressive police. We will continue to strike and hold the employer to account.” CWA District 2-13 Vice President Mike Davis added, “Their decision to prioritize greed over solidarity with their fellow union members is not only disappointing but also a betrayal of the values that we hold dear in the labor movement.” The Teamster local and the three other non-newsroom unions went on strike in October 2022, and they were joined by the Newspaper Guild members two weeks later. The Post-Gazette hired replacement employees, while the striking newspaper guild members have been producing their own newspaper, the Pittsburgh Union Progress, during the strike. Joe Barbano, a trustee and business agent for the Teamsters local, told WESA that the union was backed into a corner, noting its membership had fallen from around 150 to just 30 when the strike began. “A majority of (the remaining members) said we would take some type of a settlement, we’ll move on with our lives,” Barbano said. “And that’s what we did.” Barbano said his local had presented the idea for this settlement about six months ago to the other unions but they other didn’t move on it, so the Teamsters decided to move forward on their own. He acknowledged the Teamsters negotiated in secret from the other unions on strike, saying it was because the Post-Gazette made that a requirement.
IRS expects ‘a million returns' every hour on Tax Day, commissioner says. What last-minute filers need to know 2024-04-15 17:36:00+00:00 - watch now File by the deadline to avoid penalties, interest While April 15 is the federal deadline for most taxpayers, filers in Maine and Massachusetts have until April 17. There are also automatic extensions for some taxpayers impacted by natural disasters. But if you skip the tax filing deadline and owe a balance, you can expect IRS penalties and interest. For failure to file, the IRS charges 5% of your unpaid taxes per month or partial month, capped at 25% of your balance due. The late-payment penalty is 0.5% per month or partial month, with a maximum fee of 25% of unpaid taxes. Interest is based on the current rates. If you're missing tax forms, the tax deadline is your last chance to file an extension, which pushes the filing deadline to Oct. 15. But the "extension to file is not an extension to pay," warned certified financial planner Sean Lovison, founder of Philadelphia-area Purpose Built Financial Services. Extension to file is not an extension to pay. Sean Lovison Founder of Purpose Built Financial Services According to the IRS, those who can't pay taxes by the deadline have options. They can apply for a payment plan, or "installment agreement," to pay their balance over time. Two-thirds of taxpayers can expect a refund If you don't file, you could be giving up a refund, Werfel said on "Squawk Box." "Two out of every 3 taxpayers that are going to file by tonight's deadline are actually owed a refund," he said. "So it's in your interest to get your taxes done." As of April 5, the IRS processed nearly 67 million refunds, with an average payment of $3,011, a 4.6% increase from last April's refund, the agency reported Friday. "Don't walk down to the post office," Werfel said. "File electronically, select direct deposit and we will get you your refund in under 21 days." How to file your taxes for free This season, taxpayers have several ways to file federal taxes for free and there's still time to use a couple of digital options. Most Americans qualify for IRS Free File, which offers free guided tax prep software from several partners. The adjusted gross income limit is $79,000, but each partner has different eligibility requirements. "It's a product that we're very proud of," Tim Hugo, executive director of the Free File Alliance previously told CNBC. "We just wish more people knew about it." This season, millions of taxpayers also qualify for IRS Direct File, a free tax filing pilot program from the agency. Currently, Direct File is open to certain filers in Arizona, California, Florida, Massachusetts, Nevada, New Hampshire, New York, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Washington and Wyoming. Some 100,000 taxpayers successfully filed returns with Direct File, as of April 15, according to a Treasury official. Werfel said an announcement about the program's future is coming "later this spring" but the "results so far have been encouraging."
Trump Media shares tank after company reveals plan to sell more stock 2024-04-15 17:33:00+00:00 - Shares of the former president Donald Trump’s social media company slumped 12% on Monday, extending their string of losses, after the company said in a regulatory filing that it could sell millions of additional shares in coming months. The filing showed a potential sale of 146.1m shares in Trump Media & Technology Group, including 114.8m shares owned by Trump himself. Documents also listed an additional 21.5m shares that could be sold upon the exercise of certain warrants issued when the company went public through a blank-check merger with Digital World Acquisition Corp. Shares of the Truth Social parent company have retreated sharply since their market debut on 26 March, falling 60% from the opening price of $70.90. Trump is subject to a lockup agreement that prevents him from personally selling his shares until September, further tying his wealth to the company’s market value. If the price holds, he could reap billions of dollars from his shares. Trump, the presumed Republican 2024 nominee, started his criminal trial on Monday in a Manhattan court as the stock dipped. He is facing 34 felony counts of falsifying business records related to hush-money payments to the adult film star Stormy Daniels. It is the first criminal trial of an American president, and the proceedings are expected to last about six weeks. Trump is under significant financial pressure after a series of legal woes in the past year. He owes about $500m as a result of being found liable in civil fraud, defamation and sexual abuse cases. Trump Media, which was backed by some of the former president’s biggest political donors, has offered him a future lifeline and source of income to pay off those debts. skip past newsletter promotion Sign up to Trump on Trial Free newsletter Stay up to date on all of Donald Trump’s trials. Guardian staff will send weekly updates each Wednesday – as well as bonus editions on major trial days. Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy . We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. after newsletter promotion Earlier this month, several Democratic-aligned groups called on Congress to investigate Trump Media amid a flurry of news about the firm’s dubious hangers-on. Two Florida brothers pleaded guilty at the beginning of April to insider trading-related to the ex-president’s social media company. Meanwhile, the Guardian reported that the company was kept afloat by loans from a Russian-American businessman who is under federal investigation for money laundering and insider trading.
Tax Day is here, but the expanded Child Tax Credit never materialized 2024-04-15 17:32:00+00:00 - What to know about requesting a tax filing extension Earlier this year, the federal Child Tax Credit appeared headed for an expansion that would have helped lift hundreds of thousands of children out of poverty. But the expanded CTC failed to materialize ahead of the April 15 tax deadline, and its future appears uncertain. The bill, called the Tax Relief for American Families and Workers Act of 2024, easily passed the House in February with bipartisan support. But it currently remains mired in the Senate, with Senator Josh Hawley, a Republican from Missouri, telling NBC News earlier this month that the bill is "on life support." Some parents were watching the bill's progress because it had a provision that could have boosted their refund for their 2023 taxes, which are due on April 15 (unless a taxpayer requests an extension.) The expanded CTC would have bumped up the credit's maximum per-child refund amount to $1,800, up from $1,600 in its current form. Tax experts caution it's not a good idea to delay filing your taxes with the hope that tax legislation could pass, given the unpredictability of the political process. While April 15 is the regular tax-filing deadline, taxpayers can request an extension that gives them until October 15 to send their returns to the IRS. "Don't wait to file," said Mark Jaeger, vice president of tax operations at TaxAct, told CBS MoneyWatch. "I'm not saying it's impossible — there are people on both sides of the aisle that would like it to happen — but I wouldn't hold my breath." Child Tax Credit: Could it start in 2024? The Tax Relief for American Families and Workers Act still hasn't been scheduled for a vote in the Senate, with the New York Times reporting that Republicans have pushed back against some provisions. One of those issues is a so-called "look back" provision that would allow parents to use income from a prior year if it would help boost the amount they could claim through the CTC. Some Republican lawmakers claim it could weaken parents' incentive to work, Politico reported. Even so, advocates are still holding out hope that the tax bill could pass. The National Parents Union, an advocacy group for parents, urged lawmakers at an April 10 rally to move the legislation forward. "Both Republicans and Democrats, doesn't matter what area of the country we're talking about — there is unanimity," said National Parents Union co-founder Keri Rodrigues in a statement. "American families are in support of this Child Tax Credit." What happens if expanded CTC goes into effect after you file? If Congress passes the legislation, the IRS says it will automatically make adjustments for parents who already filed and claimed the CTC. The IRS is urging taxpayers not to wait to file their 2023 tax returns in anticipation that Congress could pass the expanded Child Tax Credit. What can parents claim for the 2023 Child Tax Credit? Without the bill's passage, the Child Tax Credit is $2,000 for each eligible child for the 2023 tax year. There is an income limit for claiming the $2,000 credit, which is $200,000 in adjusted gross income for single filers and $400,000 for joint filers. A portion of that $2,000 credit is considered fully refundable, which means that you can receive it as a tax refund even if you don't owe any federal taxes. That's noteworthy because some tax credits will at most reduce your tax liability to $0, and any amount of the credit beyond that has no impact on your refund. But in the case of the CTC, the tax credit is refundable up to $1,600 per child, potentially boosting their tax refund by that amount.
Seven-mile stretch of M25 in Surrey to be closed between 10 and 13 May 2024-04-15 17:29:00+00:00 - The second weekend closure of the M25 will take place between 10 and 13 May, National Highways has confirmed, with a seven-mile stretch of the road between junctions 9 and 10 in Surrey due to be shut. In March a five-mile stretch of the motorway between junctions 10 and 11 was closed for a three-day period, the longest planned closure on the road since it was opened in 1986. On Monday, National Highways released details of the latest closure, which will begin at 9pm on 10 May, with the road set to reopen at 6am on 13 May. The body has told drivers to expect delays, saying that the diversion routes for getting around the closures would be longer than they were in March. It will be the second of five weekend closures planned for the M25 as part of the £317m upgrade of the motorway that encircles Greater London. The remaining three closures are due to take place throughout the rest of 2024 but National Highways has yet to give dates as to when. The work will involve the installation of concrete beams for a new bridge, as well as new gantries. Jonathan Wade, the senior project manager at National Highways, said the next shutdown would be “far from a repeat of the previous closure” as the diversion routes were “longer and will be different for over-height vehicles and all other traffic”. He said: “Drivers listened to our advice last time, which reduced motorway traffic levels by over two-thirds and meant delays were limited. Our advice again is please only travel if absolutely necessary and make sure you give yourself extra time if you do choose to use the M25.” The body has called on drivers to avoid the affected section of the motorway, pointing out that there will a 19-mile diversion route in place during the closure. There will be four diversionary routes in total, including clockwise and anticlockwise to and from Gatwick towards Heathrow for most traffic and over-height vehicles. skip past newsletter promotion Sign up to Business Today Free daily newsletter Get set for the working day – we'll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morning Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy . We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. after newsletter promotion The March works, which were completed ahead of schedule, resulted in two-mile tailbacks on some stretches of road leading up to the junctions. Between 4,000 and 6,000 vehicles normally use the M25 between junctions 9 and 11 per hour in each direction between 10am and 9pm on a weekend.
Salesforce drops after reports it's in talks to acquire Informatica 2024-04-15 17:25:00+00:00 - People pass by the Salesforce Tower and Salesforce.com offices in New York City on March 7, 2019. Salesforce shares closed down 7% on Monday after reports over the weekend that the cloud software company is in advanced talks to buy data-management firm Informatica. Shares of Informatica , which has a market cap of around $10 billion, closed down 6% following the reports. The price being weighed is below Informatica's closing stock price on Friday of $38.48, according to The Wall Street Journal, which first reported the talks on Friday. A Reuters article said the deal could be announced soon. Neither publication provided specifics on the size of a potential transaction. Regardless, it would be Salesforce's largest deal since purchasing Slack for nearly $28 billion in 2021, the company's largest acquisition to date. Prior to Slack, Salesforce bought data visualization company Tableau for $15.3 billion in 2019, and MuleSoft for $6.5 billion in 2018. Salesforce declined to comment on the reports. Informatica didn't respond to CNBC's request for comment.
Particle Health says data dispute with Epic Systems not affecting most customers 2024-04-15 17:23:00+00:00 - Particle Health said on Monday that the "vast majority" of its customers are still receiving records from medical software giant Epic Systems despite an ongoing dispute between the two companies over data-sharing practices. Epic's software supports more than 300 million patient records, and Particle acts like a middleman that helps health-care organizations access the data they need. Both companies belong to an interoperability network called Carequality, which facilitates the exchange of patient information on a large scale. On March 21, Epic filed a formal dispute with Carequality citing concerns that Particle and its participant organizations "might be inaccurately representing the purpose associated with their record retrievals." To join the Carequality network, organizations must be approved and abide by "Permitted Purposes," generally having to do with treatment, for the exchange of patient records. Patient data is protected by a federal law called the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, or HIPAA, which requires a patient's consent or knowledge for third-party access. Particle said in a release Monday that while Epic "indiscriminately stopped responding" to data requests from some of its customers because of the dispute, most clients were not affected. The company said it's been pressing Epic to restore connection to impacted customers, and many are already back to normal. "While there is an ongoing dispute between Epic and Particle Health, related to three specific customers, the significant majority of Particle Health customers impacted by Epic's actions were not in any way related to this dispute," the company said in the release. In a statement to CNBC on Monday, Epic said it discovered that some Particle customers were accessing patient medical records by "falsely claiming to be treating them as patients." Epic said that after a review, its customers asked the company to prevent "a small number" of groups from using Particle's Carequality connection to access their data. "This violates the guidelines and spirit of Carequality, which was established to advance interoperability to improve treatment for patients," Epic said in the statement. Epic said its customers have asked Particle to provide more information about how these organizations are using medical records before it restores access. Particle CEO Jason Prestinario said in his company's release that the startup will address the dispute with Epic through official procedural channels. WATCH: Insurer stocks fall on Medicare rates
Trump Media Stock Plunges 18%, Extending Recent Losses 2024-04-15 17:12:51+00:00 - Shares of former President Donald J. Trump’s social media company plunged on Monday after the company filed to register the potential sale of tens of millions of additional shares. Trump Media & Technology’s stock fell 18.3 percent, erasing hundreds of millions of dollars from the company’s market value — and putting a dent in Mr. Trump’s majority stake. Since a surge in its first days of trading as Trump Media, which lifted the value of the company to about $8 billion at one point last month, the company’s shares have dropped by around 60 percent. Trump Media was expected to register the potential sale of new shares after the completion of its merger last month with Digital World Acquisition Corp., a cash-rich shell company known as a SPAC. Companies that merge with SPACs, or special purpose acquisition companies, typically file a registration statement a few weeks after the deal is completed for the sale of additional securities held by early investors. In the filing, Trump Media — the parent company of Truth Social — registered more than 146 million shares of stock that could be sold, along with 21 million shares that were converted after the exercise of warrants, which enable an investor to buy shares at a preset price. When a SPAC goes public, it issues warrants to investors that can later be converted into shares.
Trump Media stock slides again to bring it more than 66% below its peak as euphoria fades 2024-04-15 17:04:20+00:00 - NEW YORK (AP) — The stock price for Donald Trump’s social media company slid again Monday, pushing it more than 66% below its peak set late last month. Trump Media & Technology Group closed down 18.4% at $26.61 as more of the euphoria that surrounded the stock fades. It’s a sharp comedown since nearing $80 after the owner of Truth Socialmerged with a shell company to get its stock trading on the Nasdaq under the symbol “DJT,” for Trump’s initials. Part of the decline may be due to criticism that the stock price had zoomed way past what skeptics said the money-losing company is worth, particularly one with tough odds for success. But another part is also likely because of action Trump Media took Monday. The company filed documents with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that open the door for the future potential sale of millions of shares. The document, called an S-1, relates to warrants held by investors that can be transformed into shares of stock, as well as shares held by company insiders. The filing also includes all the shares held by the former president. Trump, though, remains under a “lock-up” deal that largely restricts him from selling his shares for another roughly five months. His son, Donald Trump Jr., who is a director on the board, and CEO Devin Nunes, are also bound by the lock-up. Typically, all shares of stock held by insiders subject to lock-up deals are included in such filings, according to Jay Ritter, an expert on initial public offerings of stock at the University of Florida’s Warrington College of Business. The filing does not necessarily mean any investors are planning to sell their shares, Sarasota, Florida-based Trump Media & Technology Group said in a statement. Trump Media got its place on the Nasdaq after merging with a company called Digital World Acquisition Corp., which was essentially a pile of cash looking for a target to merge with. It’s an example of what’s called a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, which can give young companies quicker and easier routes to getting their shares trading publicly. S-1 filings are typically filed quickly after a SPAC deal closes, usually within 15 or 30 days, said Kristi Marvin, founder of SPACInsider.com, which specializes in SPAC deals. The exercise of warrants referenced in Trump Media’s S-1 filing would increase the number of shares outstanding for the company. That in turn could put downward pressure on the stock price. When something becomes more available, it tends to fall in price unless demand for it picks up accordingly. The drop in Trump Media’s stock price over the last few weeks hurts its shareholders, who experts say are mostly smaller-pocketed investors rather than big institutions. Several users of Truth Social have said they bought shares to show their support of the former president. The drop also puts a huge hit on Trump’s finances directly. He could personally own nearly 114.8 million shares, depending on the company’s performance. That would be worth $3.15 billion at its current price. On March 27, that was worth nearly $7.6 billion. On Monday, Trump arrived at a New York court for the start of jury selection in his hush-money trial. It’s the first trial of any former U.S. commander in chief.
Battle lines drawn as US states take on big tech with online child safety bills 2024-04-15 17:01:00+00:00 - On 6 April, Maryland became the first state in the US to pass a “Kids Code” bill, which aims to prevent tech companies from collecting predatory data from children and using design features that could cause them harm. Vermont’s legislature held its final hearing before a full vote on its Kids Code bill on 11 April. The measures are the latest in a salvo of proposed policies that, in the absence of federal rules, have made state capitols a major battlefield in the war between parents and child advocates, who lament that there are too few protections for minors online, and Silicon Valley tech companies, who protest that the recommended restrictions would hobble both business and free speech. Known as Age-Appropriate Design Code or Kids Code bills, these measures call for special data safeguards for underage users online as well as blanket prohibitions on children under certain ages using social media. Maryland’s measure passed with unanimous votes in its house and senate. In all, nine states across the country – Maryland, Vermont, Minnesota, Hawaii, Illinois, New Mexico, South Carolina, New Mexico and Nevada – have introduced and are now hashing out bills aimed at improving online child safety. Minnesota’s bill passed the house committee in February. Lawmakers in multiple states have accused lobbyists for tech firms of deception during public hearings. Tech companies have also spent a quarter of a million dollars lobbying against the Maryland bill to no avail. Still can't believe that Carl Szabo testified as a concerned parent before the Maryland State Senate without mentioning how he represents the Big Tech lobby group NetChoice. https://t.co/HugLVW9i5u pic.twitter.com/j2J3mwTMiP — Accountable Tech (@accountabletech) May 3, 2023 Carl Szabo, vice-president and general counsel of the tech trade association NetChoice, spoke against the Maryland bill at a state senate finance committee meeting in mid-2023 as a “lifelong Maryland resident, parent, [spouse] of a child therapist”. Later in the hearing, a Maryland state senator asked: “Who are you, sir? … I don’t believe it was revealed at the introduction of your commentary that you work for NetChoice. All I heard was that you were here testifying as a dad. I didn’t hear you had a direct tie as an employee and representative of big tech.” For the past two years, technology giants have been directly lobbying in some states looking to pass online safety bills. In Maryland alone, tech giants racked up more than $243,000 in lobbying fees in 2023, the year the bill was introduced. Google spent $93,076, Amazon $88,886, and Apple $133,449 last year, according to state disclosure forms. Amazon, Apple, Google and Meta hired in-state lobbyists in Minnesota and sent employees to lobby directly in 2023. In 2022, the four companies also spent a combined $384,000 on lobbying in Minnesota, the highest total up to that point, according to the Minnesota campaign finance and public disclosure board. The bills require tech companies to undergo a series of steps aimed at safeguarding children’s experiences on their websites and assessing their “data protection impact”. Companies must configure all default privacy settings provided to children by online products to offer a high level of privacy, “unless the covered entity can demonstrate a compelling reason that a different setting is in the best interests of children”. Another requirement is to provide privacy information and terms of service in clear, understandable language for children and provide responsive tools to help children or their parents or guardians exercise their privacy rights and report concerns. The legislation leaves it to tech companies to determine whether users are underage but does not require verification by documents such as a driver’s license. Determining age could come from data profiles companies have on a user, or self-declaration, where users must enter their birth date, known as “age-gating”. Critics argue the process of tech companies guessing a child’s age may lead to privacy invasions. “Generally, this is how it will work: to determine whether a user in a state is under a specific age and whether the adult verifying a minor over that designated age is truly that child’s parent or guardian, online services will need to conduct identity verification,” said a spokesperson for NetChoice. The bills’ supporters argue that users of social media should not be required to upload identity documents since the companies already know their age. “They’ve collected so many data points on users that they are advertising to kids because they know the user is a kid,” said a spokesperson for the advocacy group the Tech Oversight Project. “Social media companies’ business models are based on knowing who their users are.” NetChoice – and by extension, the tech industry – has several alternative proposals for improving child safety online. They include digital literacy and safety education in the classroom for children to form “an understanding of healthy online practices in a classroom environment to better prepare them for modern challenges”. At a meeting in February to debate a proposed bill aimed at online child safety, NetChoice’s director, Amy Bos, argued that parental safety controls introduced by social media companies and parental interventions such as parents taking away children’s phones when they have racked up too much screen time were better courses of action than regulation. Asking parents to opt into protecting their children often fails to achieve wide adoption, though. Snapchat and Discord told the US Senate in February that fewer than 1% of under-18 users on either social network had parents who monitor their online behavior using parental controls. Bos also ardently argued that the proposed bill breached first amendment rights. Her testimony prompted a Vermont state senator to ask: “You said, ‘We represent eBay and Etsy.’ Why would you mention those before TikTok and X in relation to a bill about social media platforms and teenagers?” NetChoice is also promoting the bipartisan Invest in Child Safety Act, which is aimed at giving “cops the needed resources to put predators behind bars”, it says, highlighting that less than 1% of reported child sexual abuse material (CSAM) violations are investigated by law enforcement due to a lack of resources and capacity. However, critics of NetChoice’s stance argue that more needs to be done proactively to prevent children from harm in the first place and that tech companies should take responsibility for ensuring safety rather than placing it on the shoulders of parents and children. “Big Tech and NetChoice are mistaken if they think they’re still fooling anybody with this ‘look there not here’ act,” said Sacha Haworth, executive director of the Tech Oversight Project. “The latest list of alleged ‘solutions’ they propose is just another feint to avoid any responsibility and kick the can down the road while continuing to profit off our kids.” All the state bills have faced opposition by tech companies in the form of strenuous statements or in-person lobbying by representatives of these firms. Other tech lobbyists needed similar prompting to Bos and Szabo to disclose their relevant tech patrons during their testimonies at hearings on child safety bills, if they notified legislators at all. A registered Amazon lobbyist who has spoken at two hearings on New Mexico’s version of the Kids Code bill said he represented the Albuquerque Hispano Chamber of Commerce and the New Mexico Hospitality Association. He never mentioned the e-commerce giant. A representative of another tech trade group did not disclose his organization’s backing from Meta at the same Vermont hearing that saw Bos’s motives and affiliations questioned – arguably the company that would be most affected by the bill’s stipulations. The bills’ supporters say these speakers are deliberately concealing who they work for to better convince lawmakers of their messaging. “We see a clear and accelerating pattern of deception in anti-Kids Code lobbying,” said Haworth of the Tech Oversight Project, which supports the bills. “Big tech companies that profit billions a year off kids refuse to face outraged citizens and bereaved parents themselves in all these states, instead sending front-group lobbyists in their place to oppose this legislation.” NetChoice denied the accusations. In a statement, a spokesperson for the group said: “We are a technology trade association. The claim that we are trying to conceal our affiliation with the tech industry is ludicrous.” These state-level bills follow attempts in California to introduce regulations aimed at protecting children’s privacy online. The California Age-Appropriate Design Code Act is based on similar legislation from the UK that became law in October. The California bill, however, was blocked from being passed into law in late 2023 by a federal judge, who granted NetChoice a preliminary injunction, citing potential threats to the first amendment. Rights groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union also opposed the bill. Supporters in other states say they have learned from the fight in California. They point out that language in the eight other states’ bills has been updated to address concerns raised in the Golden state. The online safety bills come amid increasing scrutiny of Meta’s products for their alleged roles in facilitating harm against children. Mark Zuckerberg, its CEO, was told he had “blood on his hands” at a January US Senate judiciary committee hearing on digital sexual exploitation. Zuckerberg turned and apologized to a group of assembled parents. In December, the New Mexico attorney general’s office filed a lawsuit against Meta for allegedly allowing its platforms to become a marketplace for child predators. The suit follows a 2023 Guardian investigation that revealed how child traffickers were using Meta platforms, including Instagram, to buy and sell children into sexual exploitation. “In time, as Meta’s scandals have piled up, their brand has become toxic to public policy debates,” said Jason Kint, CEO of Digital Content Next, a trade association focused on the digital content industry. “NetChoice leading with Apple, but then burying that Meta and TikTok are members in a hearing focused on social media harms sort of says it all.” A Meta spokesperson said the company wanted teens to have age-appropriate experiences online and that the company has developed more than 30 child safety tools. “We support clear, consistent legislation that makes it simple for parents to manage their teens’ online experiences,” said the spokesperson. “While some laws align with solutions we support, we have been open about our concerns over state legislation that holds apps to different standards in different states. Instead, parents should approve their teen’s app downloads, and we support legislation that requires app stores to get parents’ approval whenever their teens under 16 download apps.”
Tesla to cut 14,000 jobs as Elon Musk aims to make carmaker ‘lean and hungry’ 2024-04-15 16:13:00+00:00 - Tesla is laying off more than 10% of its global workforce, equivalent to at least 14,000 roles, as the electric carmaker reacts to slowing demand and pressure on prices. The chief executive, Elon Musk, announced “the difficult decision” in a memo first reported by the online publication Elektrek. Tesla employs 140,473 people, according to its annual report. Musk wrote that Tesla had grown rapidly in recent years and as a result there had been duplication of roles and job functions in certain areas. Referring to the job cuts, he wrote: “There is nothing I hate more, but it must be done. This will enable us to be lean, innovative and hungry for the next growth phase cycle.” The move follows a difficult start to the year for the electric carmaker. Tesla said it had made approximately 387,000 deliveries to customers in the first quarter of 2024, missing market expectations by about 13%. It was its first fall in deliveries in nearly four years. The company cited production problems caused by unforeseen factors such as attacks on shipping in the Red Sea and an arson attack on its factory in Berlin, but the figures also pointed to a softening in global demand. After the release of the sales figures this month, Musk dismissed comments that his divisive persona had caused a downturn in sales and pointed to similarly poor figures from the Chinese rival BYD, saying it was a “tough quarter for everyone”. Ross Gerber, the chief executive of the investment management firm Gerber Kawasaki and an outspoken critic of Musk’s leadership, said the jobs cuts were “proof of the true cost of the damage to the brand as Tesla sales fall in a strong economy”. Gerber, whose firm owns a small shareholding in Tesla, added: “No doubt the combination of a lack of advertising, real competition and a toxic CEO is a bad mix.” The company is also aiming to shore up its margins – a measure of profit – which have been hit by repeated price cuts, especially in China, where it faces stiff competition from local competitors including BYD, which briefly overtook Tesla as the world’s largest electric vehicle maker in the fourth quarter of 2023, and the new entrant Xiaomi. Tesla recorded a gross profit margin of 17.6% in the fourth quarter, its lowest in more than four years. Matthias Schmidt, an automotive industry analyst, said the job cuts reflected “the slowing pace of growth of an electric car market, which it appears Tesla isn’t immune from”. Shares in Tesla dropped by 3.5% in early trading on Monday to $165, down from $171.05 on Friday night. That knocked about $19bn (£15bn) off its market capitalisation, which fell to $525bn, down from $544bn at the end of last week. So far this year, Tesla has lost a third of its value. The carmaker has manufacturing sites in California, Nevada, New York and Texas in the US as well as plants in Germany and China. Separately, Reuters reported on Monday that BP had cut more than a tenth of the workforce in its electric vehicle charging business – representing more than 100 jobs – and has pulled it out of several markets after a bet on rapid growth in commercial electric vehicle fleets did not pay off. BP said the changes at its Pulse unit were “a step towards ensuring that we can execute our goals with even greater precision and effectiveness”. Tesla was contacted for comment.
What next for oil prices after Iran’s attack on Israel? 2024-04-15 16:13:00+00:00 - Investors are on high alert as they await Israel’s response to Iran’s attack. However, oil prices dropped on Monday even as Israel’s war cabinet met to discuss its response. The price for future delivery of a barrel of Brent crude oil, the global benchmark, dropped to $89.64 on Monday, down by 0.9% on the closing price on Friday. The price of West Texas Intermediate, the North American benchmark, fell by 0.9% to $84.90. Iran launched more than 300 drones and missiles from its territory towards Israel over the weekend, an escalation from its previous reliance on attacks on Israel by proxies in other countries. However, the effect on markets has been more muted than the headlines might suggest. Why has the oil price not risen after Iran’s attack on Israel? Brent crude prices had risen to a six-month high of $92.18 a barrel on Friday after Israel’s allies warned that an Iranian attack was imminent in retaliation for an Israeli strike on an Iranian diplomatic building in Syria. However, the advance warning allowed Israel and its allies to destroy all but a handful of the missiles, leading some analysts to conclude that it may not mark the start of a new war. Bob Savage, the head of markets strategy and insights at BNY Mellon, an investment bank, said that even as prices rose for oil and supposed investment “safe havens”, particularly gold, there was “hope that this attack is just a one-off”. The attacks have not so far had any effect on oil supply, and the members of Opec, the oil producers’ cartel, have spare capacity to produce another 6m barrels a day, according to Goldman Sachs. If they decided to, they could use their spare capacity to drive prices down much further. Neil Shearing, the group chief economist at Capital Economics, a consultancy, wrote that the United Arab Emirates had already pushed to increase Opec production quotas. US pressure to do so “will intensify if tensions in the region continue to push up oil prices”, he wrote. What if Israel responds by escalating? Before the threat of Iran’s attack became public, there had been limited energy market consequences from the attack on Israel by Hamas on 7 October and the retaliatory bombing campaign against Gaza by Israel. Israel and Palestine are not major energy producers, so a spillover conflict was seen as the main risk to energy supplies. An Israel-Iran war would be different. Iran is a founding member of Opec and produces about 3.2m barrels of oil a day, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). Iranian oil is under sanctions but any hits to production could still raise prices. In 2023, Iran was the world’s second largest source of supply growth after the US, according to the IEA. The Paris-based forecaster had predicted that Iran would produce 280,000 more barrels a day this year compared with last. Any hit to this would surely raise prices. Citigroup analysts, led by Max Layton, wrote in a note to clients that oil prices could rise above $100 a barrel for the first time since the summer of 2022 – shortly after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine sparked a global energy crisis – if a direct conflict started. skip past newsletter promotion Sign up to Business Today Free daily newsletter Get set for the working day – we'll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morning Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy . We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. after newsletter promotion Could prices drop back further if there is no escalation? Analysts led by Daan Struyven from Goldman Sachs, an investment bank, said oil prices were already between $5 and $10 higher than they would be without concerns over a risk that supply could be hit. There is little sign of the tensions in the Middle East lessening, but if they were to do so then that price premium could slowly fade, lowering prices further. However, the Goldman analysts noted several further risks to prices. Opec’s members, plus their unofficial associate Russia, could extend production cuts as a political tool to keep prices high. Any wider conflict could cause real damage to oil infrastructure, or the flow of oil through the strait of Hormuz, a key trade route, could be interrupted. The latter is “highly unlikely”, in Goldman’s words, but could cause a 20% price increase in one month. What would the knock-on effects be of further price increases? Higher oil prices would be a headache for central banks. The US Federal Reserve, the European Central Bank and the Bank of England are all considering when to cut interest rates as inflation falls back to their target levels. However, the International Monetary Fund declared last week – before the threat of the Iranian attack was widely known – that central bankers should avoid the temptation to cut rates too early, fearing that inflationary pressures may still be acting on the richest economies. If oil prices move higher, inflation could take even longer to die down and could make central bankers feel they have no choice but to delay rate cuts. Higher-for-longer rates could exact a cost on global economic growth in a big election year.
It's easy to bash tech, but I've started taking robotaxis — and they're awesome 2024-04-15 16:07:03+00:00 - Unlike other hyped-up tech, self-driving taxis look like they could be the real thing. You can take Waymo's software-powered taxis in San Francisco and Phoenix. They work just like an Uber. Waymo's robot taxis aren't perfect, and there are very reasonable concerns about them. But also: They're self-driving taxis that really work! NEW LOOK Sign up to get the inside scoop on today’s biggest stories in markets, tech, and business — delivered daily. Read preview Thanks for signing up! Access your favorite topics in a personalized feed while you're on the go. download the app Email address Sign up By clicking “Sign Up”, you accept our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy . You can opt-out at any time. Advertisement It's easy to crap on tech. We — I — do it all the time. Sometimes it's because tech doesn't work the way I want it to. Sometimes it's schadenfreude about a big hyped thing that falls flat. Sometimes it's just a sense that the tech we all depend on may be harming us in ways we don't understand and can't control. But also: Sometimes tech reminds you that tech can be awesome, in the golly-gee-can-you-believe-it sense some of us used to have about this stuff. Which is exactly how I felt after my last trip to San Francisco, when I took several rides in Waymo's robotaxis. Advertisement That's partly because the tech is … amazing. You really are in a car, driving around the city, with no one in the driver's seat. Software and sensors take care of everything. And partly because the tech already seems so … normal. You order a Waymo via an app, just like an Uber or Lyft. It shows up, you get in, it takes you where you want to go, and you get out. Yes, my 13-year-old son and I spent the first few minutes in our first Waymo texting our friends and family: OMG IM IN A SELF DRIVING TAXI. We also documented it on social, of course. We also felt a bit of the trepidatious rush you get when you sit down in a roller coaster and have that internal debate: Is this safe? It must be safe, because otherwise they wouldn't let you do it, right? But seriously, is this safe? Advertisement But after those first few minutes of novelty, we went back to doing what we always do in an Uber or a Lyft: zoning out on our phones, staring out the window, and spending next to no time thinking about who, or what, was driving us. Which, to me, is really the most amazing part: This stuff is here, now, and you can … just use it. At least some people can. Waymo, which is owned by Google's parent company, Alphabet, has a couple hundred self-driving cars roaming around San Francisco, and access is still limited there via a waiting list, as well as by geography. You can't get a Waymo to pick you up at San Francisco International Airport, for instance, or take you across the Bay Bridge to Oakland. In Phoenix, where Waymo first launched consumer access, it has about the same number of cars but no waiting list. And now it's starting to roll out in Los Angeles and Austin. Advertisement We've heard about self-driving taxis forever, but they're just starting to become a reality While Waymo says it drives tens of thousands of trips a week, even the most tech-savvy people I talk to have yet to ride in one. And it's reasonable to have concerns about this tech as it rolls out. Waymo's rival Cruise halted its service last fall after a slew of incidents, including a grisly one where a self-driving Cruise dragged a pedestrian who had been hit by a human-driven car. Related stories Self-driving tech is also an obvious problem for humans who depend on ride-hailing services to make a living. (On my previous trip to San Francisco, one of my Uber drivers told me he had previously been a recruiter at Amazon who lost his job during one of Amazon's recent layoff rounds.) And to be honest, I'm not even sure I would always order a Waymo if I had a chance. Right now, beyond the novelty, the big upside for me is that the fleet's cars — electric Jaguars — are comfortable and clean. And that the per-trip cost is about the same as an Uber Comfort (one level up from the base Uber X fare) — but really a bit cheaper, since you're not tipping your robot driver. Advertisement Waymo's self-driving taxis, like this Jaguar model crossing an intersection in San Francisco, are kitted out with cameras and other sensors. JASON HENRY/Getty Images But there's no reason to believe that the cars will remain pristine, and that pricing will stay low, as this stuff rolls out more broadly. (Waymo doesn't disclose financials, and the company wouldn't tell me if it's making money on each trip. I assume it does not, for now; we do know Waymo has invested billions in this since it started out as a Google project in 2009.) Still, I can think of all kinds of uses for Waymo — right now. Like using it for food delivery — which is happening in Phoenix, via Uber Eats. Maybe it's for people who believe a robot is more reliable than a human driver — at least we know a Waymo won't watch TikTok while driving on the highway like a Lyft driver did when I was in their back seat a couple of years ago. Or maybe it's simply for people who would rather not interact with another human when they're in a taxi. Which is what David Margines, Waymo's director of product management, says is the service's chief appeal for customers right now. "It's their own space," he says. Waymo's self-driving cars aren't perfect Yes, there are still some issues with Waymo, at least in the rides I took recently. One is simply figuring out how to get in the thing: When your Waymo arrives, you unlock its doors with your phone — but only once it has driven to a very precise location that Waymo knows and you don't. Advertisement Which led, a couple times, to some awkward slow dancing between myself and the robot car. It would stop when I got near but wouldn't let me in because it wasn't exactly where it was supposed to be. Then I'd step away, and then it would lurch forward toward its still-unknown-to-me target spot. Then I'd step forward and it would stop — but it still wouldn't let me in. On one of my trips, this happened on a particularly tight, winding San Francisco street. As my Waymo and I negotiated with each other, we ended up blocking multiple cars, including a minivan whose driver started honking at us in frustration. "You can't honk at a robot," I told her, not very helpfully. "It doesn't care." Meanwhile, a guy walking by stopped and took out his phone to record the scene. "You can put a cone on it to disable it," he told me, unprompted. Apparently he's right? Advertisement A self-driving Waymo taxi makes its way through Los Angeles. Mario Tama/Getty Images More worrisome to me was that on one of my trips — to a Warriors game at the Chase Center arena — at a busy intersection, a Waymo in front of us wouldn't respond to a traffic cop trying to wave it through a red light. Then another Waymo pulled up beside it and also didn't respond to the cop. So now three Waymos were sitting there, blocking traffic and waiting for the light. The traffic cop stopped trying to move us and just held his hands over his head in disgust. I figured this was a well-known and understandable problem for Waymos — of course their software and sensors wouldn't respond to humans telling them to override traffic signals! Think of the problems that could cause! But Margines told me that Waymos are, in fact, supposed to understand human signals like a traffic cop. A Waymo PR person sent me this clip from Waymo CEO Dmitri Dolgov showing a Waymo doing just that: Leveraging AI for semantic understanding of complex driving scenes is a key capability of the #WaymoDriver. Check out this example of it autonomously interpreting and adhering to a police officer directing traffic in Los Angeles. pic.twitter.com/PyPqVaOc6B — Dmitri Dolgov (@dmitri_dolgov) January 19, 2024 But unlike with other Big New Tech innovations I've seen in the past — anyone still have a 3D TV in their living room? — I don't think self-driving tech is going away. I think the people behind the tech will figure out its possibilities, its limitations, and the places it does and doesn't make sense. Advertisement Meanwhile, Cruise is starting up again, but this time with humans in the driver's seat. Elon Musk has promised to unveil his robotaxi this summer, and while your doubt about anything Musk says is well warranted, you never know. So I think that one way or another, we are going to make some version of this standard for many of us in the not-far-off future. Is that great? I don't know. But it really is amazing.