Cheddar RSS

Did you know we’re on YouTube? If you want 20 more minutes of Big Business This Week, subscribe to Cheddar’s channel!

Striking U.S. dockworkers have the economy by the short hairs, cutting as much as $5 billion daily from U.S. economic activity. That number could rise as the strike by the International Longshoremen’s Association blocks the loading and unloading of everything from food to cars at all ports on the Gulf and East Coasts. Some 60% of U.S. containerized trade moves through the ports in which dockworkers unloaded nearly $600 billion of imports last year, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence.

U.S. companies—and consumers—can wait out a strike for a couple of weeks, but beyond that, prices will start rising as shortages appear. Despite lessons learned during the pandemic, the global supply chain is still a tenuous linkage of many parts, says Amir Mousavian, supply chain management professor at the University of New England’s College of Business.

“It’s a global economy and global supply chain,” Mousavian said in an interview. “There has not been sufficient time since the pandemic for all companies to create the resiliency they need.” He said some items are too perishable to be stored, and not every company wants to pay for warehousing months worth of parts and materials.

“When you order something off Amazon, within two days you have the product delivered at your door—we have a supply chain that is very efficient but not resilient,” he said.

The dockworkers are serious. Their leader, Howard Daggett, says he’s seeking a 77% pay hike over six years, raising the base pay for dockworkers to $69 an hour from $39. Employers and shippers offered 40% but upped that to 50% this week under pressure from the White House.

Daggett, 78, has been indicted for fraud but never convicted. In a 2005 trial, witnesses said Daggett was an associate of the Genovese crime family. One of his co-defendants was found dead during the trial in the trunk of a car, and Daggett was acquitted.

Ultimately, says Mousavian, the dockworkers have the upper hand. Their demands are a fraction of the damage they are causing. When fully phased in, the wage hike will cost about $2.1 billion a year, less than half of what the strike costs the economy each day.

“People are going to sit up and realize how important longshoremen jobs are,” Daggett said in an interview at the rally. “They won’t be able to sell cars. They won’t be able to stock malls. They won’t be able to do anything in this country without my f—ing people. And it’s about time they start realizing it,” Daggett told the Wall Street Journal.

Get Big Business This Week in your inbox every week—and read it before everybody else! Sign up today.

• Elon’s World: October 10 is the day that could define Tesla: Musk will unveil the electric carmaker’s robo-taxi on the Warner Brothers Studio lot in Los Angeles. Wedbush Securities says the unveil will be a “linchpin day for the tesla story.” If it works, the tech upgrade will turn every Tesla into a robo-taxi that could earn $30,000 a year for every Tesla owner, Musk says, which could make Tesla worth $5 trillion. • You can say one thing about Musk—he embodies the current spirit of X. The New York Times held Musk’s own tweets to light, and the results were dismal: Almost a third of Musk’s 171 posts last week were false, misleading, or missing vital context, the newspaper reported. Those posts included a false report of a bomb at a Trump rally. Maybe that’s why Musk’s popularity among Democrats has fallen to 6%. “It’s a damaged brand,” said Democratic pollster Jeff Horwitt, who conducted the survey with Republican pollster Bill McInturff. • It’s not only Musk’s popularity that’s suffered. Investment giant Fidelity, which helped fund Musk’s $44 billion takeover of Twitter in 2022, says it’s written down its stake by 78.7%. X is now worth $9.4 billion, a loss of a staggering $34.6 billion. • The Lost in Space Chronicles: After the successful launch of a capsule to rescue two NASA astronauts stranded on the International Space Station, Space X’s workhorse Falcon 9 rocket was grounded by regulators when its booster failed to properly touch down. The capsule has docked at the International Space Station, and the two space cadets will head back to Earth next year. • Musk’s Brazilian nemesis, Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, moved X a step closer to being restored in the country, unblocking X’s local bank accounts after Musk agreed to pay fines of over $5 million for spreading alleged disinformation in Brazil. • Is Musk in a China bind? That’s the contention of Axios, which notes that a Biden Administration move to keep Chinese software out of advanced U.S. vehicles would help Tesla fight off growing competition from cheaper Chinese EVs. If Beijing responds, Teslas could be banned in China, which might be the second-biggest market for Musk’s EV. • Musk nemesis Mark Cuban had some advice for the X-man: No matter how much you help Trump, he will never pay you back. “At the point you need him the most, you will find out what so many before you have learned, his loyalty is only to himself,” Cuban wrote on X. • In a bold move, Musk says he will ban italics and boldface letters on X users’ main timelines. Musk said the typography is being abused for “engagement farming,” adding “My eyes are bleeding.” • In a state that is the pork capital of the world, it’s no surprise that Musk and Donald Trump are hogging credit for giving cellphone customers free access to Starlink on their phones in areas of North Carolina hard hit by Hurricane Helene. FEMA responders have long-standing programs to use Starlink satellites to help residents of hard-hit areas communicate. • Meanwhile, Musk is facing a lawsuit for helping to spread false stories that Haitian residents of Springfield, Ohio, are eating cats and dogs. The Office of the Haitian Diaspora filed a defamation suit in federal court in Miami. • Despite his recent anti-immigration comments, Musk, who was born in Africa, has his own immigrant story, and his brother Kimbal said the two were “illegal immigrants” when they started their first venture. A year ago, Elon Musk said, “As an immigrant to the United States, I am extremely pro-immigrant,” calling for “a greatly expanded legal immigration system, and that we should let anyone in the country who is hardworking and honest and will be a contributor to the United States,” CNN reports. • Elon says he is not having an affair with Italian Prime Minister Georgia Meloni. “There is no romantic relationship whatsoever with PM Meloni,” Musk wrote on X in response to a post of a photo of the two of them gazing fondly into each other’s eyes at a banquet table.
• Dismal Disney: Hurricanes, competition, and the end of the post-pandemic travel surge are weighing heavily on Disney, with its share price down 29% in the past six months and 36% over the past five years. Analysts at Chicago-based fund manager Raymond James say concerns about Disney’s theme parks division pushed them to downgrade the stock this week from outperform to market perform, and they said they’re getting off the “rollercoaster.” Disney is in the midst of a planned $60 billion investment in theme parks and cruises under Experiences division CEO Josh D’Amaro, a potential successor to Disney chair Robert Iger.
• Rotten Apple: Apple has illegally blocked workers from organizing and advocating for better working conditions, the National Labor Relations Board said. The board’s complaint claims Apple required employees nationwide to sign illegal confidentiality, non-disclosure, and non-compete agreements. Apple allegedly imposed overly broad misconduct and social media policies. Apple said it disagrees with the claims, and an administrative judge will hear the case in January.
• Boeing: The embattled planemaker is considering issuing $10 billion in new stock, equivalent to about 25% of its current market capitalization, to help pay for a punishing strike by the 33,000 union machinists who build its planes and weapons as well as federally mandated safety and quality control slowdowns on its planemaking. Meanwhile, the machinists union urged new CEO Kelly Ortberg to “truly engage” in negotiations.
• Open Agents: OpenAI says AI-powered assistants will become mainstream next year as tech firms race to bring AI agents to consumers. “We want to make it possible to interact with AI in all of the ways that you interact with another human being,” Kevin Weil, Open AI’s chief product officer, said at the company’s developer day. Meanwhile, OpenAI is close to completing a $6.5 billion funding round this week that would value the concern, a non-profit that wants to become a for-profit corporation, at $150 billion.

Union boss behind port strikes has sprawling mansion in NJ — complete with Bentley, 5-car garage and guest house https://t.co/Uamz882e0m pic.twitter.com/ApFAK1tIDj

• That taxi is so fly: Toyota says it’s betting $500 million on electric air taxis, investing into Joby Aviation’s electric vertical take-off and landing craft. Joby is still waiting for some approvals from the FAA while Toyota has supplied them with components.
• Another brick in the vault: Pink Floyd agreed to sell the rights to its entire catalog to Sony Music for $400 million. Sony gets the rights to the band’s recordings, name, and likeness, the Financial Times reports. Floyd keeps the songwriting royalties. The deal, one of the last for the great rock bands of the late 20th Century, was held up for years by a feud between Roger Waters and David Gilmour, as well as concerns by band members over the tax structure of the deal.

Two weeks after the Fed cut rates by a dramatic half of a percentage point—the first cut in more than two years—how has the economy reacted? Well, the man behind the curtain spoke out Monday at a Nashville conference.

“Overall, the economy is in solid shape; we intend to use our tools to keep it there,” chair Jerome Powell said. Because the Federal Open Markets Committee (which sets the benchmark Federal Funds Rate) has a positive outlook on the economy, he added, “This is not a committee that feels like it’s in a hurry to cut rates quickly.”

Consumers are doing well, with wages outpacing inflation, say Ernst & Young economists Lydia Boussour and Gregory Daco. They noted that real disposable income is now growing at a robust 3.1% year-on-year pace, and real consumer spending growth ticking up to 2.9%. The data, they said, “indicate a more sustainable pace of consumer spending backed by robust income momentum.”

The Fed’s dual mandate—to keep inflation down and employment up—seems to be paying off in both directions. U.S. job openings unexpectedly increased in August after two straight monthly decreases, with 1.13 job openings for every unemployed person in August compared to 1.08 in July, and the number of Americans quitting their jobs fell to the lowest level since August 2020. This puts the economy on track for an expected .25% rate cut in November.

Mortgage rates are still inching downward at about 6.22 % this week, down from 7.35% in August; however, the Fed has less power over mortgages, notes Melissa Cohn, a regional vice president at William Raveis Mortgage. “Rates follow the 10-year yield and not the fed funds rate,” she said. “Renewed concerns that the inflation battle has not yet been won has sent yields up this week and some mortgage rates with it.”

Still, even as some economists worry about a potential rise in unemployment, a recession, or stagflation, Swiss bank UBS says the chance of a boom cycle is 50%.

“It’s no longer too soon nor too optimistic to suggest that the US will experience a Roaring ‘20s economy,” said Jason Draho, head of asset allocation for the Americas at UBS. “It already is by our criteria, with the relevant question being whether these conditions will continue, not whether they will materialize.”

One cloud on the horizon is Donald Trump’s tariff plan. Morgan Stanley economists say the plan would drive up inflation, crimp economic growth, and hurt employment. “If the proposed tariffs are fully implemented, we estimate a near-term acceleration in the inflation rate and a delayed drag in GDP growth,” they wrote in a note Monday.

NEW YORK (AP) — Crude prices are jumping Thursday on worries that worsening tensions in the Middle East could disrupt the global flow of oil, while U.S. stocks pull back further from their records.

The S&P 500 was edging down by 0.4% in afternoon trading after a shaky week knocked the index off its all-time high set on Monday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 251 points, or 0.6%, as of 3 p.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.3% lower.

Stocks sank as oil prices kept rising amid the world's wait to see how Israel will respond to Iran’s missile attack from Tuesday. A barrel of Brent crude, the international standard, leaped 5% to settle at $77.62 after starting the week below $72. It's potentially on track for its biggest weekly gain in nearly two years.

Oil prices rose after President Joe Biden suggested on Thursday that U.S. and Israeli officials were discussing a possible strike by Israel against Iranian oil facilities.

“We’re in discussion of that,” Biden said to reporters. He added, “I think that would be a little – anyway,” without finishing the thought. Biden also said he doesn’t expect Israel to retaliate immediately against Iran.

Iran is a major producer of oil, and a worry is that a broadening of the fighting could not only choke off Iran's flows to China but also affect neighboring countries that are integral to the flow of crude. Helping to keep prices in check, though, are signals that supplies of oil remain ample at the moment. Brent last month hit its lowest price in nearly three years.

In the bond market, Treasury yields rose after reports suggested the U.S. economy remains solid. One showed growth for real estate, health care and other U.S. services businesses accelerated to its strongest pace since February 2023 and topped economists' expectations, though employment trends may be slowing.

A separate report, meanwhile, suggested the number of layoffs across the United States remains relatively low. Slightly more workers filed for unemployment benefits last week, but the number remains low compared with history.

Outside of this week’s worries about the Middle East, the dominant question hanging over Wall Street has been whether the job market will continue to hold up after the Federal Reserve earlier kept interest rates at a two-decade high. The Fed wanted to press the brake hard enough on the economy to stamp out high inflation.

Stocks are near their records because of hopes the U.S. economy will indeed continue to grow, now that the Federal Reserve is cutting interest rates to give it more juice. The Fed last month lowered its main interest rate for the first time in more than four years and indicated more cuts will arrive through next year.

China is also talking about more aid for its economy, and “when the top policymakers in the world’s two largest economies are determined to support economic growth, it pays to listen,” according to Evan Brown, head of multi-asset strategy at UBS Asset Management. He suggests not underestimating policy makers' resolve to cut off the risk of a recession.

The job market could use help, as U.S. hiring has been slowing. The U.S. government will release the latest monthly update on the jobs market on Friday, and economists expect it to show hiring slowed slightly from August's pace.

On Wall Street, Levi Strauss dropped 7.4% despite reporting better profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected. The denim company’s revenue fell short of forecasts, and it said it’s considering what to do with its Dockers brand, whose revenue fell 7% last quarter.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 3.85% from 3.78% late Wednesday. The two-year yield, which moves more closely with expectations for what the Fed will do with overnight rates, rose to 3.71% from 3.64%.

Yields have been rising as as traders pare their bets for how much the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates by at its next meeting in November. After many were earlier forecasting another deeper-than-usual cut of half a percentage point, they're now betting on a 65% chance the Fed will cut by just a quarter of a percentage point, according to data from CME Group.

In stock markets abroad, Japan’s Nikkei 225 jumped 2% as its sharp swings continue amid speculation about when the country’s central bank may hike interest rates next.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng has also been swerving, and it gave back 1.5%. Stocks in China have largely been surging on hopes for a flurry of recent announcements from Beijing to prop up the world’s second-largest economy. With Shanghai and other markets in China closed for a weeklong holiday, trading has crowded into Hong Kong.

___

AP Business Writers Matt Ott and Elaine Kurtenbach contributed.

October 3, 2024, New York, NY – Cheddar, the finance, technology, and innovation news platform, is thrilled to announce a programming collaboration with the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). This collaboration introduces NYSE TV Live, which airs every weekday from 9am-10am EST. NYSE TV Live offers streaming coverage of bell ceremonies, exclusive interviews with company executives and guests, and real-time market reporting from the New York Stock Exchange.

Cheddar’s content distribution efforts include its 30+ partner-strong CTV and OTT streaming app network, social media channels that reach over 10 million people, the cheddar.com website, and daily newsletters to over 500,000 subscribers. Starting this fall, five exclusive annual sponsorships will be available across the Cheddar Network for the NYSE TV Live show broadcast during the NYSE’s Opening Bell

In conjunction with this exciting collaboration, Cheddar is set to launch a dedicated section on its website titled “NYSE TV Live.” This channel will highlight segments from the show and provide a rich archive of historical content from the NYSE.

“Cheddar’s mission has always been to offer news in an approachable and engaging format, and collaborating with the NYSE amplifies this commitment,” said Lauren Babbage, Head of Content and Programming for Cheddar. “By integrating the prestigious NYSE TV Live into our show lineup and creating a channel to house the show, we are setting a new standard for financial journalism and opening up a world of possibilities for our viewers and sponsors alike.”

This collaboration is designed to captivate our core audience of young professionals aged 26-49 who prefer Cheddar’s fresh and dynamic approach to finance, technology, and innovation news. As the preferred platform for millennials, representing the largest generational group in the U.S., Cheddar is uniquely positioned to connect innovative brands with this influential demographic through impactful and integrated marketing campaigns.

For more information about this collaboration and sponsorship opportunities, please visit Cheddar’s website or contact our team at [email protected].

Cheddar is the leading source of news and analysis in finance, technology, and innovation. Known for its journalistic integrity and engaging presentation style, Cheddar reaches millions of viewers who seek a more modern take on financial news. Cheddar is not just a news outlet; it’s a movement towards making financial and technological literacy accessible to everyone.

Media Contact: Stephanie Gildea, Head of Marketing, [email protected]