Business category, Page 143
The British pound has taken a tumble. What’s the impact?
LONDON — The pound is taking a pounding. The British currency has taken a plunge, sliding against the U.S. dollar to touch an all-time low. It’s a sign of the alarm in financial markets over new Prime Minister Liz Truss’ emergency budget measures unveiled last week aimed at jump-starting the...
Amazon to hold holiday shopping event in October
Amazon said Monday that next month it will hold a second Prime Day-like shopping event, making it the latest major retailer to offer holiday deals earlier this year to entice cautious consumers struggling with tighter budgets. During the Oct. 11-12 event, Amazon Prime members will get early access to discounted...
U.S. case against American Airlines, JetBlue heads to court
DALLAS — The government’s antitrust lawsuit against American Airlines and JetBlue begins Tuesday and the outcome could determine how closely the Biden administration examines other airline deals, including JetBlue’s pending attempt to buy Spirit Airlines. The Justice Department and six states are suing American and JetBlue to break up their...
Judge rejects Justice Dept.’s bid to stop sugar merger
WASHINGTON — A federal judge has rejected the Justice Department’s bid to block a major U.S. sugar manufacturer from acquiring its rival, clearing the way for the acquisition to proceed. The ruling, handed down Friday by a federal judge in Wilmington, Delaware, comes months after the Justice Department sued to...
Some cities are passing bans on natural gas appliances to help curb emissions, climate change
Cookin’ with gas? Maybe not for long. According to CBS News, “major cities across the U.S. are passing bans on gas stoves and other appliances that run on natural gas because of their planet-warming emissions.” About 80 local governments — mostly in California — have passed laws requiring or encouraging...
Airfares hit highest level in years despite falling fuel prices
LOS ANGELES — Jet fuel prices have been dropping dramatically since May, and the nation’s airlines now have more workers on staff than before the pandemic. So Americans preparing for Thanksgiving and Christmas travel should expect lower airfares and fewer delays and cancellations, right? Don’t get your hopes up. Ticket...
Global markets fall sharply on worries about rates, economy
Stocks tumbled worldwide Friday on more signs the global economy is weakening, just as central banks raise the pressure even more with additional interest rate hikes. The S&P 500 fell 2.3% in early afternoon trading, adding a dismal cap on what’s already been a rough week. It’s almost all the...
U.S. Sen. Warnock: Electric car tax credit needs ‘flexibility’
SAVANNAH, Ga. — U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock urged the U.S. Treasury secretary Friday to use “maximum flexibility” in implementing a revised tax credit for Americans buying electric vehicles, a perk that Hyundai stands to lose as the automaker invests billions of dollars to open its first American EV plant in...
Wall Street ends lower as global central banks raise ratesVideo
Stocks fell again Thursday, deepening Wall Street’s losses for the week, as central banks around the world hiked interest rates to fight inflation. The S&P 500 fell 0.8%, its third straight drop. The benchmark index is down about 3% so far this week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.4%...
Average long-term mortgage rates climb to 6.29% this week
WASHINGTON — Average long-term U.S. mortgage rates jumped by more than a quarter-point this week to their highest level since 2008 as the Federal Reserve intensified its effort to tamp down decades-high inflation and cool the economy. Mortgage buyer Freddie Mac reported Thursday that the 30-year rate climbed to 6.29%,...
Walmart, Target begin holiday early to ease inflation sting
NEW YORK — Walmart and Target plan to begin offering deals and price matching offers earlier this year to keep up with Americans pressed by soaring inflation and looking for ways to ease the potential sting of holiday shopping. For two years now, shoppers have started preparing for the holidays...
Jerome Powell signals more pain to come with Fed sending rates higherVideo
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell vowed officials would crush inflation after they raised interest rates by 75 basis points for a third straight time and signaled even more aggressive hikes ahead than investors had expected. “We have got to get inflation behind us. I wish there were a painless way...
Home Depot workers petition to form 1st store-wide union
NEW YORK — Home Depot workers in Philadelphia have filed a petition with the federal labor board to form what could be the first store-wide union at the world’s largest home improvement retailer. The petition, filed with the National Labor Relations Board this week, seeks to form a collective bargaining...
Airbnb hosts are sick of Airbnb, too
Disgruntled Airbnb guests are taking to Twitter and TikTok to vent about everything from cleaning fees to misleading listings. But they aren’t the only ones with complaints: Airbnb hosts themselves have become increasingly disillusioned with the platform and its disrespectful guests. On message boards and Facebook groups, hosts are sharing...
U.S. home sales slipped, prices grew more slowly in August
Sales of previously occupied U.S. homes slowed in August for the seventh month in a row, as sharply higher mortgage rates and rising prices made homebuying less affordable, further cooling the once red-hot housing market. The National Association of Realtors said Wednesday that existing home sales fell 0.4% last month...
Walmart to hire 40,000 mostly seasonal workers for holidays
NEW YORK — Walmart said it will hire 40,000 U.S. workers for the holidays, a majority of them seasonal workers. The move, announced Wednesday, comes as the nation’s largest retailer and largest private employer said it’s in a stronger staffing position heading into the holidays than last year and is...
Hertz to order up to 175K GM electric vehicles over 5 years
Hertz plans to order up to 175,000 electric vehicles from General Motors over the next five years. The agreement announced Tuesday includes electric vehicle deliveries through 2027 and will include SUVs, pickups and luxury automobiles from Chevrolet, Buick, GMC, Cadillac and BrightDrop. The companies expect deliveries of the Chevrolet Bolt...
Spotify launches audiobook store with some 300,000 titles
NEW YORK — The expanding audio books market has a major new retailer: Spotify. On Tuesday, the music streaming service announced its long-rumored audiobook initiative, launching a store that includes more than 300,000 titles, including such popular works as Delia Owens’ “Where the Crawdads Sing,” Michelle Obama’s “Becoming” and Colleen...
How much ‘pain’? Fed to signal more rate hikes ahead
WASHINGTON — Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell bluntly warned in a speech last month that the Fed’s drive to curb inflation by aggressively raising interest rates would “bring some pain.” On Wednesday, Americans may get a better sense of how much pain could be in store. The Fed is expected...
U.S. stocks rise ahead of expected interest rate hike by Fed
A choppy day of trading on Wall Street ended with stocks closing higher Monday as investors brace for another big interest rate increase this week from the Federal Reserve. The indexes swayed between modest gains and losses for much of the day before a burst of buying in the final...
John Dorfman: Short-selling contest has repeat winner
Laurent Condon, a professional trader in France, won my Short Sellers Don’t Have Horns short-selling contest — his second triumph in the annual competition. Condon won the contest in 2017-2018 and finished third the following year. He also has excelled in some of my other contests. In addition to the...
New Orlando terminal is $2.8 billion bet on Florida tourism
ORLANDO, Fla. — Visitors to the new terminal at Orlando International Airport may want to wear sunscreen, shades and a floppy hat. Sun rays beaming through the windows of its soaring ceilings don’t just peck at the passing passengers — they practically smooch them as if they were spending a...
Locked Up: The prison labor that built business empires like U.S. Steel
More than 150 years ago, a prison complex known as the Lone Rock stockade operated at one of the biggest coal mines in Tennessee. It was powered largely by African American men who had been arrested for minor offenses — like stealing a hog — if they committed any crime...
Serious breach at Uber spotlights hacker social deception
The ride-hailing service Uber said Friday that all its services were operational following what security professionals are calling a major data breach, claiming there was no evidence the hacker got access to sensitive user data. But the breach, apparently by a lone hacker, put the spotlight on an increasingly effective...
Wall Street slips as FedEx warning adds to market woes
Wall Street closed out the stock market’s worst week in three months with more losses Friday, as a stark warning from FedEx about rapidly worsening trends in the economy rattled already anxious investors. The S&P 500 fell 0.7%, with all but two of its 11 company sectors ending in the...
