Business category, Page 287
Warren Buffett praises potential successors, but no plans to retire
OMAHA, Neb. — Warren Buffett says two potential successors earned roughly $18 million each last year managing Berkshire Hathaway’s dozens of operating companies. Buffett appeared on CNBC Monday after releasing his annual letter to shareholders over the weekend. Buffett says Greg Abel and Ajit Jain have both done a great...
Pittsburgh might not be as hard-working as you think
Lazy bunch of … Pittsburghers, according to a study from WalletHub, are the 103rd hardest-working group in the United States. Say it a different way: Pittsburghers don’t really work that hard. Hang on a second. Pittsburgh? Not hard-working? That has to be wrong, right? Pittsburgh is as blue-collar as it...
China’s Huawei unveils 5G phone with folding screen
BARCELONA, Spain — China’s Huawei unveiled a new folding-screen phone on Sunday, joining the latest trend for bendable devices as it challenges the global smartphone market’s dominant players, Apple and Samsung. Huawei revealed its Mate X phone on the eve of MWC Barcelona, a four-day showcase of mobile devices, as...
Ground-breaking electric Chevrolet Volt runs out of juice
DETROIT — As their company was swirling around the financial drain in the early 2000s, General Motors executives came up with an idea to counter its gas-guzzling image and point the way to transportation of the future: an electric car with a gas-engine backup that could travel anywhere. At Detroit’s...
EU says it’s ready to hit back if U.S. imposes car tariffs
BUCHAREST, Romania — A European Union official says “there is full support” from member states to hit back if President Donald Trump imposes tariffs on cars and car parts. EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom said EU trade ministers had discussed the bloc’s trading relationship with Washington during an informal meeting...
Stocks climb, giving S&P 500 its 4th straight weekly gain
Technology and health care companies led U.S. stocks higher Friday, erasing some of the market’s losses from a day earlier and giving the benchmark S&P 500 its fourth straight weekly gain. The broad rally came as investors grew hopeful that the latest round of talks between the U.S. and China...
Kraft Heinz plunges near record low on $15.4 billion writedown
Kraft Heinz Co. recorded a $15.4 billion non-cash charge to write down assets including some of its most well-known brands, a striking acknowledgment that changing consumer tastes have destroyed the value of some of the company’s most iconic products. The packaged food giant’s charge to reduce the goodwill value of...
Trump challenges U.S. companies to speed up work on 5G networks
President Donald Trump challenged U.S. telecommunications companies on Thursday to boost their efforts to build advanced networks and said leadership should come from competition, not by blocking competitors. “American companies must step up their efforts, or get left behind,” Trump tweeted. “There is no reason that we should be lagging...
‘Ugly produce’ trend may have limits, as grocers end tests
URBANDALE, Iowa — Is the “ugly produce’” trend already reaching the end of its shelf life in supermarkets? Walmart and Whole Foods in recent years tried selling some blemished fruits and vegetables at a discount, produce they said might otherwise be trashed because it’s not quite the right size, shape...
The Home Depot hiring 700 workers for Pittsburgh-area stores
The Home Depot says it is hiring 700 employees in the Pittsburgh area in preparation for spring, its busiest selling season. Hiring events are being held at several Pittsburgh area stores until 7 p.m. Thursday. Candidates are encouraged to apply online at prior to attending the event, but walk-ins also...
U.S. home sales tumbled 1.2 percent in January
WASHINGTON — U.S. home sales fell 1.2 percent in January to their worst pace in more than three years, as persistent affordability problems have put a harsh chill in the real estate market. The National Association of Realtors said Thursday that sales of existing homes declined 1.2 percent to a...
Nestlé, AT&T pull YouTube ads over pedophile concerns
Several companies, including AT&T and Nestlé, are pulling advertisements from YouTube over concerns about inappropriate comments on videos of children. A video from a popular YouTuber and a report from Wired showed that pedophiles have made unseemly comments on innocuous videos of kids. The comments reportedly included timestamps that showed...
America’s shale boom keeps rolling even as wildcatters save cash
America’s surging shale oil production shows little sign of abating, despite industrywide spending cuts, as explorers learn to do more with less. Almost all the independent producers have reduced their budgets for 2019, but many still expect to deliver double-digit growth in production this year, fourth-quarter earnings reports show. Growth...
Commodities giant Glencore to cap coal output over climate
BERLIN — Commodities giant Glencore said Wednesday it will cap how much coal it mines amid shareholder pressure for it to help reduce global emissions of greenhouse gases. The move is a sharp reversal for a company that has long championed the extraction and burning of fossil fuels, and which...
U.S. stocks cap day of listless trading with modest gains
Wall Street capped another day of listless trading Wednesday with a slight gain, extending the market’s winning streak to a third day. Financial, materials and industrial companies accounted for much of the gain, outweighing losses in health care and real estate stocks as investors reviewed the latest batch of company...
Samsung’s foldable phone will cost nearly $2,000
SAN FRANCISCO — Samsung has unveiled a highly anticipated smartphone with a foldable screen that breaks new ground in a market that has been stuck in an innovative funk. The phone announced Wednesday in San Francisco will be called the Galaxy Fold and will sell for $1,980 when it is...
13 Pittsburgh-area Payless stores among those closing nationwide
About a dozen Payless ShoeSource stores in the Pittsburgh region are among the 2,300 closing nationwide. Payless officials announced the closures last week and locations — including Westmoreland, Ross Park, Robinson and Monroeville malls — have started liquidation sales, according to a notice on the company’s website. Merchandise is between...
Walmart flexes in the fourth quarter, beats all expectations
NEW YORK — Walmart defied a gloomy government retail sales report for December, delivering fiscal fourth-quarter profits and sales that beat Wall Street expectations. The world’s largest retailer also enjoyed another quarter of surging e-commerce sales during the critical holiday period as it expanded its online assortment and services. Shares...
U.S. stocks bounce back from wobbly start to extend gains
Stocks shook off an early wobble on Wall Street on Tuesday, finishing modestly higher and extending the market’s gains into a fourth week. Solid earnings from Walmart encouraged investors to bid up other retailers and consumer goods companies. Communication services stocks and banks also contributed to the broad gains. Homebuilders...
Tariff uncertainty could hurt auto industry more than plant closures in 2019
An auto industry that many experts think already is overdue for a slowdown just got a major dose of uncertainty that could reduce investment in new technologies and vehicles. The Trump administration dealt automakers a wild card by reportedly deciding not to reveal the Commerce Department’s recommendations on whether to...
Amazon aims to cut its carbon footprint
NEW YORK — Amazon, which ships millions of packages a year to shopper’s doorsteps, says it wants to be greener. The online retail giant announced plans Monday to make half of all its shipments carbon neutral by 2030. To reach that goal, the online retail giant says it will use...
‘Digital gangsters’: U.K. wants tougher rules for Facebook
LONDON — British lawmakers issued a scathing report Monday that calls for tougher rules to keep Facebook and other tech firms from acting like “digital gangsters” and intentionally violating data privacy and competition laws. The report on fake news and disinformation on social media sites followed an 18-month investigation by...
John Dorfman: The near insanity of investing at 100 times revenue
The height of folly. That’s what I call it when people pay 100 times a company’s pre-share revenue to buy a stock. You see this behavior mostly with young biotechnology stocks and fledgling technology stocks. Investors mentally build what economics professor Burton Malkiel called “castles in the sky” when they...
Pittsburgh water authority issues ‘flush and boil’ advisory for 3 neighborhoods
About 2,000 households in portions of Hazelwood, Swisshelm Park and Greenfield are under a flush and boil water advisory from Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority following a water main break Friday night. The precautionary advisory, which was posted to the PWSA website and social media late Saturday morning, was issued...
Gone in a New York minute: How the Amazon deal fell apart
NEW YORK — In early November, word began to leak that Amazon was serious about choosing New York to build a giant new campus. The city was eager to lure the company and its thousands of high-paying tech jobs, offering billions in tax incentives and lighting the Empire State Building...
