Aurelia Butler

The reductions, part of the company’s previously announced plan, would primarily impact corporate roles and not frontline jobs in stores, pharmacies and distribution centers, it said.Reuters exclusively reported on Monday that CVS is exploring options that could include a break-up of the company to separate its retail and insurance units, as it looks to turn around its fortunes amid pressure from investors.Healthcare-focused investment firm Glenview Capital Management said on Tuesday it is engaged in private and “constructive conversations” with CVS to strengthen its operating performance.”The company is operating well below its potential and has fallen short in its investment and actuarial approach in recent years, creating economic losses and volatility that pressures its people, its customers and its shareholders,” Glenview said in a statement, adding that it is not pushing for a break-up of CVS.The hedge fund owns less than 1% of CVS’ outstanding shares, according to data compiled by LSEG. CVS had disclosed a multi-year plan in August to save $2 billion in costs through measures such as streamlining operations and using artificial intelligence and automation across its business.Last year, the company said it had eliminated about 5,000 non customer-facing roles as a part of its restructuring plan.CNN, STAT News and other media outlets had reported about the job cuts. More

On Monday, HSBC Global Research adjusted its forecast for the Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ), anticipating more aggressive interest rate cuts in the upcoming months due to signs of a slowing economy.The bank now expects the RBNZ to lower its cash rate by 50 basis points (bp) in both October and November, a change from its previous prediction of 25bp cuts in each of the two months.The revision comes after the Quarterly Survey of Business Opinion (QSBO) indicated excess capacity within the economy and easing price pressures, suggesting firms are struggling to pass on higher costs to consumers. This aligns with the RBNZ’s pivot to an easing stance at its August meeting, where it reduced the cash rate by 25bp to 5.25%, marking a departure from earlier hawkish guidance.”The key data point this week was the Q3 Quarterly Survey of Business Opinion (QSBO) which highlighted that excess capacity is persisting and that weak demand is the key concern facing businesses. Critically, it also showed easing price pressures, with businesses reporting that they are now unable to pass higher input costs on to higher prices,” said the analysts.”This, combined with the monthly ‘selected price indices’ – a partial,timelier read on CPI – point to further disinflation in Q3, with headline CPI inflation likely to be comfortably back in the RBNZ’s 1-3% target band.”The economic backdrop for the RBNZ’s potential rate cuts includes a contraction in GDP for the second quarter, a cooling jobs market, and subdued consumer and business confidence. Despite some improvements in near-term indicators, overall demand remains weak in the third quarter.HSBC’s expectation of a 50bp rate cut in October would bring the RBNZ’s cash rate down from 5.25% to 4.75%. However, the firm acknowledges that there is significant uncertainty regarding the RBNZ’s decision-making, given the central bank’s rapid shift from a hawkish to a more accommodative approach earlier this year.This article was generated with the support of AI and reviewed by an editor. For more information see our T&C. More

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.US business groups warned of economic “paralysis” just five weeks before the presidential election as tens of thousands of dockworkers went on strike on Tuesday, shutting ports along the east and Gulf coasts.Dockworkers represented by the International Longshoremen’s Association walked out of major US ports for the first time in almost five decades after their employment contract expired at midnight. Negotiations for a new contract, which covers about 25,000 ILA workers, have been at an “impasse” for months over pay and automation, according to the United States Maritime Alliance (USMX), which represents the employers.“We are prepared to fight as long as necessary, to stay out on strike for whatever period of time it takes, to get the wages and protections against automation our ILA members deserve,” ILA president Harold Daggett told picketing members in New Jersey on Tuesday.The three dozen affected ports, which stretch from Maine to Texas, together handle one-quarter of the country’s international trade, worth $3tn a year, according to The Conference Board. The business group warned on Monday that the work stoppage would “paralyse US trade”, halting imports of food, pharmaceuticals, consumer electronics and clothing. The union said it would continue to handle military cargo.The closure represents the latest disruption to global supply chains, which have been strained by a drought that limited traffic through the Panama Canal and by attacks by the Houthi militant group in Yemen that forced vessels out of the Red Sea.JPMorgan analysts estimated that the strike could cost the US economy as much as $4.5bn a day, but said they did not expect it to last longer than a week.“A disruption of a week or two will create some backlogs but the broader consequences will be minimal outside of a handful of very port-reliant areas, including Savannah, Georgia,” said Moody’s Analytics economist Adam Kamins.“But anything longer will lead to shortages and upward price pressures. This would prove especially problematic for food and automobiles, which rely especially heavily on the ports that will be shut down.”The White House said President Joe Biden was “closely monitoring” the strike and had been briefed that its effects on consumers were expected to be “limited at this time, including in the important areas of fuel, food, and medicine”.Former president Donald Trump claimed the strike was “a direct result” of actions by Kamala Harris, his rival in November’s presidential election, while voicing support for American workers negotiating for better wages. Biden piled pressure on employers’ representatives to make concessions, saying he had urged the USMX to present “a fair offer” to port workers that reflects “the substantial contribution they’ve been making to our economic comeback”. Julie Su, Biden’s acting labour secretary, went further, saying: “As these companies make billions and their CEOs bring in millions of dollars in compensation per year, they have refused to put an offer on the table that reflects workers’ sacrifice and contributions to their employer’s profits.”USMX said its offer of a near-50 per cent wage increase “exceeds every other recent union settlement, while addressing inflation, and recognising the ILA’s hard work to keep the global economy running”.On Tuesday the union said that it was demanding a $5 per hour pay increase in addition to “absolute airtight language that there will be no automation or semi-automation”. ILA members earned between $20- $39 an hour under the old contract.The president has declined to invoke a 1947 federal law that would allow him to break the strike, rebuffing repeated calls from business leaders for him to intervene.“Americans experienced the pain of delays and shortages of goods during the pandemic-era supply chain backlogs in 2021,” said Suzanne Clark, chief executive of the US Chamber of Commerce, hours before the strike began. “It would be unconscionable to allow a contract dispute to inflict such a shock to our economy.”Additional reporting by Lauren Fedor More

LONDON (Reuters) – The impact of a political backlash against environmental, social and governance-related (ESG) issues in the United States is overstated and having little bearing on the country’s burgeoning green economy, a JPMorgan executive said on Tuesday.While some companies and investors were saying less about sustainability, they were still moving money in a similar way to peers in Europe, Chuka Umunna, JPMorgan’s global head of sustainable solutions, told the Reuters Energy Transition conference in London.”If you peel away all the noise and look at what investors are doing, it isn’t so different, albeit they may not be using the labels quite in the way that we do in Europe,” Umunna, who is also the bank’s regional head of green economy investment banking, said.”The U.S. is not so much pulling back because of the weaponisation of the term ESG, the reality in the States is more complex than that.” A host of U.S.-based investors, including the fund arm of JPMorgan, have pulled back from global climate coalitions this year amid a tense political backdrop as some U.S. Republican politicians said membership could breach antitrust rules.Despite that, Umunna noted while more anti-ESG resolutions were proposed during the most recent proxy-voting season, less than 2% actually passed. At the state level, meanwhile, less than 10% of anti-ESG bills actually passed.While those funds trying to raise investment dollars in Republican states might tailor their pitch accordingly, the large global clients of the bank’s fund arm tended to stick to a single investment stewardship policy across the globe. For companies in the real economy of the United States seeking investment or bank loan support, arguably the greater challenges came from inflation, supply-chain issues and high interest rates, he added. “Is all the noise depressing the valuations? I’m not sure it necessarily is,” he said. “I think there are more fundamental issues at play.” More