Raphael Stevens

A Starbucks store is seen inside the Tom Bradley terminal at LAX airport in Los Angeles, California.
Lucy Nicholson | Reuters

Check out the companies making headlines in premarket trading.
Alphabet — Shares declined more than 3% after Google-parent Alphabet missed analyst expectations in its latest earnings report. Alphabet earned $1.05 per share, lower than the expected earnings of $1.18 per share, according to consensus estimates from Refinitiv. It posted revenue of $76.05 billion, less than the forecasted $76.53 billion.

Apple — The tech giant saw its stock fall about 2% in premarket after the company missed expectations for revenue, profit, and sales for many of its lines of business. Apple’s overall sales for the holiday quarter fell 5% year over year, marking the company’s first top-line decline since 2019.
Amazon — Amazon dropped 4% after the e-commerce giant reported its fourth-quarter results. Although the company’s quarterly sales beat analysts’ estimates, current-quarter guidance came in somewhat light of expectations. The e-retailer estimates its first-quarter revenue to fall between $121 billion and $126 billion. Meanwhile, analysts were expecting sales to come in at $125.1 billion, according to Refinitiv.
Ford – Shares of Ford slipped 6.5% after the company reported earnings that badly missed Wall Street’s earnings expectations. The automaker reported adjusted earnings per share of 51 cents on $41.8 billion in revenue where analysts polled by Refinitiv expected adjusted earnings per share of 62 cents and $40.37 billion in revenue. The company also posted a net income that was down more than $1 billion on the year. 
Starbucks — The coffee giant’s shares slid 2.10% after the company’s earnings report fell short of expectations. Starbucks reported earnings per share of 75 cents compared to Refinitiv analysts’ projections of 77 cents. Revenue also fell short of the $8.78 billion Refinitiv estimates, coming in at only $8.71 billion. Weakened international demand, particularly in its second-largest market China, weighed on the results.
Qualcomm — The semiconductor group saw its stock drop almost 3% after its top line fell short during its fiscal first quarter. Qualcomm’s revenue fell 12% year over year during the quarter. The company cited macroeconomic conditions and higher channel inventory as headwinds to its results. The company’s stock has fallen 24% in the past year.

Nordstrom — Shares of Nordstrom rallied 27% after The Wall Street Journal reported that activist investor Ryan Cohen is building a sizeable stake in the retailer. The report, which cites people familiar with the matter, also said Cohen will push for changes to Nordstrom’s board following a sharp stock price drop.
Clorox — The cleaning products producer saw its shares rise 3.55% before the bell on the back of strong quarterly numbers. Clorox posted fiscal second quarter earnings of 98 cents per share, excluding items, on revenue of $1.72 billion. That compares to earnings of 65 cents per share on revenue of $1.66 billion estimated by analysts, according to Refinitiv.
— CNBC’s Fred Imbert, Carmen Reinicke, Sarah Min and Yun Li contributed reporting

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Nordstrom shares are zooming higher after a report said GameStop Chairman Ryan Cohen bought a stake in the department store chain.
The Wall Street Journal said Cohen is focusing on former Bed Bath & Beyond CEO Mark Tritton, who is a Nordstrom board member.
The news came weeks after Nordstrom reported lackluster holiday sales and cut its full-year guidance.

Shoppers exit Nordstrom at the King of Prussia Mall on December 11, 2022 in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania.
Mark Makela | Getty Images

Shares of Nordstrom surged Friday morning following news that activist investor and meme stock maven Ryan Cohen bought a stake in the high-end department store company.
The stock was up about 30% in premarket trading.

The Wall Street Journal, citing people familiar with the matter, reported Thursday evening that Cohen was in the process of acquiring a “sizable stake” in Nordstrom while looking to shake up its board. The Journal said Cohen is now one of Nordstrom’s top five nonfamily shareholders.
Nordstrom, for its part, said it was open to hearing Cohen out.
“While Mr. Cohen hasn’t sought any discussions with us in several years, we are open to hearing his views, as we do with all Nordstrom shareholders,” the company said in a statement. “We will continue to take actions that we believe are in the best interests of the company and our shareholders.”
The news about Cohen comes weeks after Nordstrom, which has had to dramatically mark down prices to ease an inventory glut, reported lackluster holiday sales and slashed its guidance for the year. The company is set to report earnings March 2.
Cohen, who founded pet retail and health site Chewy, is considered a champion of the meme stock crowd. He is the chairman of Reddit favorite GameStop. He also triggered a brief rally in Bed Bath & Beyond last year before he ultimately dumped out of the stock. Bed Bath is expected to file for bankruptcy protection any day now.

Cohen appears to be taking aim once again at Mark Tritton, the former Target executive who was forced out as Bed Bath CEO last year as Cohen’s firm pressured the struggling home goods retailer. Tritton has been on Nordstrom’s board for nearly three years, after having previously worked for the company from 2009 to 2016.
According to the Journal, Cohen thinks Tritton, because of his prior experience working at the company shouldn’t be deciding on compensation for Nordstrom family members who are also executives at the retailer. Erik Nordstrom is the company’s CEO, while Peter Nordstrom serves as its president.
–CNBC’s Kerry Caufield contributed to this report.

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CEO Jim Farley wants Ford to become a far more efficient company, and he needs it to happen quickly.
“We have to change our cost profile,” Farley told CNBC. “We know what we have to go after.”
The Detroit automaker missed analyst expectations by a wide margin due to another quarter in which costs and supply chain issues hurt the bottom line.

Ford CEO Jim Farley is frustrated.
The company’s fourth-quarter earnings on Thursday missed analyst expectations by a wide margin, as costs and supply chain issues again hurt Ford’s bottom line, Farley knows his company needs to change.

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“We have to change our cost profile,” Farley told CNBC after a call with analysts to discuss the quarter’s results. “We know what we have to go after. I’d love to give you all the metrics and all the specific gaps we see. But you know, whether it’s absenteeism, the number of sequencing centers, the number of wiring harnesses we have, we know what it is.” 
In short, Farley wants Ford to become a far more efficient company, and he needs it to happen quickly.
The push to transform Ford is taking on greater urgency after the automaker reported 2022 adjusted earnings of $10.4 billion, just three months after the company told analysts it expected to make $11.5 billion to $12.5 billion in that year. 
How did Ford fall more than a billion dollars shy of hitting a profit target it gave Wall Street at the end of October?  
Blame it on poor execution and higher-than-expected costs. Last quarter, Ford said, overcoming supply chain challenges, including a shortage of semiconductor chips, increased costs by $1 billion more than planned. Ford production was 100,000 vehicles shy of what the automaker expected to build.

Ford workers produce the electric F-150 Lightning pickup on Dec. 13, 2022, at the automaker’s Ford Rouge Electric Vehicle Center.
Michael Wayland | CNBC

Supply chain and cost issues hurt Ford over the last two years. Last September, Ford warned third-quarter costs would be $1 billion greater than expected. For the last two years, high warranty costs — from recalls and troubled launches of new vehicles — were a problem that Farley and his team have been unable to fix.
Farley said Ford’s complexity is part of the problem.
“We have a lot of complexity relative to the customer and also inside our company. And we can cut the customer-facing complexity like we have, but it takes time to work that down to parts on the line, to the manufacturing line,” he said. “It just takes time to work through that and that’s what we’ll do.”
While discussing the fourth-quarter results with Wall Street analysts, Ford’s leadership declined to detail the specific steps it will take to cut costs and make the automaker more efficient and profitable.  
Farley said the answer is not simply cutting jobs, which has historically been the way automakers have cut costs. “There are things we could do in the short term, but I don’t want to just make the output the cuts without redesigning the work. This has to be sustainable and that’s how we’re thinking about it nowadays,” he said.
Will this new push to cut costs hurt Ford’s growth in production and sales of electric vehicles? Farley said no. 
In fact, he said he believes separating the EV and internal combustion engine vehicle operations into two distinct divisions will actually accelerate efforts to drive greater efficiency. To prove his point, Farley says Ford’s second generation of EVs will be radically simplified, which should eventually lead to fewer problems and higher margins. 
“I can’t wait to show you and the whole world this next cycle of products,” he said. “Many of our competitors are just coming out with their first cycle and we can see their batteries are too big. Their distribution costs are too expensive. They’re spending too much money on advertising. You know, we can’t do that. We don’t plan on doing that.”

A Ford Mustang Mach-E GT at the 2022 New York International Auto Show in New York in April that year.
Jeenah Moon | Bloomberg | Getty Images

When Farley became CEO of Ford in October 2020, he vowed to quickly drive the automaker into a new leg of growth led by electric models like the Mustang Mach-E, the E-Transit commercial van and the F-150 Lightning. 
And in many ways, he has succeeded. Ford is No. 2 in EV sales in the United States, with just under 8% market share. 
While it’s not close to catching up with Tesla, which sells two out of every three EVs in the U.S., Ford’s EV production is increasing rapidly. At the end of last year, Ford was building 12,000 EVs a month. By the end of 2023, Ford expects EV production will reach 50,000 a month. 
Still, for all of its accomplishments transitioning to EVs, Ford continues to face issues with internal combustion engine vehicles, which are responsible for almost all of Ford’s profits.
Farley knows investors are watching and waiting for Ford to finally get its act together.
“Be patient. You know, we got the right team. We got the right plan. We’re growing like heck in our pro and EV business,” Farley said when asked what he would say to Ford shareholders. “This key team is going to deliver for you and you are going to get a great return on your investment.”
— CNBC’s Meghan Reeder contributed to this report.

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While there’s a buzz about hydrogen and its use as a tool in securing a low-carbon future, the vast majority of its production is still based on fossil fuels.
Today, an array of sources and systems of hydrogen production are being put forward as alternatives.
From blue to grey and green to pink, a host of colors are being used to classify these different methods of production.

Both pink and blue have been used to differentiate between different methods of hydrogen production.
Eve Livesey | Moment | Getty Images

From Tesla’s Elon Musk to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, the past few years have seen many high-profile names talk about the role hydrogen may — or may not — play in the planet’s shift to a more sustainable future.
Musk has expressed skepticism about hydrogen’s usefulness, but many think it could help to slash emissions in a number of sectors, including transportation and heavy industry.   

While there’s a major buzz about hydrogen and its importance as a tool in securing a low-carbon future — a topic that’s generated a lot of debate in recent months — the vast majority of its production is still based on fossil fuels.
Indeed, according to a Sept. 2022 tracking report from the International Energy Agency, low-emission hydrogen production in 2021 accounted for less than 1% of global hydrogen production.
If it’s to have any role in the planned energy transition, then hydrogen generation needs to change in a pretty big way.   

Read more about energy from CNBC Pro

“The first thing to say is that hydrogen doesn’t really exist naturally, so it has to be produced,” said Rachael Rothman, co-director of the Grantham Centre for Sustainable Futures at the University of Sheffield.
“It has a lot of potential to help us decarbonize going forwards, but we need to find low-carbon ways of producing it in the first place,” she said, adding that different methods of production had been “denoted different colors.”

“About 95% of our hydrogen today comes from steam methane reforming and has a large associated carbon footprint, and that’s what’s called ‘grey’ hydrogen,” Rothman told CNBC.
Grey hydrogen is, according to energy firm National Grid, “created from natural gas, or methane.” It says that the greenhouse gases associated with the process are not captured, hence the carbon footprint that Rothman refers to.
The dominance of such a method is clearly at odds with net-zero goals. As a result, an array of sources, systems and colors of hydrogen are now being put forward as alternatives.
These include green hydrogen, which refers to hydrogen produced using renewables and electrolysis, with an electric current splitting water into oxygen and hydrogen.
Blue hydrogen, on the other hand, indicates the use of natural gas — a fossil fuel — and carbon capture utilization and storage. There has been a charged debate around the role blue hydrogen could play in the decarbonization of society.

Pink potential

Alongside blue and green, another color attracting attention is pink. Like green hydrogen, its process incorporates electrolysis, but there’s a key difference: pink uses nuclear.
“If you split … water, you get hydrogen and oxygen,” Rothman said. “But splitting water takes energy, so what pink hydrogen is about is splitting water using energy that has come from nuclear.”
This means that “the whole system is low carbon, because … there’s no carbon in water … but also the energy source is also very low carbon because it’s nuclear.”
Alongside electrolysis, Rothman noted that nuclear could also be used with something called a thermochemical cycle.
This, she explained, harnessed very high temperatures to split water into oxygen and hydrogen. 

Pink hydrogen already has some potentially significant backers. These include EDF Energy, which has floated the idea of producing hydrogen at Sizewell C, a 3.2-gigawatt nuclear power station planned for the U.K.
“At Sizewell C, we are exploring how we can produce and use hydrogen in several ways,” the firm’s website says. “Firstly, it could help lower emissions during construction of the power station.”
“Secondly, once Sizewell C is operational, we hope to use some of the heat it generates (alongside electricity) to make hydrogen more efficiently,” it adds.
EDF Energy, which is part of the multinational EDF Group, said in a statement sent to CNBC: “Hydrogen produced from nuclear power can play a substantial role in the energy transition.”
The company also acknowledged there were challenges facing the sector and its development.
“Hydrogen is currently a relatively expensive fuel and so the key challenge for low carbon electrolytic hydrogen, whether produced from renewable or nuclear energy, is to bring down the costs of production,” it said.
This needed “supportive policies which encourage investment in early hydrogen production projects and encourage users to switch from fossil fuels to low carbon hydrogen.”
“Growing the market for low carbon hydrogen will deliver the economies of scale and “learning by doing” which will help to reduce the costs of production.”
While there is excitement about the role nuclear could play in hydrogen production and the wider energy transition — the IEA, for example, says nuclear power has “significant potential to contribute to power sector decarbonisation” — it goes without saying that it’s not favored by all.
Critics include Greenpeace. “Nuclear power is touted as a solution to our energy problems, but in reality it’s complex and hugely expensive to build,” the environmental organization says. “It also creates huge amounts of hazardous waste.”
A multi-colored future?
During her interview with CNBC, the University of Sheffield’s Rothman spoke about the bigger picture and the role different types of hydrogen might play. Could we ever see a time when the level of blue and grey hydrogen drops to zero?
“It depends how long a timeframe you’re looking at,” she said, adding that “in an ideal world, they will eventually drop very low.”
“Ultimately, we ideally get rid of all of our grey hydrogen, because grey hydrogen has a large carbon footprint and we need to get rid of it,” Rothman said.
“As we improve carbon capture and storage, there may be a space for blue hydrogen and that’s yet to be evaluated, depending on the … developments there.”
“The pink and green we know there has to be a space for because that’s where you really get the low carbon [hydrogen], and we know it should be, it’s possible to get there.”
Fiona Rayment, chief scientist at the UK National Nuclear Laboratory — which, like EDF Energy, is a member of trade association Hydrogen UK — pressed home the importance of having a range of options available in the years ahead.
“The challenge of net zero cannot be underestimated; we will need to embrace all sources of low carbon hydrogen generation to replace our reliance on fossil fuels,” she told CNBC.

While there has been a lot of talk about using colors to differentiate the various methods of hydrogen production, there is also a lively discussion about whether such a classification system should even exist at all.
“What we want is low carbon hydrogen,” Rothman said. “And I know there is a lot of confusion about the various colors, and I’ve heard some people say … ‘why do we even have the colors, why do we not just have hydrogen and low carbon hydrogen?'”
“And ultimately, it’s the low carbon bit that’s important, and both pink and green would do that.” More

Hong Kong’s new global promotional campaign will “kickstart” the city’s reopening to international travelers, the Hong Kong Tourism Board told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Asia” on Friday. 
The “Hello Hong Kong” campaign, which was launched on Thursday, includes 500,000 free air tickets over the next six months starting in March.

Hong Kong’s new global promotional campaign will “kickstart” the city’s reopening to international travelers, the Hong Kong Tourism Board told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Asia” on Friday. 
As part of the “Hello Hong Kong” campaign, which was launched on Thursday, 500,000 air tickets will be given away over the next six months, starting in March.

The tickets will be given out through three Hong Kong’s carriers — Cathay Pacific, HK Express and Hong Kong Airlines. 

The free tickets are part of the HK$2 billion ($255 milion) relief package that the government offered to airlines in 2020, during the height of the pandemic.
The Hong Kong Tourism Board is also investing a minimum of HK$100 million in the promotion of the campaign’s initial phase, it said at the launch ceremony.
But Hong Kong still faces a “dilemma” — its infrastructure has some catching up to do to accommodate the increase in visitors, said Dane Cheng, the tourism board’s executive director.
“I think this dilemma, we have actually been seeing from other markets and destinations when they started to reopen in the last year or so. It’s difficult to catch up … particularly for the airlines, the airports and even hotels,” he told CNBC. 

“[But] you want to kickstart and … tell the world in a clear message that Hong Kong and then mainland — we have finally reopened.”

How the tickets are allocated

The ticket giveaway will be phased: It will start with Southeast Asian markets, followed by mainland China and North Asia, and lastly, other parts of the world. 
Some 80,000 tickets have also been reserved for Hong Kong residents which authorities aim to give out in the summer.
The number of tickets for each region was based on “traffic shares” and visitor numbers from before the pandemic, said Cheng.
Fred Lam, the CEO of Hong Kong’s airport authority, also expects the free tickets to have multiplying effects on the number of visitors.

“We hope those who received the tickets will bring 2-3 more friends and family with them [to Hong Kong],” according to CNBC’s translations of Lam’s comments at the campaign launch ceremony.
“Even though we are only giving out 500,000 air tickets, we believe it will bring in more than 1.5 million incoming tourists,” Lam added. That’s about 10% of the total number of visitors expected during the campaign period.
As for how visitors can get their hands on these free tickets, it will depend on “local market regulations and customs,” he said.
“[That] could include large-scale lucky draws, giving it out through a first-come-first serve basis, offering buy-on-get-one free tickets, or through game participations,” Lam said.

‘Very clearly reopened’ 

On Friday, China said cross-border travel with Hong Kong and Macao would fully resume from Feb. 6, scrapping mandatory pre-departure tests and lifting arrival quotas, according to a Reuters report.
“I think it’s very clear that the Hong Kong government and also our mainland central government has been very prudent and they [made] it very clear that everything wants to be resumed in an orderly and progressive manner,” said Cheng. 
He added that before the pandemic, Hong Kong had “over 25 million overnight visitors” each year, and it will take the city time to “get back” those numbers.

Return of MICE events in Hong Kong 

Cheng said the past two to three years were “difficult” for Hong Kong’s MICE (meetings, incentives, conferences & exhibitions) industry, which brought in more than 1.6 million overseas visitors in 2019, before the pandemic. 
“The last year or so, other countries and cities and destinations have started opening up and of course we have some wonderful events that have been in Hong Kong for years,” said Cheng. 
“Anchor events [were] moving out and they say sorry, ‘We’re going to other places in Southeast Asia, Middle East,’ or some just basically postpone or defer.”
However, he said the city is now “confident” and “looking forward to receiving visitors” again.
That can be seen through its “Hello Hong Kong” campaign, which has a 2023 lineup of more than 250 events and festivals — including the Hong Kong Marathon, the Clockenflap music festival and Hong Kong Rugby Sevens. 
There are also more than 100 international MICE events planned for the year, said the city’s tourism board.  More

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CNBC’s Jim Cramer gave young investors a list of stocks he believes should be on their shopping lists.
Cramer explained that junior growth stocks are smaller, faster-growing companies that could become huge in the future.

CNBC’s Jim Cramer on Wednesday gave young investors a list of stocks he believes should be on their shopping lists.
“If you’re a younger investor, you need to take some risk in your portfolio — that’s how you have a chance to generate gigantic returns. I recommend betting on long-term stories that can eventually give you big wins as long as you’re patient,” he said.

Cramer explained that junior growth stocks are smaller, faster-growing companies that could become huge in the future. “Four or five years ago, Tesla was just a wee bit junior growth stock. Well, there’s nothing junior anymore about the stock.”
He added that these stocks are particularly attractive investments for investors still in their 20s, since they have time to correct potential mistakes and to invest in stocks that could take a while to blow up.
Here are the three junior growth stocks Cramer recommends:

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While Etsy’s stock valuation got a bit “excessive” during the height of the Covid pandemic, its underlying business remains solid, according to Cramer. 

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He said that the continued strong demand for travel will help lift Airbnb’s earnings.

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“I think Dutch Bros. is a fantastic long-term holding as long as you can get it now, less than $40,” he said.

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