WHEN ADNAN SABIC began looking for a home in 2023, he was shocked. The hotel executive, whose wife had just given birth to twins, could not believe how mortgage rates had rocketed. Then he found a four-bedroom house listed for $775,000 with a nice selling point. Rather than borrow at 6% and pay $4,500 a month, Mr Sabic could “assume” the seller’s mortgage, at 2.6%, and pay just $3,100. More
A TRILLION DOLLARS. That number may keep Scott Bessent, America’s treasury secretary, up at night. Next year his government’s net interest payments will break the 13-figure mark. The combination of a bulging deficit, now worth 7% of GDP, and the sharp increase in government-bond yields over the past four years makes America’s budgetary mathematics increasingly ugly. More
A TRILLION DOLLARS. That number may keep Scott Bessent, America’s treasury secretary, up at night. Next year his government’s net interest payments will break the 13-figure mark. The combination of a bulging deficit, now worth 7% of GDP, and the sharp increase in government-bond yields over the past four years makes America’s budgetary mathematics increasingly ugly. More
America’s import duties just keep rising. On August 1st levies on more than 20 countries, plus the European Union, will take effect unless they negotiate deals in the meantime. On July 14th President Donald Trump said that he would impose “secondary tariffs” of 100% on countries doing business with Russia, should it fail to reach a peace agreement with Ukraine in 50 days. Such threats should be taken with a heavy pinch of salt: Mr Trump has form for backing down if markets become turbulent. But the trend is clear. America’s average effective tariff rate has already risen to 17%, from 2.5% last year. More
Goldman Sachs on Wednesday posted results that topped expectations as its trading operations generated $840 million more in revenue than analysts had expected.
The bank said that second-quarter profit jumped 22% from a year earlier to $3.72 billion, or $10.91 per share.
Revenue climbed 15% to $14.58 billion, roughly $1.1 billion more than the estimate.
Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon speaks during the Goldman Sachs Investor Day at Goldman Sachs Headquarters in New York City, U.S., February 28, 2023.
Brendan Mcdermid | Reuters
Goldman Sachs on Wednesday posted results that topped expectations as its trading operations generated $840 million more in revenue than analysts had expected.
Here’s what the company reported:
Earnings: $10.91 per share vs. $9.53 per share expected, according to LSEG
Revenue: $14.58 billion vs. $13.47 billion expected
The bank said that second-quarter profit jumped 22% from a year earlier to $3.72 billion, or $10.91 per share. Revenue climbed 15% to $14.58 billion, roughly $1.1 billion more than the estimate.
Trading desks across Wall Street have benefited this year as President Donald Trump’s tariff policies have roiled markets for bonds, currencies, commodities and stocks. Goldman Sachs, which relies more on Wall Street activities than its peers, is known to have outsized returns during boom times.
Most of the quarter’s revenue beat came from equities trading, which generated $4.3 billion in revenue, a 36% jump from a year earlier and $650 million more than analysts surveyed by StreetAccount expected.
The bank thrived in its role as both a middleman in the equities world, connecting buyers and sellers of stocks, as well as a lender to institutional investors.
Fixed income trading revenue rose 9% to $3.47 billion on higher financing fees and more activity in currency and credit markets, topping the StreetAccount estimate by $190 million.
Investment banking activity in the quarter exceeded expectations at rivals including JPMorgan Chase thanks to a sharp rebound in asset values from April lows.
Goldman said that investment banking fees jumped 26% from a year earlier to $2.19 billion as more advisory deals closed; that haul is $290 million more than the StreetAccount estimate.
The bank’s asset and wealth management division was the sole disappointment in the quarter. It generated $3.78 billion in revenue, 3% lower than a year earlier and $100 million below the StreetAccount estimate. The decline came from lower gains in private equity stakes and debt investments, Goldman said.
Finally, the firm’s smallest division, its platform solutions arm, saw revenue rise 2% to $685 million, topping the StreetAccount estimate by about $12 million.
Shares of the bank have climbed 23% this year before Wednesday.
On Tuesday, JPMorgan, Citigroup and Wells Fargo each posted results that topped analysts’ expectations for earnings and revenue. On Wednesday, Morgan Stanley reported similarly strong trading results and Bank of America became the sole major U.S. bank to fall short of revenue expectations for the period. More
In an industry that’s long been run by storied Hollywood executives, those with backgrounds in finance and deal-making are increasingly reshaping the landscape.
The most recent example came last month when Warner Bros. Discovery announced its intention to split into two public companies next year.
“It is probably a sign that these businesses are in perpetual decline and the only way to survive is to financial engineer your way towards any sort of modest growth, or just less decline than would be otherwise typical,” said Brandon Nispel, an analyst at KeyBanc.
Warner Bros. Discovery Chief Financial Officer Gunnar Wiedenfels walks to a session at the Allen & Company Sun Valley Conference on July 9, 2025 in Sun Valley, Idaho.
Kevin Dietsch | Getty Images
Legacy media is in a time of tumult. And it’s bringing a new crop of decision-makers to the fore.
In an industry that’s long been run by storied Hollywood executives, usually with resumes in content and programming, those with finance backgrounds and track records of deal-making are increasingly reshaping the landscape.
Many of those leaders — some of whom recently attended Allen & Co.’s annual conference in Sun Valley, Idaho, known as “summer camp for billionaires” — will be featured on conference calls in the coming weeks as the media industry reports quarterly earnings. Netflix will kick off media’s earnings season on Thursday.
Industry analysts and experts say the elevation of these previously lesser-heard-from media executives comes as the industry shifts its focus to stemming the cable TV bleed, making streaming profitable and reining in content spending budgets. It’s also a signal that these companies are in a moment of transformation, and there’s a need to enlist leaders who have a different mindset than the old guard.
“It is probably a sign that these businesses are in perpetual decline and the only way to survive is to financial engineer your way towards any sort of modest growth, or just less decline than would be otherwise typical,” said Brandon Nispel, an analyst at KeyBanc.
The most recent example came last month when Warner Bros. Discovery announced its intention to split into two public companies next year. Current CEO David Zaslav will run the streaming and studios company, while CFO Gunnar Wiedenfels will step into the top job at the global networks business.
Before serving as WBD’s finance chief, Wiedenfels held the same post at Discovery prior to its merger with Warner Media in 2022. And before that, he was CFO at German media company ProSiebenSat.1 Media SE.
His past contrasts with the typical legacy media CEOs such as Disney chief Bob Iger, who held various entertainment roles before taking the top job, including at ABC Entertainment where he was in charge of green-lighting TV series. Iger’s predecessor, Michael Eisner, had a foundation that included stints across top media companies. Media mogul Barry Diller rose through the ranks of entertainment — from the mailroom at the William Morris Agency to eventually top roles at Paramount and Fox.
Even Wiedenfels’ counterpart, Zaslav, was on the TV programming side for much of his career prior to taking over as CEO.
This trend toward finance and operation leaders has been propelled by Netflix’s upheaval of the media industry, said Jonathan Miller, chief executive of Integrated Media, which specializes in digital media investments. Miller is a longtime senior media industry executive who’s held top posts at News Corp. and AOL. He is also a former board member at Hulu.
As Netflix courted consumers to its streaming platform, it “just outspent everybody” to bulk up its library, said Miller.
“In my view, that diminished the role of creative programmers who most typically would have been the ones to run this kind of company,” said Miller. “Managing the money is now at least as important, if not more, than the creative side. I’m not sure if that should be true, but I think that’s where we are in the industry.”
Strategic shift
Greg Peters, Co-CEO of Netflix, speaks at a keynote on the future of entertainment at Mobile World Congress 2023.
Joan Cros | Nurphoto | Getty Images
In 2023, industry disruptor Netflix stepped outside the box when it promoted Greg Peters, previously the company’s COO, as co-CEO with Ted Sarandos after Reed Hastings announced he would step back.
While Sarandos has long been in charge of content, Peters had focused on growing the business beyond DVDs and into streaming, expanding partnerships and growing the international footprint — all key to the media giant’s growth.
In Hastings’ note announcing the leadership change, he called Peters’ track record “instrumental in driving our partnerships, building and launching advertising, pushing us into deeper personalization, rebuilding our talent organization and helping to strength our culture.”
Bringing an executive like Peters to the forefront of decision-making and leadership proved to be another sign of Netflix’s disruptive nature — both internally and industrywide.
Hastings had long been against instituting an advertising model that would offer a cheaper option for subscribers, and the company had ignored password sharing among its customers for years. But when subscriber growth stalled the company shifted gears, and it has proven fruitful, as evidenced by both company growth across revenue, profitability and subscriber base. In response, Netflix’s stock has soared.
“Ted is the content guy there, right? He just lives for film and TV and the art of that. I think Netflix is one of the few places that the co-CEO framework seems to work,” said UBS analyst John Hodulik. “It lets Ted do what he loves doing, and content is key to the growth of that business. While Greg, he seems to be more of the nuts and bolts business background.”
There’s also the promotion of Mike Cavanagh to president of Comcast in 2022 after previously serving as CFO of the cable giant since 2015. Cavanagh’s remit expanded months later when Jeff Shell exited his CEO role at Comcast’s NBCUniversal, and Cavanagh took over direct leadership of the company’s TV, film and theme parks units.
Under Cavanagh’s leadership, NBCUniversal has made a variety of strategic moves. Soon after he assumed leadership of NBCUniversal, the unit was restructured. About a year later at Sun Valley, Cavanagh began laying the groundwork for NBCUniversal to spin out most of its cable TV networks.
Comcast CEO Brian Roberts has publicly said the cable spinout, one of Comcast’s most significant moves in years, was Cavanagh’s idea.
Cavanagh, who was previously co-CEO of JPMorgan’s corporate and investment bank, is frequently put forth by industry insiders as the heir apparent to Comcast’s lead role, and his oversight of NBCUniversal gives him the chance to embed in the sports and entertainment side of the business after much focus on the cable and broadband parent company.
(L-R) Michael Cavanagh, then-chief financial officer of Comcast, talks with Brian Roberts, chief executive officer of Comcast, as they arrive for the annual Allen & Company Sun Valley Conference, July 9, 2019 in Sun Valley, Idaho.
Drew Angerer | Getty Images
A shift toward financial expertise has been true in cable and broadband as well. Charter Communications’ current leader, Chris Winfrey, took on the CEO job after serving as CFO and COO under longtime cable executive Tom Rutledge. Since taking over, Winfrey has orchestrated various changes at the company, most recently the proposed acquisition of Cox Communications.
It’s even extended to the restaurant industry in recent months, where CFOs have been tapped for the CEO role at companies such as Panera Brands, Jack In The Box and most recently, Yum! Brands.
And it could play a role in the selection of Disney’s successor to CEO Iger.
The Disney board has been narrowing down potential successors to Iger, with an announcement expected next year. Disney’s four chairs — Disney Entertainment Co-Chairs Dana Walden and Alan Bergman, Disney Experiences Chairman Josh D’Amaro and ESPN Chairman Jimmy Pitaro — have been interviewed for the top job.
Walden’s deep history in entertainment programming puts her in a favorable position, but CNBC earlier reported that criticism of her business acumen could affect her chances, despite her overseeing the streaming unit when it reached profitability. CFO Hugh Johnston has been speculated to be part of the conversation, but he’s not part of the formal succession planning, said a person familiar with the matter who declined to be named speaking about internal matters.
Still, it’s very much undecided who will be the next CEO of Disney and the process is in early stages, said the person. Iger’s contract was extended through the end of 2026, giving the board more time for the due diligence process, CNBC previously reported.
A Disney representative declined to comment.
— CNBC’s Amelia Lucas and Alex Sherman contributed to this article.
Disclosure: Comcast is the parent company of CNBC. Versant would be the parent company of CNBC under the proposed cable spinout. Comcast is a part owner of Hulu. More
Bank of America profit climbed about 3% from a year earlier to $7.12 billion, or 89 cents per share.
Revenue climbed about 4% to $26.61 billion, below analysts’ expectations.
CEO Brian Moynihan pointed to the larger trends at his bank, saying that it was the fourth consecutive quarter that NII rose amid rising deposits and loan growth.
Brian Moynihan, CEO of Bank of America, leaves the U.S. Capitol after a meeting with Republican members of the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee on the issue of debanking on Thursday, February 13, 2025.
Tom Williams | Cq-roll Call, Inc. | Getty Images
Bank of America on Wednesday posted mixed results for the second quarter, beating estimates on earnings and missing on revenue.
It was the only major U.S. bank to fall short on revenue for the quarter.
Here’s what the company reported:
Earnings: 89 cents per share vs. 86 cents per share expected by LSEG
Revenue: $26.61 billion vs. expected $26.72 billion
The company said profit climbed about 3% from a year earlier to $7.12 billion, or 89 cents per share, topping the 86 cent estimate.
Revenue climbed about 4% to $26.61 billion, below analysts’ expectations, as the firm generated $14.82 billion in net interest income, missing the StreetAccount estimate by $70 million.
The company said that NII, which is the difference in what a bank pays its depositors and what it earns from loans and investments, rose about 7% in the quarter as deposit and loan growth were offset by lower interest rates compared to a year ago.
CEO Brian Moynihan pointed to the larger trends at his bank, saying that it was the fourth consecutive quarter that NII rose amid rising deposits and loan growth. Big American banks have benefited from strong trading results and consumer credit that has held up in the first six months of the year.
“Consumers remained resilient, with healthy spending and asset quality, and commercial borrower utilization rates rose,” Moynihan said in the earnings release. “In addition, we saw good momentum in our markets businesses.”
The firm’s fixed income operations posted $3.25 billion in revenue, exceeding the $3.14 billion StreetAccount estimate, while equities trading revenue of $2.13 billion was just below expectations.
The firm said investment banking fees fell 9% to $1.4 billion, though that was still higher than the $1.27 billion StreetAccount estimate.
Shares of the bank have climbed roughly 5% this year before Wednesday.
On Tuesday, JPMorgan, Citigroup and Wells Fargo each posted results that topped analysts’ expectations for earnings and revenue. Later Wednesday, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley both reported results that beat on the top and bottom lines, boosted by strong trading revenue. More
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang’s Beijing trip this week coincided with news that the company expects the U.S. will let it resume sales of an AI chip to China.
Huang walked into the sunny courtyard of the Mandarin Oriental hotel about 15 minutes earlier than scheduled and took multiple questions from reporters.
Here’s what he said about export controls, Huawei and the China market.
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang speaks to journalists as he arrives for a press conference at a hotel in Beijing on July 16, 2025.
Adek Berry | Afp | Getty Images
BEIJING — Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang was all smiles and compliments as he made his third trip to China in just about half a year.
As the leader and co-founder of the world’s first, newly-minted $4 trillion market cap company, Huang had particular reasons to be happy when he met the press on Wednesday: Nvidia expected it would be able to resume sales of its less advanced H20 artificial intelligence chips to China after a three-month pause.
“Many of my competitors are my friends,” he noted.
Huang said his understanding was that allowing Nvidia chips into China was part of an exchange with the U.S. for Beijing to release critically needed rare earths. CNBC has reached out to the White House for comment.
Wearing his iconic black leather jacket, Huang walked into the sunny courtyard of the Mandarin Oriental hotel about 15 minutes earlier than scheduled and took multiple questions in the nearly 90-degree Fahrenheit weather.
“Only in China can we do this out in the sun!” he said.
Then he realized the press conference was supposed to be held inside an air-conditioned room.
“What are we doing out here? Why didn’t somebody say so?” he said.
He was swarmed by local reporters asking for signatures of books and T-shirts. “Who needs an autograph? I’ll do it while I’m listening.”
Here are the highlights of what he said over 90 minutes:
Whom he met
Huang said he had a “wonderful meeting” with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng, and clarified that the discussions did not include China’s restrictions on battery technology or rare earths.
Earlier in the week, he met with Xiaomi founder and CEO Lei Jun, whom he labelled as “a brilliant business person.” He said the two discussed artificial intelligence for large language models, autonomous driving and robotics.
Xiaomi uses Nvidia’s automotive chips in its electric cars.
Huang said he told U.S. President Donald Trump about his planned voyage to China during a meeting with the White House leader last week to celebrate Nvidia’s $4 trillion market cap.
“[Trump] said, ‘Have a great trip,'” Huang said.
Export controls
Nvidia on Tuesday said it expected to resume its H20 chip shipments to China soon following assurances from the U.S. government. The company was forced to halt such sales in April due to new U.S. requirements at the time.
“In terms of the H20 ban and the lifting of the ban, it was completely in control of the U.S. government and China government. The discussion has nothing to do with me,” Huang said, rejecting the idea that he had played a part in changing Trump’s mind.
“It’s my job to inform the president about what I know very well, which is the technology industry, artificial Intelligence, the developments of AI around the world,” he said.
Huang emphasized Nvidia complies with the final policy decision and that tariffs are just something the company has to “adapt to.”
What’s next for Nvidia in China
U.S. chip restrictions nearly halved Nvidia’s market share in China, Huang said in May. Due to the U.S. export controls on China, the company said it missed out on $2.5 billion in sales during the April quarter and will likely take another $8 billion hit in the July quarter, pegging its sales at $45 billion over the period.
The U.S. effectively banned Nvidia from selling its most advanced chips to China back in 2022.
“I hope to get more advanced chips into China than the H20,” Huang said in response to a CNBC question, “and the reason for that is because technology is always moving on. It’s not like wood.”
He stressed that, years from now, there will be better and better technology available, adding, “I think it’s sensible that whatever we’re allowed to sell in China will continue to get better and better over time as well.”
But Huang would not give a definitive answer about how many orders Nvidia had received, or when the company would restart local sales of its chips — which he acknowledged were not the company’s best, but which could still train AI models.
He said the U.S. government was still processing the licenses for Nvidia to sell the chips to China, and that the company would need to restart its supply chain — a process he indicated could possibly take nine months.
Huawei
Huang also discussed the outlook for competing Chinese tech giant Huawei, which has been impacted by U.S. sanctions that precede the export controls on Nvidia.
“Anyone who discounts Huawei and anyone who discounts China’s manufacturing capability is deeply naïve,” Huang said, pointing also to how Huawei has “excellent chip design” and their own connected cloud system.
“They can go to market all by themselves.”
Underpinning Huawei’s AI model capabilities is an entire tech system that doesn’t rely on any of Nvidia’s chips or tools. Instead, Huawei has developed its own Ascend chips, which works with the company’s “CANN” system that acts as an alternative to Nvidia’s CUDA. It has also built an AI-specific cloud computing system called CloudMatrix that launched last year.
Asked about indications that Huawei’s AI chip systems are still challenging for many developers to switch over to, Huang said, “That’s just a matter of time.”
He said “the important thing to realize I’ve been doing this for 30 years, they’ve been doing it for a few, and so the fact they’re already on the dance floor tells you something about how formidable they are.”
China’s AI
Huang rained down praise on Chinese AI models, as he had during a speech Wednesday morning at the opening ceremony of the high-profile supply chain expo in Beijing.
“The Chinese models, DeepSeek, Qwen, Kimi, are excellent,” he said, referring to the breakthrough from a Chinese startup, Alibaba’s model and another one from an Alibaba-backed startup Moonshot.
“I think over time it will be increasingly less important which one of the models are the smartest,” he said. “It’s going to be which one of the models are the most useful.”
China-developed DeepSeek shocked global investors in January with the release of an AI model that undercut OpenAI on development and operating costs. It’s not clear how DeepSeek managed to develop the model under broad U.S. chip restrictions on China, but the startup’s parent, High-Flyer, reportedly stockpiled Nvidia chips.
One aspect that Huang said he particularly appreciated about Chinese AI models was that they are open source, making them available for people to download for free and use on their own computers.
He said many companies in many countries downloaded DeepSeek R1 — “99%” of people — to use it locally for healthcare, robotics, imaging and other applications.
As Huang was about to end the press conference, a reporter asked whether he would come back to China again this year.
“I hope so. You have to invite me.” More
