Raphael Stevens

Hycroft Mining Holding saw big spikes in its stock price and trading volume in the days leading up to the announcement that movie theater chain AMC Entertainment had agreed to purchase a major stake in the company.
Two weeks prior to Tuesday’s announcement, on March 1, the 90-day average trading volume of Hycroft shares was around 355,000 according to CNBC analysis of FactSet data.
The day before AMC’s announcement, 58.6 million shares exchanged hands and the 90-day average was 10.5 million.

View of the huge Gold and Silver Allied Nevada-Hycroft Mine near Sulphur in Black Rock Desert, Nevada, near the small towns of Sulphur and Gerlach.
Federica Grassi | Moment | Getty Images

Hycroft Mining Holding, a small mining firm with a troubled financial history, saw big spikes in its stock price and trading volume in the days before Tuesday’s announcement that movie theater chain AMC Entertainment had agreed to purchase a major stake in the company.
Trading volume in Hycroft averaged hundreds of thousands of shares in the lead-up to March. Then, millions of shares in the company started to change hands daily. On Friday, days before the AMC announcement, trading volume in Hycroft exceeded 340 million shares – over five times the amount of shares it has outstanding.

The company’s share price also surged from just over 30 cents a week ago to nearly $1.40 the day before the announcement. There was no news about the company during that period.
Shares of Hycroft closed up about 9% Tuesday to $1.52 per share.
Adam Aron, the CEO of AMC, cited legal advice and Hycroft’s volume when he explained why he canceled a live interview with CNBC’s Jim Cramer and David Faber on Tuesday morning. “I am excited about our investment in HYMC, but there has been so much volume in that stock today, lawyers insisted I stay off air,” Aron tweeted.
None of the parties involved have been accused of illegal or unethical activity.

Breaking down trade in Hycroft

On March 1, the 90-day average trading volume of Hycroft shares was around 355,000, according to CNBC analysis of FactSet data. That average would grow dramatically over the next two weeks.

On March 4, the trading volume began to spike. More than 3.7 million shares exchanged hands on that day, pushing the 90-day average to more than 400,000 shares.
On March 7, the trading volume jumped to 6.2 million shares. Then it hit 202.7 million the next day. With that, the 90-day average became 2.8 million shares.
Forty-six million shares of Hycroft changed hands on March 9. The next two days saw extreme increases in volume: 220 million shares were bought and sold on March 10, and 341.4 million were traded on March 11.
By the close on March 11, the 90-average was 9.9 million. Then, on Monday, the day before AMC’s announcement, 58.6 million shares exchanged hands, and the 90-day average was 10.5 million.

Between March 4 and March 15, the daily volume average was 144.9 million shares. Comparatively, from Feb 22 to March 3, a period that also includes eight trading days, the daily volume average was under 800,000 shares. Hycroft has over 60.4 million shares outstanding, according to FactSet.

Representatives from Mudrick Capital, a large shareholder in Hycroft, and AMC did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment. The Securities and Exchange Commission, which is the leading regulator of U.S. stock markets, declined to comment.
During the days leading up to AMC’s announcement, Hycroft’s share price went from around 33 cents on March 7 to $1.88 on March 11. On Monday, the day before the announcement, shares closed at $1.39.

AMC is spending $27.9 million in cash for the deal and will receive roughly 23.4 million shares in the company and an equal amount of stock warrants. The deal would make AMC the owner of roughly 22% of Hycroft.
The movie theater is purchasing these shares at around $1.19 a piece. Shares of Hycroft closed Monday at $1.39 each, up nearly 400% from the 52-week low of 28 cents seen on March 17, 2021. The stock neared this low on March 3, when shares traded at 29 cents a piece.
Early in the day Tuesday, shares jumped to $2.72 a piece, but settled around $1.60 during midday trading, up 15%.

Beyond the meme stock frenzy

Aron, the AMC CEO, was slated to appear on CNBC on Tuesday morning, but he canceled his interview, saying he wasn’t comfortable making public comments on the move due to volatility in Hycroft’s stock.
AMC declined to comment beyond what Aron said in the press release announcing the move, but Aron later tweeted to apologize to Cramer and Faber for canceling his appearance.
In addition to a press release, Aron used Twitter to announce the new investment and posted three photographs of him on Hycroft’s property. Many see AMC’s decision to buy up shares in a gold mining company as a way of reigniting fervor among retail investors. In recent months, shares of the movie theater chain have fallen below $15 per share, down from a 52-week high of $72.62.
Hycroft, meanwhile, said in November that it would likely need to raise additional cash to meet its financial obligations over the next year.
That same month, the company laid off more than half of its workers at its mine in western Nevada, ceasing mining operations there. At the time, the company said it would focus more on processing gold and silver sulfide ore, according to a report from the Elko Daily Free Press. Hycroft’s corporate offices are in Denver.
— CNBC’s Chris Hayes contributed to this story.

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General Motors announced Tuesday it will begin production next week on customer units of its EV crossover, called the Lyriq.
The Lyriq, starting at $59,990, is the first of a new lineup of electric cars and SUVs for the brand as it plans to exclusively make all-electric vehicles by 2030.
Rory Harvey, vice president of Cadillac, said it has seen “massive” interest in the Lyriq, citing more than 220,000 “hand raisers,” or people who have asked for additional information on the vehicle.

An undated handout photo shows the new Cadillac Lyriq, one of the electric vehicles that General Motors Co said on October 20, 2020, that its Spring Hill, Tennessee, factory will begin to produce.
General Motors Co. | Reuters

DETROIT — General Motors is gearing up to deliver Cadillac’s first electric vehicle to drivers, announcing Tuesday that it will begin production next week on customer units of its EV crossover, called the Lyriq.
Production will start as planned despite the coronavirus pandemic and the shortage of semiconductor chips that’s been causing sporadic plant shutdowns, according to Rory Harvey, vice president of Cadillac.

“Lyriq has been protected as we worked our way through it,” Harvey told reporters Tuesday, signaling how important the launch is to the company.
The Lyriq, starting at $59,990, is the first of a new lineup of electric cars and SUVs for the brand as it plans to exclusively make all-electric vehicles by 2030.

2023 Cadillac Lyriq

Production starts on Monday at a plant in Tennessee, and Harvey said he expects Lyriqs to begin arriving on dealer lots by May.
Cadillac unveiled the car in August 2020 as one of the first of GM’s next-generation Ultium EV architecture. The company has called the vehicle its new “technology spearhead” to take on Tesla and other legacy automakers that are releasing EVs.
Harvey said the company has seen “massive” interest in the Lyriq, citing more than 220,000 “hand raisers,” or people who have asked for additional information on the car. He declined to comment on how many reservations Cadillac has received.
“With the level of demand that we think that we’ve got for the Lyriq, we’re looking to increase capacity fairly significantly from where the previous plan of record was,” Harvey said.

The illuminated Cadillac crest on the Lyriq show car.

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Rocket builder Astra returned to flight with a successful orbital mission Tuesday, despite a momentary hiccup.
The company’s shares swung wildly during and following the launch.
After the rocket reached orbit, the company was unable to immediately confirm a successful deployment of the satellites.
Astra CEO Chris Kemp ultimately announced a successful mission, about an hour after liftoff.

A view from onboard the upper stage of rocket LV0009 during the company’s livestream on March 15, 2022.
Astra / NASASpaceflight

Rocket builder Astra returned to flight with a successful orbital mission Tuesday, despite a momentary hiccup. The company’s shares swung wildly during and after the launch.
Astra’s rocket LV0009, carrying three customers’ satellite payloads on a mission for launch services company Spaceflight, took off from Astra’s launchpad in Kodiak, Alaska.

After the rocket reached orbit, the company was unable to immediately confirm a successful deployment of the satellites, sending the stock down as much as much as 9% before Astra CEO Chris Kemp ultimately announced a successful mission, about an hour after liftoff.
“The payloads have started to communicate with ground stations. Our customers are calling us and indicating that satellites are alive – they’re talking, which means they’ve been successfully deployed. The flight was nominal,” Kemp said on the company’s webcast.
Astra stock traded with heavy volume after the mission, following a brief trading halt, with the stock repeatedly bouncing to ultimately finish the day slightly lower at $3.49 a share. The stock experienced trading volume more than triple its daily average, according to FactSet.

Astra’s LV0009 rocket lifts off from Kodiak, Alaska on Mar. 15, 2022.
Astra / NASASpaceflight

The company’s mission on Tuesday was its first attempt to return to flight since the mid-launch failure of its LV0008 rocket on Feb. 10. Astra’s investigation into the LV0008 mission found an electrical issue that prevented the rocket’s payload from fully deploying, and a separate software issue that caused the rocket’s upper stage, the section responsible for delivering satellites to orbit, to tumble.
Before launching Tuesday’s mission, Astra announced it implemented corrective actions to both the design of the rocket’s fairing as well as its software.

Astra’s vehicle stands 43 feet tall and would be considered a small rocket in the broader market. Astra’s goal is to launch as many of its small rockets as it can — aiming to hit a rate of one rocket per day by 2025 — and drop its $2.5 million price point even further.
The company went public last year after completing a SPAC merger, raising funds to build out production of its small rockets, expand its facilities in Alameda, California, and grow its spacecraft and spaceport business lines.
Astra’s valuation has been slashed over the past three months, with shares battered alongside other space growth stocks.

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The White House is urging Congress to pass $22.5 billion in Covid spending, warning that the U.S. is running out of money to fight the virus.
House Democrats last week stripped $15 billion in Covid funding from a broader spending bill after failing to reach a bipartisan agreement with Republicans.
The White House said the U.S. will not have enough money for booster shots, antiviral pills, monoclonal antibodies and robust testing if Congress fails to approve more funding.

A healthcare worker prepares a dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine at a vaccination clinic in the Peabody Institute Library in Peabody, Massachusetts, on Wednesday, Jan. 26, 2022.
Vanessa Leroy | Bloomberg | Getty Images

The White House on Tuesday warned the U.S. won’t have enough booster shots and lifesaving Covid treatments for Americans if Congress fails to pass $22.5 billion in additional pandemic funding.
Senior Biden administration officials, on a call with reporters, said the U.S. could face another wave of Covid infections in the coming months, even as new cases and hospitalizations have dramatically declined from the peak of the unprecedented omicron surge in January. Infections are already on the rise again in major European nations, such as the U.K. and Germany. China is battling its worst outbreak since 2020.

The officials warned the funding is urgently needed to get ahead of another Covid wave. House Democrats last week stripped $15 billion in coronavirus funding, which was already less than Biden requested, from a broader spending bill after failing to reach a bipartisan agreement with Republicans. The GOP has insisted that Congress offset new Covid money by cutting funds for state and local governments allocated for the spring, a demand many Democrats were unwilling to accept.
The senior administration officials told reporters the federal government will not be able to purchase enough booster shots, vaccines that target specific variants or more antiviral pills beyond the 20 million already on order from Pfizer if more funding isn’t approved.
There is also no more funding for additional monoclonal antibody treatments, including an order planned for March 25, the officials said. If more funding doesn’t come through, the federal government will have to cut state allocations of monoclonal antibodies by more than 30% starting next week, they said.

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The federal government will also not be able to maintain sufficient Covid testing capacity beyond June in the event of another surge, the officials said. During the omicron wave, there was a run on at-home tests and in-person clinics, resulting in hourslong lines and empty pharmacy shelves.
Uninsured people will also no longer have coverage for Covid testing and treatments, according to the White House. The fund that covers them will stop accepting new claims a week from now, forcing health-care providers to either absorb the costs or turn patients away, the officials said. The fund will completely end in early April and the uninsured will no longer have coverage for vaccinations, they said.

Some investments made in surveillance of new Covid variants will also have to be wound down, the officials said, leaving the U.S. without the capabilities it needs to stay on top of how the virus is evolving. The emergence of the highly mutated omicron variant blindsided the U.S. and much of the world in November.
The White House said the money is also needed to fund the development of a vaccine that covers a range of Covid variants, and support the administration’s efforts to help increase the vaccination rate in developing nations. Without the money, the risk will rise that new variants will emerge, the officials said. Omicron emerged in South Africa and Botswana, and the delta variant was first identified in India.
 — CNBC’s Ylan Mui contributed to this report.

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Retail sales are expected to grow between 6% and 8% in 2022, as consumers spend more on services instead of goods and cope with inflation, the National Retail Federation said on Tuesday.
That annual forecast represents a slower pace of growth for retailers than 2021, but it’s higher than the pre-pandemic growth rate.
The trade group delivered its outlook as inflation and the Russian invasion of Ukraine send food and gas prices higher and raise questions about whether shoppers will pull back on spending

Miami, Florida, Brickell City Centre shopping mall with Apple Store, Chanel and escalators.
Jeff Greenberg | Universal Images Group | Getty Images

Retail sales in the U.S. are expected to grow between 6% and 8% this year, as Americans shift more of their spending to restaurants and trips and cope with sticker shock at the grocery store and gas station, the National Retail Federation said on Tuesday.
That would total between $4.86 trillion and $4.95 trillion in retail sales, the trade group said, with some of the sales gains coming from inflation-fueled prices. Those sales numbers exclude automobile dealers, gas and restaurants.

“Consumers do want to spend and do have the ability to spend, but we expect there will be a shift back to services from goods,” the group’s chief economist Jack Kleinhenz said at NRF’s virtual event.
The NRF delivered its annual outlook as inflation and the Russian invasion of Ukraine send food and gas prices higher and raise questions about whether shoppers will pull back. Retailers are also starting to lap challenging comparisons. A year ago, Americans were receiving stimulus checks from the government and putting those extra dollars toward purchases.
The NRF’s forecast is significantly slower than the 14% annual growth rate in 2021, which was the highest in more than 20 years. Yet the group’s 2022 outlook is above the 10-year, pre-pandemic growth rate of 3.7%.
Kleinhenz said he does not expect inflation to cool until 2023, but said the retail industry should benefit from declining unemployment and increasing wages. He said longer lasting inflation, additional waves of Covid and an escalating crisis in Ukraine could jeopardize the forecast, however.
“Given the recent geopolitical disruptions, we will likely see some resetting of the world economy and these ripples will make their way to the United States,” he said.

In recent weeks, retail leaders from Walmart, Target and Macy’s reported strong holiday-quarter earnings and said customers are still opening up their wallets rather than trading down to smaller packs, private labels and other budget-friendly alternatives. Yet all three companies said value is top of mind.
Walmart CFO Brett Biggs told CNBC in an interview last month that the company’s own studies show customers are paying attention to inflation. Macy’s CFO Adrian Mitchell said last week at an investor conference that the department store is thinking about how best to market itself to lower-income families who may feel squeezed by larger grocery bills.
Retail sales numbers bear that out, too. Sales rose 3.8% in January on a monthly basis, or 13% on a year-over-year basis, according to the Commerce Department. Inflation accounts for some of that increase, as it pushes up prices of food, fuel, cars and more.
Ellen Zentner, chief U.S. economist of Morgan Stanley, said the first quarter is tracking ahead of expectations, but the bank recently cut its full-year forecast as energy prices spike.
She said budget-strapped families are already feeling the pinch.
“The burden on lower-income households has basically quadrupled in terms of what they were spending to fill up their gas tanks last year,” she said at the NRF event.
Joel Prakken, chief U.S. economist and co-head of U.S. economics for IHS Markit, said at the event that the firm’s outlook on the economy and consumer spending is more pessimistic than Morgan Stanley and NRF. He said it anticipates record gas prices and elevated food prices, as the war in Ukraine disrupts the wheat harvest and spring plantings and fertilizer costs spike.
Prior to the Russian invasion, he said retailers had a lot working in their favor: Strong employment growth. Rising wages, especially among low-income earners. And families who socked away money in savings accounts during the pandemic.
“Right now, a lot of that has to be thrown aside to contemplate what’s been happening in Eastern Europe,” he said.

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Volvo Cars and Starbucks are partnering on a pilot program to research the usage and potential scalability of electric vehicle chargers at the coffee giant’s stores nationwide.
Volvo will install as many as 60 Volvo-branded, ChargePoint DC fast chargers at up to 15 Starbucks locations along a 1,350-mile route from the Denver area to the coffee company’s Seattle headquarters.
Charging infrastructure is viewed as a major hurdle to EV adoption.

Volvo will install as many as 60 Volvo-branded, ChargePoint DC fast chargers at up to 15 Starbucks locations along a 1,350-mile route from the Denver area to the coffee company’s Seattle headquarters.

DETROIT – Volvo Cars and Starbucks are partnering on a pilot program to research the usage and potential scalability of electric vehicle chargers at the coffee giant’s stores nationwide, the companies announced Tuesday.
As part of the pilot, Volvo will install as many as 60 Volvo-branded, ChargePoint DC fast chargers at up to 15 Starbucks locations along a 1,350-mile route from the Denver area to the coffee company’s Seattle headquarters.

Volvo and Starbucks will monitor stations closely and assess usage by electric vehicle owners to determine potential expansion of the program, according to a representative for the companies.
Charging infrastructure is viewed as a major hurdle to EV adoption, prompting automotive and charging companies to launch partnerships to study use cases and install chargers across the U.S.

Volvo and Starbucks plan to establish a charging location about every 100 miles, well within the battery range of most electric vehicles. Installation of the chargers is scheduled this summer and is expected to be completed by the end of this year, the companies said.
The Volvo-branded chargers will be open to all EV owners with a ChargePoint account. Volvo owners can access the stations at no charge or at preferential rates, according to a press release.
The announcement comes a day before Starbucks’ annual meeting that is expected to highlight its sustainability efforts, among other things. Separately, the coffee chain on Tuesday also unveiled the latest steps it’s taking to reduce its disposable cup usage.

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More than 80 House Democrats this week called on President Joe Biden to restart negotiations over his delayed social spending bill and push forward critical climate change funding.
The letter comes several months after the House passed more than $500 billion in climate change investments as part of the president’s Build Back Better Act.
Since then, the legislation has stalled in the Senate and talks between the White House and some key senators have essentially stopped.

U.S. President Joe Biden speaks during an event at Germanna Community College February 10, 2022 in Culpeper. Virginia.
Win McNamee | Getty Images

More than 80 House Democrats this week called on President Joe Biden to restart negotiations over his delayed social spending bill and push forward funding for promoting clean energy and fighting climate change.
The letter comes several months after the House passed more than $500 billion in climate change investments as part of the president’s Build Back Better Act. Since then, the legislation has stalled in the Senate and talks between the White House and some key senators have essentially stopped.

The climate portion of the legislation would be the largest-ever federal investment in clean energy and would help the U.S. get about halfway to meeting Biden’s commitment to cut emissions in half by 2030, according to the nonpartisan analysis firm Rhodium Group.
The climate funding comes mainly through tax incentives for low-emissions energy sources. Provisions include tax credits that would speed up investments in renewable power and help expand the U.S. electric vehicle market.
“Throughout 2021, we bore witness to the devastating impacts of the climate crisis, further illustrating why transformational action cannot wait,” lawmakers wrote in a letter on Monday. “Inaction now will mean irreversible consequences for our future generations.”
“Given the widespread agreement in the U.S. Senate for House passed climate provisions, we have an opportunity to recommence negotiations with climate serving as a key starting point,” they wrote.

Rep. Sean Casten speaks during a rally about climate change issues near the U.S. Capitol on September 13, 2021 in Washington, DC.
Drew Angerer | Getty Images

Democratic Reps. Sean Casten of Illinois, Jamaal Bowman of New York and Nikema Williams of Georgia led the letter. Other signees include all the Democratic members of the Select Committee on the Climate Crisis, as well as members of the Energy and Commerce Committee and the Congressional Progressive Caucus.

Lawmakers cited a recent report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which warned that limiting global warming to close to 1.5 degrees Celsius will become impossible in the next two decades without immediate and major cuts in greenhouse gas emissions.
The letter did not mention Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., who helped sink the Build Back Better Act by opposing it in December. The Senate is split 50-50 between Democrats and Republicans, with Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris casting the deciding vote in any deadlock.
Every Senate Democrat would need to support the $1.75 trillion House-passed bill for it to reach the president’s desk and become law. Every Republican in Congress has opposed the plan, arguing it would exacerbate the worst inflation the U.S. has seen in decades.
Earlier this year, Biden said he will likely need to break up the plan but that he believes Congress can still pass parts of it. The president also said he thinks he can get enough support for the $555 billion in climate spending.

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