China’s leaders have ambitious plans for the country’s economy, spanning one, five and even 15 years. In order to fulfil their goals, they know they will have to drum up prodigious amounts of manpower, materials and technology. But there is one vital input China’s leaders have recently struggled to procure: confidence. More
It is safe to say that neither Kamala Harris nor Donald Trump will win November’s presidential election by pledging fiscal prudence. The deficit and debt are afterthoughts for most Americans these days. And proposals from both candidates for cleaning up the country’s finances are fundamentally unserious. Mr Trump has talked about using cryptocurrency or drilling for oil in order to pay off the national debt—ideas that amount to utter nonsense. Although Ms Harris has vowed to reduce the deficit, she has declined to offer any substantive plan for doing so. More
The hotly anticipated comeback of a 1990s British legend sold out fast. Fans took to social media to complain. “Poor effort and a load of hype,” wrote one. “What a shitshow,” added another. “Anyone else loving the chaos?” asked an amused onlooker. To celebrate its 30th birthday, St. John, a restaurant that pioneered modern British cooking, brought back its menu from 1994, along with prices from 1994. As punters rushed to take advantage, tables were booked up in seconds—leaving most empty-handed. More
Microsoft’s generative artificial intelligence prospects are impressive. But the stock has more to offer investors than just the new tech. Jim Cramer said Microsoft shares could bottom Wednesday — and out of all the megacap tech stocks, this Club name is the one to buy. Microsoft closed at a record high of $467 on July 5. But then, almost immediately, it began to slide. It got no help from its July 30 earnings report and made a recent bottom in the Aug. 5 market plunge. The stock’s subsequent recovery stalled out late last month and turned lower once again. Exacerbated by Tuesday’s tech wreck, shares on Wednesday were back to where they were around on Aug. 2 at $408 each. MSFT YTD mountain Microsoft YTD Wells Fargo is more aligned with Jim, pointing out three “underappreciated levers” — search, cybersecurity, and enterprise software — that could add to Microsoft’s overall revenue growth. The analysts added the stock to their “Signature Picks” list — keeping a buy-equivalent overweight rating and a price target of $515. The Club has a price target of $500 on the stock. Microsoft’s search engine Bing could grab more share in the search market from Alphabet , Wells Fargo said in a research note Wednesday, citing last month’s antitrust case loss regarding exclusivity deals with device makers like Apple. If Google Search is no longer the iPhone’s default search engine, then more business could come to Microsoft. To be sure, search is small at Microsoft compared to Alphabet. Google Search has about 88% market share in the U.S., versus just over 7% for Bing, according to web data provider StatCounter. The numbers worldwide are even more lopsided in Google’s favor. Wells Fargo also highlighted Microsoft’s cybersecurity business. “Microsoft has quietly become the largest cybersecurity vendor on the planet, continuing to take share in adjacent areas,” the analysts wrote. Similar to others in the sector, Microsoft’s cybersecurity business can continue to rake in major corporations as clients as the threat of hacks and breaches remains elevated. Microsoft did take some heat when July’s CrowdStrike upgrade caused a major global IT outage . In 2023, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said the company’s cybersecurity business had surpassed $20 billion in revenue over a 12-month period. Microsoft’s customer relationship software suite, dubbed Dynamics, could see more upside as well, Wells Fargo said. The analysts see “significant cross-sell potential.” That’s because the company already has a massive customer base from its cloud computing business Azure and productivity apps included in Office. Bottom line These three underappreciated areas are encouraging, even though Microsoft’s generative AI efforts are still crucial to the Club’s investment thesis. While Azure revenue missed expectations last quarter, we still expect a pick-up in the back half of the year, given management’s bullish commentary around its outlook. Wall Street firms seem to agree with us. In addition to Wells Fargo’s bullishness, Piper Sandler added Microsoft to its high-conviction buy list on Wednesday due to these AI tailwinds. (Jim Cramer’s Charitable Trust is long MSFT, GOOGL, AAPL, NVDA. See here for a full list of the stocks.) As a subscriber to the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer, you will receive a trade alert before Jim makes a trade. Jim waits 45 minutes after sending a trade alert before buying or selling a stock in his charitable trust’s portfolio. If Jim has talked about a stock on CNBC TV, he waits 72 hours after issuing the trade alert before executing the trade. THE ABOVE INVESTING CLUB INFORMATION IS SUBJECT TO OUR TERMS AND CONDITIONS AND PRIVACY POLICY , TOGETHER WITH OUR DISCLAIMER . NO FIDUCIARY OBLIGATION OR DUTY EXISTS, OR IS CREATED, BY VIRTUE OF YOUR RECEIPT OF ANY INFORMATION PROVIDED IN CONNECTION WITH THE INVESTING CLUB. NO SPECIFIC OUTCOME OR PROFIT IS GUARANTEED.
Executive Chairman and CEO of Microsoft Corporation Satya Nadella speaks during the “Microsoft Build: AI Day” event in Bangkok, Thailand, May 1, 2024.
Chalinee Thirasupa | Reuters
Microsoft’s generative artificial intelligence prospects are impressive. But the stock has more to offer investors than just the new tech. More
Molson Coors plans to cut supplier diversity quotas and DEI-based training programs, and sever ties with the Corporate Equality Index of the LGBTQ+ advocacy group Human Rights Campaign.
The brewer’s decision comes after a wave of retailers over the summer took a step back in their DEI efforts.
Corporate DEI practices saw a major increase in 2020, but have been struggling in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn affirmative action in colleges.
Coors beer is displayed on a store shelf on February 13, 2024 in San Rafael, California.
Justin Sullivan | Getty Images
Molson Coors is the latest addition to a growing list of companies reversing their diversity, equity and inclusion policies.
In an internal memo sent Wednesday and obtained by CNBC, Molson Coors executives said the company will be getting rid of supplier diversity quotas, adding that they can be “complicated and influenced by factors outside of [the company’s] control.”
But the brewer has said it will continue to make sure its suppliers are representative of the company’s diverse consumer base.
“We are ensuring our executive incentives are tied to business performance and do not include aspirational representation goals beginning next year,” company executives wrote in the memo.
Molson Coors also said it is developing “the next evolution” of its company trainings, which will focus on key business objectives instead of its previously DEI-based training programs that the company said all current U.S. employees have already participated in.
Molson Coors will rebrand its Employee Resource Groups as Business Resource Groups, while seemingly maintaining the existing function of the groups, and will cease participation in any voluntary “best of” third-party company rankings in the U.S., which includes the Human Rights Campaign’s Corporate Equality Index that ranks companies based on corporate equality measures for LGBTQ+ individuals. The brewer had scored a perfect 100 points previously.
“This will not impact the benefits we provide our employees, nor will it change or diminish our commitment to fostering a strong culture where every one of our employees knows they are welcome at our bar,” the company said.
Molson Coors will also ensure all corporate charitable giving programs are focused on supporting “core business goals” such as alcohol responsibility, disaster relief efforts and promoting access to higher education. The company had raised more than $700,000 nationally for LGBTQ+-focused organizations through its “Tap Into Change” program since 2011 and sponsored Pride festivals.
Although conservative activist Robby Starbuck characterized the moves as preemptive changes in response to his probe into the company’s DEI practices one week ago, Molson Coors says in its memo that the decision “has been in process since March.”
Molson Coors’ decision comes after a wave of retailers over the summer took a step back in their DEI efforts.
Rural retailer Tractor Supply started the trend when it severed ties with the LGBTQ+ advocacy group Human Rights Campaign and retired previous DEI targets like boosting the number of employees of color at the managerial level. Companies like Harley-Davidson and Lowe’s followed suit. Most recently, Ford executives highlighted plans to slash supplier diversity quotas and cut the company’s relationship with the HRC’s metric.
Corporate DEI practices received renewed interest in the wake of the murder of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020, but have struggled in the aftermath of the Supreme Court decision to overturn affirmative action in colleges. Although the reversal of affirmative action concerns academic institutions and has no legal bearing on corporate initiatives, companies are concerned that the growing anti-DEI sentiment will bleed into corporate America.
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The domestic summer box office secured $3.6 billion in ticket sales, a 10% drop from the same period in 2023, but a markedly better outcome than anyone in the industry was expecting.
Entering into the summer movie season, the domestic box office was down 22% from the previous year and lacking the traditional kick-off of a Marvel Cinematic Universe flick.
The unlikely duo of “Inside Out 2” and “Deadpool & Wolverine” from Disney boosted ticket sales for the summer period.
Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman star in Marvel’s “Deadpool & Wolverine.”
Box office analysts and cinema owners braced themselves a few months ago for the possibility that the summer movie season could be the worst showing in a decade.
Thanks to some anthropomorphic emotions and a bad-mouthed, fourth-wall breaking antihero, the domestic summer box office scraped together $3.6 billion in ticket sales. While that’s a 10% drop from the same period in 2023, it’s a markedly better outcome than anyone in the industry was expecting.
“In the wake of the $4 billion ‘Barbenheimer’-powered summer of 2023, expectations heading into May were tempered as the industry braced for what would certainly be a more modest summer revenue result for 2024,” said Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst at Comscore.
Summer box office tallies
2024 — $3.6 billion
2023 — $4 billion
2022 — $3.4 billion
2021 — $1.7 billion
2020 — $176.2 million
2019 — $4.3 billion
2018 — $4.4 billion
2017 — $3.8 billion
2016 — $4.4 billion
2015 — $4.4 billion
2014 — $4 billion
2013 — $4.7 billion*
2012 — $4.2 billion
* Record summer box office revenue
Source: Comscore
Entering into the summer movie season, which starts the first weekend in May and runs through Labor Day, the domestic box office was down 22% from the previous year and lacking the traditional kick-off of a Marvel Cinematic Universe flick.
In fact, it was the first time since 2009 that the summer box office didn’t have a blockbuster superhero film to start the season — and it showed.
Disney and Marvel Studios have consistently launched this highly lucrative moviegoing season over the last two decades. In fact, only two films in the Marvel franchise that released at the beginning of summer have generated less than $100 million on opening weekend — not including pandemic years.
This year, the headline film for the first summer weekend was Universal’s “The Fall Guy.” And despite strong marketing efforts and solid reviews, the movie failed to drum up ticket sales. The film tallied less than $28 million during its domestic debut and stalled out shy of $100 million during its domestic run.
Warner Bros. and George Miller’s “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga” also spun out. The high-octane action flick snared just $67 million during its domestic run.
Meanwhile, Disney’s “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes” overperformed expectations, tallying $171 million during its run.
But it wasn’t until mid-June that the box office got a proper surge of moviegoers. Disney and Pixar’s “Inside Out 2” smashed records and marked the return of the beleaguered animation studio. Through Labor Day, the film was the highest-grossing summer movie with $650 million in box office receipts.
“Thankfully May gloom turned into a much needed June boom, as a string of box office overachievers set off a chain reaction that carried forward all the way into August,” Dergarabedian said.
The summer got another boost from “Deadpool & Wolverine,” which arrived in late July. The third installment in the Deadpool franchise, and the first for Disney’s MCU, sliced through records for an R-rated film, tallying north of $600 million domestically through the holiday weekend.
Universal and Illumination’s “Despicable Me 4,” Universal’s “Twisters” and Sony’s “Bad Boys: Ride or Die” also made large contributions to the summer box office alongside breakout hits like Disney’s “Alien Romulus,” Sony’s “It Ends With Us” and Paramount’s “A Quiet Place: Day One.” The 15th anniversary re-release of “Coraline” by Fathom also padded the total with $31 million in ticket sales.
These titles also contributed to the more than $900 million in ticket sales accrued during the month of August, marking the highest August haul since 2016.
Box office analysts foresee the summer’s momentum carrying over into the fall, ultimately bolstering the overall third-quarter box office results.
“Our confidence in a better than projected 3Q result is bolstered by a solid September lineup of releases including ‘Beetlejuice Beetlejuice’ (now tracking towards a reported $80mn+ opening weekend), horror title ‘Speak No Evil,’ and animated features ‘Transformers One’ (tracking for a $40mn+ opening) and ‘The Wild Robot,'” Eric Handler, an analyst at Roth MKM, wrote in a research note published Tuesday. “If September finishes up low double digits from last year, the quarter would end being down low single digits.”
It’s unclear if the full-year box office will reach 2023 levels — last year’s dual labor strikes, which disrupted production, continue to weigh heavily on the cinema slate — but there are plenty of appealing titles arriving in theaters in the coming months.
“There may not be a pound-for-pound juggernaut on the scale of ‘Inside Out 2’ or ‘Deadpool & Wolverine,’ but the aggregate of sequels from appealing franchises like Beetlejuice, Transformers, Joker, Smile, and Venom offer plenty of reason for moviegoers, theaters, and studios to be excited about the next two months,” said Shawn Robbins, founder and owner of Box Office Theory.
Disclosure: Comcast is the parent company of NBCUniversal and CNBC. More
Ken Griffin, founder and CEO of Citadel, speaks at the Milken Global Conference 2024 at The Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, California, on May 6, 2024.
David Swanson | Reuters
Billionaire investor Ken Griffin’s suite of hedge funds at Citadel eked out small gains in what proved a volatile month in August as markets grappled with an emerging growth scare.
Citadel’s multistrategy Wellington fund gained about 1% in August, bringing its year-to-date return to 9.9%, according to a person familiar with the returns, who spoke anonymously because the performance numbers are private. All five strategies used in the flagship fund — commodities, equities, fixed income, credit and quantitative — were positive for the month, the person said.
The Miami-based firm’s tactical trading fund rose 1.5% last month and is up 14.5% on the year. Its equities fund, which uses a long/short strategy, edged up 0.8%, pushing its 2024 returns to 9.3%.
Citadel declined to comment. The hedge fund complex had about $63 billion in assets under management as of Aug. 1.
Volatility made a strong comeback in August as fears of a recession were rekindled by a weak July jobs report. On Aug. 5, the S&P 500 dropped 3%, its worst day since September 2022. Still, the market quickly bounced back, with the equity benchmark ending August up 2.3%. The S&P 500 is now ahead more than 15% in 2024.
Overall, the hedge fund community recently moved into a defensive mode as macroeconomic uncertainty mounted. Hedge funds on net sold global equities for a seventh straight week recently, driven by sales of communication services plus financial and consumer staples stocks, according to Goldman Sachs’ prime brokerage data. More
Tune in to CNBC all day on Sept. 5 for coverage of the Official 2024 NFL Team Valuations
Most major sports media rights deals are locked up for the immediate future, making it difficult to determine how the ongoing shake-up across media companies will affect valuations.
The NFL can opt out of its current media rights deal, which is valued at $111 billion over 11 years, with all of its media partners, except Disney, after the 2028-2029 season.
The NFL will likely wait to see how turmoil in the media industry — from consolidation to the dwindling of the pay TV bundle — alters company balance sheets before determining if it’ll opt out of its current deal.
A view of a ESPN cameraman during the game between the Jacksonville Jaguars and the Cincinnati Bengals on December 4, 2023 at EverBank Stadium in Jacksonville, Fl.
David Rosenblum | Icon Sportswire | Getty Images
In 2021, the National Football League signed an 11-year, $111 billion media rights deal. In July, the National Basketball Association signed an 11-year, $77 billion deal of its own.
What’s next? Well, not much all that soon.
While Ultimate Fighting Championship and Formula 1 have deals expiring in 2025, the vast majority of major college and professional sports have recently signed long-term media rights deals with U.S. TV networks and streamers.
Welcome to the sports media rights doldrums. Or, the calm before the storm.
The NFL can opt out of its current deal with all of its media partners — except Disney, which has a slightly different deal structure — after the 2028-29 season. By that time, driven by the pace of change among the largest media companies, the entire landscape could be significantly different than it is today, dramatically altering how much revenue leagues generate and who is paying.
“Anyone telling you with any degree of certainty the NFL is going to opt out or not is bananas,” said Daniel Cohen, executive vice president of global media rights consulting at Octagon. “There’s so much you can’t predict even two years out, never mind six.”
The NFL’s opt-out decision, while years away, is the next potential tectonic shift that will influence the balance of power in media. It’s possible the NFL could choose to end deals with longtime Sunday afternoon media providers such as Fox and Paramount Global’s CBS in favor of streamers, such as Apple, Amazon, Google’s YouTube or even Netflix.
It will also be a significant driver of future NFL team valuations. On Thursday, CNBC will reveal its Official 2024 NFL Team Valuations list, ranking all 32 professional franchises.
Media’s transformation
Given the current state of media, with Paramount Global agreeing to merge with Skydance Media by mid-2025, Warner Bros. Discovery actively looking for partners to build scale and share the cost of content, and Netflix jumping into live sports with its acquisition of Christmas Day NFL games, the potential bidders for games in four to five years could be dramatically different than today. That will determine how much of an increase the NFL may get on its next rights deal.
“There probably will be companies that don’t exist today that will merge to create new competitive bidders,” said former CBS Sports President Neal Pilson, who founded sports media consulting firm Pilson Communications. “Other deals, like the NBA, are a data point, but the NFL is its own marketplace. The programming is the honey. It’s all driven by the popularity of the NFL.”
Another determination of how much sports media rights deals will escalate in the future will be the state of the dwindling pay TV bundle. There have been 4 million pay TV customer losses this year to date, “a mindboggling total for just six months,” according to a recent MoffettNathanson report.
Live sports has long been the glue holding the bundle together, and a majority of viewership still comes from traditional TV versus streaming.
The economics of the bundle — still a cash cow for content providers like Disney and Comcast’s NBCUniversal — have driven rights increases for decades. Meanwhile, streaming has yet to turn a profit for most media companies.
Traditionally, the reach of broadcast networks, particularly in rural areas that still don’t have consistent high-speed internet, has caused the NFL to value Fox, Disney, NBCUniversal and CBS — all of which own broadcast networks. Most NFL games air on national broadcasters.
The NBA has also replaced its partnership with Warner Bros. Discovery, which doesn’t own a broadcast network, with NBCUniversal, which does.
But four years from now, it’s possible the ongoing shift to streaming, combined with Big Tech’s deeper pockets, will convince the NFL to view broadcasting as anachronistic rather than essential.
On the other hand, if streamers become the sole distributors of sports, they’ll have all the market power, which could stifle valuations.
“If you put all your eggs in the streaming parties’ baskets, and if legacy media is hobbled to the point they can’t pay for media rights anymore, then you’re giving streamers a lot of market power,” said Shirin Malkani, co-chair of the sports industry group at Perkins Coie.
Rights locked up
Bank of America recently put together a chart of recent media rights deals and their estimated values. Some of the numbers are slightly different than reported figures.
The National Hockey League’s deal with its media partners lasts through the 2027-28 season.
Major League Baseball’s deal is up in 2028 — and will likely be shaped more by the expiration of the players’ collective bargaining agreement in 2026 than the state of the media industry. Still, the vastly changing regional sports business, on top of the traditional TV landscape, could make MLB a litmus test for the rights deals that follow.
The PGA Tour’s media deal runs through 2030. NBCUniversal owns the Winter Olympics until 2030 and the Summer Olympics until 2032. NASCAR signed a contract late last year with media carriers until 2031. ESPN locked up the College Football Playoffs until 2031. Apple inked a deal for Major League Soccer until 2032.
The long-term nature of these deals has given the current media ecosystem some certainty. That’s a benefit for the leagues, media companies and pay TV providers, who all rely on the consistency of cash flow.
“My advice to clients is that if you’re in a deal that feels fair right now, or that is analytically fair to good, don’t go searching for something great,” said Octagon’s Cohen, who represents several professional sports leagues in their media deals. “Things will keep evolving over the next six years, so it’s best to hold onto a good deal.”
Disclosure: Comcast’s NBCUniversal is the parent company of CNBC.
Tune in: CNBC reveals the Official 2024 NFL Team Valuations Thursday, Sept. 5 on air and online. More
