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McDonald’s second-quarter earnings topped estimates, but its revenue fell short of expectations.
Its net sales fell 3%, hurt in part by the closure of McDonald’s Russian and Ukrainian restaurants.
Global same-store sales rose 9.7% in the quarter, fueled by strong international growth.

A sign is posted in front of a McDonald’s restaurant on April 28, 2022 in San Leandro, California.
Justin Sullivan | Getty Images

McDonald’s on Tuesday said both higher prices and value items fueled U.S. same-store sales growth, which was higher than expected during its second quarter.
However, CEO Chris Kempczinski said the environment is still “challenging” as inflation and the war in Ukraine weighed on its quarterly results.

Shares of the company were roughly flat in premarket trading.
Here’s what the company reported compared with what Wall Street was expecting, based on a survey of analysts by Refinitiv:

Earnings per share: $2.55 adjusted vs. $2.47 expected
Revenue: $5.72 billion vs. $5.81 billion expected

McDonald’s reported second-quarter net income of $1.19 billion, or $1.60 per share, down from $2.22 billion, or $2.95 per share, a year earlier. The company reported a $1.2 billion charge related to the sale of its Russian business due to the war in Ukraine.
Excluding that charge, a French tax settlement and other items, the fast-food giant earned $2.55 cents per share.
Net sales fell 3% to $5.72 billion, hurt in part by the closure of McDonald’s Russian and Ukrainian restaurants.

Global same-store sales rose 9.7% in the quarter, fueled by strong international growth. Russian locations were excluded from the company’s same-store sales calculations, but Ukrainian restaurants were included.
U.S. same-store sales increased 3.7% in the quarter, topping StreetAccount estimates of 2.8%. The company credited strategic price hikes and its value offerings for its strong performance. Last quarter, McDonald’s executives said some low-income consumers were trading down to cheaper options in response to inflation.
The company’s international developmental licensed markets division saw its same-store sales climb 16% in the quarter. Same-store sales shrank in China as the government reimposed Covid restrictions, but growth in Brazil and Japan more than offset the market’s weak performance.
McDonald’s international operated markets segment reported same-store sales growth of 13%, fueled by strong demand in France and Germany.
Read the full earnings report here.

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General Motors reported second-quarter earnings that missed Wall Street’s estimates, after supply chain issues led it to ship fewer vehicles than expected.
GM also confirmed that it has secured the battery materials needed to build 1 million EVs a year by 2025.
The company maintained its previous earnings guidance for the full year, saying it expects to ramp up production in the second half.  

GM CEO Mary Barra talks with media prior to the start of the 2017 General Motors Company Annual Meeting of Stockholders Tuesday, June 6, 2017 at GM Global Headquarters in Detroit, Michigan.
Photo by John F. Martin for GM

General Motors reported second-quarter earnings Tuesday that missed Wall Street’s estimates after the company was unable to ship nearly 100,000 vehicles by quarter-end due to parts shortages.
But the company maintained its previous earnings guidance for the full year, saying it’s confident it will be able to ramp up production in the second half of 2022. It also confirmed it has locked in sufficient supplies of critical battery-related materials to support its mid-decade EV plans.

The company’s shares were down roughly 1% in premarket trading Tuesday.
Here are the key numbers, compared with Wall Street’s consensus expectations as compiled by Refinitiv.

Adjusted earnings per share: $1.14, versus $1.20 expected and $1.97 in the second quarter of 2021.
Revenue: $35.76 billion, versus $33.58 billion expected and $34.17 billion in the second quarter of 2021.
EBIT-adjusted: $2.34 billion, versus $4.12 billion in the second quarter of 2021.
EBIT-adjusted margin: 6.6%, versus 11.2% in the first quarter of 2022 and 12.0% in the second quarter of 2021.

CEO Mary Barra said in a statement that GM has “binding agreements” securing all of the battery-related raw materials it will need to build 1 million electric vehicles annually in North America by 2025, including “new multi-year agreements” announced Tuesday with Livent for lithium, and with longtime GM battery partner LG Chem for cathode material.  
Like other global automakers, GM has been working through supply chain disruptions for the last several quarters as Covid-19 outbreaks – and more recently, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – have forced factory shutdowns and wreaked havoc with logistics around the world.
Those disruptions have been felt at GM’s U.S. dealers, where inventories continue to be tight. The dealers have had just 10 to 15 days’ worth of inventory over the last year, including through the second quarter, the company said Tuesday. That’s much tighter than the 60 to 90 days’ worth that was typical before the Covid-19 pandemic.

But GM expects to get more vehicles to its dealers soon. The company told investors on July 1 that it had about 95,000 vehicles with missing components in its inventory. It confirmed on Tuesday that it expects to complete and ship those vehicles — many of them high-margin SUVs — over the next few months.
GM, like most automakers, books revenue when a completed vehicle is shipped to dealers, not before.
“We have been operating with lower volumes due to the semiconductor shortage for the past year, and we have delivered strong results despite those pressures,” Barra said. “There are concerns about economic conditions, to be sure. That’s why we are already taking proactive steps to manage costs and cash flows, including reducing discretionary spending and limiting hiring to critical needs and positions that support growth.
“We have also modeled many downturn scenarios and we are prepared to take deliberate action when and if necessary,” she said.
Barra said that GM is still confident that it will meet its previous guidance for the full year. The company expects net income of between $9.6 billion and $11.2 billion for 2022.
“This confidence comes from our expectation that GM global production and wholesale deliveries will be up sharply in the second half,” she said.
Correction: General Motors reported an EBIT-adjusted margin of 6.6% for the second quarter of 2022. An earlier version of this story misstated the number.

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Ferrari CEO Benedetto Vigna made his comments during an interview with CNBC’s Joumanna Bercetche.
The carmaker plans to launch a fully electric vehicle in 2025.
Internal combustion engines are still set to play a role in Ferrari’s future, however.

A Ferrari photographed in Switzerland on March 2, 2015. The Italian company plans to launch a fully electric vehicle in 2025.
Harold Cunningham | Getty Images News | Getty Images

The CEO of Ferrari on Tuesday moved to allay fears the firm’s upcoming electric offering will compromise on performance, telling CNBC the luxury carmaker had a “deep understanding” of vehicle dynamics.
In an interview with CNBC’s Joumanna Bercetche, Benedetto Vigna was asked about the weight of batteries used in an EV, and if an electric model would be able to preserve the feel, power and aerodynamics of a Ferrari.

“In terms of drive, in terms of … vehicle dynamics, we can manage this additional weight,” he said.
“It’s true, we have a few 100 kilos more than a regular ICE car for the same kind of horsepower, but what really … reassures me is the fact that we have [a] deep understanding of the vehicle dynamics.”
“Consider today, a lot of cars have, more or less, access to the same electronic chips,” Vigna said.
“But we in Ferrari … the engineers in Ferrari, are able to provide something that is unique, that is distinctive.”
“So it’s a challenge,” he went on to state, “but we see it as an opportunity … to continue to make something unique.”

Read more about electric vehicles from CNBC Pro

Ferrari plans to launch a fully electric car in 2025, although internal combustion engines are still set to play a significant role in its future.
The company has said ICEs will have a 40% share in its “product offering” by the year 2026, with hybrid and fully electric vehicles making up 60%. By 2030, it wants ICEs to make up 20% of its offering, with hybrid and fully electric vehicles each having a 40% share.
On its plans for EVs, Ferrari says its battery cells are to be assembled in Maranello, Italy. “The handcrafted battery modules will be integrated into the chassis of cars in a process focused on reducing the weight of the vehicle,” it says.
Other luxury carmakers, such as Volkswagen-owned Bentley Motors and BMW’s Rolls-Royce Motor Cars, are also developing electrification strategies.
All of the above comes at a time when major European economies are laying out plans to move away from road-based vehicles that use diesel and gasoline.
The U.K. wants to stop the sale of new diesel and gasoline cars and vans by 2030, for example. It will require, from 2035, all new cars and vans to have zero-tailpipe emissions.
The European Union — which the U.K. left on Jan. 31, 2020 — is pursuing similar targets. More

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Many would think the scorching heat of the past few days would represent the ultimate sweet spot for solar photovoltaic systems. But it’s more complex than that.
Solar power is not alone in being affected by the rising temperatures Europe has experienced.
Last week saw temperatures in the U.K. surge, with highs of over 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) recorded for the first time ever.

This image, from May 2022, shows solar panels in Worcestershire, England. The recent hot weather in the U.K. has led to a discussion about the optimum conditions for solar power.
Mike Kemp | In Pictures | Getty Images

Last week saw temperatures in the U.K. surge, with highs of over 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) recorded for the first time ever.
The news out of the U.K. — which experienced a number of significant weather-related disruptions — came as other parts of Europe grappled with a heatwave that caused fires, delays to travel, and death.

On July 20, Solar Energy UK, citing data from Sheffield Solar’s PV Live site, said the country’s solar power output had “met up to a quarter of the UK’s power demand.” The trade association added that, across 24 hours, solar had “provided an estimated 66.9 gigawatt-hours, or 8.6% of the UK’s power needs.”
Many would think the scorching heat of the past few days would represent the ultimate sweet spot for solar photovoltaic systems, which directly convert light from the sun into electricity.

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The reality is a bit more complex. According to Solar Energy UK, the U.K.’s solar capacity reaches an optimum level of output at temperatures measuring roughly 25C.
“For every degree either side of that, it is lowered by about only 0.5%, though newer modules have improved performance,” it says.
In a statement, Alastair Buckley, who is professor of organic electronics at the University of Sheffield and leads Sheffield Solar, said this was “why we never see peak output in midsummer — peak national output is always in April and May when it’s cool and sunny.” Sheffield Solar is part of the university’s Grantham Centre for Sustainable Futures.

Buckley’s argument is borne out by the current record for solar generation in the U.K. It stands at 9.89 GW and was reached on April 22, 2021, according to data from Sheffield Solar.
The temperatures of last week were far higher than 25C, but the overall effect was, it would seem, not too disruptive. A significant ramp up would be required for major issues to arise, according to Solar Energy UK.
It says panel temperatures are determined by a range of factors: what it calls “radiative heating from the sun,” ambient temperature and the cooling effects of wind. “Losing 20% efficiency, considered a significant amount, would require them to reach a huge 65°C.”

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There is clearly some breathing space for solar panels, then, but the prospect of hotter summer temperatures occurring on a more regular basis is something that does not seem to perturb Chris Hewett, the chief executive of Solar Energy UK.
“It’s marginally better for efficiency in the spring but essentially, if you have more light, you produce more solar power,” he said last week.
“You have to remember that solar panels work all over the world. The same technology we put on our roofs is used in solar farms in the Saudi Arabian desert.”
Solar power is not alone in being affected by the rising temperatures Europe has experienced.
Last week, it was reported that a nuclear power plant in Switzerland was lowering its output in order to prevent the river that cools it from hitting temperature levels dangerous to marine life.
On July 18, the Swiss Broadcasting Corporation’s international unit, citing the country’s public broadcaster SRF, said the Beznau nuclear power plant had “temporarily scaled back operations” to stop the temperature of the River Aare from rising “to levels that are dangerous for fish.”
More broadly, a number of companies involved in renewables have highlighted how weather conditions can affect their output. Lower wind speeds, for example, can hit operations. More

There are grave concerns that the U.S. and other countries are not doing enough to contain monkeypox from becoming a large scale global outbreak, according to an infectious disease epidemiologist.
Over the weekend, the World Health Organization activated its highest alert level for the virus, labeling monkeypox a public health emergency of international concern.
“This is a unique outbreak where we know this virus, but it’s causing a very large outbreak in a number of countries around the world. In fact, if we look at case counts, United States is kind of trailing behind Spain in the number of cases,” Dr. Syra Madad, senior director of the special pathogens program at New York City Health + Hospitals, told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Asia” on Monday.

There are grave concerns that the U.S. and other countries are not doing enough to contain monkeypox from becoming a large scale global outbreak, according to an infectious disease epidemiologist.
Over the weekend, the World Health Organization activated its highest alert level for the virus, labeling monkeypox a public health emergency of international concern.

The rare designation means the WHO now views the outbreak as a significant enough threat to global health that a coordinated international response is needed to prevent the virus from potentially escalating into a pandemic. 
“This is a unique outbreak where we know this virus, but it’s causing a very large outbreak in a number of countries around the world. In fact, if we look at case counts, United States is kind of trailing behind Spain in the number of cases,” Dr. Syra Madad, senior director of the special pathogens program at New York City Health + Hospitals, told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Asia” on Monday.
“It’s not an outbreak to take lightly. What is a really big concern is that it becomes an established virus in the United States, as well as in other countries that this virus is not endemic to,” she added.
Madad said “it is really unacceptable,” especially in the wake of the Covid pandemic, for countries to be struggling to contain the spread of monkeypox.
“Having all the lessons learned with Covid-19, we should not be dealing with an outbreak of this scale and are not doing enough to ensure that this does not become endemic,” she added.

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Although the WHO declaration does not impose requirements on national governments, it serves as an urgent call for action.

Growing virus cases

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said monkeypox can spread through respiratory droplets after prolonged face-to-face interaction or intimate physical contact. The virus can also spread through contact with bodily fluids, skin lesions as well as contaminated items like bedsheets and clothing.
More than 16,000 cases of monkeypox have been reported across more than 70 countries so far this year, and the number of confirmed infections rose 77% from late June through early July, according to WHO data. 
Madad said while men who have sex with men are currently at highest risk of infection, the virus is starting to spread to a wider community.
“For example, in the United States, two children contracted monkeypox through household transmission of someone that has monkeypox. We know those cases may start to increase over a period of time as more transmissions happening in the community,” she said.
On Monday, the WHO warned against complacency in containing the outbreak, saying there is no guarantee that the virus will continue to spread within specific communities.
While cases have so far been concentrated primarily within gay and bisexual communities, the U.N. health agency said there is little evidence to suggest that the disease will remain confined to those groups.
Rather, their early detection could be a harbinger of a wider outbreak.

U.S. vaccine challenges

Madad said the best way to cut chains of transmission is to vaccinate people who are at risk and may have been exposed to monkeypox. She noted, however, access to vaccines is an issue, especially in the U.S.
On Friday, a senior White House official said President Joe Biden is considering declaring a public health emergency in response to the growing monkeypox outbreak. Dr. Ashish Jha, the White House Covid response coordinator, said the administration is looking at how a public health emergency declaration might bolster the U.S. response to the outbreak.
The U.S. has reported more than 2,500 monkeypox cases so far across 44 states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico, according to the CDC.
“The vaccines are continuing to be released to territories, cities and states. By the end of this year, we’re going to have about 1.6 million by the end of 2023 or mid-2023 — we’re going to  have millions of doses,” Madad said.
“But the problem here is that it’s just not happening enough,” she added as demand is currently outstripping supply. “We really need to get ahead of this epidemic.”
—  CNBC’s Spencer Kimball contributed to the report.

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It may seem paradoxical, but a trip to Europe may be a way to save money on travel this year.
Amid a global scramble to find ways to save money while traveling, hotel rates dropped in many European cities. Average airfares originating from the United States are also down, according to travel specialists.

Another boon for Americans? This month, the U.S. dollar hit parity with the euro for the first time in 20 years.
To put that into perspective, a three-night stay in a hotel in Paris that charges 250 euros a night would cost about $767 today, versus $841 in July 2019.

Cheaper flights

The average lowest airfare to Europe dropped 15.1% from last year, according to a year-over-year study by the online travel booking site CheapAir.com.
Based on a review of more than 24 million airfares this spring, flights to Europe from cities across the United States averaged $908 this year, down from an average of $1,070 in 2021, according to the study.
Travelers looking to find the cheapest flights to Italy can fly into Milan, where airfares dropped by more than 20%, according to the study. Flights to Venice (-17%) and Rome (-14%) also decreased, it said.

Flights to Europe’s most visited cities, such as London (-10%) and Paris (-9%), also fell, albeit to a lesser extent, while airfare to Dublin (-0.02%) remained largely unchanged, according to CheapAir.com.
According to the analysis, price drops occurred in flights originating from almost every major American city too. One exception was Boston, where airfare rose by 1.8% to $685 per ticket. Still, that makes Boston the second-cheapest U.S. city from which to fly to Europe. Only New York is less expensive, with average airfares to Europe this year costing $636 per ticket.
The drop in airfares to Europe seemed to catch the people behind the study off guard. They said they were “pleasantly surprised” by the results, which showed more cheap flights to Europe than they expected.
Travelers searching for low airfares to Europe can access CheapAir.com’s “2022 Summer Europe Flights Calendar,” which estimates deep discounts will restart on Sept. 4.

Cheaper hotels

Many hotels are more expensive now than they were before the pandemic, especially in places such as the Hamptons in New York; Maui, Hawaii; and Telluride, Colorado, according to the booking website Hotels.com.
But that’s not the case in parts of Western Europe, the company said.
“Hotels typically increase their rates when demand is high during the busy summer travel season,” said Melissa Dohmen, a spokesperson for Hotels.com. “But this year … it’s dialing up competition for rooms and rates in top destinations.”
In April, the company highlighted Madrid ($135 per night) and Copenhagen ($210 per night) as places with attractive hotel rates for August vacations.    
The travel company Expedia said hotel rates in many European cities will be cheaper this August than before the pandemic.

Except for Nice, cities in Italy and France are absent from this list. Rates in both countries were up 25% this summer, according to Hotels.com, which singled out Saint-Tropez along the French Riviera as one of the season’s most expensive getaway destinations in Europe.

Cheaper destinations

Conventional wisdom holds that domestic travel is more economical than international travel. But that hasn’t been the case for two years in a row, according to the travel insurance comparison engine Squaremouth.
As of mid-July, the average cost of a domestic trip is about $500 more than an international trip, according to the company’s data.
But that doesn’t hold true for all spots. Of the most popular travel destinations this year, travelers are spending the most to go to Greece, followed by Italy and France, according to the company.

The average cost to go to Greece this year is around $7,600, according to Squaremouth’s review of thousands of travel insurance policies purchased from January to mid-June.
Francesco Riccardo Iacomino | Moment | Getty Images

Average nightly hotel rates in Greece are $610 in Mykonos and $434 in Santorini, but are as low as $204 in Ionian Islands and $162 in Crete, according to travel booking website Holidu.
Athens is likely even cheaper. In April, Greece’s capital city was named one of the world’s best-valued city breaks for families by the travel website The Family Vacation Guide, based on hotel fees, food and a visit to the Acropolis.
According to the website’s analysis, the average daily cost for a family to visit Amsterdam ($244) is twice that of Istanbul ($122), while Stockholm was found to average less than $150 a day.
Conversely, Las Vegas was ranked the world’s most expensive city for family vacations, owing mainly to hotel room rates which averaged $399 per night, according to the website. More

The SEC and federal prosecutors have launched probes into payments made by WWE CEO Vince McMahon to settle allegations of sexual misconduct, according to a Wall Street Journal report.
The WWE on Monday disclosed $14.6 million in previously unrecorded expenses paid personally by McMahon, who announced his retirement Friday.
McMahon, 76, is the largest shareholder in the company, with an approximately 32% stake.

WWE Chairman and CEO Vince McMahon speaks at a news conference announcing the WWE Network at the 2014 International CES in Las Vegas.
Getty Images

The Securities and Exchange Commission and federal prosecutors have launched probes into payments made by World Wrestling Entertainment CEO Vince McMahon to settle allegations of sexual misconduct, according to a new report from The Wall Street Journal.
The WWE on Monday disclosed $14.6 million in previously unrecorded expenses paid personally by McMahon, who announced his retirement Friday. The company also hinted that the misconduct allegations, already the subject of an ongoing independent review overseen by the board of directors, are under investigation by other entities, but did not specify which agencies.

According to The Wall Street Journal, these federal investigations into McMahon hastened his retirement from the company. McMahon, 76, is the largest shareholder in the company, with an approximately 32% stake.
CNBC has reached out to the WWE for comment.
McMahon allegedly paid nearly $15 million to women from 2006 through this year to ensure their silence over alleged affairs and misconduct. The WWE said it would reflect the unrecorded expenses in updated reports for 2019, 2020 and 2021, as well as this year’s first quarter, when it reports second-quarter earnings.
The company was set to report Aug. 9, but the revisions could delay that, WWE said.
Shares of WWE rose more than 8% to reach a new 52-week high Monday, as investors became more bullish about a potential sale of the wrestling and media company. The stock is up 45% so far this year, outpacing the S&P 500, which is off more than 16% in 2022.
Read the full report from The Wall Street Journal.

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It’s that time again! “Mad Money” host Jim Cramer rings the lightning round bell, which means he’s giving his answers to callers’ stock questions at rapid speed.

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Prudential Financial Inc: “The best insurer’s Chubb, and that stock keeps going down. So as far as I’m concerned, we’ve got to stay away from the insurers.”

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Arbor Realty Trust Inc: “I tend to be against these companies. … Real estate finance is just a dicey business.”

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BHP Group Ltd: “We do not buy a mineral and mining company going into a recession that’s mandated by the Fed. … I know it looks cheap, but we’re not going there.”

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