Business

JACK MA, CHINA’S most famous entrepreneur, has not been one to mince his words about the role of government and business. At a meeting with corporate leaders in Bali in 2018 he told the audience that it is not the government that makes business and innovation happen. That is the work of entrepreneurs, he insisted: “They have the ideas and dreams.”A harsh crackdown that began in late 2020 on China’s largest consumer-internet groups has made such inspiring sentiments harder to sustain. For the first time the leading firms are suffering slowing revenue growth. Alibaba’s revenues rose by just 10% in the final three months of 2021, marking its slowest quarterly expansion since going public in 2014. Tencent, an internet-services and video-game Goliath, notched 8% revenue growth in the same period, its slowest rate since being a public company. JD.com, another e-commerce group, announced solid revenues but Richard Liu, its founder and chairman, resigned in April, one of many high-profile entrepreneurs to do so in the past couple of years. Although Meituan, a delivery giant, reported revenue growth of 30%, local media reported it plans to axe up to 20% of its employees in core business units. Shares in those four companies, along with Pinduoduo, yet another e-commerce group, have shed about $1.5trn in value since February of last year.The government’s campaign is moving into a new phase in 2022. The sorry state of the Chinese economy has forced regulators to delay further planned punishment for companies in the hope that they can help recharge growth. In the most positive signal for the sector in over a year, the central government said on April 29th that it planned to normalise regulation and “promote the healthy development of the platform economy”.The share prices of several companies, including Alibaba, soared on the news. But some new rules have only been put off for a later date, according to the Wall Street Journal. And much damage has already been done. The entrepreneurs behind China’s biggest tech successes have come to a grim reckoning: that because of government meddling they will be unable to innovate, and may even become boring.When Mr Ma celebrated Chinese enterprise in Bali, Alibaba and Tencent were by then two of China’s biggest private investors, pushing into an array of businesses within the country and abroad. Acquisitions seemed to ensure them an early toehold in hot new areas of growth. Online education and health, media and entertainment, banking and lending services, promising data-harvesting businesses: all were fair game. Mr Ma proved how powerful a tech entrepreneur’s financial dreams could be. By 2020 Ant had swallowed up 15%, or 1.7trn yuan ($257bn) of the market for total outstanding consumer loans in China.For a time the empire-building of Mr Ma and other Chinese entrepreneurs bore a striking resemblance to the expansionary tendencies of America’s tech titans. As Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, was buying the Washington Post, and Jack Dorsey of Twitter, a social-media group, was launching Block, a payments platform, Mr Ma was scooping up his own media assets and building a finance conglomerate.Bottling up the genieAmerican tech bosses are still reshaping and expanding their empires. Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook, is seeking to turn his social-media group into a “metaverse company”, bringing virtual reality to the mainstream. Elon Musk, boss of Tesla, an electric-car maker, is buying Twitter. Chinese empire-builders, by contrast, are tempering their ambitions.Beijing’s regulatory crackdown has greatly discouraged risk-taking. Tencent’s hefty expansion into online education in 2019 is now a dead end, as is that whole industry, after sweeping new rules on the services that can be offered to school-age pupils were announced last year. Investors want nothing to do with Chinese fintech after Ant’s initial public offering was crushed by Communist Party leaders in late 2020. Forget about massive data-crunching businesses, too, where the government’s new framework for control and ownership over personal and financial data will limit private innovation. Online video-games, Tencent’s largest revenue generator, have also come under attack. The government has signalled that it will no longer tolerate private investment in news-gathering, putting Mr Ma’s media empire at risk. It may even be planning to take small stakes in tech groups in order to guide their development.The companies’ strategies reflect limited options for rapid growth. Take Alibaba and its three core areas of operation: international, such as Lazada, an e-commerce group based in Singapore; within China, dominated by e-commerce; and a tech division that counts cloud computing as its biggest engine of growth. Alibaba’s solution to a long-expected slowdown in Chinese e-commerce as the market becomes saturated has been to move downmarket into smaller cities across the country with the expansion of Taobao Deals, a platform that allows groups of people to buy products at lower cost. Alibaba has recently started playing down this strategy to analysts and investors, who are underwhelmed by the low margins associated with such businesses.Alibaba’s global business has grown rapidly, mainly because of the fast expansion of Lazada. But its retail operations abroad have contributed only about 5% of overall annual revenues since 2017 and are unlikely ever to make up a meaningful part of the Alibaba empire. Its prospects of breaking into developed markets in America and Europe are close to non-existent. Some of that pessimism is based on America’s increasing distrust of Chinese companies. In 2018 Ant’s attempt to buy an American payments group was shot down by regulators in Washington on national-security grounds. This has pushed Alibaba to focus more on developing markets with much less spending power.Chinese regulators, too, have clamped down on the firms’ foreign investments. They have also stepped up prevention of monopolistic behaviour at home, stifling domestic investments. Alibaba was one of China’s biggest corporate acquirers in 2018, when it pulled off about $18bn in mergers and acquisitions. In 2021 that slumped to $5.7bn, over four-fifths of which was spent within China, according to Refinitiv, a data company. The acquisitive Tencent’s dealmaking was valued at $20bn last year, down from $32bn in 2018 (see chart). The company also sold about $16bn in shares in JD.com in December, sparking fears that regulators were pushing it to unwind its sprawling empire.As customary sources of revenues come under further pressure China’s internet giants have gamely talked up a new stage of innovation—one in which the firms’ ambitions are much more clearly defined by the state. The government wants China’s future tech giants to make or design semiconductors and artificial-intelligence (AI) software, and run cloud-computing businesses. It has been designating specific areas in which companies should lead, giving an unambiguous green light for private entrepreneurs to go after the next big thing, as long as it lines up with policy goals. Baidu, best known as China’s online-search champion, is the government’s first choice for leading AI and autonomous-driving businesses. On April 28th the firm was awarded China’s first permit allowing driverless ride-hailing on public roads.Many tech companies have taken the hint. Alibaba relies heavily on the success of its cloud-computing division, which leads the market and brought in 8% of total revenue in the last quarter of 2021. In February Daniel Zhang, Ailbaba’s chief executive, told analysts that cloud-computing could be a trillion-yuan business by 2025 and be transformed into his firm’s main activity. Tencent and Baidu have large and growing cloud operations, too. Most business-to-business services will one day be dominated by the incumbent tech groups, says Elinor Leung of CLSA, an investment bank.Such top-down delegation of entrepreneurial activity cannot be completely written off, says Sam Hsu of the Wharton School in Pennsylvania. State-backed research and development is commonplace in even the most market-driven economies. The momentum building in China may eventually enhance the underlying technologies on which a new wave of enterprise will take root.Finding state-endorsed technologies to invest in is certainly politically expedient for the largest internet platforms, says Robin Zhu of Bernstein, a broker. Robin Li, the founder of Baidu, has embraced his firm’s party-picked mission with such zeal that he even wrote a book on autonomous driving last year. Yet even self-driving cars and other state-backed projects will probably fall short of the growth rates to which the companies grew accustomed in the heady 2010s.Alibaba is again a case in point. Aliyun, its party-approved cloud business, has suffered big setbacks recently. It lost ByteDance, the owner of TikTok, Western teenagers’ favourite time sink, as a customer. A steady stream of state-controlled companies are leaving it for cloud platforms owned by other state groups. China’s big telecoms firms, which have competing businesses, are expected to eat up market share in the lower-value-added part of cloud services. There are limits to how much Aliyun can earn in foreign markets, where a distrust of Chinese technology has led to the banishment of tech compatriots such as Huawei, a telecoms-equipment maker. Aliyun’s revenues grew by 20% year on year in the last quarter of 2021. Not bad, you might think. But much slower than analysts had anticipated.For more expert analysis of the biggest stories in economics, business and markets, sign up to Money Talks, our weekly newsletter. More

Exhibitors are no longer going to rely solely on studios to drive consumers to theaters.
A lack of product during the pandemic, and a slow start to 2022, has led movie theater owners to be more aggressive with their marketing strategies.
They have become more innovative with food and beverage offerings and more flexible in the type of content they place on the big screen.
For big chains like AMC, Regal and Cinemark, the emphasis has been on adding live event streams, like concerts, sports and even Dungeons & Dragons campaigns.
Smaller chains are still investing in the theatrical experience, but they are more heavily using digital and social advertising to target their local communities.

A Regal Cinemas movie theater stands at night on 42nd Street in New York, U.S., on Tuesday, Oct. 6, 2020.
Amir Hamja | Bloomberg | Getty Images

“If you build it, they will come.”
Universal’s president of domestic theatrical distribution borrowed the iconic line from “Field of Dreams” during the studios slate presentation at CinemaCon on Wednesday to describe how moviegoers are flocking back to theaters now that there is a steady stream of content available.

Domestic ticket sales for the first four months of the year may be down around 44% compared with 2019 pre-pandemic levels, but cinemas are seeing significant gains over last year.
Blockbuster titles like Warner Bros.′ “The Batman,” Paramount’s “Sonic 2″ and the Marvel-Sony’s “Spider-Man: No Way Home” have led to a 338% increase in ticket sales from 2021, reaching $1.95 billion, according to data from Comscore.
Operators are glad for the new titles and were reassured by studios throughout CinemaCon last week that they will continue to receive a large number of theatrical exclusives going forward.
For the most part, the day-and-date experiment of the pandemic has ended and studios used their time at the annual convention hosted at Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas to tout their biggest and boldest tentpoles as well as showcase a diversity of content.
Exhibitors, however, are not going to rely solely on studios to drive consumers to theaters. A lack of product during the pandemic, and a slow start to 2022, has led movie theater owners to be more aggressive with their marketing strategies, more innovative with food and beverage offerings and more flexible in the type of content they place on the big screen.

A bold reminder for moviegoers

For big chains like AMC, Regal and Cinemark, the emphasis has been on adding live event streams, like concerts, sports and even Dungeons & Dragons campaigns, and upgrading its theaters with state-of-the-art projectors and sound systems.
Last month, AMC announced it was investing $250 million to bring Cinionic’s laser projectors to 3,500 of its U.S. auditoriums by 2026. Laser is largely considered a step-up from digital projection, offering brighter pictures, and therefore, a crisper image. The bulbs also do not need to be replaced multiple times a year, meaning upkeep is much easier for theater operators.
Cinemas big and small have long partnered with IMAX and Dolby to bring large-format options to consumers, but updating the digital projectors ensures that even those unwilling to pay an upcharge for premium options will still have a quality experience at the cinemas. The hope is that this experience will inspire moviegoers to continue to leave their couches and return to theaters for future film releases.

AMC went so far as to launch its first-ever advertising campaign last September featuring Nicole Kidman with the tagline “we make movies better.” The company invested around $25 million in the campaign.
“We wanted to make a bold, straightforward statement to remind moviegoers of that immersive, communal, multi-sensory experience that you can only get by seeing a movie in a theater,” said Alicia Cook, director of advertising at AMC Theatres, during a CinemaCon panel hosted by CNBC on Tuesday.
Traditionally, movie theater owners have relied on studios to promote films and drive moviegoers to their local cinemas. At the time of the ad’s launch, AMC CEO Adam Aron said the company will no longer depend on “what’s always worked before,” noting that the pandemic has pushed the industry into “uncharted waters.”

‘We do crazy stuff’

Smaller chains with less access to large sums of capital are still investing in the theatrical experience by upgrading seats, projectors and sound equipment, but they are more heavily using digital and social advertising to target their local communities.
“We are more nimble than the larger organizations,” said Rich Daughtridge, president and CEO of Warehouse Cinemas, during Tuesday’s panel. “I think our superpower is eventizing but also creating those experiences around going to the movies. So, we do crazy stuff.”
Daughtridge said promotions range from offering margaritas with movie tickets to special “daddy-daughter” date night showings. Mid-pandemic, Warehouse Cinemas capitalized on the release of Solstice Studio’s “Unhinged” by hosting a car smash event during the film’s fifth week in theaters.
Customers who bought a ticket could take swings at an old car, leading to a 2% lift in ticket sales compared to projections of what the film would have done if Warehouse had not hosted the event, he said.
Events at Reading Cinemas in Australia and New Zealand are a little more tame, according to Ben Deighton, general manager of marketing for the cinema chain. A surprisingly popular event at one of his cinemas is a knitting club.
“We just started knitting sessions .. and knitting clubs come in and watch a movie and knit,” he said during Tuesday’s panel, noting that the idea came from a local patron.
Starting this month, Cinepolis has begun a program called Self-care Sundays, which offers guests gold undereye patches and a small popcorn with any ticket purchase.
“One of the things we noticed naturally over the years people were coming to our theaters and practicing their own self-care,” said Annelise Holyoak, senior national director of marketing and loyalty at Cinepolis, during Tuesday’s panel.
Each showing also has a 10-minute mindfulness meditation to relax consumers before they enjoy their film.
“I think as marketers we tend to say ‘this movie is playing,’ ‘this movie is playing,'” Daughtridge said “I think from an engagement perspective, let’s talk a little bit more about why going to the movies is a good thing to do … I think the messaging that we are trying to do to create that engagement is more about the why moviegoing makes sense versus just the what movie is playing.”

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While GM, Ford and Stellantis steer toward the electric vehicle age, the rivalry between the Detroit three automakers remains alive and well.
As Ford prepared to celebrate the launch of its electric F-150 Lightning pickup Tuesday, both GM and Stellantis sought to steal the limelight from their archrival.
The “Big Three” rivalry can be big business, fueling merchandising as well as making for long-lasting brand loyalty among car buyers.

Ford CEO Jim Farley speaks at the launch of the all-new electric Ford F-150 Lightning pickup truck at the Ford Rouge Electric Vehicle Center on April 26, 2022 in Dearborn, Michigan. The F-150 Lightning is positioned to be the first full-size all-electric pickup truck to go on sale in the mainstream U.S. market. 
Bill Pugliano | Getty Images

DETROIT — Even as the Detroit automakers change and adapt to compete with electric vehicle leader Tesla, some things in the Motor City stay the same.
General Motors, Ford Motor and Stellantis (formerly Fiat Chrysler) are all steering toward electric vehicles, seeking to catch Elon Musk’s car company in sales. Yet the long-standing rivalry between the three U.S. automakers remains alive and well. That’s especially true in the hotly contested full-size pickup truck market, which is a major profit driver for them.

Take, for example, the events of last week: As Ford prepared to celebrate the launch of its F-150 Lightning Tuesday at a plant in Dearborn, Michigan, both GM and Stellantis sought to steal the limelight from their archrival and its highly anticipated electric pickup.
A day before the event, amid a blitz of stories on the F-150 Lightning, GM seemingly out of nowhere confirmed the Chevrolet Corvette will be offered in both hybrid and all-electric models in future years. The announcement, which industry onlookers had been expecting for some time, was light on details, but it got GM in the Lightning’s news cycle.
Stellantis’ Ram Trucks brand was more transparent about its intentions, when the brand released a teaser video on social media of its upcoming electric pickup, saying, “Time to steal some thunder.”
Ford said it’s no surprise its competitors are trying to troll the F-150 Lightning, which is arriving on the market at least a year or so ahead of the Chevy and Ram electric pickups.
“The F-150 Lightning is one of those rare product launches that transcends the auto world and becomes a cultural moment, and it’s been called a tipping point for America’s transition to electric cars. Of course, others are going to try to get in that slipstream,” Ford chief communications officer Mark Truby said in a statement to CNBC.

A GM spokesman declined to comment on the timing of its announcement, but said “it’s only natural the world pays attention when we confirm Corvette is going electric,” while touting the company’s other upcoming EVs. A spokesman for Ram declined to comment.

‘It’s bloodthirsty, and it’s beautiful’

Last week’s announcements are just the latest examples in a long-held tradition of the companies trying to one-up each other or get in on a conversation. Automakers have hordes of public relations and marketing experts whose jobs include making sure their vehicles get talked about.
“This rivalry started, I think in 1931. Don’t act like it’s a new thing,” said Jason Vines, a former auto PR executive known for over-the-top debuts at auto shows. “It’s bloodthirsty, and it’s beautiful.”

Vines, who at various times worked for Ford, Chrysler and Nissan, said when he was part of the launch for the Dodge Challenger for Chrysler, Chevrolet crashed the event with a new Chevrolet Camaro on a flatbed truck.
In 2016, Chevy launched a national ad campaign targeting the durability of Ford’s aluminum truck bed, literally poking holes in it with tools and other things. And four years earlier, during a Super Bowl ad about the predicted Mayan apocalypse, Chevy drivers survived, while “Dave,” a Ford owner, didn’t make it.
Vines said executives at the automakers live to beat their Motor City competitors.
Such corporate rivalries aren’t unique to the automotive industry, but the passion some car owners have for the brands they drive arguably is unique. It’s also big business in merchandising as well as making for long-lasting brand loyalty among buyers.
GM seems to have specifically enjoyed taking shots at Ford’s best-selling F-Series pickups, including the F-150 and its larger siblings, which Ford has touted as a $42 billion franchise for the automaker.

The all-electric Chevrolet Silverado at the New York Auto Show, April 13, 2022.
Scott Mlyn | CNBC

That fierce rivalry also helps explain why auto brands will offer lucrative incentives to entice buyers to switch brands. It also drives innovation, according to Vines.
“The beauty is, that’s great for the American consumer. These folks, these men and women, are bloodthirsty on building the best product they can to steal away customers from each other,” Vines said. “That’s a beautiful part of our industry. We’re searching for the customer.”
In some cases, the rivalries date back decades and live on through generations.
Ford CEO Jim Farley, whose grandfather worked for the company, has always been passionate about the companies he’s worked for during his career. Notably, in a 2011 book, “Once Upon a Car” by New York Times reporter Bill Vlasic, Farley is quoted as saying he planned to enjoy beating “Chevrolet on the head with a bat.”
Farley, who later apologized for the comments and has publicly shown respect for his competitors, was head of the automaker’s marketing department at the time: “We’re going to beat on them, and it’s going to be fun,” he is quoted as saying in the book. “I hate them and their company and what they stand for. And I hate the way they’re succeeding.”

Mary Barra, CEO of General Motors, attends the annual Allen and Co. Sun Valley media conference in Sun Valley, Idaho, July 12, 2019.
Brendan McDermid | Reuters

While GM executives haven’t been as public about their opinions of Ford, the automaker’s top executives — CEO Mary Barra and President Mark Reuss — both had parents who worked for the automaker. And they have exclusively worked at the automaker during their careers.

Getting back to Tesla

Michelle Krebs, an executive analyst at Cox Automotive, said that the Detroit automakers need to focus less on each other if they want to succeed in EVs. Hyper focus on one another and underestimating newcomers is part of the reason they lost their stranglehold on the U.S. market, he said. It’s also how Tesla has been able to dominate the EV market.
“While there’s this intense focus, particularly with GM and Ford, you always know if one has planned a big announcement, the other is going to try to sabotage it with a different announcement,” she said. “But at the same time, you know, the rest of the world is carrying on and being competitive.”
The Detroit automakers have definitely taken notice of Tesla, which Farley himself trolled last week at the Lightning event, noting the pickup is capable of charging a Tesla. He also alluded to Ford’s truck being thousands of dollars less expensive than “competitors’ trucks, whenever they actually go on sale” — a dig at the long-delayed Tesla Cybertruck.
“We plan to challenge Tesla and all comers to become the top EV maker in the world,” Farley said, adding the company is determined to be the top-selling automaker for EV pickups and challenge Musk’s company in sales.
Of course, over at GM, Barra has a different point of view: “I am very comfortable, because when people get into [our vehicles], they are just wowed,” Barra told CNBC last year. “So we will be rolling them out and we’re going to just keep working until we have No. 1 market share in EVs.”

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Bookings and airfares have surged this year.
Carriers will be challenged to rebook passengers during routine disruptions.
Some airlines are paring back schedules to give themselves a greater buffer.

Airline passengers, some not wearing face masks following the end of Covid-19 public transportation rules, sit during a American Airlines flight operated by SkyWest Airlines from Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) in California to Denver, Colorado on April 19, 2022.
Patrick T. Fallon | AFP | Getty Images

Airlines that once touted globe-spanning destinations, promising adventure, luxury or both, are now leaning on a simpler sales pitch: reliability.
Flight delays and cancellations spiked at several points over the last year, costing U.S. carriers more than $100 million combined and disrupting travel plans of hundreds of thousands of customers. Even some crews have been forced to sleep at airports, a rare last resort for an industry that’s used to accommodating thousands of pilots and flight attendants on the road each day.

As the peak travel season gets underway, the industry risks a repeat of those headaches, and airlines are hoping to get ahead of the problems. Their efforts include massive hiring, better technology for staff and customers, earlier planning for storms, and for some carriers, conservative scheduling or cuts to their spring and summer schedules altogether.
One of airlines’ biggest challenges in what’s shaping up to be a monster travel season is how to handle routine disruptions like bad weather, whether that means delaying flights or canceling outright before passengers arrive at the airport. When planes are packed, airlines have fewer options to move passengers to alternate flights, setting up a game of musical chairs in the sky⁠ — with luggage.
Airlines don’t charge passengers to rebook and big network carriers scrapped standard economy date-change fees to spur bookings during the coronavirus pandemic. But travelers could pay the price if they are forced to buy a new, last-minute ticket on another airline to make it to big events like a wedding or keep other travel plans.
Preventing cancellations is important.
“If we’re reliable, the seat is much more comfortable, the food tastes a lot better, the service that we provide is much more accommodating,” American Airlines CEO Robert Isom told employees in a town hall on April 12. “People really need to feel like they have control of their itineraries.”

American over the last three years has developed its Hub Efficiency Analytics Tool which it debuted last month. Dubbed HEAT, the tool helps the airline to delay more flights ahead of bad weather thunderstorms and avoid canceling them later, according to the town hall. It analyzes data such as crew availability and passenger connections, among other data points.
“The goal is to prevent the cancellations in the first place so that we don’t have to re-accommodate people given the high loads that we expect this summer,” Maya Leibman, American’s chief information officer, said on an earnings call earlier in April.
Carriers including Spirit Airlines and JetBlue Airways have already pared back spring and summer flying. JetBlue, for example, slashed its plan to expand flying as much as 15% this year from 2019 levels and is now planning a schedule no more than 5% up from three years ago as it tries to stabilize its operation while facing staffing shortages, including from pilot attrition.
Schedule cuts for June are deeper at low-cost and ultra low-cost airlines than at network carriers because of staffing shortages and high fuel costs, according to Deutsche Bank analyst Michael Linenberg.
Those carriers “are likely to be disproportionately impacted by this effect given that low fare traffic accounts for a greater share of their revenue base than for the major carriers,” he wrote in a note on April 11.

Staffing solutions

American plans to fly as much as 94% of its 2019 schedule during the second quarter, while United Airlines expects to fly 87% and Delta Air Lines plans to fly 84% compared with three years ago. Growth potential for major airlines is constrained by a pilot shortage, particularly at smaller regional airlines that feed their hubs.
American said it’s hired 12,000 people since last summer, and plans to add some 20,000 people this year in total. United hired 6,000 people this year, and Delta has hired 15,000 people since the start of 2021, partially to replace the more than 17,000 workers who took the airline up on buyout offers during the depths of the pandemic.
The $54 billion in taxpayer aid airlines received to pay staff during the pandemic prohibited layoffs, but buyouts were allowed.
American, Delta and United all say they are well staffed for the surge in demand.
“We made so much progress with customers during the pandemic and really building the United brand,” United CEO Scott Kirby said on the Chicago carrier’s quarterly call in April. “We’re not willing to sacrifice that customer goodwill for the possibility of short-term profits.”
United has spent years building tools to help passengers rebook themselves and avoid long queues at airports — technology that saves time and labor costs. In 2019, it launched ConnectionSaver, which can help hold an aircraft for connecting passengers, as well as agent-on-demand, a video chat platform for customer service.

Tricky delays

Airlines also have to contend with frequent disruptions stemming from bad weather, like those felt at bustling airports in Florida in April.
Thunderstorms have sparked cascades of thousands of cancellations and delays over the past year, disruptions made worse by airlines that scheduled too many flights relative to their staffing levels.
The Federal Aviation Administration is calling airlines for a two-day meeting in Florida early this month to discuss the congested airspace over the state, one of the tourism hotspots during the pandemic, CNBC reported. Flight capacity into some of the state’s busiest airports has already surpassed what was flown in 2019, at the same time space launches and general aviation pick up, the FAA said.
Last week, some executives including at JetBlue and Frontier Airlines put some of the blame on short staffing at a key air traffic control center in Florida.
The Government Accountability Office is examining recent airline disruptions, a spokesman told CNBC.
Thunderstorms are especially tricky for airlines because they’re less predictable than larger systems like hurricanes or winter storms, which allow airlines to cancel flights sometimes days in advance so that crews are in position to restart the operation.
Cutting flights as early as possible “will probably make it smoother for the passenger, but things happen. It is summer,” said Adam Thompson, founder of Lagniappe Aviation consulting firm, and has worked in the industry for more than two decades. “Weather is unpredictable. Every time someone says, ‘This is the worst summer I’ve had,’ I say, ‘Give it a year.'”
Infuriated passengers, used to the conveniences of modern life, where groceries, clothing and ride-shares arrive promptly at one’s door, wait for hours for help from customer service and only grow more frustrated.
“We are used to, ‘Hey, Amazon will bring my package tomorrow. Why can’t you be there on a dime?” said Savanthi Syth, airline analyst at Raymond James. “[Airlines] have to step up and meet those expectations.”

How passengers can cope

Some extra preparation can help avoid headaches this season.
Here are some tips:
1. Book flights that leave early in the day.
That will give you more of a chance of getting rebooked and avoid the impact of a delay when things go wrong. “Being a lifelong airline guy, I always tell people when they travel, don’t book the last flight of the night. You need something as a cushion,” Thompson said.
2. Check the weather beyond where you are.
Airlines run complex networks, and the weather at your departure point isn’t necessarily the weather at your destination. Many airline apps will show you where your arriving aircraft is coming from. Check that airport’s weather, too.
3. Pick a busier day if you have flexibility.
Thompson said to look at an airline’s schedule for how many flights the carrier is operating to their destination that day. Airlines generally fly less on Saturdays. That could mean less wiggle room if you face disruptions. Thursdays and Fridays traditionally have bigger schedules, but airports are often more crowded, he added.
4. Know what you’re owed.
You are entitled to a refund if the airline cancels or significantly delays your flight, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation. Airlines could offer you a voucher for future travel, but passengers can insist on a refund if they prefer.
Keep in mind that low-cost airlines like Southwest don’t have interline agreements with other carriers that allow them to book travelers on a competitor. While airlines use these agreements sparingly, if a carrier doesn’t have one it could reduce your chances of an alternative flight.
5. Be kind.
Gate agents and reservations agents, many of them new employees, are also under stress. Keeping calm is more effective all around. Simply put, Thompson said, don’t be a jerk.

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Bill Murray is still reflecting on his inappropriate behavior, which led to a production shutdown on the Searchlight Pictures’ film “Being Mortal” last week.
He said he was optimistic that “we are going to make peace” and that production will restart, but noted that he’ll only do so if the woman involved in the incident is comfortable doing so.
The film was about halfway completed before production was halted. It is slated for release in 2023, but it is unclear if Murray will continue on with the project.

Bill Murray is still reflecting on his inappropriate behavior, which led to a production shutdown on the Searchlight Pictures’ film “Being Mortal” last week.
On Saturday, the actor told CNBC’s Becky Quick that he had a “difference of opinion” with a woman he was working with on the film, saying, “I did something I thought was funny and it wasn’t taken that way.”

Murray said he has spent the last week thinking about the incident. He did not elaborate on what was said or to whom.

Bill Murray on CNBC TV at the Berkshire Hathaway Shareholders Meeting, April 30, 2022.
David A. Grogan | CNBC

“As of now we are talking and we are trying to make peace with each other,” Murray said in an interview during CNBC’s exclusive streaming coverage of the Berkshire Hathaway annual shareholders meeting. “We are both professionals, we like each others’ work, we like each other I think and if we can’t really get along and trust each other there’s no point in going further working together or making the movie as well. It’s been quite an education for me.”
“Being Mortal” is based on Atul Gawande’s nonfiction book “Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End” and stars Murray alongside Aziz Ansari and Seth Rogan. The film was about halfway completed before production was halted. It is slated for release in 2023, but it is unclear if Murray will continue on with the project.

Bill Murray surrounded by a crowd at the Berkshire Hathaway Shareholders Meeting, April 30, 2022.
David A. Grogan | CNBC

He said he was optimistic that “we are going to make peace” and that production will restart, but noted that he’ll only do so if the woman involved in the incident is comfortable doing so.
“I think it’s a sad dog that can’t learn anymore,” Murray said of learning from his mistakes. “That’s a really sad puppy that can’t learn anymore. I don’t want to be that sad dog and I have no intention of it.”
“What would make me the happiest would be to put my boots on and for both of us to go back into work and be able to trust each other and work at the work that we’ve both spent a lot of time developing the skill of,” he said. More

A playground and sports complex has been built in Toms River, New Jersey, for children of all abilities.
The founders of the RWJBarnabas Health Field of Dreams were inspired to create the park after their son was left with traumatic brain damage from a car crash.
Doctors say the benefits of the facility are crucial to the long-term health of those with disabilities.

A first of its kind inclusive complex, the RWJBarnabas Health Field of Dreams, will open Saturday in Toms River, New Jersey.
The grand opening of the $3.6 million facility comes after nearly five years of planning and pandemic-related delays and challenges. The Toms River complex will focus on serving children with physical and social disabilities.

While the opening of the complex is a triumph, it all started as a horrifying nightmare. Christian Kane was driving with his 19-month-old son, Gavin, when a beer truck barreled into his car near Toms River High School North. As a result, Gavin had a traumatic brain injury, a right front temporal stroke and a complete skull fracture.
Today, Gavin is 11 years old. He’s in a wheelchair most of the time, and he communicates primarily through an iPad. But he is an otherwise ordinary preteen cracking jokes at his parents’ expense and wanting to play with his friends.

Gavin Kane at the RWJBarnabas Health Field of Dreams.

But it hasn’t been easy.
“He wanted to do everything that all the other kids were doing,” said Mary Kane, Gavin’s mother. “But because of his lack of strength to hold up his head, he was very limited.”
As Gavin grew, she found it increasingly difficult to take him to playgrounds and have him participate in sports. The Kanes have six children.

“It was very challenging, almost impossible, for me to get him on a swing or a slide or anything like that, so he didn’t. We could go to the playgrounds and he could watch, and that’s not fun,” Mary Kane said.
Five years ago, Gavin’s parents grew tired of watching him sit on the sidelines. They dreamed up a playground and sports complex where kids of all abilities could play and participate in physical activities together. “To be able to do things they didn’t think they’d be ever able to do,” said Christian Kane.
Christian Kane, an Advanced Placement statistics teacher at Toms River High School North, poured everything he had into this project. The $3.6 million dollar facility would require major sponsors, state aid, and grants and fundraising, in addition to specialized equipment to accommodate kids of all abilities.

A young girl tests out the new playground for the first time.

Christian Kane said the biggest challenge came when the pandemic nearly threatened the entire project. It meant a major increase in prices for raw materials and a shortage of construction workers.
“Because of inflation, something that costs $4 that was going to be donated now is $12 to $13,” he said. “All of a sudden, I’m getting these bills that I know somehow I’m going to have to fund.”
Now that the complex is ready, Christian Kane said he’s been getting inquiries from groups from all over the state looking to visit the facility. The Kanes gave CNBC a first look at the facility ahead of its official opening. Gavin and some of his closest friends also got the chance to visit the complex for the first time.
“You can hear the kids’ pure enjoyment in the background and you knew that that’s what they needed,” said Christian Kane.
The 3.5-acre, state-of-the-art complex features a basketball court made of special materials to accommodate wheelchairs, a miniature golf course, a baseball diamond and a playground that caters to children with walkers, wheelchairs and more. It also has a community garden, pavilion, snack bar and a quiet corner that looks off into the woods.
“You know when you come here that you’re not going to be stared at and you’re not going to be looked at and you know you’re coming here for pure enjoyment and fun,” said Christian Kane.
Doctors say the benefits of such a facility are crucial.

Gavin and Christian Kane at the new RWJBarnabas Health FIELD OF DREAMS.

“The opportunity to be playing, learning and showing off one’s abilities outside of the hospital is just as important sometimes as the medications and therapies that occur within the hospital,” said Matt McDonald, CEO of Children’s Specialized Hospital, which treats Gavin.
As Gavin tested out the facility for the first time, he showed pure joy being around other children who were similar to him. For parents, it’s a place to let their guard down and socialize with other families going though similar challenges.
Christian Kane said he hopes this is just the start. He wants others to see the importance and success of his complex and build facilities just like it.
He passes the site of his crash every day on his way to work, but he said driving near the new Field of Dreams makes his days a little bit better.
“Driving past it and seeing kids and adults playing here,” he said. “All the hard work to build this was all worth it.”   More

Monday – Friday, 6:00 – 7:00 PM ET

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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Star Bulk Carriers Corp: “The way this stock is priced, the dividend’s going to be cut. I don’t know if that’s the case. … This is what I almost would call too good to be true.”

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PG&E Corp: “I don’t like them. … Cut [your shares] in half, take the profit and move on.”

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Monday – Friday, 6:00 – 7:00 PM ET

CNBC’s Jim Cramer on Friday advised investors to pick up shares of Canadian oil producer Suncor Energy, but only if they’re confident oil prices will stay elevated.
“This could be just an absolutely terrific stock because the oil sands can generate tremendous earnings growth,” the “Mad Money” host said.

CNBC’s Jim Cramer on Friday advised investors to pick up shares of Canadian oil producer Suncor Energy, but only if they’re confident oil prices will stay elevated.
Cramer’s comments come after activist investment firm Elliott Management, which holds a 3.4% stake in Suncor, called for the firm to shuffle its management and take other measures to improve its performance.

“I think Suncor’s future is less about this activist campaign and more about where the price of crude might be headed. If you think it’s going to stay elevated, this could be just an absolutely terrific stock because the oil sands can generate tremendous earnings growth,” the “Mad Money” host said.
“However, indeed, if you believe oil will peak soon and head meaningfully lower, this stock’s going to be a dog and it won’t matter what changes [Elliot Management] make,” he added.
Shares of Suncor fell 2.58% on Friday but reached a new 52-week high earlier in the day.
Elliott Management cited “missed production goals, high costs, and, tragically, a number of employee fatalities and other safety incidents” in its letter.
Suncor responded to Elliott’s letter stating it will review the investment firm’s recommendations.

“Whether you look at it from a financial perspective or a purely human perspective, this is not a well-run enterprise,” Cramer said of Suncor’s track record.
However, he said he believes the company has more room to run since the price of crude is up, meaning the company could become a high-performer if it takes Elliott’s urgings under consideration.
Brent crude futures settled at $109.34 on Friday while U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude settled at $104.69.
“I think the stock jumped … yesterday because Wall Street’s confident Elliott can push Suncor’s board to unlock value,” Cramer said. “Here’s some free advice to Suncor’s directors: Work with these guys.”
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