Business

BILL ACKMAN is hunting for deals. The boss of Pershing Square, a hedge fund, is on the lookout for “large private growth companies” which are seeking to raise $1.5bn or more, but are wary of the “risks and expenses” of a conventional initial public offering (IPO). His solution: a special-purpose acquisition-rights company, or SPARC. On September 29th regulators approved the novel investment vehicle, which Mr Ackman bills as a fairer, cheaper alternative to its tainted cousin, the special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC), which enjoyed a boom in 2021.There is much to like about this financial innovation. First, unlike SPACs, which raise a pot of money via an IPO and then scour the market for potential targets, the SPARC will find a merger candidate first. Helpfully, Mr Ackman has more time to make the deal—ten years, compared with two years for SPACs. He has also lined up potential investors: Pershing Square has granted SPARC rights at no cost to shareholders of its previously disbanded SPAC. Pershing Square itself can retain up to 5% of the new company.Once a deal is agreed with a target firm, the SPARC’s shares can start trading on an exchange. The SPARC rights-holders can then purchase stock at a price agreed in the deal within four weeks of the stockmarket debut. If an investor chooses not to exercise the rights, they expire. By pledging to chip in between $250m and $3.5bn as anchor investor, Pershing Square is aligning its incentives with those of its investors.For the firm merging with his SPARC, Mr Ackman promises certainty and lower fees. In an old-school IPO the amount of money a company raises is not determined until its shares are priced just ahead of its trading debut. By contrast, a business merging with a SPARC knows exactly how much capital it will raise: it is the price at which it will combine with the already listed SPARC. Moreover, a SPARC does not have to pay bankers expensive fees to find investors and underwrite the share issue. SPACs offer their merger targets the same certainty, but at a high cost to anyone other than early backers (or “promoters”), who receive preferential warrants (the right to buy shares at a set price later).image: The EconomistFor subsequent offerings Mr Ackman hopes to “roll over” the investors in the first SPARC, creating a pool of capital without the overhead of a finder’s fee. His pitch also appeals to two other groups. The first is startup founders who grumble about the hefty fees charged by bankers to shepherd a public listing. They also harbour suspicions that banks deliberately underprice offerings, at their companies’ expense, to get an opening-day “pop” for favoured clients. The second group is retail investors keen to get in on IPO action that banks typically reserve for those same clients.SPACs got a bad name because of a poor stockmarket record (see chart) and a few spectacular implosions. Many failed to find a merger target in time and had to return cash to shareholders. Whether Mr Ackman’s vehicle can avoid the same fate will depend on whether he really can keep costs down and find an attractively priced target. Many tech startups raised funds at high valuations before interest rates shot up. Few will relish a public listing that would raise capital at a more modest valuation. The SPARC may be a bright idea. But it is not a sure-fire one. ■To stay on top of the biggest stories in business and technology, sign up to the Bottom Line, our weekly subscriber-only newsletter. More

THOSE WHO want to gauge India’s economic prospects often look to businesses that erect homes, produce consumer staples, manufacture inexpensive vehicles and provide basic services like electricity or discretionary ones like travel. Each of these sectors is currently sending mixed messages—enough good news to justify hope, but with caveats that counsel caution. One industry, though, is sending an unequivocal signal. And a loud one.Since April the share price of Premier Explosives has more than doubled. That of a larger maker of things that go boom, Solar Industries, has quadrupled since 2021. Other dynamite producers are enjoying a similar streak. Besides being a gift to pun-lovers, this explosive growth reflects changes in an industry well placed to capture everything that is going right for India’s economy.image: The EconomistIndia began producing explosives in the 1940s, around the time it gained independence from Britain. Most of the engineers and technology came from Imperial Chemical Industries, a British concern. Coal India, a state-owned miner at the heart of both domestic energy production and industrial development, has long been the biggest customer. Because its mines are spread throughout India, and because transporting old types of explosive over long distances used to be best avoided, separate companies were created to serve Coal India’s individual sites. That geographical dispersion was preserved as other customers emerged, leading to a fragmented market. Today India boasts 36 large explosives producers.For many years business was merely good. The rosier outlook of late stems from the confluence of several factors. Demand from Coal India, which is tasked with feeding the country’s growing energy needs, remains robust. This has been supplemented by a boom in the domestic construction industry. Explosives are used in the mining of limestone, which is needed to make cement and to produce steel. They are also indispensable in the vast land clearance for new roads and tunnels that is happening as part of the central government’s infrastructure ambitions.Lastly, explosives-makers are benefiting from increased defence spending, in India and elsewhere. Business Line, a newspaper, has reported that Munitions India, created in a reorganisation of state-controlled companies in 2021 to manufacture ammunition, bombs and rockets, as well as explosives, is booked up with orders until March 2025. Buyers include seven companies in Europe, four in Africa and two in the Middle East.In the past such exports were constrained by worries about transporting things that might blow up. The basic raw materials to produce explosives, such as various sorts of nitrates, were also well understood and widely available. Modern explosives are considerably more stable, which makes them less hazardous to move around, even as safety and environmental concerns are putting many countries off domestic production. Until recently it was China, the other big explosives manufacturer, that got a lot of the outsourced business. As geopolitical tensions mount, many customers, especially in the West, are seeking alternatives to Chinese suppliers. Excitement over firms like Premier and Solar will not be fizzling out soon. ■To stay on top of the biggest stories in business and technology, sign up to the Bottom Line, our weekly subscriber-only newsletter. More

These are anxious times for the bosses of Western multinational companies. After decades of being wooed by governments the world over, many now live with an ever-present fear of being caught in the crossfire of fraying geopolitical relations. An increasingly assertive China has now taken to slapping exit bans on the executives of foreign firms. The latest example came on September 29th, when a Hong Kong-based restructuring consultant at Kroll, an American advisory firm, was reported to have been barred from leaving the mainland.Doing business in China is far from the only source of worry. American chief executives are contending with the regulatory zeal of Brussels just as their European counterparts are dealing with a more interventionist America. Both groups are trying to tap the cash gushers of the Gulf without appearing to cosy up to its authoritarian rulers. A diplomatic spat between Canada and India over the alleged assassination of a Sikh activist on Canadian soil will have sent shivers down the spines of many Western business grandees. Trouble, it seems, is everywhere.Luckily, an industry of consiglieri is at hand to help multinational firms traverse these treacherous waters. Although geopolitical advisers have existed for decades, demand for their services is now soaring, thanks to the growing complexity of doing business abroad. Bankers, lawyers and management consultants are pouring into the field. What was once a niche and secretive business is entering the mainstream of professional services.Retiring statesmen have long sought to cash in on their knowledge and foreign connections. In 1982 Henry Kissinger, previously America’s secretary of state, set up Kissinger Associates to that end. Later administrations produced their own equivalents, from McLarty Associates and Albright Stonebridge Group to WestExec Advisors and plenty more. All are packed full of former government luminaries.Lee Feinstein, a one-time ambassador who now works for McLarty, notes that many clients value advice from those who have been “in the room where it happens”. The exact services these firms offer are opaque and vary between them, but generally range from gauging the policy intentions of foreign governments to helping open doors for companies that want to sell or manufacture in a new market.Spooky action at a distanceSuch “formers” are not the only source of specialist counsel available to multinationals. Geopolitical consultancies like Eurasia Group and Oxford Analytica rely less on retired bigwigs and more on professional analysts who monitor global affairs and provide briefings to clients. (EIU, The Economist’s sister company, competes in this business.) Another flavour of service is provided by Hakluyt, a firm founded in 1995 by former British spooks. It sources intelligence from a global network of associates with connections in high places, and offers clients the inside scoop on anything from a regulator’s opinion of a possible takeover to the probity of a potential supplier. Geopolitics now permeates nearly everything it does, says Varun Chandra, the firm’s managing partner. (The chairman of Hakluyt is also chairman of The Economist’s parent company.)In recent years the breadth of advice being sought has widened. Amy Celico of Albright Stonebridge notes that the focus of her firm’s work has broadened from helping companies expand overseas to also helping them defend themselves against a deteriorating geopolitical climate. An increasing number of multinationals are finding themselves used as pawns in global politics, rarely to their advantage. In May China banned memory chips made by Micron, an American company, from being used in the country’s critical infrastructure. The firm generates a quarter of its sales in China, half of which it now expects to lose. Advisers can help businesses pre-empt such blows, and in some cases lobby against them.The focus of geopolitical advice is expanding beyond emerging markets, too. Mr Chandra observes that America’s technology giants are increasingly coming to Hakluyt for assistance in navigating Brussels. An executive at another firm notes that America’s Inflation Reduction Act, with perhaps $1trn in handouts for climate-friendly investments, has brought many clients to its doors.The upshot has been a surge in growth. Most advisers keep their revenue figures closely guarded. Hakluyt, which does not, has doubled its sales in the past four years, according to Mr Chandra. Younger entrants are also gaining steam. Macro Advisory Partners, founded a decade ago, has more than doubled the size of its team since 2018, according to Nader Mousavizadeh, its chief executive.Larger corporate advisers, eyeing an opportunity, have muscled in. McKinsey, a management consultancy, has launched a geopolitical-risk practice. Ziad Haider, who co-leads it, says that demand from clients has rocketed. EY, a professional-services giant, has set up a similar service.Dentons, a multinational law firm, helped launch Dentons Global Advisors (DGA), a stand-alone advisory firm that acquired Albright Stonebridge in 2021. Ed Reilly, DGA’s boss, explains that its services have a “natural adjacency” to the practice of law. Lazard, an investment bank, is also building a geopolitical advisory business. Teddy Bunzel, who oversees the effort, says that geopolitical questions have become central to much of Lazard’s conventional advisory work. In October last year the bank hired Jami Miscik, formerly the chief of Kissinger Associates.Such moves are happening thick and fast as firms in the industry race to nab talent. The supply of good geopolitical advice is constrained, argues Ms Miscik. Michèle Flournoy, managing partner of WestExec, says that her line of work “is all about the people, and those people can’t be manufactured”. But they can be acquired. After the takeover of Albright Stonebridge by DGA, McLarty and WestExec were bought by, respectively, Ankura and Teneo, two management consultancies. Eurasia now has a partnership with KPMG, a professional-services heavyweight.After years of trimming their public affairs departments, many multinational companies have been busily hiring geopolitical experts, too. Mr Reilly says such teams are fast becoming DGA’s biggest competitors. Eventually, that could force the fragmented industry of advisers to consolidate. For now, it reinforces the growing realisation among multinationals’ bosses that global politics will shape their success in the years ahead. ■To stay on top of the biggest stories in business and technology, sign up to the Bottom Line, our weekly subscriber-only newsletter. More

Constellation Brands reported double-digit sales growth in its beer business as the division continues to dominate.
Revenue growth was driven by demand for its Modelo Especial and Modelo Chelada brands as well as Corona Extra.
The company raised its guidance for its fiscal 2024.

In this photo illustration, bottles of Modelo Especial beer sit on a table on June 14, 2023 in Los Angeles, California.
Mario Tama | Getty Images

Constellation Brands on Thursday reported earnings and revenue that topped analysts’ expectations for its fiscal second quarter of 2024.
The Mexican beer powerhouse, owner of the Modelo Especial and Corona Extra brands, reported double-digit sales growth in its beer business as the division continues to dominate the overall beer and high-end categories. Meanwhile sales of wine and spirits lagged.

The company raised its fiscal 2024 earnings per share outlook to a range of $9.60 to $9.80, up from a prior range of $9.35 to $9.65.
Here’s what Constellation reported for the three months ended August 31, compared with what Wall Street was expecting, based on a survey of analysts by LSEG, formerly known as Refinitiv:

Earnings per share: $3.70 adjusted vs. $3.36 expected
Revenue: $2.84 billion vs. $2.82 billion expected

Constellation’s beer portfolio posted 12% sales growth, boosted by 8.7% growth in shipments. The Modelo brand family was a particular bright spot: Modelo Especial grew nearly 9%, while Modelo Chelada brands posted growth of more than 40%.
Modelo Especial remains the best-selling brand in the U.S. beer category, the company said.
The company’s wine and spirits brands, however, underperformed year over year. The category posted a 14% decrease in sales and nearly 8% decrease in depletions — an industry term for the number of cases sold to retailers by a distributor.

The division wasn’t without its standout brands, though: Constellation’s Meiomi and Kim Crawford wine brands saw 7% and 6% depletion growth, respectively, while its craft spirit, Mi Campo tequila, reported more than 60% depletion growth.
“We continue to expect solid growth acceleration and margin improvement from our overall Wine and Spirits Business in the second half,” said CEO Bill Newlands.
Back in June, the company delivered an earnings beat and reiterated its forecast. In its previous quarter, beer sales rose 11% year over year driven by stable consumer demand and higher pricing. More

Dungeons & Dragons fans are hungry for elevated, luxury merchandise that celebrates and enhances their fandom.
Enter companies like Cantrip Candles, Wyrmwood Gaming and Find Familiar Spirits, which offer bespoke, upscale products tied to the fantasy gaming space.
Dungeons & Dragons claims more than 50 million active players and these consumers have consistently boosted sales for brand owner Hasbro.

Inside the storefront of Cantrip Candles in Hollywood, CA.
Sarah Whitten | CNBC

It’s not every day that a spilled beer can start a company. But that’s exactly how Christoff Visscher got the idea for Cantrip Candles.
An avid Dungeons & Dragons fan, Visscher was hosting a game when a beer got knocked over during a rowdy tavern interaction. The malty scent added to the ambiance of the scene and inspired him to start making his own candles and fragrances to elevate his friend’s tabletop gaming experience.

Some seven years later, Visscher’s Cantrip Candles has a physical storefront in Hollywood and nearly two dozen custom scents — from the airy, pine-scented Walk in the Woods to the rich, smoky whiskey and firewood aroma of Black Hound Tavern.
Inspired by fantasy games and settings like those seen in Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder and other popular tabletop role-playing games, Cantrip Candles has created its own lore to pair with its scents. They include Library Scriptorium (parchment, aged wood, leather), Den of Thieves (smoke, red wine, aged leather) and Forest of Fae (jasmine, neroli, tomato leaf and amber), all locations that could be found in any fantasy world.
“We always make it our own,” said Visscher. “And that’s how we can be an authentic to ourselves. Sometimes, we create environments that aren’t the most traditional fantasy environments. We have a scent called Goldwheat Bakery.” It smells like yeast, bread and flour.
Products from the company range from $15 for wax melts all the way up to $99 for 20-ounce centerpiece candles. Cantrip Candles also partners with other small businesses to sell wick trimmers, matches, notebooks, plush and apparel.
Sellers need to be on their game with these customers, too.

“They expect you to respect, understand and anticipate their needs, even though the problems you’re solving can be extremely niche,” said Ed Maranville, co-founder of Wyrmwood, a tabletop gaming accessory and furniture company.

The franchise life

The customer base is growing, and it’s hungry for elevated, luxury merchandise that celebrates and enhances their fandom. It’s more than just T-shirts and special dice. There is a desire to live the fantasy, or at least incorporate it into day-to-day life. Crafters and hobbyists have turned into entrepreneurs creating unique and bespoke merchandise like wooden lamps shaped like 20-sided dice (commonly called d20s), custom wall art and just about any item you can find in a kitchen: cutting boards, glasses, spoons, you name it.
It’s part of a wider trend among many different entertainment franchises, from Marvel and Star Wars to Harry Potter and “Friends,” as well as for fans of regency era romance novels, the horror genre and Broadway musicals.

Smells like whiskey and firewood, the Black Hound Tavern candle is one of nearly two dozen bespoke scents from Cantrip Candles.
Sarah Whitten | CNBC

Dungeons & Dragons was created by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson in the early 1970s. It is a structured but open-ended role-playing game often played around a table. Players solve puzzles, go on quests and battle enemies. In recent years, due in large part to Covid social-distancing protocols, many games are played virtually using video-conferencing tools.
Hasbro, which owns the Dungeons & Dragons brand through its subsidiary Wizards of the Coast, has boasted that the game has more than 50 million active players. These consumers have consistently boosted sales for Wizards, pushing the division’s revenue to over $1 billion in each of the last two years.
Hasbro acquired Wizards of the Coast, the company that owned the rights to Dungeons & Dragons, in 1999. The Rhode Island-based toymaker is protective of its intellectual property. It recently tried to revamp its game license to crack down on third-party content creators and boost revenue. However, those plans were shot down in January, as the D&D community balked at the new terms, which were largely viewed as overreaching and unfair.
The company did not respond to CNBC’s request for comment.
The shopper cohort that stocks up on fantasy-themed lifestyle merch is often grouped as “kidults.” Essentially, this customer is 12 or older and spends money on collectibles, toys or merchandise. Last year, these kids-at-heart were responsible for one-quarter of all toy sales annually, around $9 billion worth, and were the biggest driver of growth throughout the industry, according to data from the NPD Group.
Kidults buy other products linked to their interests, like furniture, art and even alcohol. And there are plenty of companies offering up unique, quality products for fantasy tabletop gamers.

Drink like a warlock

“In this community, in most fandoms, if you build something that’s premium, a luxury feeling item, people respond,” said Matthew Lillard, co-founder of Find Familiar Spirits. “The industry sort of discounts their buying power. They’re like, ‘Oh, they just want dice,’ but the reality is that I want something that speaks to me as a modern human. I want to be able to live it on my own.”
Lillard, who rose to fame in the ’90s and early ’00s for roles in films like “Scream” and “Scooby-Doo,” is an avid Dungeons & Dragons player and fan of the fantasy role-playing genre. This week his new company, Find Familiar Spirits, which he founded alongside screenwriter Justin Ware, is launching its first in a series of limited edition whiskeys.
Distilled in Indiana and Kentucky, the first whiskey edition, which has an initial run of 5,000 bottles, is called Paladin, named for the playable class in classic tabletop role-playing games like Dungeons & Dragons. It’s a bourbon whiskey blend with notes of vanilla, fruit and a little spice and will retail for $150.
Three other whiskeys — Rogue, Warlock and Dragon — will roll out at later dates under the banner Quest’s End Whiskey. Early interest in the product has led the company to expand the number of bottles produced going forward.

Arrows pointing outwards

Source: Quest’s End Paladin

In total there will be 16 whiskeys, released every three to four months over the course of four years. Each bottle is paired with a booklet that contains a chapter of a new and original fantasy saga called “Dawn of the Unbound Gods.” With every release, a new chapter will be unveiled.
Similarly to Cantrip Candles, Found Familiar Spirits is creating its own lore.
“Our whole thing is that we’re creating an immersive unboxing experience that goes along with the whiskey,” Lillard said. “It does no good to create a beautiful bottle and a s— whiskey.”
Lillard is no stranger to selling products to this community. In 2018, he co-founded Beadle & Grimm’s, a gaming company that offers licensed expanded editions of Dungeons & Dragons modules, Magic: The Gathering sets and other games in the tabletop role-playing game space.
The company started by selling premium $500 boxes filled with high-end miniatures, maps and props tied to specific Dungeons & Dragons campaigns.
“Our belief is that if you create a high-end premium experience for a whiskey connoisseur, that also loves Dungeons & Dragons, people will turn out to buy and support that,” Lillard said.

A seat at the table

Other companies have found similar interest from consumers, particularly those looking to meld their fandom with their dining rooms.
That’s where Wyrmwood Gaming comes in, offering products that serve multiple needs for consumers. In this case, a place to play weekly tabletop role-playing games and have dinner every night.
“Gaming tables serve a need that most consumers have, which is to save space and give them flexibility in their life,” Wyrmwood’s Maranville said. “While some are fortunate enough to have a dedicated space for gaming, for most of us, space is at a premium, and your space for playing games is in either your living room, kitchen or dining area.”
Wyrmwood is known for its high quality wooden accessories and gaming tables, which feature modular pieces that can transform furniture from a dining space to a fantasy landscape. The company first launched on independent online marketplace Etsy in 2012, offering products that could bring gamers “out of the basement.” The company now has its own website.
“As lifelong gamers, there weren’t a lot of options for finely made accessories,” Maranville said. “Gaming could often still feel like a childish hobby, despite the enormous passion and seriousness that many gamers bring to it, along with their grown-up tastes and budgets.”

Wrymwood’s prophecy gaming table in Bolivian rosewood with wine fabric trim.
Courtesy: Wrymwood

Prices range from $600 to more than $10,000 based on table size, shape, wood and other customizations. The company also sells accessories with magnetic components including cup holders, card and poker chip holders, dice trays and bottle openers. Wyrmwood recently extended its line to include a customizable modular desk.
Maranville said he knew the company would thrive nearly a decade ago when Wyrmwood first attended the PAX East convention in 2014. He said patrons gravitated toward the brand because it took their passion seriously and provided merchandise for everyday use.
“We sold out of everything, I completely lost my voice, and our little booth was inundated with attendees all weekend long,” he said. More

“The Exorcist: Believer” is projected to draw a large Hispanic audience.
Horror movies, particularly ones with religious overtones, are popular among Hispanic film fans.
“Religious horror is flirting with danger,” a Fangoria editor said, explaining the appeal for Hispanic and Latino moviegoers.

Still from the set of “The Exorcist: Believer.”
Courtesy: Universal Studios

Take it on faith. The new “Exorcist” movie will draw big Hispanic audiences.
Universal is seeing stronger-than-average Hispanic interest for “The Exorcist: Believer” as the movie heads into its opening weekend, according to people familiar with the matter. This fits a pattern among recent religious-horror releases such as “The Nun II” and “The Pope’s Exorcist.”

Lea este artículo en español aquí.

“They like the emotions. They like the scary aspect of it. It’s something that’s unique in our culture,” Rolando Rodriguez, the Cuban-born chairman of the National Association of Theatre Owners, said of Hispanic and Latino crowds. “We expect big things out of ‘The Exorcist.'”
“The Exorcist: Believer,” a sequel to the classic 1973 original, tells the story of two girls who disappear for three days in present-day Georgia and end up possessed by a demon, or demons, traumatizing their families and resuming an old battle that is rooted in the first movie. It stars Leslie Odom Jr. of “Hamilton” fame.
The new film is slated to open in more than 3,600 theaters Friday, including Imax and other premium formats. It’s expected to pull in up to $30 million in its first weekend. While that should be enough to send it to No. 1 at the domestic box office for the weekend, it remains to be seen whether the film and the next two entries in a planned trilogy will pay off for NBCUniversal. The company’s movie studio and streaming service, Peacock, shelled out $400 million for the movies.
“The Exorcist: Believer” also faces a formidable foe in its second weekend: Taylor Swift, who’s releasing the concert film version of her megahit Eras Tour. “Believer” is also entering a crowded horror movie marketplace. Hollywood and indie studios are releasing scary flicks just about every week as Halloween approaches.
“The horror genre is as popular and plentiful as ever, with a consistent demand from audiences driving studios to keep the pipeline flowing with scary movies big and small, with both major and independent studios supplying the seemingly insatiable demand from an adoring fanbase of thrill-seeking moviegoers,” said Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst at Comscore.

Hispanic and Latino viewers will have a big say in how “The Exorcist: Believer” does at the box office, no matter what. They tend to represent 26% of horror movie audiences, compared with 20% for other genres, according to the Comscore/Screen Engine PostTrak Audience Survey.
“Horror films are a communal experience for Latinos, especially in big cities with multiple cinemas located within blocks of one another,” said R.C. Jara, a film writer who has been published on sites such as Hear Us Scream and Dread Central.

Religious roots

Actor Max von Sydow plays a priest performing an exorcism in a scene from the film “The Exorcist.” Linda Blair plays the possessed girl.
Bettmann | Bettmann | Getty Images

Hispanic audiences’ taste for horror goes back a long way in Hollywood.
In 1931, Universal released a Spanish-language version of the Bela Lugosi film “Dracula,” made with a different cast and crew, that has become a cult classic in its own right. The Oscar-winning career of Mexican director Guillermo del Toro (“Pan’s Labyrinth”) is full of macabre and fantastical tales. Hispanic viewers made up a whopping 44% of the audience during the opening weekend for the new “Saw X.”
Beyond the movies, creepy folk tales about bogeyman El Cucuy and weeping ghost La Llorona go back even further.
“We are a unique blend of ‘the old ways’ and modern Christianity, with a large portion of our members practicing Catholicism specifically,” Angel Melanson, an editor at horror publication Fangoria, told CNBC in an email. “These horror stories aren’t saved for once we come of age and ‘can handle’ them. Instead, they’re freely shared right from the start.”
Religion is at the core of much of the fervor for spooky stuff among the rapidly growing Hispanic population in the United States. As of last year, Catholics accounted for the biggest religious bloc among Latinos, according to Pew Research Center.
The original film “The Exorcist” and its source novel — both written by the late William Peter Blatty, a devout Catholic — are set within the dogma and rituals of Roman Catholicism. They tell the story of a preteen girl (played by Linda Blair in the movie) whose possession by a demon leaves her mother (Ellen Burstyn, who returns in the new film) with no choice but to petition priests (Jason Miller and Max von Sydow) to perform an exorcism.
Some of the story’s most shocking moments come when the demon says blasphemous things and performs profane acts, particularly during a notorious scene involving a crucifix.
“Religious horror is flirting with danger. Something maybe your abuela would yell at you for watching, but doesn’t that make it all the more appealing? Forbidden fruit. A horror story based on things we grow up learning are true and possible,” Melanson said.

Possession unbound

Ellen Burstyn, pictured in a still from the set of 2023’s “The Exorcist: Believer,” reprises her role from the original 1973 film. Also pictured: director David Gordon Green.
Courtesy: Universal Studios

Religious horror films resonate deeply with Latino moviegoers in large part because of the emphasis on rituals, experts say.
“Even for modern Latinos who don’t practice Brujeria or cleansings, Catholicism is rife with ritual. So there’s this concept of being able to defeat the demon with ritual, a how-to-survive guidebook of sorts,” Melanson said.
But it’s not unusual to hear atheistic or agnostic horror fans say “The Exorcist” made them believe, if only for two hours. The original movie, released the day after Christmas in 1973, was the kind of must-see event that resulted in lines of moviegoers of all faiths wrapping around blocks to wait for a screening. Hollywood hadn’t released anything like it before, not even Alfred Hitchcock’s classic slasher “Psycho” or the similarly satanic “Rosemary’s Baby,” in terms of shock value.
“The Exorcist” grossed more than $193 million, according to Comscore data. That would still be a big haul for a movie released these days, especially one as explicitly graphic as “The Exorcist.” At its heart, though, the movie is a tense, confrontational theological drama.
“I believe very strongly in God and the power of the human soul,” the late William Friedkin, who directed “The Exorcist,” once said in an interview. “I also believe that they are unknowable. But the film, ‘The Exorcist,’ is primarily about the mystery of faith, the mystery of goodness, that mystery which is inexplicable, but it’s there.”
The new movie’s director, David Gordon Green, is looking to tap into similar ground.
“Whatever faith you subscribe to, there’s always that curiosity, always that interest in the unknown,” Green, who also co-wrote “The Exorcist: Believer” and is set to helm its sequels, told CNBC.
Indeed, Green, who grew up Presbyterian and helps steer HBO’s evangelical comedy “The Righteous Gemstones,” took a small-c catholic approach to the story of the new “Exorcist.” The film opens up the religious sandbox beyond Jesuit priests, also embracing voodoo and evangelical rituals. Catholics don’t have a monopoly on the subject, after all. Possession, Green said, comprises a “huge world” of myths and ideas, from various cultures.

Leslie Odom Jr., seen in a still from the set, stars in “The Exorcist: Believer.”
Courtesy: Universal Studios

“We may have doubt, we may have certainty, but until we experience something, we don’t really know. There’s something beautiful about that,” he said.
The franchise’s branching out from its Catholic roots mirrors what’s happening among Latinos in the U.S. According to Pew, while Catholicism remains the largest faith among the group, the share of the population who identify as Catholic has fallen dramatically in recent years. Meanwhile, the number of Latinos who aren’t affiliated with any religion is surging. In fact, those ages 18 to 29 are more likely to be unaffiliated than Catholic, according to the study.
“Speaking on behalf of my profoundly Catholic family members, films about serial killers, monsters and especially demonic possession are a means of facing evil vicariously through fiction,” said Jara, reflecting on the genre. “But those of us, like myself, who are agnostic towards the existence of a higher power have found a primary home in horror.”
Still, even as beliefs shift, it’s not “The Exorcist” without religion. The next entry in the planned trilogy is scheduled for release on April 18, 2025 — Good Friday.
Disclosure: NBCUniversal is the parent company of CNBC and Universal Pictures, the distributor of “The Exorcist: Believer.” More

Clorox warned that its quarterly sales and profit took a big hit largely due to a cyberattack that significantly affected operations.
The Pine-Sol and bleach maker said the attack’s after effects continue to hurt production.
Scattered Spider, a group of hackers tied to recent cyberattacks on casino companies MGM and Caesars, is suspected of being tied to the August attack on Clorox, Bloomberg reported Wednesday.

Adam Jeffery | CNBC

Clorox on Wednesday warned that its sales and profit took a big hit during the quarter ending Sept. 30, largely due to the after effects of a cyberattack that significantly affected operations.
The bleach and cleaning products maker said it expects net sales to decrease 23% to 28%. Clorox also estimates its gross margin for the quarter will be down from the year-ago period. It expects to post a per share loss of 35 cents to 75 cents. On an adjusted basis, it projects a loss of up to 40 cents a share.

Clorox also said the cyberattack, which it disclosed in August, continues to hurt production, although the effect is lessening. “The Company also expects to begin to benefit from the restocking of retailer inventories as it ramps up fulfillment” during the current quarter, it said in a release.
Clorox said it is still assessing what effect the hack could have on the current fiscal year and beyond.
The effects of the attack were widescale, the company disclosed in a September securities filing. While operational systems were repaired, Clorox resorted to going manual on many of its procedures, slowing down product fulfillment. Nonetheless, the company has said the threat is contained.
Scattered Spider, a group of hackers tied to recent cyberattacks on casino companies MGM and Caesars, is suspected of being tied to the August attack on Clorox, Bloomberg reported Wednesday. MGM also warned in September that the attack could have a material effect on company finances. More

Cannabis company Tilray Brands posted net revenue of $177 million, an increase of 15% year over year, for its first-quarter earnings report.
The company has been acquiring brands outside of its core business for recreational cannabis in Canada.
Earlier this week, it completed its acquisition of eight beer brands from Anheuser-Busch InBev that it had announced over the summer.

Cannabis producer Tilray Brands on Wednesday reported a jump in revenue as it diversifies its portfolio and moves deeper into the beer industry.
The company reported $177 million in net revenue, up 15% year over year, for its fiscal first quarter. Its cannabis division brought in $70 million in net revenue, reflecting a 20% spike year over year.

It also narrowed its net loss to $55.9 million during the quarter, compared to a loss of $65.8 million a year earlier.
Tilray is a multinational cannabis company based in Canada, but it has increasingly moved into other segments, particularly the U.S. craft beer industry, as it navigates an uncertain legal environment for marijuana around the world.
The company said it grew cannabis revenue in Canada by 16.5% and strengthened its leading market share position in the country to 13.4%. Canada is one of the few major markets where recreational cannabis is legal at the federal level.

Workers inspect cannabis plants inside the grow room at the Aphria Inc. Diamond facility in Leamington, Ontario, in Canada, on Jan. 13, 2021.
Annie Sakkab | Bloomberg | Getty Images

On an earnings call Wednesday, CEO Irwin Simon said the company’s recent beverage mergers and acquisitions will accelerate growth and expand the company’s footprint beyond its recreational cannabis business as the drug remains illegal in key markets in the world, including at the federal level in the U.S. and in much of Europe.
“We’re waiting for legalization to happen in the U.S.,” Simon said separately during an appearance on CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street” on Wednesday. “If it happens, it will be great and we’re well-positioned.”

If legalization in the U.S. doesn’t happen, Simon said the company will fall back on its booming beverage business.
In recent years, the company has been on a buying spree, making deals in what it said are fast-growing markets, such as craft beers and cannabis-infused beverages.
Earlier this week, Tilray completed its acquisition of eight beer brands from Anheuser-Busch InBev that it had announced over the summer. The company said the deal makes it the fifth largest in the U.S. craft beer market.
Around the same time, the company acquired the remaining 57.5% equity ownership of cannabis-infused drinks maker Truss Beverage from Molson Coors Canada.
The transaction prices of both deals were not disclosed.
Tilray’s beverage alcohol revenue jumped 17% to $24 million in its first quarter, from $21 million in the prior-year period. It cited in part growth in its Montauk Brewing Company subsidiary. Tilray acquired Montauk, a fast-growing brewer in metro New York, in 2022.
“We have strategically diversified our company globally over the past several years and, as a result, Tilray is now ideally positioned to capture a wide range of opportunities across multiple industries,” said Simon in the earnings release. More