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British supermarket chain Tesco has warned that some food producers may be taking advantage of inflationary pressures, raising prices more than necessary.
Chairman John Allan said it was “entirely possible” that some food firms are profiteering from inflation at the cost of some of the poorest consumers.
But consumer group Which? has said supermarkets may be passing the buck, as the price of their own label foods rose at a greater rate than that of branded products in the last quarter.

Consumers have been feeling the pinch from higher food prices as inflation soars.
Nathan Stirk | Getty Images News | Getty Images

As inflation continues to push up grocery bills, supermarket chain Tesco has warned that some food producers may be taking advantage of the situation by raising prices more than necessary.
The chairman of Tesco, one of Britain’s largest supermarket chains, said Sunday it was “entirely possible” that some food firms are profiteering from inflation at the cost of some of the poorest consumers.

John Allan told the BBC that Tesco had “fallen out” with “a number of suppliers,” following discussions over price hikes that the supermarket had challenged.
Tesco has created a team to monitor food input costs against price rises and is challenging companies it believes are lifting prices disproportionately, Allen said.
“We have a team who can look at the composition of food, costs of commodities, and work out whether or not these cost increases are legitimate,” he told the “Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg” program.
Allan said that, while most price hikes were legitimate, the supermarket was “trying hard to challenge” those it deemed were not.
Tesco told CNBC that it was unable to provide further comment.

Food suppliers have hit back at the claims. Heinz beans and tomato ketchup were among the products that Tesco temporarily removed from shelves last year in a pricing dispute. The products returned to sale after an agreement was reached.
A spokesperson for Kraft Heinz told CNBC Monday that the company continues to face increased production costs and rising inflation, but is “absorbing costs” where possible.

Passing the buck

A consumer group called Which? said that it was possible that supermarkets like Tesco were passing the buck by claiming that suppliers were raising prices unfairly.
In its latest Supermarket Inflation Tracker, Which? found that branded items had a lower inflation rate than that of supermarkets’ own label items. In the three months to December 2022, the prices of stores’ own label items rose 18.3% year-on-year, compared to a 12.3% year-on-year hike for branded items.
“We’ve seen huge price increases at the supermarket with our research showing that despite more people opting for own-brands and basic products to help them through the cost of living, these ranges have been subject to higher rates of inflation than premium and branded foods,” Reena Sewraz, Which? retail editor, told CNBC.
It comes as consumers continue to face higher prices, as a result of supply chain disruptions and Russia’s war in Ukraine.

U.K. inflation dipped slightly to 10.5% in December from 10.7% in November, but remains at a 40-year-high.
The price of food and non-alcoholic beverages rose 16.9% in the year to November 2022, new data showed Wednesday.
These price hikes have prompted more shoppers to opt for supermarket branded items and discount chains, such as Lidl and Aldi.
Discount supermarkets are not immune to the recent cost increases. While they remain among the U.K.’s cheapest supermarkets, prices at Lidl and Aldi respectively rose 21.1% and 20.8% in the year to December, according to Which?.

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SpaceX announced on Monday it completed a major test of its latest Starship prototype.
Starship prototype 24, stacked on Super Heavy booster prototype 7, was fueled up at SpaceX’s Starbase facility in Texas in a test known as a “wet dress rehearsal.”
An orbital launch attempt of Starship marks the next step in flight testing for the rocket.

Starship prototype 24 stacked on top of Super Heavy booster prototype 7 at the company’s facility near Brownsville, Texas on January 9, 2023.

SpaceX announced on Monday it completed a major test of its latest Starship prototype, as the company prepares for the first orbital launch of the towering rocket.
Starship prototype 24, stacked on Super Heavy booster prototype 7, was fueled up at SpaceX’s Starbase facility in Texas in a test known as a “wet dress rehearsal.” While the test does not include firing up the rocket’s engines, it is a typical practice during development of a new liquid-fueled vehicle to show that it can be safely filled before a launch, as well as verify the steps of a launch countdown.

“This was the first time an integrated Ship and Booster were fully loaded with more than 10 million pounds of propellant,” SpaceX said in a tweet.
Starship is a nearly 400-foot-tall rocket, designed to carry cargo and people beyond Earth. It is also critical to NASA’s plan to return astronauts to the moon, with SpaceX having won a nearly $3 billion contract from the agency in 2021.

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An orbital launch attempt of Starship marks the next step in flight testing for the rocket. It’s been nearly two years since the company last performed a Starship flight test, and late last year SpaceX shook up leadership at its “Starbase” facility in Texas as the company pushes to get the next launch off the ground.
SpaceX has a few more steps remaining before Starship can next launch, including a planned test firing of all 33 engines at the base of the Super Heavy rocket booster. The company also needs a launch license from the Federal Aviation Administration.

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Anti-abortion physicians are suing to overturn the FDA’s approval of mifepristone, which dates back more than two decades.
Mifepristone used in combination with misoprostol is the most common way to terminate a pregnancy in the U.S.
If the lawsuit prevails, mifepristone would no longer be available in the U.S. market and the FDA’s drug approval powers would be weakened.

Mifepristone (Mifeprex) and Misoprostol, the two drugs used in a medication abortion, are seen at the Women’s Reproductive Clinic, which provides legal medication abortion services, in Santa Teresa, New Mexico, on June 17, 2022.
Robyn Beck | AFP | Getty Images

The Food and Drug Administration is squaring off with anti-abortion physicians in an unprecedented legal challenge to its more than two-decade-old approval of a pill used to terminate early pregnancies.
The Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine asked a federal district court in Dallas late last year to declare the FDA approval unlawful and completely remove the abortion pill from the U.S. market.

The case has thrust the FDA in the middle of the fierce national battle over abortion access in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade last June. If the lawsuit prevails, women across the U.S. would lose access, at least temporarily, to the most commonly used abortion method. The FDA’s powers to approve drugs would also be weakened.
The court could issue a ruling as soon as Feb. 10 when it will be fully briefed.
The Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine is represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom, a Christian organization that played a central role in the Dobbs vs. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case that ultimately resulted in the Supreme Court abolishing federal abortion rights.
Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk is hearing the challenge to the FDA’s approval of the abortion pill. Kacsmaryk was appointed by former President Donald Trump to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas in 2019.
If the alliance wins in federal district court, the Biden administration would appeal to the 5th Circuit in New Orleans, a conservative court with 12 of its 16 active judges appointed by Republicans. From there, the case could end up at the Supreme Court.

The FDA approved mifepristone in 2000 for use in combination with misoprostol as a safe and effective way to end early pregnancies. The drug regimen is currently approved for use up to the 10th week of pregnancy. Half of abortions in the U.S. are performed with mifepristone and misoprostol.

‘Extraordinary and unprecedented’

In their complaint, the anti-abortion physicians argue the FDA abused its power by approving mifepristone through an accelerated process which is reserved for new drugs that would benefit patients with serious or life-threatening illnesses more than what’s currently available.
They contend pregnancy is not an illness, mifepristone is not more safe and effective than surgical abortion, and claim the FDA’s actions have put patients’ health at risk.
The FDA, in its response filed earlier this month, described the lawsuit as “extraordinary and unprecedented.” The government’s lawyers said they could not find any previous example of a court second-guessing an FDA approval and removing a widely available drug from the market.
The FDA determined that mifepristone is a safe and effective way to end an early pregnancy more than two decades ago based on extensive scientific evidence, the agency’s lawyers wrote. Decades of experience from thousands of women and their physicians has confirmed mifepristone is safer than surgical abortion or childbirth, they said.

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The public interest would be “dramatically harmed” by pulling mifepristone from the market, the government lawyers argued. It would put more women’s health at risk and cause overcrowding and delays at clinics that provide surgical abortion, they wrote in their response.
A decision by the court to overturn the FDA’s approval could also harm future drug development, the government’s lawyers said.
“If longstanding FDA drug approvals were so easily enjoined, even decades after being issued, pharmaceutical companies would be unable to confidently rely on FDA approval decisions to develop the pharmaceutical-drug infrastructure that Americans depend on to treat a variety of health conditions,” the Biden administration lawyers wrote.
Lawrence Gostin, an expert on public health law at Georgetown Law, said it would be “highly irresponsible” and “reckless” for a judge to overturn the FDA approval of mifepristone. It would have “disastrous” consequences and set a “cataclysmic” precedent, he said.
“You can’t have individual states let alone a single judge overturning all of the scientific evidence that’s assessed by the federal Food and Drug Administration and usurping that power for itself,” said Gostin, who has advised the Biden administration in the past on health policy.
“It would mean that any FDA regulatory or approval decision could be subject to the whims of a single federal court or state,” Gostin said.

Standing and statute of limitations

The federal government has argued that the medical associations and individual physicians who filed the lawsuit do not have standing because their claims of harm are speculative.
Two obstetricians, an emergency department doctor and a family physician claim in the lawsuit that they’ve treated patients who have had complications from “chemical abortions.” The medical associations claim they spent resources petitioning the FDA over its regulatory actions on mifepristone.
Standing aside, the federal government has also contended that the statute of limitations bars the plaintiffs from challenging the FDA’s 2000 approval of mifepristone. Under federal law, lawsuits against the U.S. government must be filed within six years of an agency action.
The Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, however, has also asked the court to overturn a number of more recent FDA actions on mifepristone. These include the agency’s 2019 approval of a generic version of the pill and its 2021 decision to allow delivery of the medication by mail.
The alliance argues that the delivery of abortion pills violates a federal statute from 1873 known as the Comstock Act, which declares anything designed or intended to produce an abortion as nonmailable.
But the Justice Department, in an opinion issued in late December, said the law does not prohibit the delivery of mifepristone and misoprostol when the sender does not intend to break the law.
“It’s giving the Post Office, the USPS, the legal ground that they feel they need to stand on to do what they’re doing — which is to continue to ship these medications,” Jennifer Piatt, an expert at Arizona State University’s Center for Public Health Law and Policy, said of the DOJ opinion.
It’s possible the judge could block these 2019 and 2021 actions by the FDA rather than completely withdraw mifepristone from the U.S. market. The federal government has argued that even an injunction which is more limited in scope “would unduly burden the public and healthcare systems.”
“Never say never,” Gostin said. “Some of these judges have proven to be real culture warriors. They do have the power to issue nationwide injunctions.”

FDA authority in post-Roe America

Regardless of the outcome in the Northern District of Texas, abolishing federal abortion rights has called into question just how far the FDA’s approval of new drugs extends in a post-Roe America.
The FDA earlier this month allowed retail pharmacies to dispense mifepristone for the first time if they get certified with the federal government and the patient has a prescription from a certified health-care provider.
CVS and Walgreens, the nation’s two largest drugstore chains, have said they are applying for certification and will provide the abortion pill in states where the law allows. But a dozen states have banned abortion in nearly all circumstances, and a number of others have restrictions on dispensing and administering mifepristone that conflict with FDA regulations.
The attorney general of Alabama recently suggested that women could be prosecuted for self-managing abortions with mifepristone. And Florida warned pharmacies in a letter last week that dispensing the abortion pill directly to patients is illegal under state law.
But the FDA’s powers stem from Congress’ constitutional authority to regulate interstate commerce. Lawmakers gave the agency the power to decide which drugs are introduced into the U.S. based on whether they are safe and effective. This raises the question of whether or not the FDA’s approval of mifepristone preempts state laws that ban it for abortions.
Pharmacies, however, are licensed by state boards. As a practical matter, this means states that have banned abortion have the power to revoke the licenses of pharmacies that dispense mifepristone in contravention of local law.
“For retail pharmacies that want to get into this space, they’re going to be looking at risk and the risk that they’re looking at is that they’re in a state with a full abortion ban,” Piatt said. “They’re not going to want to start immediately selling those items for fear of violating the state law.”
The courts have in the past ruled that FDA’s drug approval powers supersede state law. In 2014, Massachusetts tried to ban the painkiller Zohydro, which contains hydrocodone, after declaring a public health emergency in response to the opioid crisis. But a federal district court judge blocked the ban from taking effect, arguing Massachusetts was obstructing the FDA’s mandate from Congress.
“If the Commonwealth were able to countermand the FDA’s determinations and substitute its own requirements, it would undermine the FDA’s ability to make drugs available to promote and protect the public health,” Judge Ryan Zobel of the U.S. District Court for Massachusetts wrote.
Just how far the FDA’s authority extends into states with abortion bans that conflict with the agency’s decisions on mifepristone is a question which will be decided in federal courts in the months ahead, Piatt said.

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The Oscar nominations are set to be announced at 8:30 a.m. ET.
“Everything Everywhere All at Once,” “The Fabelmans” and “Top Gun: Maverick” could be in the mix.
The Academy Awards ceremony will be held March 12.

An Oscar statue is shown in a shopping mall next to the arrivals area as preparation for the 92nd Academy Awards continues in Los Angeles, California, February 7, 2020.
Mike Blake | Reuters

The nominations for the 95th annual Academy Awards are set to be announced on Tuesday morning.
Actor and producer Riz Ahmed and actress Allison Williams will announce all of the award nominees in a two-part livestream that will be broadcast across the Academy of Motion Picture Sciences’ social media accounts and the organization’s website.

Contenders to be nominated for the biggest prizes of the ceremony, which will take place on March 12, include “Everything Everywhere All At Once,” “The Banshees of Inisherin,” “Elvis,” “The Fabelmans,” “Tar” and “Top Gun: Maverick.”
Michelle Yeoh (“Everything Everywhere All At Once”) and Cate Blanchett (“Tar”) appear to be shoo-in nominees for best actress, while Austin Butler (“Elvis”), Brendan Fraser (“The Whale”) and Colin Farrell (“The Banshees of Inisherin”) are expected to pick up nods in the best actor category.
Steven Spielberg is expected to pick up a best director nomination for “The Fabelmans,” a semi-autobiographical film based on his own childhood. Todd Field is also expected to be in the mix for “Tar” and Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert for “Everything Everywhere All At Once.”
The 95th Oscars will be held at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles with Jimmy Kimmel as host and will be televised live on ABC. This year’s ceremony is sure to draw extra attention after Will Smith smacked Chris Rock during last year’s show.
This is a breaking news story. Please check back for updates.

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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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Paysafe Ltd: “It is a good company. … I bless that for a trade to $25.”

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Jim Cramer’s Guide to Investing

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Monday – Friday, 6:00 – 7:00 PM ET

CNBC’s Jim Cramer highlighted several factors that could help propel stocks higher, even during what could be an ugly earnings season.
Tuesday kicks off a new earnings season with some of the biggest companies in technology, retail and consumer goods reporting their quarterly financial results.

CNBC’s Jim Cramer on Monday said that several elements could help propel stocks higher, even during what could be an ugly earnings season.
Tuesday kicks off a new earnings season featuring some of the biggest companies in technology, retail and consumer goods. Companies like Microsoft, IBM and ServiceNow are slated to report their quarterly financial results this week.

Here are the six factors that could help stocks as companies report earnings, according to Cramer:

More firms are implementing layoffs. Companies including Microsoft, Salesforce and Wayfair recently announced head count cuts, and their stocks popped.
The U.S. dollar and interest rates peaked last fall. Cyclical, more economically sensitive stocks have since bounced, as many companies conduct a large portion of their business overseas.
The Federal Reserve could almost be done raising interest rates. That’s according to a Wall Street Journal report, and could mean that bad loan worries – and possible ensuing damage to banks – could be over.
China’s economy is reopening. The return of the world’s second-largest economy is great news for companies, particularly those in entertainment, travel and consumer goods.
The government is poised to spend big on infrastructure. Cash from the bipartisan infrastructure bill and the Inflation Reduction Act provide a “safety net” for companies that build roads, bridges or tunnels.
Analysts are upgrading chip stocks. Barclays on Monday upgraded Advanced Micro Devices and Qualcomm to overweight. “Remember, the [semiconductor chips] inventory glut included everything from cellphones to desktops to high-performance computers. This is a very big deal,” Cramer said.

Cramer cautioned that while earnings season may still not be smooth sailing, any dips in stock price aren’t necessarily unwelcome.
“At the moment of the first print, when we see the numbers, I still expect to see some vicious declines. The difference from 2022? Those declines, they might be buyable,” he said.
Disclaimer: Cramer’s Charitable Trust owns shares of Advanced Micro Devices, Qualcomm, Salesforce and Microsoft.

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Monday – Friday, 6:00 – 7:00 PM ET

CNBC’s Jim Cramer on Monday warned investors to stay away from crypto despite bitcoin’s recent gains and instead look to gold.
Bitcoin, the world’s top cryptocurrency, continued to gain on Monday as investors continued to bet that the Federal Reserve will ease its pace of interest rate cuts or stop them altogether.

CNBC’s Jim Cramer on Monday warned investors to stay away from crypto despite bitcoin’s recent gains and instead look to gold.
“The charts, as interpreted by Carley Garner, suggest you need to ignore the crypto cheerleaders now that bitcoin’s bouncing. And if you seriously want a real hedge against inflation or economic chaos, she says you should stick with gold. And I agree,” he said.

Bitcoin continued to gain on Monday, reaching as high as $23,155.93 as investors bet that the Federal Reserve will ease its pace of interest rate cuts or stop them altogether. 
The price of the digital currency climbed reached $23,333.83 on Saturday for the first time since August, according to Coin Metrics. That marks an almost 39% climb in bitcoin since the beginning of this month.
To explain the analysis from Garner, who is the senior commodity market strategist and broker at DeCarley Trading, Cramer examined the daily chart of Bitcoin futures and the tech-heavy Nasdaq-100 going back to March 2021.

Arrows pointing outwards

Garner pointed out that the two indexes are almost trading in lockstep, which suggests that it’s a risk asset rather than a currency or stable store hold of value, according to Cramer.
“Imagine business owners trying to conduct transactions with shares of Facebook or Google … it’s ridiculous, they’re too volatile. Bitcoin is no different,” he said.

The reason they trade so closely is because of “counterparty risk,” which is the probability that the other party in an investment or transaction might not fulfill their end of the deal, Cramer said.
“Of course, you can just own Bitcoin directly in a decentralized wallet — that protects you from counterparty risk — but if you ever want to use it for anything, the risk is back on the table. And as FTX’s customers learned, it can be devastating,” he said. “On the other hand, gold, well, it’s the opposite.”
Disclaimer: Cramer’s Charitable Trust owns shares of Meta Platforms and Alphabet.
For more analysis, watch Cramer’s full explanation below.

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Candy maker Mars said it is replacing its M&Ms “spokescandies” with actress Maya Rudolph after facing right-wing criticism.
Rudolph will star in the candy brand’s upcoming Super Bowl commercial.
Conservatives, including Fox News host Tucker Carlson, claimed the makeovers the mascots got last year, including new shoes and personalities, were an example of a liberal agenda gone too far.
Mars in December said it would return to the Super Bowl ad slate with a 30-second commercial, teasing the spot with an image of its seven M&M characters silhouetted on a football field.

Actor Maya Rudolph to replace M&Ms spokescandies.
Source: Mars (L) | Getty Images (R)

Candy maker Mars said Monday it is replacing its M&Ms “spokescandies” with actress Maya Rudolph after facing right-wing criticism over its mascot makeover.
Rudolph will star in the candy brand’s Super Bowl LVII commercial, Chief Marketing Officer Gabrielle Wesley told CNBC. It will be the actor’s first appearance as the brand’s spokesperson and “Chief of Fun.”

“The original colorful cast of M&M’S spokescandies are, at present, pursuing other personal passions,” said Wesley.
She noted that in the coming weeks, the company will announce “what the M&M’S spokescandies are up to over the next few weeks before, during and after Super Bowl LVII,” via their website and social media channels.
The spokescandies are a team of cartoon M&Ms mascots that have represented the brand in commercials and other marketing materials since 1960. Early last year, the candy brand updated the cartoons and its marketing, rebranding each mascot with a new backstory, clothing and personality to be more inclusive.
The green M&M, for example, had previously drawn criticism for being marketed as too sexy, so the company switched out her knee-high heeled boots for sneakers and put more emphasis on her feminist values. “Orange” became a mascot riddled with anxiety, and the company added a new purple M&M, which was designed to represent inclusivity.
The rebrand caught the eye of conservatives, including Fox News host Tucker Carlson, at the time of the update and again in recent weeks, with some claiming the makeovers were another example of a liberal agenda gone too far.

“In the last year, we’ve made some changes to our beloved spokescandies. We weren’t sure if anyone would even notice. And we definitely didn’t think it would break the internet,” M&Ms said in a statement Monday on Twitter. “Now we get it — even a candy’s shoes can be polarizing … Therefore, we have decided to take an indefinite pause on the spokescandies.”
The company announced Rudolph would take the place of the iconic mascots just ahead of the key Super Bowl advertising event.
“I am a lifelong lover of the candy, and I feel like it’s such an honor to be asked to be part of such a legendary brand’s campaign,” Rudolph said in an interview Monday with NBC’s TODAY.
Representatives for Rudolph did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Mars in December announced it would make its return to the Super Bowl advertising slate with a 30-second spot during the game Feb. 12. The company teased the commercial with an image of its seven M&M characters, silhouetted on a football field.
“The latest campaign extends our purposeful work over the last year but is rooted in a new creative territory, and we can’t wait for our fans to see what’s about to unfold,” Wesley said in a statement at the time.
Correction: A photo caption in this story has been updated to correct the spelling of Maya Rudolph’s name.

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