Business

Shares of Kohl’s surged on Tuesday, leading to a temporary halt in trading due to volatility.
Chatter on Reddit’s Wall Street Bets has picked up recently about Kohl’s because of the stock’s high short interest and its name recognition among retail investors.
The legacy department store’s stock more than doubled in early trading, and by late morning, trading volume was nearly 17 times higher than the 30-day average.

A Kohl’s store in Pleasant Hill, California, on Nov. 25, 2024.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Shares of Kohl’s surged Tuesday in volatile trading that echoed the meme stock rallies of recent years.
The legacy department store’s stock more than doubled from Monday’s close of $10.42 per share, only to see those gains wiped out about a half an hour after markets opened. Trading in the stock was temporarily halted at one point Tuesday morning.

Still, shares closed about 37% higher on the day.
Meanwhile, the trading volume by late morning Tuesday was almost 17 times higher than the average over the past 30 days. 
There were no apparent corporate announcements or major stock ratings to send shares soaring on Tuesday, but Kohl’s has all the markings of a meme stock. It’s a legacy department store that many retail investors grew up shopping at, and it’s heavily shorted, with about 50% of shares outstanding sold short, according to FactSet. 
It has a sprawling retail footprint of more than 1,100 stores and has been the subject of takeover offers, activist campaigns and bankruptcy watchlists in recent years. 
“There’s a lot of irrational exuberance around the stock. It’s a very similar thing to what we saw with Bed Bath and Beyond back in the day,” said Neil Saunders, managing director of GlobalData. “There’s nothing really that Kohl’s has done to fundamentally earn this level of increase. The business fundamentals remain quite weak.”

There has been recent chatter around Kohl’s stock in the Wall Street Bets forum on Reddit, which became popular during the GameStop short squeeze in 2021. Some pointed to it as a potential squeeze candidate given the short interest and its name recognition among retail investors.
When investors flock to a heavily shorted stock, those with short positions may buy more to cover their losses, which can drive the price higher. 
Beyond its share price, Kohl’s business has been struggling for several years. Its sales are falling, it faces rising competition and it is currently led by an interim CEO after its former CEO Ashley Buchanan was ousted over a conflict-of-interest scandal. 
In May, Kohl’s said it expects sales to fall between 5% and 7% in fiscal 2025, with comparable sales down between 4% and 6%.

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While Tesla remains the No. 1 electric vehicle manufacturer in the U.S. by far, General Motors said it has secured the No. 2 position and believes it has an “inherent advantage” when it comes to EVs.
GM CFO Paul Jacobson said the automaker’s leg up lies in the diversity of its lineup across gas and electric vehicles, as EV demand fluctuates.
Automakers are faced with changing demand for EVs, heightened by President Donald Trump’s new tax-and-spending bill.

The Chevrolet display is seen at the New York International Auto Show on April 16, 2025.
Danielle DeVries | CNBC

While Tesla remains the No. 1 electric vehicle manufacturer in the U.S. by a wide margin, General Motors said on Tuesday it has secured the No. 2 position and believes it has an “inherent advantage” when it comes to EVs.
Executives on GM’s quarterly earnings call on Tuesday said the company is focused on reaching and improving profitability for its EVs. When asked on the call about how GM aims to do that when Tesla is facing the same uphill climb, GM CFO Paul Jacobson said the company’s advantage lies in the diversity of its lineup across gas and electric vehicles, as EV demand fluctuates.

“A lot is made about Tesla’s simplicity and their scale,” Jacobson said. “And clearly, within a couple of narrow segments, they do have that, and they’ve realized some good advantages. And hats off to them. It also leaves them overexposed to a demand set that has been highly volatile.”
GM currently has 12 EVs in its lineup, while Tesla has five models. Tesla does not break out sales by model, but lumps them together in groups.
Jacobson’s comments come as automakers are faced with changing demand for EVs, heightened by President Donald Trump’s new tax-and-spending bill, which is set to end the $7,500 tax credit for new electric vehicles and $4,000 credit for used EVs after Sept. 30.
Sales of new EVs in the second quarter of 2025 were down 6.3% year over year, which marks only the third decline on record, according to the auto industry forecaster Cox Automotive.
Those sales amounted to a 4.9% uptick from the first quarter of 2025, according to Cox Automotive, which Cox Senior Analyst Stephanie Valdez said may represent the start of a rush to buy EVs before the tax credit ends.

Valdez predicted there will be record new EV sales in the third quarter of 2025, followed by a collapse in the fourth quarter as the EV market adjusts to its “new reality” without EV tax credits.
GM CEO Mary Barra acknowledged that EV growth has been slower than expected, but said on the earnings call Tuesday that “we believe the long-term future is profitable electric vehicle production, and this continues to be our North Star.”
Amid this fluctuating demand, a July 17 Barclays note said Tesla’s demand and fundamentals remain weak, while its autonomous vehicle and robotaxi narratives have been front and center.
In the second quarter, Tesla reported around 384,000 vehicle deliveries, a 14% year-over-year decline and its second straight quarterly decrease. Deliveries are the closest approximation of vehicle sales reported by Tesla but are not precisely defined in the company’s shareholder communications.
But Tesla is still the vast EV leader by far. GM’s electric vehicle sales totaled 46,300 for the quarter, more than double the 21,900 a year ago. That’s a relatively small portion of the Detroit automaker’s total vehicle sales in the second quarter of 974,000.
Cox Automotive noted that GM’s 78,000 EVs in the first half of 2025 amount to more than twice the volume posted in 2024.
Jacobson said on Tuesday’s call that GM is prepared for changing EV demand because it has built flexibility into its manufacturing plants by investing in both EVs and internal combustion engine cars.
“That built-in flexibility for us to switch between EV and ICE and make sure that we meet customers where they are is an inherent advantage that we have because we can absorb some of the costs of that manufacturing facility with more ICE production if EV demand goes down,” Jacobson said.
He highlighted GM’s new investments in its Spring Hill plant in Tennessee and Fairfax plant in Kansas as an example of this diversification. GM announced last month that it was investing $4 billion in several American plants and is set to increase U.S. production of both gas and electric vehicles.
GM said on Tuesday that Chevrolet holds the No. 2 spot and Cadillac sits at No. 5 in EV brand rankings.
— CNBC’s Lora Kolodny contributed to this report. More

Sensors placed around the office space record the heat and then incorporate AI to look at every aspect of physical interactions.
Companies use the data to make decisions about layout and design, retrofits, hybrid work schedules, maintenance, cleaning schedules and lease negotiations.
The cost of office upgrades is on the rise, due to both material prices and labor shortages.

Butlr heat sensing tech provides insights into office space utilization.
Courtesy of Butlr

A version of this article first appeared in the CNBC Property Play newsletter with Diana Olick. Property Play covers new and evolving opportunities for the real estate investor, from individuals to venture capitalists, private equity funds, family offices, institutional investors and large public companies. Sign up to receive future editions, straight to your inbox.
As more and more employees return to the office, by choice or by force, large companies are more interested than ever in understanding how they use the space. The pandemic fundamentally changed how and where people work, and even in the return-to-office dynamic, there is a greater focus on how to best utilize and monetize office space, as well as make it more energy-efficient.

To that end, some companies are using body heat. Butlr, a 6-year-old, San Francisco-based startup that was a spinoff of MIT Media Lab, leverages body temperature technology to understand how humans act and interact in the office without using cameras. In other words, it’s anonymous.
Sensors placed around the office space record the heat and then incorporate AI to look at every aspect of physical interactions. That includes occupancy, foot traffic, frequency and location of meetings, areas that are unoccupied or crowded and the impact on heating and cooling systems. But it goes beyond that.
“By understanding how colleagues act and interact in the office while ensuring privacy, you can make it a place that is more productive, collaborative and aligned with the corporate culture – one where they look forward to being there,” said Honghao Deng, CEO and co-founder of Butlr. “This can impact retention and performance, and you may even see attitudes shift from negative to positive.”
Companies use the data to make decisions about layout and design, retrofits, hybrid work schedules, maintenance, cleaning schedules and lease negotiations.

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 The costs of so-called office fit-outs, or upgrades to spaces, are on the rise, according to a new report from JLL.

“Increased focus on in-office attendance, employee experience and sustainability performance is leading focus on investing in high quality workspaces, with increased spend on materials and finishes and shifting cost profiles on many projects,” according to the report.
JLL also noted that those rising costs, as well as economic uncertainty, are contributing to hesitancy in CRE investment decisions. That has the potential to have long-term impacts on the overall workplace. Both raw material price increases and labor shortages are increasing overall construction costs across all regions.
Still, more and more companies are pushing workers back to the office and solidifying flexible work arrangements into the culture. That flexible work paradigm, according to Deng, has more employers seeking data and insights into actual office usage. 
“You can think about this from both a cultural and a financial perspective,” he said. 
In April, Butlr announced the completion of its latest investment round for a total of $75 million in funding to date. The company’s clients span office, higher education and senior care and include names like Verizon, CBRE, Carrier and Compass Group. 
The company serves customers in North America, Europe and Asia. More

Airlines have long been champions of price discrimination. To fatten their notoriously slim profit margins, they have developed what are known as “fare fences”, based on factors such as whether or not a trip spans a weekend, to charge more to customers who are willing to pay higher prices, particularly business travellers. More

Skims has reached a partnership deal with League One Volleyball.
Women’s volleyball has seen growth at both the amateur and professional level in recent years.
The popular undergarments brand started by star Kim Kardashian and Swedish entrepreneur Jens Grede has been ramping up its efforts in the women’s sports category.

Skims is teaming up with League One Volleyball.

Skims is deepening its ties in women’s sports with a new partnership in League One Volleyball.
The popular undergarments brand started by star Kim Kardashian and Swedish entrepreneur Jens Grede will become the official loungewear, intimates and sleepwear partner of the emerging volleyball league. They did not disclose the size of the deal.

The partnership comes as Skims has been ramping up its efforts in the women’s sports category. In February, the company announced it was teaming up with Nike as it looks to win over more women and take on competitors such as Lululemon, Alo Yoga and Vuori.
League One Volleyball — or LOVB, pronounced “love” — was founded in 2020 and consists of the largest community of youth volleyball clubs in the country. LOVB launched a professional league in January.
“This partnership with LOVB is an exciting opportunity to expand our reach at the intersection of fashion, culture and sports,” said Grede, co-founder and CEO of Skims. 
Skims said as part of the deal, the brand will also participate in the LOVB community, including athlete-driven events and leaguewide activations. The brand said it plans to help elevate the voices of female athletes of all levels and highlight volleyball’s growth across the U.S.
“Together, we look forward to inspiring confidence and empowering athletes at every level through innovative products, community activations, and storytelling that celebrates the athletes on and off the court,” Kardashian, co-founder and chief creative officer of Skims, said in a statement.

Skims sees huge potential in volleyball, calling it “America’s next major sports league.” In recent years, the sport has seen huge upticks both in fans and television ratings.
In 2023, 92,000 fans recorded the largest-ever crowd for a women’s sports event when the Nebraska Cornhuskers’ women’s team took on the Omaha Mavericks.
The 2024 Women’s NCAA Volleyball Tournament was the most-consumed ever for ESPN, with more than 1.3 billion minutes watched across its platforms, according to the network. The entirety of the NCAA Women’s Volleyball Tournament finished up 41% year over year, ESPN said.
In May 2024, ESPN secured the media rights for League One pro matches.
“Partnering with Skims is an incredible milestone for our league and clubs,” said Michelle McGoldrick, LOVB’s chief business officer. “Together, we’re not only supporting our remarkable athletes on their journey to becoming household names, but also helping to inspire the next generation of players and fans.” More

Corporations are continuing to spend on business travel, but are being strategic about how they allocate those dollars amid ongoing trade uncertainties.
Corporate travel spending activity increased 15% year over year in the second quarter of 2025, according to a business travel index published Tuesday from Navan.
While global business travel is expected to reach a new high of $1.57 trillion in 2025, that total represents less growth than the Global Business Travel Association predicted a year ago.

istocksdaily | iStock | Getty Images

Corporations are continuing to spend on business travel, but are being strategic about how they allocate those dollars amid ongoing trade uncertainties, according to new reports from the Global Business Travel Association and travel and expense platform Navan.
Corporate travel spending activity increased 15% year over year in the second quarter of 2025, according to a business travel index published Tuesday from Navan.

Navan’s index, backed by Nasdaq, is derived from millions of corporate business transactions on its platform. It examines the amount spent and number of transactions relating to airline travel, hotel reservations and expense transactions from corporate cards.
Amy Butte, Navan’s CFO, said during an interview that from talking with other chief financial officers over the past few months, she never got the sense that corporate leaders would stop spending on business travel altogether. Instead, they are in “wait and see” mode.
“If you’re making choices about where you’re being cautious, we’re not seeing people be cautious in the area of relationship building, either with their customers or with their teammates. We’re still seeing the spend allocated towards travel as a key component of any business strategy,” Butte said.
But while global business travel is expected to reach a new high of $1.57 trillion in 2025, according to a Monday report by the Global Business Travel Association, that total represents 6.6% year-over-year growth, which is less than the 10.4% increase that was previously predicted. GBTA cited trade tensions, policy uncertainty and economic pressures as the reasons for the more moderate growth.
A string of sentiment polls by GBTA also shows that corporate travel optimism for the rest of 2025 appears muted. The percentage of respondents who said they were optimistic about the overall outlook for the business travel industry in 2025 dropped sharply from 67% in November 2024 to 31% in April and declined slightly again this month to 28%.

The findings from both reports, grouped together with commentary from airline CEOs last week, show C-suite leaders are still largely left in wait-and-see mode amid President Donald Trump’s fluid tariff policies, but companies appear now to have a better read on how they will manage the uncertainty.
“Historically, corporate travel has been the first thing, one of the easiest things, to minimize if you’re a company,” Delta Air Lines CEO Ed Bastian said during the company’s earnings call this month, adding that corporate travel on the airline has been flat on a year-over-year basis.
But Butte said that Navan has not seen a drop-off in business travel. Instead, businesses are shifting how they are spending.
For example, Butte said businesses are continuing to commit to individual, face-to-face meetings, rather than spending on large group outings. The Navan index shows that spending on personal meals, meaning one-on-one meetings held over a meal, was up 9.8% from last year, while spending on team events and meals was the only category in the report that declined.
Navan did see some compression earlier in the year in the share of higher-priced airline tickets purchased that were first class or business class, Butte said, but she added that the platform has since seen an acceleration as uncertainty has lessened.
Airfare prices have also declined so far this year, which means business and consumers alike are spending less on plane tickets. Airfare fell 3.5% in June from a year earlier while inflation overall rose, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
GBTA CEO Suzanne Neufang said during an interview that CFOs have not cut travel spending off entirely, but are looking for efficient ways to get employees on the road. This may look like booking multicity trips, scheduling multiple meetings per trip or booking fewer trips per month, she said.
Neufang said the business travel industry has been focused over the past five years on making sure every trip has a purpose and delivers a return on investment.
“Gone are the days when there’s really frivolous business traveling,” Neufang said.

Airline executives weigh in

The new findings on business travel spending also come as airlines are reporting their quarterly earnings.
When Delta reported earnings on July 10, Bastian said he expects both consumer and corporate confidence to improve in the second half of the year, creating an environment for travel demand to accelerate.
Delta and other airlines saw travel demand come in weaker than expected at the beginning of the year, especially from price-sensitive customers traveling domestically. Bastian said back in April that Trump’s trade policies were hurting bookings.
Bastian took a more positive tone this month, telling CNBC that corporate travel has stabilized as businesses have more clarity and confidence than they did earlier this year. But he said corporate travel is in line with last year, not the 5% to 10% growth Delta expected at the start of the year.
Meanwhile, Delta President Glen Hauenstein said on an earnings call this month that corporate travel trends are “choppy” and overall corporate volumes are expected to be “flattish” over last year.
United Airlines reported earnings last week. CEO Scott Kirby said during the company’s call with analysts that so far this month, the airline has seen a double-digit acceleration in business demand as uncertainty has declined.
Andrew Nocella, United’s executive vice president and chief commercial officer, added that the business traffic growth is “across the board” and not restricted to any singular hub or vertical, which he said reflects lessening macroeconomic uncertainty.
Southwest Airlines, Alaska Airlines and American Airlines are scheduled to report their quarterly results this week. More

Coca-Cola plans to expand its U.S. soda offerings with a version of its namesake cola sweetened with cane sugar.
President Donald Trump had earlier announced that he had spoken with Coke about using “REAL Cane Sugar” in its drinks.
Coke first started using high-fructose corn syrup to sweeten its namesake soda in the U.S. in the 1980s.

A man walks past shelves of Coca-Cola bottles and cans at a shopping mall in Lagos, Nigeria November 5, 2019.
Temilade Adelaja | Reuters

Coca-Cola plans to introduce a version of its namesake cola made with cane sugar in the U.S. this fall, the company announced on Tuesday.
Coke has used high-fructose corn syrup to sweeten its namesake soda in the U.S. since the 1980s, although it still uses cane sugar in other markets like Mexico. “Mexican Coke” has gained popularity in the U.S. over the last decade or so, as retailers like Costco and Target have stocked the drink, following the lead of bodegas and restaurants catering to Hispanic clientele.

In a news release announcing its second-quarter earnings Tuesday, Coke said the new product offering is “designed to complement the company’s strong core portfolio and offer more choices across occasions and preferences.”
The product announcement comes after President Donald Trump posted on Truth Social on Wednesday that he has been speaking with the company about using “REAL Cane Sugar” in its U.S. soda. Trump is a longtime fan of Diet Coke, which uses the artificial sweetener aspartame, and even has a button in the Oval Office to summon the drink.
“As you may have seen last week, we appreciate the president’s enthusiasm for our Coca-Cola brand,” Coke CEO James Quincey said Tuesday on the company’s earnings conference call, before announcing the new product.
Trump’s Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has vocally opposed the use of high-fructose corn syrup, blaming it for obesity and chronic disease. Research does not suggest that cane sugar is a healthier option than high-fructose corn syrup.
Longstanding tariff-rate quotas on sugar imported from other countries make the commodity a more expensive option than corn syrup, which is made in the U.S. and supported by government subsidies for corn farmers.

Prior to Tuesday’s announcement, Coke had been touting moves to cut back the amount of sugar in its portfolio — and customers are liking the switch. For example, Coca-Cola Zero Sugar has been one of the fastest-growing drinks for the company, with 9% volume growth last year.
Rival PepsiCo has also been adding cane sugar back to its namesake cola. On Monday, the company announced the forthcoming launch of Pepsi Prebiotic Cola, which includes three grams of fiber and five grams of cane sugar. More

Coca-Cola topped Wall Street’s estimates for its quarterly earnings and revenue.
The company reiterated its full-year forecast for organic revenue growth and narrowed its outlook to the top end of its prior range for comparable earnings per share.

A 12-pack of Coca-Cola is displayed on a counter in a 7-Eleven convenient store in Austin, Texas, on July 17, 2025.
Brandon Bell | Getty Images

Coca-Cola on Tuesday reported quarterly earnings and revenue that topped analysts’ expectations as strong demand in Europe offset weaker volume in other markets.
Shares of the company fell less than 1% in premarket trading.

Here’s what the company reported compared with what Wall Street was expecting, based on a survey of analysts by LSEG:

Earnings per share: 87 cents adjusted vs. 83 cents expected
Revenue: $12.62 billion adjusted vs. $12.54 billion expected

Coke reported second-quarter net income attributable to shareholders of $3.81 billion, or 88 cents per share, up from $2.41 billion, or 56 cents per share, a year earlier.
Excluding asset impairments, restructuring charges and other items, the beverage giant earned 87 cents per share.
Net sales rose 1% to $12.54 billion. Excluding items, the company’s revenue reached $12.62 billion.
The company’s organic revenue, which strips out acquisitions, divestitures and foreign currency, increased 5%.

But Coke’s global unit case volume fell 1% in the quarter. Every division but Coke’s Europe, Middle East and Africa business reported shrinking volume. The metric strips out the impact of pricing and foreign currency to reflect demand.
Coke executives have previously said that economic uncertainty and geopolitical tensions have weighed on consumer confidence, hurting its sales in some markets.
In North America, volume fell 1% as demand for the company’s namesake soda declined. Latin American unit case volume decreased 2%, while Coke’s Asia-Pacific market saw the metric drop 3% in the quarter. The company’s EMEA segment saw volume growth of 3%.
Globally, Coke’s sparkling softs drink segment, which includes its namesake soda, reported that volume shrank 1%. The company’s juice, value-added dairy and plant-based beverage division saw volume fall 4%. And its water, sports, coffee and tea segment reported flat volume for the quarter, as growth in coffee offset declines in sports drinks.
Coke also announced that it plans to introduce a version of its namesake cola made with cane sugar in the U.S. this fall.
For the full year, Coke narrowed its outlook for comparable earnings per share growth to 3%, the top end of the range it had previously provided. The company reiterated its forecast that organic revenue will increase 5% to 6% in 2025.

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