In today’s Recap, Marcello tells us that Warren Buffett’s company, Berkshire Hathaway, is making headlines for stacking up record cash reserves. Meanwhile, Tesla is soaring high after securing approval to launch its full self-driving technology in China, sending its stock price up by a whopping 15.31%. And over at Apple, its fortunes are mixed as its stock surged by 7% in after-hours trading, driven by impressive Q2 earnings and a substantial stock buyback announcement, despite a notable drop in iPhone sales.
Bitcoin continued its month-long slide on Tuesday, to close out April, at one point trading down to below $57K. The leading cryptocurrency ended the month down -15% & post its 1st negative month in the past 8. It was be the worst month since November 2022, when FTX collapsed. It’s still up over +37% for 2024. On Wednesday, Bitcoin rose over +1.50% bringing it to near $58K, again. It remains up near 100% year on year.
Preliminary data from the federal statistics office showed that German inflation rose slightly in April, due to higher food prices & a smaller drop in energy prices than in previous months. German consumer prices, harmonised to compare with other European Union countries, rose +2.4% in April, compared with 2.3% y/y in March.
The global nickel market has been thrown into chaos after a flood of new supply from the world’s largest producer Indonesia, the result of huge Chinese investment & major technological breakthroughs. Mines across the world are at risk of closing, while others are asking for state bailouts or going broke. The scale of the collapse has left some in the industry questioning if there’s a future for most mines outside of Indonesia, while China’s dominance over the nation’s processing sector, has also raised concerns about the reliability of supply.
U.S. economy added 175K jobs & the jobless rate ticked higher to 3.9% in April. After several hotter-than-expected jobs reports, April’s employment gains fell short of economists’ expectations of 240K new jobs & a 3.8% unemployment rate. Average hourly earnings rose +0.2% from the previous month & 3.9% from a year ago, below consensus estimates. The jobless rate tied for the highest level since Jan 2022. The rate that includes discouraged workers & those holding part-time jobs for economic reasons also edged up, to +7.4%, highest level since November 2021. Labor force participation rate, was unchanged at 62.7%.
Tesla, which had 140,473 employees globally as of end-2023, but job cuts continue. Elon Musk has dismissed 2 Tesla senior executives & plans to lay off 100’s more employees, frustrated by falling sales & the pace of job cuts so far. Rebecca Tinucci, senior director of the electric vehicle maker’s Supercharger business & Daniel Ho, head of the new vehicles program, will leave on Tuesday morning, it is being reported. Musk also plans to dismiss everyone working for Tinucci & Ho, including the roughly 500 employees who work in the Supercharger group.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed
Subscribe: RSS