The Week's Top Stories is a guided tour through the biggest market stories of the week, from winning stocks to brutal dips to the facts and forecasts generating buzz on Wall Street.
WALGREENS CEO OUT
After just 2 years, Rosalind Brewer resigned as the head of Walgreens Boots Alliance, parent company of the eponymous pharmacy chain. During Brewer's tenure, the company acquired preventative care providers, like VillageMD, expanding its focus from just providing medications to more medical care also. Now it sounds like Walgreens is seeking a new CEO with deeper healthcare experience. Prior to Walgreens, Brewer held high-ranking roles at Starbucks, Sam's Club, Walmart, and Kimberly-Clark Corporation. Walgreens stock was down 7 percent on the news and 37 percent for the year so far.
3M EARPLUG SETTLEMENT
3M has agreed to pay $6 billion for earplugs that service members say did not protect their hearing. People who used the devices to mitigate incredibly loud noises, like those of close-range gunfire, say the design actually made them come loose. 3M does not have to admit liability as part of the deal. The settlement seemed to be a pro for investors - the company's stock actually rose with this issue seemingly settled, although it has not been finalized and could end up reaching as much as $12.5 billion. It ended the week up 1 percent.
BEST BUY TRIMS FORECAST
Best Buy says Americans are not spending as much on its electronics these days as prices have risen, but even their drops in sales and profits last quarter were okay with investors. The stock rose as the company's earnings report beat expectations. The rest of the year isn't shaping up to be a slam dunk, though. Best Buy expects the slow-down to continue until 2024, when CEO Corie Barry says she expects the market to stabilize. Best Buy ended the week up 2 percent.
UBS' BILLIONS
UBS announced this week that it will save $10 billion as it integrates Credit Suisse's operation into its own and that will mean losing 3,000 staff members. This cost saving will come on top of the megabank's $29 billion profit last quarter, thanks to a fancy accounting move called negative goodwill. UBS stock ended the week up 7 percent.
JOBS REPORT
The August jobs report, which the Labor Department released on Friday, shows the labor market is still strong. While that has, at times, been bad news for investors, this time it seems to be giving them hope. Hiring is still growing - but at a slower rate - and the unemployment rate is rising - because people who had stopped looking for work are jumping back in. Stock markets rose after the report was released because signs that the labor market is stabilizing is providing hope that the Federal Reserve will rethink the future rate hikes Fed Chair Jerome Powell warned of in Jackson Hole last week.
