Here is a rundown of Cheddar News' top market stories of the day.
TECH LAYOFFS
Multiple outlets are reporting that Microsoft will begin a series of planned layoffs on Wednesday that could cut around 5 percent of its workforce, or 10,000 employees. CEO Satya Nadella warned the cuts were coming, and said the next couple of years were likely to be challenging, as the tech sector contracts after a decade plus of rapid growth. Amazon is also set to move ahead with plans to cut 6 percent of its 350,000 corporate employees.
ADOBE'S DATA DEBACLE
Adobe is facing backlash from customers who are concerned the software company is using personal images and video to train artificial intelligence models such as OpenAI’s Dall-E. Chief Product Officer Scott Belsky denied the accusations in an interview with Bloomberg, saying: "We have never, ever used anything in our storage to train a generative AI model."
UNITED AIRLINES EARNINGS
United Airlines' fourth quarter earnings beat Wall Street estimates on the heels of a rebound in travel demand. The company reported a 31 percent increase from the same period before the pandemic. The gains were made despite the airline flying 9 percent fewer trips and a litany of other challenges, from winter storms to labor shortages to supply chain disruptions.
UNIVERSITY BANS TIKTOK
The University of Texas at Austin is blocking access to TikTok on its Wi-Fi and wired networks. The move is a response to Gov. Greg Abbott's requirement that all state agencies delete the app from government-issued devices. The administration said it is also seeking to eliminate risks to information on the university's networks. University of Texas at Dallas and Texas A&M University System have since implemented similar restrictions.
Johnson & Johnson reported a miss on its Q1 earnings just shy of analyst expectations. The pharmaceutical giant also noted that it has an excess of COVID-19 vaccines and that it will be lowering its end-of-year earnings outlook for 2022.
Garrett Nelson, a senior analyst and VP of equity research at CFRA Research, joined Cheddar News to give a preview of Tesla earnings amid its seventh straight record quarter in vehicle deliveries while it faces some headwinds with the ongoing Shanghai, China, lockdown due to pandemic. "We view Tesla as one of the market's best secular growth stories," he said. "It's one of our top picks, and their execution has been really stellar over the last several quarters. They've beat nine of the past 10 quarters, so that's a 90 percent beat rate."
Netflix is slated to give its Q1 report after the closing bell, and Jason Moser, a senior analyst at The Motley Fool, joined Cheddar News to give a preview of what to expect from the streaming giant's earnings. "I think Netflix, like many businesses out there the last couple of years, says it's pulled forward a lot of success just due to the pandemic, and that's not necessarily a bad thing," he said. "But it does alter the picture, the growth picture maybe, going forward." Moser also noted that the streaming space for Netflix is especially competitive now as opposed to about a decade ago.
Catching you up on what you need to know on April 19, 2022, with a federal judge voiding mask mandates on public transportation, updates from the Russia and Ukraine war, Mac Miller’s drug dealer sentenced for involvement in the rapper's death, and more.
Twitter has dropped a major roadblock in front of Elon Musk’s effort to take over the company, leaving investors to wonder about the mercurial Tesla CEO’s next move.
A federal judge’s decision to strike down a national mask mandate was met with cheers on some airplanes but also concern about whether it’s really time to end the order sparked by the COVID-19 pandemic.
