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.
SHORT MARKET WEEK
Stocks ended down for the most part this holiday-shortened week, despite an uptick on Thursday and data showing the labor market somewhat cooling (which could encourage the Fed not to continue raising interest rates at a fast clip). The S&P fell 0.1 percent, the Nasdaq dropped 1.1 percent, while the Dow Jones ended up slightly with 0.6 percent. On Good Friday, while U.S. stock markets were closed, the bond market saw a jump following the anticipated March jobs report from the Labor Department which also indicated a slowdown in employment.
GOOGLE RALLIES
Shares of Google popped after the company announced that it planned to integrate conversational artificial intelligence (AI) features into its flagship search engine. CEO Sundar Pichai said the technology should make Google answer queries faster. He also noted that Google also plans to eventually add AI features to its work-related products such as Gmail. In addition, the company earlier in the week said it's making cuts to employee services such as office equipment, like laptops and staplers, and employee benefits, like fitness classes. The stock was up about 5 percent for the week.
FEDEX GETS A BOOST
FedEx's stock got a bump this week following the announcement of a $4 billion cost-cutting plan. The so-called DRIVE program will restructure the company by combining its division to operate as a full air-ground service provider. It will also implement a number of other efficiencies designed to create $2 billion of savings. The stock was up around 2 percent for the week.
WWE HYPED
World Wrestling Entertainment stock soared this week to its highest price in about four years following news it would be merging with Ultimate Fighting Championship's parent company. "Together, we will be a $21+ billion live sports and entertainment powerhouse with a collective fanbase of more than a billion people and an exciting growth opportunity,” said Vince McMahon, executive chairman of WWE, in a statement. The professional wrestling giant saw its share price surge 15 percent during the shortened trading week. Ari Emanuel, CEO of UFC parent company Endeavor Group Holdings, will be the chief executive for the newly merged company, while McMahon will stay on in his role as WWE executive chairman, and the presidents of WWE and UFC, Nick Khan and Dana White respectively, will continue on as well.
The State Department had been in talks with Elon Musk’s Tesla company to buy armored electric vehicles, but the plans have been put on hold by the Trump administration after reports emerged about a potential $400 million purchase. A State Department spokesperson said the electric car company owned by Musk was the only one that expressed interest back in May 2024. The deal with Tesla was only in its planning phases but it was forecast to be the largest contract of the year. It shows how some of his wealth has come and was still expected to come from taxpayers.
At 100 years old, the Goodyear Blimp is an ageless star in the sky. The 246-foot-long airship will be in the background of the Daytona 500 — flying roughly 1,500 feet above Daytona International Speedway, actually — to celebrate its greatest anniversary tour. Even though remote camera technologies are improving regularly and changing the landscape of aerial footage, the blimp continues to carve out a niche. At Daytona, with the usual 40-car field racing around a 2½-mile superspeedway, views from the blimp aptly provide the scope of the event.
You'll just have to wait for interest rates (and prices) to go down. Plus, this deal's a steel, the big carmaker wedding is off, and bribery is back, baby!
It’s a chicken-and-egg problem: Restaurants are struggling with record-high U.S. egg prices, but their omelets, scrambles and huevos rancheros may be part of the problem. Breakfast is booming at U.S. eateries. First Watch, a restaurant chain that serves breakfast, brunch and lunch, nearly quadrupled its locations over the past decade to 570. Fast-food chains like Starbucks and Wendy's added more egg-filled breakfast items. In normal times, egg producers could meet the demand. But a bird flu outbreak that has forced them to slaughter their flocks is making supplies scarcer and pushing up prices. Some restaurants like Waffle House have added a surcharge to offset their costs.
William Falcon, CEO and Founder of Lightning AI, discusses the ongoing feud between Elon Musk and Sam Altman, and how everyday people can use AI in their lives.
U.S. tariffs on steel and aluminum “will not go unanswered,” European Union chief Ursula von der Leyen vowed on Tuesday, adding that they will trigger toug
The Trump administration has ordered the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to stop nearly all its work, effectively shutting down the agency that was created to protect consumers after the 2008 financial crisis and subprime mortgage-lending scandal. Russell Vought is the newly installed director of the Office of Management and Budget. Vought directed the CFPB in a Saturday night email to stop work on proposed rules, to suspend the effective dates on any rules that were finalized but not yet effective, and to stop investigative work and not begin any new investigations. The agency has been a target of conservatives since President Barack Obama created it following the 2007-2008 financial crisis.
