Spotify to Buy Podcast Ad Platform Megaphone

Audio streaming service Spotify has reached a deal to buy the podcast publishing and advertising company Megaphone for $235 million.In a statement, Spotify said using Megaphone’s technology would make streaming ad insertion (SAI) available to third-party podcast publishers for the first time. The...

By Lauren Muskett • Nov. 11, 2020

Rocket Companies Revenue Up 163% in Record Q3

Rocket Companies reported third-quarter earnings after the close on Tuesday.Q3 Earnings: The parent company of Rocket Mortgage and Quicken Loans reported adjusted revenue of $4.74 billion for the third quarter, which was up 163% year-over-year and beat the $4.55 billion target from Wall Street an...

By Lauren Muskett • Nov. 11, 2020

GM Posts $4B Profit on Strong Truck, SUV Sales

General Motors crushed Wall Street earnings estimates as it returned to profitability amid strong demand for its high-margin full-sized pickups and SUVs.The largest U.S. automaker reported Thursday that net income rose 74% to $4 billion in the third quarter and adjusted earnings increased 65% to ...

By Matthew Heller • Nov. 5, 2020

Bitcoin Spikes Above $15,000

The price of bitcoin surged above $15,000 on Thursday, its highest level since January 2018, as the U.S. waits on results from the presidential election.The price of the cryptocurrency, the world’s largest, is up more than 10% since Tuesday and has more than doubled year-to-date.Central banks fro...

By Lauren Muskett • Nov. 5, 2020

Hyatt Loses $161M as Travel Slump Continues

Hyatt Hotels mounted a partial rebound from the coronavirus-fueled collapse in demand but still posted a larger-than-expected quarterly loss.For the third quarter, the luxury hotel giant reported Wednesday a net loss of $161 million, or $1.59 per share, after losing $236 million in the previous q...

By Matthew Heller • Nov. 5, 2020

COVID-19 Vaccines Could Generate Over $10B Annual Revenue

A successful COVID-19 vaccine could be a bumper revenue opportunity for the pharmaceutical companies, with the market estimated to generate at least $10 billion in revenue a year, according to analysts.The Thesis: Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse analysts estimate that people will need the vaccin...

By Lauren Muskett • Nov. 5, 2020

Oregon Becomes First U.S. State to Decriminalize Drug Possession

Voters in Oregon have approved two measures that mark an unprecedented change in the history of U.S. drug policy.Measure 110, which passed with 58.8% positive votes, decriminalizes the possession of small amounts of all illegal drugs. It also creates a support program for drug abuse and addiction...

By Lauren Muskett • Nov. 4, 2020

Metric of the Month: Number of FTEs Performing the Order-to-Cash Process

Order-to-cash (O2C) is an end-to-end process that encompasses all the steps that a company carries out from the time it receives an order to the point at which it receives full payment for the order. It includes managing sales orders, processing customer credit, delivering products and services t...

By Perry D. Wiggins • Nov. 3, 2020

PayPal Posts Record Sales on E-Commerce Boom

PayPal delivered record-setting results for a second consecutive quarter as the payment processor continued to benefit from the e-commerce boom during the coronavirus pandemic.For the third quarter, PayPal’s revenue rose 25% year-to-year to a record $5.46 billion while net income increased to $1....

By Matthew Heller • Nov. 3, 2020

Exxon Posts $680M Loss as Oil Slump Continues

Exxon lost money for a record third straight quarter and disclosed that further capital spending cuts and possible writedowns of assets are ahead as it battles the pandemic-induced slump in demand for oil and gas.For the third quarter, the oil major reported Friday a loss of $680 million, or 15 c...

By Matthew Heller • Oct. 30, 2020

Twitter Shares Fall on Slowing User Growth in Q3

Twitter shares fell sharply in extended trading Thursday after the company reported better-than-expected revenue and profit but missed estimates for user growth.For the third quarter, Twitter’s revenue rose 14% year-over-year to $936 million while net income fell to $28.66 million, or 4 cents per...

By Matthew Heller • Oct. 30, 2020

U.S. GDP Surges by Record 33.1% in Q3

The U.S. economy rebounded at a record pace from its worst quarter in history but economists believe a full recovery from the coronavirus recession is still a long way off.The Commerce Department reported Thursday that gross domestic product grew at a 33.1% annualized rate in the third quarter as...

By Matthew Heller • Oct. 29, 2020

Moderna Q3 Revenues Beat Estimates

Coronavirus vaccine developer Moderna reported forecast-beating third-quarter revenues and a vaccine supply contract, sending shares higher.Moderna’s Q3 Results: Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Moderna reported third-quarter revenues of $157.91 million, notably higher than the year-ago revenues of...

By Lauren Muskett • Oct. 29, 2020

Visa Beats Estimates as Travel Slump Continues

Visa reported a 17% decline in quarterly revenue as the slowdown in travel-related spending outweighed growth in domestic payments.The credit card giant saw its fiscal fourth-quarter revenue fall to $5.10 billion from $6.14 billion a year ago, while analysts surveyed by FactSet had been projectin...

By Matthew Heller • Oct. 29, 2020

Cloud Growth Drives Microsoft Earnings Beat

Pandemic-induced demand for cloud computing services helped push Microsoft’s quarterly earnings past analysts’ estimates though its guidance for the current quarter fell short of expectations.All three of Microsoft’s core segments grew strongly in the first quarter, with overall revenue rising 12...

By Matthew Heller • Oct. 28, 2020

Boeing Posts $466M Loss, Announces Job Cuts

Boeing lost less money than expected in the third quarter but said it would cut more jobs as it struggles to cope with reduced demand for its planes amid the COVID-19 pandemic.After reporting a third-quarter net loss of $466 million — from a profit of $1.2 billion a year earlier — Boeing said ano...

By Matthew Heller • Oct. 28, 2020

HSBC Beats Estimates, May Resume Dividend

HSBC shares jumped on Tuesday after Europe’s largest bank by assets reported better-than-expected quarterly earnings and signaled it may resume dividend payouts next year.For the third quarter, HSBC’s revenue fell 11% to $11.9 billion while pretax profit slid 35% to $3.1 billion. But analysts had...

By Matthew Heller • Oct. 27, 2020

SAP Shares Fall 23% on Q3 Results, Guidance

SAP shares plunged on Monday after the German enterprise software giant reduced its mid-term guidance to reflect the impact of COVID-19 on its business.In announcing its third-quarter results, SAP said it had “again demonstrated its resilience … with stable total revenue and an improvement in ope...

By Matthew Heller • Oct. 26, 2020

Revitalizing the Global Economy Requires Outside-the-Box Thinking

With the International Monetary Fund’s most recent projections indicating a 3% contraction in the global economy, we face the worst global economic downturn since the Great Depression that followed the notorious Wall Street crash of 1929.Following the 2008 global recession, the likes of France an...

By Vincent Ryan • Oct. 26, 2020

Dunkin Brands Explores Sale or Merger With Inspire Brands

Dunkin Brands Group confirmed a New York Times report that the company has expressed an interest in selling itself.What Happened: Dunkin Brands is the parent company of Dunkin’ Donuts and Baskin Robbins. The New York Times reports the company is in talks to sell itself to private equity backed In...

By Lauren Muskett • Oct. 26, 2020

Intel Shares Plunge on Falling Margins, Increased Competition

Intel reported a weak third quarter, which barely met revenue and earnings per share estimates.Data-centric revenue fell 10% year-over-year, with its data center group (DCG) revenue falling 7% year-over-year to $5.9 billion.In the DCG group, cloud revenue grew 15% year-over-year due to higher dem...

By Lauren Muskett • Oct. 23, 2020

Quibi Shuts Down Six Months After Launch

Short-form media streamer Quibi is shutting down six months into its launch, the company’s founder Jeffrey Katzenberg and CEO Meg Whitman said in an open letter to employees and investors.What Happened: Katzenberg and Whitman said they were winding down the business and returning cash to their sh...

By Lauren Muskett • Oct. 22, 2020

JPMorgan Takes Aim at Top Fintech Players’ SMB Market Share

The largest U.S. bank JPMorgan Chase & Co. is entering the fintech ring dominated by players like Square, PayPal Holdings, and Fiserv, with a service for small business owners, reports CNBC.What Happened: JPMorgan is introducing a fast-funding fintech service paired with a checking account ca...

By Lauren Muskett • Oct. 21, 2020

Netflix Reports Mixed Q3 Earnings, Slower User Growth

Shares of Netflix traded lower after the streaming video company reported third-quarter results.Netflix said it earned $1.74 per share on revenue of $6.44 billion. The results were mixed compared with the Street’s estimate of $2.13 per share on revenue of $6.38 billion.Revenue was higher by 22.7%...

By Vincent Ryan • Oct. 20, 2020

China’s Economy Grows Nearly 5%

The Chinese economy grew 4.9% for the quarter from July-to-September compared with the same period last year, according to official government statistics.The sharp uptick was short of the 5.2% growth for the quarter expected by analysts, according to a poll by Refinitiv.“China’s economy continued...

By Lauren Muskett • Oct. 19, 2020