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Leon Neal/AFP/Getty Images2008: iPhone 3G, meet the App StoreWith the second version of the iPhone, Apple introduces the App Store and 3G connectivity. Stephen Lam/Reuters2016: iPhone SE, a budget optionTaking a step back, the iPhone SE is a cheaper, smaller device than the 6S, giving customers a chance to enjoy Apple’s phones at a much lower cost. People handle the new Apple iPhone XS and iPhone XS Max during a media tour at an Apple office in Shanghai, China, on September 21, 2018. Brendon Thorne/Bloomberg/Getty Images2020: iPhone 12 Mini, small but mightyThe iPhone 12 mini is smaller than the usual iPhone but packs a powerful punch. Mike Segar/Reuters2021: iPhone 13 Series, same price for more spaceThe iPhone 13 stays at the same price as the iPhone 12 with double the storage space, as well as featuring a much smaller top notch.

Persons: Steve Jobs, John Green, ” Jobs, Leon Neal, Justin Sullivan, Siri, FaceTime, “, ”, Jobs, Michael Nagle, Apple, Seth K, Hughes, Akio Kon, David Gray, Tim Cook, Josh Edelson, Stephen Lam, David Paul Morris, Phil Schiller, Aly Song, Max, Jason Lee, Pro Max, Phil Barker, Brendon Thorne, Mike Segar, Gabby Jones, Andrew Kelly Organizations: New, New York CNN, Apple, Macworld, Bay Area, Getty, Lightning, Bloomberg, Apple Inc, Worldwide, Steve Jobs, Steve, Pro, Future Publishing Locations: New York, San Francisco, London, AFP, San Francisco , California, New York City, Cupertino , California, Ginza, Tokyo, Japan, Sydney, Shanghai, China, Beijing, Australia, Manhattan , New York

☆ AI fears overblown? Theoretical physicist calls chatbots ‘glorified tape recorders’
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-13 | by ( Eva Rothenberg | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

New York CNN —The public’s anxiety over new AI technology is misguided, according to theoretical physicist Michio Kaku. “Mother Nature computes on electrons, electron waves, waves that create molecules. Quantum computing is an emerging technology utilizing the various states of particles like electrons to vastly increase a computer’s processing power. Instead of using computer chips with two states, quantum computers use various states of vibrating waves. We’re powerless to cure these diseases because we have to learn the language of nature, which is the language of molecules and quantum electrons.”

Persons: Michio Kaku, CNN’s Fareed Zakaria, ”, ’, chatbots, ChatGPT, Gabby Jones, ” Kaku, we’re, Kaku Organizations: New, New York CNN, Darktrace Plc, Bloomberg, – IBM, IBM, Microsoft, Google Locations: New York, Brooklyn, British

☆ Will Smith-backed U.S. broker Public launches in the UK in first foray overseas
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-13 | by ( Ryan Browne | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +5 min

Gabby Jones | Bloomberg | Getty ImagesAmerican stock brokerage startup Public launched its services in the U.K. Thursday, marking its first international expansion its launch in 2017. The app, backed by celebrities including Will Smith and skateboarding legend Tony Hawk, will offer U.K. users commission-free trading in over 5,000 U.S.-listed stocks during the country's regular trading hours. Bibas said that, for now, the U.K. is the only country Public is focusing on for its international expansion. In the future, it hopes to take learnings from its U.K. launch to open in other European markets. Freetrade, the U.K. brokerage startup, slashed its valuation by a whopping 65% last month to £225m in a crowdfunding round, citing a "different market environment."

Persons: Gabby Jones, Will Smith, Tony Hawk, AJ Bell, Hargreaves Lansdown, Leif Abraham, Public's, Abraham, Jannick Malling, PFOF, Dann Bibas, Bibas, he's Organizations: Bloomberg, Getty, Public, CNBC, Jannick, GameStop, Citadel Securities, European Union, Khepri Advisers, Financial, Authority, Accel, Tiger Global Locations: U.S, Abraham, Denmark, Germany, New York, Copenhagen, London, Amsterdam, Covid

☆ Crypto prices stabilize after plunging on SEC crackdown jitters
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-12 | by ( Sheila Chiang | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

The Binance website on a laptop arranged in the Brooklyn borough of New York, US, on Wednesday, June 7, 2023. The list of digital tokens deemed as unregistered securities by the Securities and Exchange Commission now spans over $120 billion of crypto after the US agencys lawsuits against Binance Holdings Ltd. and Coinbase Global Inc. The SEC sued Coinbase and Binance last week, accusing both of selling unregistered securities, among other charges. On Tuesday, the U.S. regulator alleged that Coinbase was operating as an unregistered exchange and broker, and that 13 assets listed on its platform were considered crypto asset securities. On Monday, it also accused Binance of inflating trading volumes, diverting customer funds and misleading customers about its controls, among others.

Persons: Gabby Jones, Coinbase, Ripple's XRP, Binance's, Binance Organizations: Securities and Exchange Commission, Binance Holdings, Coinbase Global Inc, Bloomberg, Getty, U.S . Securities, Exchange Commission, SEC, Polygon's Locations: Brooklyn, New York, U.S

☆ As shoppers look for savings, Nordstrom hopes Rack stores can fuel its revival
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-12 | by ( Melissa Repko | In Melissa-Repko | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +9 min

The success or failure of the Nordstrom Rack turnaround effort could shape the company's future. Those chains such as T.J.Maxx , Ross Stores and Burlington Stores , have opened more stores and wooed new customers, driving higher foot traffic than Nordstrom Rack has seen. Nordstrom Rack stores outnumber the company's namesake stores, with 241 locations across the country, according to company filings. Nordstrom Rack stores accounted for more than 40% of new customers in 2022, CEO Erik Nordstrom said on the March earnings call. As it pins its growth hopes on the off-price locations, Nordstrom has turned Rack stores into e-commerce hubs, too.

☆ When Buying Now and Actually Paying Later Isn’t Enough
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-10 | by ( Telis Demos | ) www.wsj.com time to read: +1 min

Affirm has weathered rocky capital markets and increased its funding capacity from the prior quarter. Photo: Gabby Jones/Bloomberg NewsMore people are buying now and—despite what many have feared—also paying later. Buy now, pay later provider Affirm on Tuesday reported some reassuring things related to common concerns about the installment-payment business. Plus, Affirm has weathered rocky capital markets and increased its funding capacity from the prior quarter. In April, it closed a $400 million securitization deal that had been upsized from $250 million.

☆ U.S. Senators Revive Bid to Form Covid-19 Commission
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-10 | by ( Warren P. Strobel | Michael R. Gordon | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Pop-up Covid-19 testing tents are still accessible in New York City. Photo: Gabby Jones for The Wall Street JournalWASHINGTON—A bipartisan group of U.S. senators is reviving efforts to establish a national Covid-19 task force modeled on the 9/11 Commission to investigate the U.S. government response to the pandemic and the disputed origins of the virus. Advocates have long pressed for such a panel, which would have investigatory powers and issue recommendations about how the U.S. can better prepare for future pandemics. But past legislative efforts have foundered because of partisan disagreement, turf fights in Congress, and a lack of support from the Biden administration, people familiar with the matter said.

☆ ChatGPT can pick stocks better than your fund manager
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-05 | by ( Anna Cooban | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

London CNN —A basket of stocks selected by ChatGPT, a chatbot powered by artificial intelligence (AI), has far outperformed some of the most popular investment funds in the United Kingdom. It wouldn’t “be long until large numbers of consumers try to use [ChatGPT] for financial gain,” Jon Ostler, Finder’s CEO, said in a statement earlier this week. A typical investment fund pulls together money from multiple investors, and is overseen by a fund manager who decides how to invest that money. A survey of 2,000 UK adults conducted by Finder last week showed that 8% had already used ChatGPT for financial advice, while 19% said they would consider doing so. Nevertheless, “the democratization of AI seems to be something that will disrupt and revolutionize financial industries,” Ostler said.

☆ Paramount Posts Earnings Loss on $1.7 Billion Charge, Cuts Dividend
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-04 | by ( Will Feuer | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Paramount and other streaming companies have been working to rein in costs. Photo: Gabby Jones/Bloomberg NewsParamount Global posted a steep loss in the first quarter, weighed down by nearly $1.7 billion in charges tied to its plan to remove certain programming as it combines its Showtime streaming service with its Paramount+ platform. The New York-based media company also slashed its dividend for the first time in over a decade as it continues to pour cash into its money-losing streaming division.

☆ Paramount Shares Drop 28% as Streaming Costs Mount
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-04 | by ( Will Feuer | Jessica Toonkel | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Paramount and other streaming companies have been working to rein in costs. Photo: Gabby Jones/Bloomberg NewsParamount Global shares fell nearly 30% Thursday after the media company reported a steep first quarter loss and said it would cut its dividend, the latest sign of the challenges Hollywood’s titans face as they pivot to streaming. Paramount’s results were dragged down by major charges related to its cancellation of certain programming, a soft ad market that weighed on its TV business, and rising costs for its flagship streaming service. Paramount said it has restarted its sales process to unload its book publishing unit, Simon & Schuster, and has received interest.

☆ Paramount Shares Drop Nearly 30% as Streaming Costs Mount
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-04 | by ( Will Feuer | Jessica Toonkel | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

☆ Kraft Heinz Reports First-Quarter Sales Lifted by Higher Prices
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-03 | by ( Dean Seal | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Kraft Heinz, maker of Kool-Aid and Jell-O, raised prices last year in a response to more expensive commodities and supply-chain challenges. Photo: Gabby Jones/Bloomberg NewsKraft Heinz ’s higher prices once again lifted its revenue but ate into sales volumes during the most recently completed quarter as sticker shock sets in for grocery shoppers. The Pittsburgh-based maker of Kool-Aid and Jell-O said revenue climbed 7.3% to $6.49 billion in the first three months of the year, driven by higher costs for consumers that offset a decline in volumes and unfavorable foreign currency fluctuations. Analysts had been expecting $6.39 billion, according to FactSet.

☆ Starbucks Profit Surges on Higher Prices, Improved Operations
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-03 | by ( Heather Haddon | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Starbucks said earlier this year that customers weren’t cutting back despite higher prices. Photo: GABBY JONES for The Wall Street JournalStarbucks said that higher prices and more-efficient operations helped drive higher sales and profit in its most recent quarter, while business in its China market improved. The coffee giant reported sales of $8.72 billion for the three months ended April 2, exceeding analysts’ expectations of $8.41 billion. Revenue in the chain’s second quarter increased by 14.2% from the year-earlier period.

☆ Pfizer’s Earnings Fall With Cooling Demand for Covid Products
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-02 | by ( Dean Seal | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Pfizer reaffirmed its outlook to see revenue decline by as much as a third this year from its record high $100 billion in 2022. Photo: Gabby Jones for The Wall Street JournalPfizer ’s first-quarter revenue and earnings were down by nearly a third from a year ago, when the spread of the Omicron variant of Covid-19 buoyed demand for pandemic products. The drugmaker for the first three months of the year logged revenue of $18.28 billion, down 29% from a year ago but still well above Wall Street analyst estimates for $16.61 billion, according to analysts polled by FactSet.

☆ U.S. Covid-19 Deaths and Hospitalizations Near New Lows
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( Jon Kamp | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

New Covid-19 subvariants are on the rise, but the U.S. has broadly recorded declining numbers this year. Photo: Gabby Jones for The Wall Street JournalU.S. Covid-19 hospitalizations and deaths are hovering near new lows, providing fresh evidence that even as the virus endures it has become less damaging in a population with strengthened immune defenses. New subvariants are on the rise, and cutbacks in data reporting have clouded the view of recent trends. But the U.S. has broadly recorded declining numbers this year following a winter of less intense Covid-19 spread.

☆ Gap Plans to Lay Off Hundreds of Corporate Workers in Latest Cuts
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-25 | by ( Suzanne Kapner | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Gap leaders conducted a review with the goal of stripping out layers of management to speed decision making. Photo: Gabby Jones/Bloomberg NewsGap Inc. is eliminating hundreds of corporate jobs from its global workforce as part of a broad restructuring aimed at making the company more nimble and less bureaucratic, according to people familiar with the situation. The current round of cuts is slated to be larger than in September, when Gap eliminated roughly 500 corporate positions, one of the people said. Those job cuts were mostly at its main offices in San Francisco and New York, and were part of efforts to save about $250 million annually.

☆ ByteDance is pushing a new app in the U.S. as TikTok faces a ban
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-25 | by ( Sheila Chiang | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +5 min

While political scrutiny continues to intensify on the widely popular short video app TikTok in the U.S. and across the world, Lemon8 owned by ByteDance is going viral. Jakub Porzycki | Nurphoto | Getty ImagesChinese tech giant ByteDance is pushing another social media app in the U.S. — even as its flagship short video app TikTok faces a possible ban stateside. It seems like ByteDance is pushing Lemon8 as a potential alternative to TikTok," said Lindsay Gorman, senior fellow for emerging tech at the German Marshall Fund. But Lemon8's links to ByteDance and TikTok will come under the radar of U.S. regulators too, especially as the app continues to rise in popularity. Not a solutionCreating another app to replace TikTok is not a quick solution for ByteDance, the analysts said.

☆ Coca-Cola Posts Higher Sales as Consumers Buy Drinks Away From Home
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-24 | by ( Dean Seal | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Coca-Cola’s global sales topped analysts’ expectations, as sales of its soft drinks and water ticked up. Photo: GABBY JONES for The Wall Street JournalCoca-Cola Co. saw first-quarter sales rise as customers bought more beverages on the go. The beverage company said global sales rose 5% in the first three months of the year to $10.98 billion, topping analyst expectations for $10.8 billion.

☆ Secondhand resale is getting cutthroat as platforms like Depop and Poshmark boom
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-24 | by ( Rebecca Picciotto | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +5 min

Demand for secondhand resale has been booming since the early days of the pandemic, generating a culture shift within the indie marketplaces where it all began. Users on platforms like Depop and Poshmark set up online shops to list vintage, secondhand or unique items for sale and generate notable followings of loyal shoppers. Robertson is now 17 and says the growth of resale has allowed him to turn his Depop shop, which now has over 19,000 followers, into a part-time gig. Blake Robertson, 17, poses with his closet, some of which is up for resale on his Depop shop. Zoom In Icon Arrows pointing outwards Beaux Abington, 49, models some of her own Depop items.

☆ TikTok's ad business is growing around live sports as platform faces possible U.S. ban
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-23 | by ( Lillian Rizzo | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

The social media platform has been under scrutiny from the U.S. government and faces a possible ban. But the company is nonetheless attracting billions of dollars in advertising revenue as major companies look to reach a younger audience. Hyundai prioritized TikTok this year as many automakers bypassed TV advertising during the Super Bowl to preserve cash or spend on ads elsewhere. TV ads drew more than $7 million for 30-second spots during this year's Super Bowl on Fox's broadcast network. While this makes up about 2% of overall digital advertising spending, the growth of the spending for the platform has been rapid.

☆ What's next for Disney and Ford? Here's our view on the latest news on both Club stocks
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-02 | by ( Paulina Likos | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +5 min

Walt Disney (DIS) and Ford Motor (F) could both be at inflection points. Here's the latest news on both Club holdings as of Thursday, and our take on where things stand. Iger simultaneously unveiled a comprehensive restructuring program, part of a larger effort to make its beleaguered direct-to-consumer (DTC) unit — which includes streaming platforms Hulu, Disney+ and ESPN+ — profitable. Citi reiterated a buy rating on Disney stock and a price target of $130 per share. As a subscriber to the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer, you will receive a trade alert before Jim makes a trade.

☆ Nestlé says food prices will rise further this year
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-16 | by ( Hanna Ziady | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

Food, including ice cream, will see significant price increases in 2023, CEO Alan Jope said on the same call. Unilever said price increases caused sales volumes to decline by 2.1% in 2022. Heineken, meanwhile, said it expected to sell less beer in Europe this year because of “steep” price increases related to energy costs. At the time, Tesco (TSCDF) described the company’s price increases as “unjustifiable.” Once the products were restored, prices were unchanged on Heinz’s most popular lines. Gabby Jones/Bloomberg/Getty ImagesTesco has also “fallen out with other suppliers” over price increases, its chairman John Allen recently told the BBC.

☆ Companies Tap Tech Behind ChatGPT to Make Customer-Service Chatbots Smarter
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-24 | by ( Katie Deighton | ) www.wsj.com time to read: +7 min

Businesses hope the artificial-intelligence technology behind ChatGPT can turn ordinary chatbots into impressive fonts of information, potentially transforming customer service. But customer-experience executives said overreliance on such AI models could lead to companies dishing out incorrect information to customers online without knowing they are doing so. Some executives hope the technology that drives ChatGPT might also improve customer-service chatbots. But companies should exercise care when dealing with the new AI, Mr. Truog said. Nice is also working on building OpenAI’s language models into chatbots, Mr. Willcutts said, adding that the company plans to run more tests and fine-tune more models before selling its own take on ChatGPT to clients.

☆ Teachers are adapting to concerns about a powerful new AI tool
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-19 | by ( Samantha Murphy Kelly | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +9 min

Some teachers said they’ve also heard of students being required to film short videos that elaborate on their thought process. Public schools in New York City and Seattle, meanwhile, have already banned students and teachers from using ChatGPT on the district’s networks and devices. Reid, the professor at Coastal Carolina University, believes teachers should work with ChatGPT and teach best practices in the classroom. Reid said teachers could encourage students to plug an assignment question into the tool and have them compare that result to what they personally wrote. “Like with other new technologies, this could be a tool instructors use to help students express their ideas,” she said.

☆ As BlockFi files for bankruptcy, what to know about crypto investor protections
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-28 | by ( Greg Iacurci | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +7 min

The ongoing FTX fallout — and bankruptcies earlier this year for lenders Celsius Network and Voyager Digital — is teaching crypto investors a hard lesson about their protections relative to more traditional asset classes. Howey Co., established the so-called Howey test to determine what constitutes a security, or "investment contract." More on how the Howey test works can be found below. Here's why this is important for crypto: It's unclear in many cases if digital assets are an "investment contract" under the 76-year-old Howey test. The Securities Investor Protection Corporation insures investors for up to $500,000 in the event a brokerage firm liquidates and their holdings are tied up in the insolvent firm.

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