People in New York Say They're Optimistic for 2025 | Business Matters (Jan. 2)

It is now time for Business Matters with Don Ma. Don, I haven't seen you since last year. Yeah, it's been a whole year since I've seen you, basically. I know, right? Last time I saw you was 2024, now it's 2025. Yep, and let me start off this first Business Matters on the newsroom show with an update on China. So the country could be further curbing exports on battery components and critical minerals. China's Commerce Ministry has proposed export restrictions on some technology used to make battery components and process critical minerals, lithium and gallium. A consultant noted that China's proposal would help the country retain a 70% grip on the global processing of lithium into materials needed to make EV batteries. This could be an issue for Western lithium producers who were relying on China. The proposal is open for public comment next month, but no word on when the proposed changes would go into effect. Now, 2024 wasn't a best year for Tesla. The electric vehicle maker saw its yearly sales drop for the first time as a public company. Tesla sold 1.8 million vehicles last year, and that's 1% lower than in 2023, but it was enough to keep Tesla as the world's largest EV maker. The company has faced increased competition from Chinese rivals as well as global automakers like GM, Ford, and Hyundai. Tesla has responded to the slowing demand by cutting vehicle prices both in China and in the U.S. Kobold announced that the U.S. mining startup has raised $537 million in its latest funding round. This values the company at nearly $3 billion. The company is backed by billionaire investors including Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos. Kobold uses artificial intelligence to find mineral deposits and is working to challenge China's dominance in the mineral supply chain. The U.S. relies on China for metals like copper, lithium, and nickel for mobile phones, data centers, and batteries for EVs. Kobold said the funding will be used for high-potential projects. This includes a copper deposit the company discovered in Zambia almost a year ago. And more than 9 million Americans are getting a pay bump. The hourly minimum wage increased in 21 states yesterday. The increases range from 18 cents to $1.75. According to the Economic Policy Institute, four dozen cities and municipalities hike their minimum wages above their respective state floors. The pay bumps are part of ongoing efforts to keep up with the rising cost of living. The federal minimum wage has sat at $7.25 an hour since 2009. As of now, 20 states have a minimum wage at or below that amount. And as of today, January the 2nd, the nation's debt ceiling has been reinstated. The cap was suspended in June 2023 as part of the Bipartisan Fiscal Responsibility Act. The debt ceiling stands at about $36.1 trillion. But in a letter sent to congressional leaders last week, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen says the debt level will actually decrease by $54 billion. Yellen says the country isn't expected to hit debt limit until sometime between January 14th and the 23rd. Once that happens, the Treasury Department will have to start taking so-called extraordinary measures to prevent a default. An analysis by the Bipartisan Policy Center says those measures should last at least several months after the first quarter of 2025. And pregnant women in New York will be entitled to at least 20 hours of paid leave to attend prenatal medical appointments. The new law took effect yesterday. Governor Kathy Hochul said the policy makes New York the first state in the country to offer paid leave for prenatal care. All pregnant women in the private sector are eligible for the paid time off. Workers can schedule the paid leave for physical examinations, end of pregnancy care, fertility treatments, among others. Employers are forbidden from requesting medical information when a worker requests paid leave. The policy is separate from any other paid sick leave offered by an employer. Spouses of pregnant women are not eligible for prenatal leave. Jobless claims hit an eight-month low. To close out 2024, the latest weekly initial claims for unemployment benefits totaled 211,000, which is 10,000 less than estimates had predicted. Data released this morning by the Department of Labor showed continuing claims for unemployment benefits fell to 1.84 million for the week ended December 21st. That's a three-month low. And Thursday's data underscores that the U.S. labor market remains resilient and continues to cool in a slow and steady manner. The official government tally of job growth and conditions in the labor market is set to be released January 10th. And dueling lawsuits settled. In a joint statement, GlobalFoundries and IBM said the terms of the settlement were confidential but would allow them to explore new opportunities for collaboration. GlobalFoundries bought IBM semiconductor plants in 2015. IBM then sued GlobalFoundries for allegedly breaking a contract to make high-performance chips for IBM. GlobalFoundries separately sued IBM for allegedly misusing its shipmaking trade secrets and sharing them with Intel and Japanese consortium Rapidus. The nation's debt limit has been reinstated, opening the possibility that the government could default for the first time ever, leading to catastrophic economic consequences. Here's the story. The nation's debt ceiling has been reinstated, heightening the risk that the U.S. could default for the first time ever if it can't borrow more to meet its financial responsibilities. The Treasury Department says default would have catastrophic economic consequences and lead to another financial crisis. The new debt ceiling is at around $36 trillion. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen says in a letter, America will hit this ceiling in mid-January, urging Congress to act. The ceiling is politically contentious. Many conservative Republicans say there should be significant spending cuts instead of or in addition to raising the ceiling. They say the national debt is already over the $36 trillion limit. The government has continuously raised the ceiling as the debt continuously grows. Many Democrats want the ceiling raised to avoid default and to continue payments for items like Social Security, Medicare, government salaries and interest payments. President-elect Trump wants to get rid of the debt ceiling. In an NBC News interview, he said, it doesn't mean anything except psychologically. Trump will be inaugurated on January 20th. From then on, his administration and incoming Treasury Secretary Scott Besant, once confirmed, will deal with the issue. Constellation Energy announced that it has been awarded a record $1 billion in contracts to supply nuclear power to the US government. Constellation is the country's largest operator of nuclear power plants. As part of the agreement with the US General Services Administration, Constellation will deliver electricity to more than 13 federal agencies and 80 federal facilities. The GSA estimates that contracts will provide over 10 million megawatt hours over a decade. That's the electricity equivalent of powering more than a million homes a year. The contracts are set to begin at the end of April. Aeromexico is the world's most punctual airline of 2024. And that's according to the annual ranking by aviation analytics firm, Sirium. The rest of the top five are Saudi Arabia, Delta Airlines, Latam Airlines, and Qatar Airways. Regionally, Delta took top honors for North America, followed by United and Alaska. Sirium defined on time as scheduled flight arriving or departing less than 15 minutes from its scheduled time. Bear in mind that many of the causes of delays are not the fault of individual airlines or airports. Weather can play a huge role in that. In 2024, it saw a huge amount of store closures and bankruptcies throughout the year. Major retailers were hurt by high inflation rates. NTD Sean Marshall has more. More than 7,300 stores closed in 2024, according to Core Insight Research. Store closures had a 57% increase from 2023. It's also the highest annual number of stores closed since 2020. They also faced competition from bigger and better positioned rivals, including Amazon, Walmart, and Costco. Some of the closures included 718 family dollar stores, more than 1,000 Walgreens and CVS pharmacies, and nearly 600 Big Lots. Meanwhile, Party City will shutter its business completely, and the Container Store filed for bankruptcy. At least 19 companies have cut a combined 14,000 jobs because of bankruptcies, according to Challenger, Gray & Christmas, an outplacement services firm. 12 well-known companies that went bankrupt in 2024 are Big Lots, Bowflex, Express, Joanne, LL Flooring, Party City, Red Lobster, Spirit Airlines, Stoli, TGI Fridays, True Value, and Tupperware. Hopefully, none of your favorites had to go. A number of privately owned businesses are having to exist as diversified revenue businesses or multi-revenue stream businesses in this tough business climate. Tactics like charging unique new product makers for space and exposure in a brick-and-mortar space or an omni-channel approach of e-commerce, wholesale, and in-store sales. Sean Marshall, NTD News. Now on to Apple. The company has agreed to pay $95 million to settle a proposed class action lawsuit. Mobile device owners accused the tech giant of routinely recording their private conversations after they activated Siri unintentionally. The class action period runs from September 2014 to December 2024. Users may receive up to $20 per Siri-enabled device. Apple has denied any wrongdoing in agreement to settle. The $95 million is about nine hours of profit for Apple, which is the most valuable company in the world by market capitalization. The preliminary settlement still needs to be approved by a U.S. district judge. European stocks wavered on the first trading session of 2025 today. This follows a late-year sell-off. The sell-off was driven by concerns about high valuations and policies under incoming President Trump. The pan-European stock 600 index dipped about 0.2 percent, reversing modest opening gains. Trading volumes were light, with investors still returning from their New Year holidays. The benchmark stock 600 suffered its worst quarterly drop in more than two years from October to December. One of the worries shared by many investors is, of course, the current politics, for example, the future policy of the new President Donald Trump. He has announced that he intends to impose various tariffs. He has already described this in great detail for Mexico, Canada and China. He has only reserved the right to do so for Europe. Global insurance rates fell for the first time in seven years as the market became more competitive. A report by insurance broker Howden revealed global insurance premiums fell 0.9 percent last year. Insurers have consistently raised rates in recent years in response to losses from wars and natural catastrophes and inflation. This has encouraged additional players into the market and pushed down prices. Now, the year 2024 proved to be challenging for many people's finances, with rising costs and economic pressures taking a toll on households. Looking ahead, we wanted to know how people are feeling about 2025. I asked them to find out. Take a look. What's your financial resolutions for the upcoming year? Honestly, I want to put a lot more money into investments. I'm thinking index funds and I'm probably going to put some money into Tesla as well. What's your goals for finances, your personal finances? Not going to too much debt. Yeah, I hope to have a good job and to, I don't know, to buy a car if I could. In the next five years, I want to be a millionaire. What's your strategy to achieving your plan, your financial plan? I think it's more about saving. You've got to, I mean, I'm a salary earner, of course. So percentage, 25% of it you save, 5% you can spend on yourself and the rest put it away for retirement. What's one advice you would give to people if they want to make more money, save more money and just, you know, be financially more well off? Of course, yeah. So time in the market, in my opinion, is the most important thing. I think that as long as like you start at a young age, as soon as you turn 18, get yourself, like start investing as fast as possible. I think it's the most important thing to do. If you can cancel one monthly expense, what would it be? Netflix. I pray it every month. I will try to cancel it. Just Netflix? If you can cancel anything, you wouldn't cancel like rent or like you just cancel Netflix. Yeah, no. Rent is important. I live with my parents, so I don't pay rent. But yeah, the only two expenses that I pay is Spotify and Netflix. But Spotify is very important to me. So Netflix. If you had $1,000 suddenly, what would you do with it? Oh my gosh, I'll definitely buy... I love Louis Vuitton. Yes, I would definitely buy something, $1,000. I mean, it's something that I would spend on myself. Most likely some Louis Vuitton bracelets. What are you hopeful for 2025 in terms of the economy, the stock market? Make more money, of course. Are you feeling optimistic about the economy in 2025? Look, it's kind of bleak, but we're hoping for the best. So yeah, I'm kind of optimistic that things will go well. Optimistic. You always have to be optimistic. Why is that? Because if you don't be optimistic, then life should be fun. So try to be optimistic. You got to be optimistic at all times. Like you can't, you're not going to get anywhere if you're like not motivated. You're not ready to go, you know. The Commerce Department announced today it may restrict or ban Chinese drones, citing national security threats. Officials are concerned adversaries like China and Russia could manipulate drones to access sensitive data. China dominates the U.S. commercial drone market, with DJI selling over half of all drones. Last month, President Biden signed a law that could block DJI and Autel Robotics from launching new products in the U.S. Lawmakers and officials continue to scrutinize DJI over alleged ties to Beijing's military and potential surveillance risks. Oil prices are likely to remain near $70 a barrel in 2025. Economists and analysts in a Reuters survey pointed to weak demand from China and rising global supplies as contributing factors. Most of the poll respondents expect the oil market to be in the surplus next year, with analysts from J.P. Morgan predicting that supply will outpace demand to the tune of 1.2 million barrels per day. OPEC+, which pumps about half the world's oil, delayed production increases at its meeting earlier this month and extended supply cuts to account for the expected boost in global output. Markets are also bracing for substantial policy shifts, encompassing tariffs, deregulation and tax amendments, as Donald Trump is set to return to the White House on January 20th. However, some analysts noted that implementation of intensified sanctions on Iranian oil exports by the Trump administration could offer support to oil prices in the short term. Oil prices were on track to end 2024 with a second consecutive year of losses. Brent crude is down about 3% for the year near $74 a barrel, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude is off about half of a percent to about $71 a barrel. In September, Brent futures closed below $70 a barrel for the first time in almost three years, as the impacts of a post-pandemic rebound in demand and price shocks from Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine began to fade. And on to markets. Before we go here, Wall Street seesawed today to a lower close amid choppy trading. And this comes as investors embarked on the new year, facing the cross-currents of solid labor market data, as well as a rising dollar and tumbling Tesla shares. So all three major U.S. stocks ended negative in the session. A reversal, by the way, of an earlier rally, but off-session lows. Wall Street's main indexes notched double-digit gains in 2024 with the benchmark S&P 500 recording its best two-year run since 1997 to 1998. Those gains were driven by the U.S. Federal Reserve's first rate cuts in three and a half years and the ongoing artificial intelligence boom. And don't forget expectations of pro-business policies from the incoming Trump administration. All right, that's all today from Business Matters. Back to you, Fiona. Don, great segment as always. Now, that was you right on the streets there talking to those passersby. That was me. Yeah, how was that? That was a fun one. Yeah, I mean, people were really optimistic, as you saw, for 2025. And I can sort of relate to them because, you know, you have to stay in a positive mindset if you want things to actually turn out positive, because it does have an impact on your actions. If you have a negative mindset, that's also could potentially translate. So people, you know, having a positive mindset because people down, you know, the bottom line is they make up the economy. So when people are positive, I mean, it could have a positive effect on the economy. Absolutely. I think that's a great point, especially they seem very realistic, too. You know, they know that there's difficulties ahead, but they're optimistic that they'll be able to overcome it. Love that. Yeah. And the guy in the gray hoodie. I also asked him a question that didn't make it into the report. I asked him if he was ready to retire. He looked very young, right? But he was very confident that he's ready for retirement. He wants to retire at the age of 50. Wow. Okay. Well, all the best to him. All the best to him. All right. Thank you, Don. We'll see you tomorrow. Thank you.