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Trade Wars
Nvidia Board Weighs Ousting CEO Jensen Huang Amid Affair Scandal
Nvidia's board has been meeting to discuss whether to oust CEO Jensen Huang amid reports of two extramarital affairs, one with a woman alleged to be a Chinese spy. He also had an affair with Kimberly Powell, a senior executive at Nvidia who runs the company’s healthcare business, according to a person familiar with the matter. With no obvious successor, Huang's potential departure would leave a leadership vacuum at the roughly $4 trillion chipmaker.
Huang, 63, owns about 3.6% of Nvidia's stock and has dozens of direct reports, underscoring the tight control he maintains over the company he co-founded. Nvidia shares fell nearly 7% in US premarket trading on Thursday, adding to a decline that has wiped out about $600 billion in market value this week. US President Donald Trump has called the Nvidia chief 'an honorable guy', while congressional leaders call for investigations into national security risks.
Read more at Reuters
CoreWeave Beats On Revenue And Lifts Guidance, Easing AI Slowdown Concerns
CoreWeave reported better-than-expected quarterly revenue and lifted its 2026 guidance on Tuesday, showing that demand for artificial intelligence infrastructure remains strong despite concerns of a market slowdown. The stock advanced in extended trading. The earnings announcement lands at a particularly volatile moment for CoreWeave and its neocloud peers, as the market sours on the AI trade and as Nvidia. Loss per share was 95 cents adjusted vs. $1.16 expected and revenue was: $3.66 billion vs. $3.55 billion expected.
CoreWeave’s revenue soared 168% from about $1.36 billion a year earlier, according to a statement. The company recorded a net loss of $709 million, or $1.27 per share, compared to a net loss of $110 million a year earlier. Adjusted earnings exclude stock-based compensation. Executives pushed up their forecast for 2026. They now see $1.275 billion to $1.375 billion in adjusted operating income on $13 billion to $13.3 billion in revenue. Analysts surveyed by Visible Alpha were looking for $1.07 billion in adjusted operating income, and analysts polled by LSEG had expected $12.86 billion in 2026 revenue.
Read more at The Hill
TSMC Approves Up to $1 Billion Investment Plan in Anthropic & OpenAI, Will Make $41 Billion Further Capital Investments
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. on Tuesday said its board approved investments of up to $500 million each in Anthropic’s common shares at the IPO price and OpenAI’s preferred stock. Anthropic said Tuesday that it will sell shares at $70 to $78 apiece in its initial public offering, aiming to raise more than $61 billion at the midpoint of the range. Its board also approved $40.93 billion in capital expenditure covering advanced semiconductor manufacturing, advanced packaging, plant construction and 2027 research and development investments.
The Claude maker also plans to raise $26 billion from big investors including Alphabet’s Google, Advanced Micro Devices and TSMC 2330 4.81%increase; up pointing triangle, its filing showed. TSMC’s move to buy stakes in the industry’s most influential model developers shows its desire to broaden its AI exposure beyond manufacturing advanced chips to power AI computing infrastructure. Analysts also cautioned that the distinction between investors, suppliers and customers is becoming more ambiguous in the AI sector, making it harder to assess true demand.
Read more at The WSJ
Boeing Jet Deliveries Drop 14% In October, Plans Job Cuts
Boeing is set to reduce its workforce by about 5% in the coming weeks in order to scale back its production rate as it works through assembly bottlenecks, particularly for the 737 MAX program. The layoffs are expected to affect the Boeing narrow-body assembly operations in Renton, Wash., though assembly rates for the 787 Dreamliner wide-body aircraft reportedly have been slowed too. No estimate on the number of jobs at risk has been provided. The downsizing will begin to be implemented in December, through natural attrition followed by involuntary layoffs.
Boeing Commercial Airplanes delivered 161 aircraft in Q3 2026, and 524 YTD. It closed the period with backlog of 6,976 aircraft orders, which it estimates represent a value of $612 billion. Over the past 12 months Boeing has been expanding 737 MAX production to begin filling an extensive backlog of orders. After restricting the production rate during 2024-2025, the Federal Aviation Administration last year authorized Boeing to increase its output to 47 aircraft per month. Boeing has consistently targeted a higher output, but recently Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg said the higher target rate of 52 jets/month would not be reached until the second half of 2027.
Read more at American Machinist
Unpacking the DOJ’s Investigation Of Containerboard Producers
The bombshell news last week that the U.S. Department of Justice is investigating containerboard producers over pricing suggests that a similar civil case brought last year in the Northern District of Illinois is not frivolous, according to a legal expert. Several companies — International Paper, Packaging Corporation of America and Smurfit Westrock — disclosed in filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that they were subpoenaed by DOJ in late September. The subpoenas stem from a grand jury investigation in the Northern District of Illinois regarding the pricing and sale of containerboard in the United States.
Sometimes a civil complaint can spark the interest of DOJ’s Antitrust Division, “as appears to be the case here,” explained Alexander Wentworth-Ping, attorney at Schlam Stone & Dolan. The containerboard companies that DOJ subpoenaed appear to align with the defendants in the civil case. Other actions that might prompt the DOJ to get involved are formal complaints or press coverage. Subpoenas often are issued “later in the investigation, which suggests to me that the Antitrust Division has probably already gotten information from other third parties,” he said. While it’s impossible to know for sure due to the sealed nature of these cases, he said DOJ employees “probably already have been conducting an investigation for a while that they have at least some documents for.”
Read more at Packaging Dive
Mars To Invest $1.4B In US Manufacturing, Operations In 2027
Mars plans to invest an estimated $1.4 billion into its U.S. manufacturing and operations footprint in 2027, the most the Cheez-It and Snickers maker said it has invested in a single year. The Virginia-based company said the investments “serve as an accelerator for Mars growing portfolio of snacking brands” that will allow it to scale products and boost innovation. The money will also enable it to modernize existing facilities, improve its supply chain and improve its geographical reach. Mars has been expanding its portfolio beyond its core of candy and gum. Most recently, Mars dolled out $36 billion to buy Kellanova, creating a snacking giant with a portfolio including M&Ms, Extra gum, Pringles and Pop-Tarts.
Claus Aagaard, Mars’ CFO, said 94% of the company’s products sold in the U.S. are made here. “Our continued investments build for the future – expanding our manufacturing capabilities, accelerating growth across our portfolio and services and ensuring we can meet the evolving needs of consumers for generations to come,” he added. Mars estimated it employs 80,000 people in the U.S. alone. The food maker added that with 15 new facilities added following the Kellanova acquisition, Mars will continue to make strategic manufacturing investments to modernize its U.S. facilities.
Read more at Manufacturing Dive
Lockheed Martin Plans $420 Million Missile Manufacturing Expansion In Arkansas
Lockheed Martin plans to expand its missile manufacturing operations in Camden, Ark., with a $420 million investment expected to create 650 new full-time jobs over five years. The company, which manufactures aerospace, defense and advanced technology systems, will increase production capacity for two missile programs. Lockheed Martin's Camden Operations facility spans 2.2 million square feet across 2,427 acres in Highland Industrial Park. The existing site manufactures seven U.S. Department of War programs. It has delivered more than 700,000 missiles and rockets over the past four decades.
“Lockheed Martin is investing at unprecedented speed and scale to expand manufacturing capacity and deliver the critical capabilities our warfighters need, faster,” said Adam Bailey, Camden site general manager at Lockheed Martin, in a November press release. “For more than four decades, Camden has played a vital role in strengthening our nation’s defense, and this investment marks another significant step in accelerating production, advancing next-generation manufacturing and creating 650 new jobs.
Read more at Plant Services
GE Vernova To Spend $34.5M Expanding Louisiana Transformer Manufacturing Capacity
GE Vernova will invest $34.5 million to expand transformer manufacturing operations at its existing Shreveport, Louisiana, facility to meet rising demand for electrical grid equipment, the company announced Tuesday. The investment is expected to increase the workforce at the factory by nearly 30%, with production reaching full capacity by 2028, it said.
“Electricity demand is growing, and transformers are part of the critical grid equipment essential to delivering the power our customers and modern economies depend on,” Philippe Piron, CEO of GE Vernova’s electrification segment, said in a press release. The state of Louisiana offered the company what it called a “competitive” incentive package that includes a $300,000 “performance-based grant for site and infrastructure improvements,” the release said. The company also said it expects to participate in the state’s Quality Jobs and Industrial Tax Exemption programs.
Read more at Utility Dive
BMW Announces New Battery Supply Deals For US, Europe
BMW Group has announced a supply agreement with Samsung SDI and LG Energy Solution for cells used for its sixth-generation high-voltage batteries, the automaker announced in a press release. LG Energy Solution will supply battery cells for BMW electric vehicles in the North America region, while Samsung SDI will supply cells for EVs manufactured in Europe, beginning in the late 2020s.
“Our global partner network with leading cell manufacturers ensures that we have a resilient, flexible and competitive battery cell supply,” Hendrik Lang, head of purchasing and quality of high-voltage batteries at BMW, said in a statement. Having regional infrastructure to produce batteries near its existing facilities helps secure jobs according to Lang, while reducing the geographical distances between suppliers, batteries manufacturing facilities and vehicle assembly plants boosts the automaker’s competitiveness.
Read more at Ward’s Auto
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