Every company trading on the stock exchange has 2 values – one it believes is fully valued of their shares and how the market values the shares. Often it has 2 different values because the market is more pessimistic and sees headwinds or things that could change the outlook for the company. The market is always right. That does not change the viewpoint of CEOs who want the stock to reflect what their value is.

In an article by Benjamin Mullin of Reuters, the giant media and telecommunications company Comcast. The company was originally founded by Ralph Roberts and is now headed by his son Brian. The company has its roots in the cable TV network.

Comcast has expanded over the years from cable to owning Madison Square Gardens – The Knicks and Rangers; NBC Broadcasting and a host of cable channels. CEO Brian Robets for the division called NBCUniversal Media LLC the desire is to split the movie studio and theme parks from the cable TV channels. Many people have cut their cable or do not pay cable bills because they stream services. However, cable TV is very profitable business.

The cable channels generate about $7 billion of revenue a year and include: MSNBC, CNBC, USA. Oxygen, E!, Syfy, and Golf. Comcast would keep 1/3 of the voting shares, but Mr. Roberts would not serve on the Board of Directors or oversee its operations.

The new CEO will be the Chair of NBCUniversal Media Group – Mark Lazarus. If all goes well through the regulatory agencies, late 2025 or early 2026. Then the debt free company would be able to do acquisitions.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, all CEOs if they are honest, pay attention to value of their shares including what they think is fair market value and what the market’s value is for the shares. Often times there is change in the industry or society and the issue is how will the company come through the changes. What is the history of the company and changes? Does it need new management? The market always has many questions about the company.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.

Everyone who has lived a reasonably long life can tell you about changes they have seen. Most people do not take advantage of the changes, but they can recall how the area has changed, ideally for the better of society. The reason is infrastructure takes time because if they build it, will they come? If you build it, is government funding or support highly desired. Once the infrastructure is in place and more people start using it, then the other elements of more housing and shopping and everything else in between arrives. Once everything has arrived the price of the land also rises, but the big money is made before everything arrives.

In an article by Jane Margolies of the New York Times News Service, EV charging stations are bringing in revenues to the retailers nearby. Unlike filling up gas, it takes time to charge batteries and what will people tend to do – shop for something.

New studies say retailers’ charging efforts may well be paying off: one peer-reviewed study by researchers at Boston University and the University of Wisconsin-Madison published this year looked at the impact of nearly 1,600 Tesla Inc Supercharger stations in more than 800 US counties and found a 4% increase within 200 meters after they were installed. At 150 meters, the researchers found an increase of 5% in sales.

At the moment, there are more than 200,000 public chargers across 74,000 stations. It is expected more than 1 million chargers by 2030 to keep with EV sales. 60% of the grants have gone to fuel and convenience stores, rest stops and service plazas. Under President Biden’s $5 billion plan to fill in the gap, more EV stations are expected, will President elect Trump continue or cut the program? who will make up the difference? what will happen to EV demand?

It costs about $7,000 to install the slow chargers and up to $175,000 for fast chargers for a 20 minute charge.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, often times profitable stocks are profitable because they tap into existing infrastructure and make money on the built up one. Once it is in, the cash flows go up, while it is built capital costs go up. For the companies you invest in – how do they use the infrastructure?

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.

If you have flown you likely have flown with the larger airlines – Delta, American, Southwest and United. All have feeder companies and operate with through hub and spoke and have a large share of the market. When companies have a large share of the market, there is a desire for competition and lower prices and as long as airlines can receive access to gates (although they tend to be a little further walk than the more established companies) it is possible to start an airline. Ryanair in Europe tends to be the model and Frontier and Spirit were established with lower fares. If you bought shares, they were up after COVID when all airlines’ stocks went up, but now regular ebbs and flows of the market is back and some investments are better than others.

In an article by Shivansh Tiwary and Rajesh Kumar Singh of Reuters, Spirit Airlines file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protections although it will continue to operate. Spirit is a Florida based airline and is known for bright yellow planes. Spirit is struggling with years of losses; failed merger attempts and heavy debt loads. Spirit tried to merge with JetBlue, but the deal collapsed.

In a Chapter 11 proceeding, the airline continues to function, equity or stockholders tend to lose most of their money and bondholders have to take a cut to keep the airline in operation. The cut is trading debt for equity and existing bondholders will provide $300 million in debt-or-in-possession financing, which combined with available cash will allow the airline to function through Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Spirit’s workers will receive the same pay and benefits.

Discount airlines mean not having many conveniences, but prices tend to make up for it. If you do not have much luggage, it is a good alternative. If you lots of luggage going to the larger airlines is very competitive when considering the extra fees of the discount.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, generally you would only buy the big 4 of the airline industry because many companies have gone through Chapter 11 bankruptcies. It is wonderful to consider the low cost alternative as a customer, but as an investor stick to the larger companies.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.

When a President says something, it can have an effect on many industries because all industries are regulated to some degree or another. There is a balancing act between less regulation businesses generally like and protecting the buyer which consumers tend to like. Hopefully, there is a balancing act somewhere in between. If the government has too little regulation, there are enough people to see the hole and exploit the weakness in the regulations. If there is too much regulation, it is hard to do business or it tends to protect those already in the field. One of the things the President-elect likes to talk about is tariffs.

In an article by Jack Ewing of the New York Times News Service, President-elect Trump has said he wants to impose a 100% tariff on cars made in Mexico. What does that mean?

According to the Mexican Automobile Industry Association, Mexican factories produced more than 3 million vehicles of which 2 million were exported to the US. The others went to Europe, China and other countries. All the major auto companies have plants in Mexico including BMW, VW, Audi, Mercedes, Ford, Nissans and GM. When the big companies have their plants, they have their supplier plants (of all parts and tires) nearby for additional factories in Mexico. In addition, the large Chinese EV companies are building plants in Mexico.

The reason is partly NAFTA which became the US-Mexico-Canada trade agreement or USMCA.

Ilka Horstmeier, a member of BMW’s management board which produce vehicles in the city of San Luis Potosi said the decision to build a plant is a 40-year decision and much of the output goes to Brazil, other Latin American countries and China. The plant would continue no matter what the US government decides.

However, it is more typical of the American manufacturing companies that ship most of their output back to the US that would be in trouble with changing of tariffs. Would consumers pay more for their vehicle because it takes time to adjust to tariffs.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, what the President says and does affects profitable companies. It is the reason why they have a team of lobbyists to ensure the administration effects are narrow in scope. It is the reason why markets change and can change quickly but regulations are further behind the markets changing nature.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.

In every industry there are trends towards disruption of the industry. Those trends are possible, they may happen, but a number of elements have to exist before it explodes. If you take the example of the wheel. The wheel was founded or invented in early days of people, but the wheel was made from wood, and its use was for agricultural purposes. It took hundreds of years before the wheel was easily made, for carriages there were shock absorbers and roads had to be invented. Most of us use the wheels on our vehicles on a regular basis because all the infrastructure is in place to move around with relative ease.

In an article by Michael Liedtke of Reuters, Waymo (owned by Google) opened its robotaxi service to anyone who wants a ride around Los Angeles. Waymo started the operation in Phoenix in 2020 and came to LA on a limited group of passengers. The waiting list grew to 300,000 people. Now anyone with a Waymo One smartphone app will be able to request a ride around the city of LA.

Waymo says it now transports more than 150,000 weekly trips in its robotaxis, a volume of business that helped raised $5.6 billion from Alphabet, Andreesen Horowitz and T Rowe Price. The company is still losing money, but the potential could be.

The competition includes Telsa is aiming to launch Cybercab in 2026; GM’s Cruise; and Amazon’s Zoox.

The theory is if robotaxis are easy to use and less expensive than owning a car, because for the most part 90% of the time, your car is parked. The result is car sales will go down and riding a robotaxi will be the first choice.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, at the moment robotaxis are back by some of the biggest names in the tech industry because of the learning experience and convergence of big data in the cloud and AI. Notice it needs a number of internal elements to come together as well as the regulations from the government to change. Will the new Trump administration loosen regulations?

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.

When you live in a country, you often think that the normal holidays or gatherings that happen in your country are the same as every other country. For example, everyone celebrates New Years because the calendar everyone uses changes. National holiday for the country’s founding is a celebration although that can be throughout the year, but we all celebrate a country’s birthday. Then there are the made-up days which tend to apply to various countries.

In an article by Zen Soo of the Associated Press, in November 11,2009 on-line service provider and e-commerce platform Alibaba started a sales event aimed a singles by offering attractive discounts to use Alibaba and spend money. The extravaganza is known as Double 11 and other on-line service providers such as JD.com and Pinduoduo also matched the sales promotions.

In China, the Double 11 event has a sales promotion attached to it as well as the normal promotional banners and posters and social media ads.

The event used to bring in double digit sales growth and that is why it has continued but China’s economy is not what it used to be and now sales are in the low single digits. Alibaba tried to expand the pie by offering free global shipping and allowing merchants to sell worldwide with ease. On one of Alibaba’s companies called Alizila a post said 70,000 merchants saw sales double with free shipping. In new markets such as Singapore and Hong Kong, new customers also doubled.

Even though the sales growth is single digits, expect the event to continue next year.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, every company loves to have customers all over the globe but when you do, it is important to ensure that globally your company accents the holidays and shopping habits of the country outside where the headquarters is.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.

In the retail trade, there are many elements of the reason for success of the company. People have to like what it is offered, they have to believe it is great value and they have to be repeat customers. The combination means that there is always a balancing act because people and companies like to change their offerings to keep it fresh. The raw materials can increase or decrease in prices, but usually increase and substitutions are examined. Repeat customers are the best, but every once in a while, they will try something else, hopefully coming back. When the company is public, success means most people are happy, but if the stock falls, everyone has a reason.

In an article from Reuters, the food company Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc was sued by shareholders because of growing unhappiness among customers with inconsistent portion sizes for its burritos and rice bowls. The dissatisfied shareholders say customers voiced dismay on TikTok and other social media. People take pictures of their food and post it.

CEO Scott Boatwright said the portions sizes were generous at the 3,600 restaurants.

Shareholders say the cost to repair the damage hurt margins, causing Chipotle’s stock price to fall wiping out $6.5 billion of market value. The shareholders are seeking some form of damage to purchasers in 2024.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, there is an old adage in the stock market, stocks go up and down. Sometimes the reasons are rational and sometimes they are harder to figure out. Sometimes the stock is seen as a growth stock, then it is seen as mature company and should trade at a different valuation. There are countless combinations, but stocks go up and down. One method to provide insurance is to buy profitable stocks that pay a dividend so when the stock goes up all is good, when the stock goes down there is a dividend to cushion the lower price. Generally profitable stocks trade at higher multiples so when normalcy is back in the market the profitable stocks go up first.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.

In all industries there are group or subgroups who benefit from one party or the other in the White House. Although the political parties are supposed to reach out to everyone, some groups automatically favor one party or another. Generally, in the business world those who favor less regulations tend to be closer to the Republican party, those who see more regulations closer to the Democrat party. Those who own businesses tend to favor the Republican party and those who organize people at work or unions stewards and higher tend to favor the Democrats. Although it is easy to find people going back and forth. the tendency to favor one or another is based on while attempting to pass laws or regulations on the industry, the starting point is easy for one party or the other. It does not mean the laws are easier, just the starting point is easier.

In the recent Presidential election, organized labor placed greater help on the Democrat party because they saw the alternative as bleak for them. Although in the past election many who work in unions voted for President Trump as President and then down ballot Democrat.

In an article by Jonathan Weisman and Benjamin Oreskes of the New York Times News Service, unions spent $43 million into the Harris campaign, according to Open Secrets. The unions also spent money and time on phone banks, canvassing operations, education and persuasion efforts with their members and outreach to non-union working-class households.

While that sounds a lot, 3 billionaires gave the Republican campaign at least $150 million. The 3 were Elon Musk, Timothy Melon and Miriam Adeson of the Las Vegas Sands.

Unions represent less than 10% of the private sector workforce. They have a majority of public sector workers.

Many non-union voters picked President Trump and they trust him. Although in his first term, he appointed union foes to the National Labor Relations Board. The people made it harder to organize workers to vote for collective bargaining. His secretaries of labor were not pro-union.

This election President Trump court union workers with policies such as end income taxation on tips and overtime. (many years ago, working for a union shop the biggest raises received were the increase in minimum wage, the company managed to keep employee costs at inflation). President Trump had Sean O’Brien of the Teamsters address the Republican convention.

Union leaders such as Shawn Fain of the UAW were all in for the Democrats.

In Nevada, the biggest industry is tourism tied to gambling and the employees of the hotels are unionized and belong to unions such as Culinary Workers. They were helping the Democrats.

If an employee works for the government or the public sector union. They are bracing for a fight because Project 2025, suggested eliminating such unions altogether. The phrase is Congress should consider whether public-sector unions are appropriate in the first place. (Congress can say they are appropriate.) Typically, Republicans do not like teachers’ unions.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, some companies you invest in have strong unions and are profitable and that includes utility companies. Some companies have to watch their labor costs as their margins are thin and there is a whole range in between. When you invest in a profitable company that can pay a dividend, part of it is understanding the cost structure including salaries and benefits. Why does the margin hold strong to keep earning a profit?

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.

In democracies, political parties need money to run elections. Many who support a party will donate money and most will be under $100 or what is called small dollar donations. Most people who give money on the small dollar donation do not expect much reward from their government but have an expectation of good government by their definition. The difference in what is good government is often the difference in which political party is in power. Once someone goes above $500, they want something more tangible from the government, including if they personally know the person running.

Elections are expensive and billions of dollars were spent on the past election, including $1 billion by the Democrats and $ 400 million for the Republicans directly. The rules were loosened up to allow for third parties to spend for one party or the other and they spent $500 million plus. The issue is what do people want for their money?

In an article by Nathan Gomes and Zajeer Kachwala of Reuters, Elon Musk who founded Tesla, Space X, bought formerly Twitter to become X, SolarCity, xAI, Starlink and others, what does he want or expect from President Trump? After the election of President-elect Trump, Tesla shares jumped 14% on the expectation the new administration will help Tesla. It has been reported Mr. Musk spent around $250 million on supporting Republicans.

Some of the above companies do not fit into President Trump agenda, some do. What benefits will Elon get? Mr. Musk is leading a committee to cut costs, will any of the billions his companies have received from government be cut? or are they good investments? what will or will not Mr. Musk recommend to be cut?

Linking to dividend paying stocks, most profitable stocks align themselves with lobbying groups to ensure their interests are taking care of when legislation is proposed. Most politicians want to meet with senior executives of profitable companies because they have a wide range of assets including a portfolio in many states. It is a balancing act and as long as their interests are taken care, companies can work with either the Democrats or Republicans, it is seemingly easier for one over the other. You do not necessary see in the front pages the quid pro quo question of what do you want that you see with Elon Musk, but it is there.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.