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    Warren Buffett Criticizes Trump’s Trade Policies

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    “Trade should not be a weapon,” he said at Berkshire’s annual shareholders’ meeting. Investors had been awaiting his comments on trade, given the conglomerate’s status as an economic bellwether.Warren E. Buffett took a shot at President Trump’s efforts to use tariffs to batter global commerce on Saturday, as his $1.1 trillion conglomerate, Berkshire Hathaway, braced for potential hits from American trade policies.“Trade should not be a weapon,” Mr. Buffett said at Berkshire’s annual shareholder meeting, a perennially popular event that has been nicknamed the Woodstock of capitalism. “I don’t think it’s right and I don’t think it’s wise.”Mr. Buffett’s comments were long awaited by Berkshire’s shareholders, tens of thousands of whom flocked to the company’s hometown in Omaha to hear directly from the investor — particularly on Mr. Trump’s trade policies. His comments on Saturday ended what had been months of Mr. Buffett maintaining a largely low public profile.Mr. Buffett’s comments were especially notable as the 94-year-old billionaire acknowledged that he had previously proposed an idea to help address trade imbalances. But on Saturday, the Berkshire chief defended the broader concept of global trade flows: “We should do what we do best and they should do what they do best,” he said, drawing applause.Fears about the consequences of the tariffs have roiled markets and affected vast swaths of American companies. That includes Berkshire, which on Saturday reported a sharp drop in first-quarter earnings.The company reported $9.6 billion in operating income, Mr. Buffett’s preferred measure, down 14 percent from the same time a year ago. Using generally accepted accounting principles, Berkshire reported a nearly 64 percent drop in net income, largely because of paper investment losses.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Tesla’s Falling Profit May Pressure Elon Musk to Return to Day Job

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      The carmaker is expected to report a decline in quarterly earnings after Tesla’s brand suffered because of its chief executive’s role in the Trump administration.Tesla is expected to report on Tuesday that its profits fell in the first three months of the year, which could increase the pressure on Elon Musk, the automaker’s chief executive, to curtail his work for President Trump and spend more time managing the company.Wall Street analysts expect Tesla to say its net profit declined slightly from $1.1 billion in the first quarter of 2024.Tesla sales have been slumping because of intense competition from Chinese carmakers like BYD, a lack of new models and Mr. Musk’s support of far-right causes, which has turned away some liberals and centrists from buying Tesla vehicles.Tesla remains the most valuable automaker in the world as measured by its stock price, but its shares have lost about half their value since mid-December as investors have grown more pessimistic about the company’s prospects and concerned about Mr. Musk’s role in the Trump administration.Tesla has steadily lost market share to Chinese carmakers and more established automakers, like General Motors, Volkswagen and Hyundai, that have been offering a growing selection of electric vehicles.Mr. Musk’s company once hoped to sell 20 million vehicles a year by the end of the decade, twice as many as Toyota. But sales have been sliding after climbing to 1.8 million in 2023. Last year, the company sold 1.7 million cars, and its global sales fell 13 percent in the first quarter of 2025 from a year earlier.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Tesla U.S. Sales Plunge as G.M. and Others Make Gains

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      Tesla’s sales in the United States fell almost 9 percent in the first three months of the year even as the overall market for electric vehicles grew, according to data compiled by a research firm.Car buyers are moving away from Teslas and toward models like General Motors’ Chevrolet Equinox electric vehicle, which starts at around $35,000 and can travel more than 300 miles on a charge, Cox Automotive, the research firm, said in a report.Sales of all electric vehicles in the United States rose 11 percent during the first quarter to about 300,000 cars and light trucks, Cox said, much faster than the overall auto market, which has been flat. About 8 percent of new domestic car sales were electric, Cox said, a slight increase from 2024.“Despite many obstacles — and what you may read elsewhere — electric vehicle sales continue to grow at a healthy pace in the U.S. market,” the firm said.Tesla, whose chief executive is Elon Musk, still sells far more electric cars in the United States than any other automaker, accounting for 44 percent of the market, according to Cox. But its share has fallen from 51 percent a year earlier.The decline in Tesla’s U.S. sales mirror a global slump. The company said this month that deliveries during the quarter in all markets fell 13 percent to 337,000 vehicles.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Adidas Has Sold Its Last Yeezy Sneaker

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      The sportswear maker was eager to put the scandal with the rapper Ye behind it, but its cautious earnings forecast showed the breakup’s effects still lingered.Adidas said Wednesday that it had sold its last pair of Yeezys, a wildly popular and profitable sneaker brand it developed with the rapper and designer Ye, as it tried to move past the publicity nightmare that followed after Ye’s antisemitic comments.The sportswear giant severed ties with Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, in 2022 after he posted antisemitic remarks on social media and made other offensive comments publicly. Adidas had said that ending its nearly decade-long collaboration with the American entertainer cost it nearly 250 million euros that year.The rapper apologized to the Jewish community in 2022 only to later retract his apology in a barrage of social media posts in February in which he declared he was a Nazi.The sale of Adidas’ remaining Yeezy inventory generated about €50 million in the fourth quarter of 2024, boosting the company’s overall revenue to €5.97 billion, up 24 percent from a year earlier, Adidas said Wednesday in an earnings report.But the sports brand was cautious in its outlook, cutting its revenue growth forecast for 2025 to 10 percent, from 12 percent last year. It was the first time, the company said, that the outlook did not include revenue from the Yeezy line.The breakup was hardest felt in North America, where the apparel was driven by the Grammy-winning rapper’s popularity. “Sales in North America declined 2 percent solely due to significantly lower Yeezy sales,” said Adidas, which is based in Herzogenaurach, Germany.After ending its ties with Ye, the apparel company struggled with slowing sales and revelations that it had ignored the rapper’s misconduct for years. The severed contract also left Adidas with mountains of sneakers and clothing, and potential losses of €1.2 billion in sales and about €500 million in profit last year.In 2023, under the stewardship of a new chief executive, Bjorn Gulden, Adidas decided not to write off the remaining Yeezy stock but sell it and donate part of the profit to organizations such as the Anti-Defamation League and Robert Kraft’s Foundation to Combat Antisemitism.On Wednesday, Mr. Gulden struck an optimistic tone, signaling the company’s eagerness to put the Yeezy scandal behind it with new celebrity collaborations and a focus on other popular sneaker lines, like the Samba, a decades’ old brand that has had a resurgence in popularity.“With all the challenges out there, let’s not forget that there are so many fun things to look forward to in 2025,” Mr. Gulden said.’ More

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      BP to ‘Reset’ Strategy After Pressure From Investors, C.E.O. Says

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      The energy giant was vague on details, but analysts say the changes will likely include less spending on renewable sources and a bigger investment in oil and natural gas production.Murray Auchincloss, the chief executive of the struggling energy giant BP, promised “a fundamental reset” of the company’s strategy on Tuesday while reporting disappointing earnings.The shift comes after a long period of lackluster share performance compared with its industry peers. BP’s weak stock price has attracted interest from Elliott Investment Management, a hedge fund known for shaking up its targets in an effort to improve shareholder value.Mr. Auchincloss is reserving the details of BP’s shift for a presentation to investors on Feb. 26, but analysts seem to have little doubt about its direction.BP is likely to reduce spending on low-emissions energy technologies like wind and hydrogen and try to boost oil and natural gas production, they say. “We would anticipate that there will be major changes in capital allocation, particularly around lower spending in the low-carbon arena,” Alastair Syme, an analyst at Citigroup, wrote in a note to clients on Tuesday.Mr. Auchincloss appears headed toward a major reversal of the course taken by his predecessor, Bernard Looney, who left the company in 2023 after failing to disclose personal relationships with colleagues.In the early part of this decade, when oil prices were low and governments were pressing companies to reduce emissions, Mr. Looney aggressively invested in green technologies like offshore wind and throttled back on oil and gas.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Macy’s Earnings Report Details Multimillion-Dollar Accounting Error

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      Analysts see much bigger challenges for the retailer than lax accounting.With just two weeks until Christmas, Macy’s has been operating under a cloud. The retailer shocked Wall Street last month when it said that an employee had “intentionally” hidden more than $150 million over the past few years, forcing the company to delay an earnings report that analysts use to gauge its health as it enters the most important selling season.On Wednesday, Macy’s gave investors a full look at its financials and provided more information about the accounting snafu that involved how it measured the cost of delivering small packages. It found “no material impact” on its previous results, but nonetheless had to revise its accounts going back a few years and lower its forecast for profits this year.Macy’s confirmed in a filing that a single employee, who is no longer with the company, “intentionally made erroneous accounting entries and falsified underlying documentation, to understate delivery expenses” from late 2021 through the third quarter of this year. On a call with analysts, Adrian Mitchell, Macy’s finance chief, said the error was not made for personal financial gain.“This was not theft,” he said. “There was no impact to revenues, and there was no impact to cash or inventories as all vendors were fully paid.”Macy’s said it was taking measures to improve its financial controls, including “re-evaluating the risk of employee circumvention of controls.”Concerns still remain about how the company will turn around its falling sales and fend off activist investors pushing for major changes.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Kohl’s Picks C.E.O. of Michaels to Help It Turn Around

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      Ashley Buchanan will be the third chief executive of the department store chain since 2018.Kohl’s has hired Ashley Buchanan, chief executive of the crafts retailer Michaels, to be its next chief executive, the department store chain said on Monday. Mr. Buchanan, who has run Michaels since 2020, will start on Jan. 15.Mr. Buchanan will be the third chief executive at Kohl’s since 2018. Tom Kingsbury has served as interim chief executive since Michelle Gass left in December 2022 to run Levi Strauss & Company. Mr. Kingsbury will retain his seat on the board of directors until he retires in May.Mr. Buchanan, 50, is a familiar name in the retail industry. He joined Michaels at the start of 2020, not long before the Covid pandemic forced millions of Americans to stay at home and led them to pick up a hobby. He helped Michaels increase its digital presence with its online marketplace, improved its merchandising and focused on smaller format stores.Previously, Mr. Buchanan spent 13 years at Walmart, holding several senior roles, including chief merchandising officer and chief operating officer for Walmart’s U.S. e-commerce. He was on Macy’s board of directors from October 2021 until Monday, when he resigned as part of his new role at Kohl’s.“I am thrilled to join Kohl’s, a storied and respected brand in the retail industry,” Mr. Buchanan said in a statement. “We have the privilege of serving millions of families all across the country, and I’m excited to work with the teams to evolve our business — building off the strength of our brand and loyal customer base while also creating a compelling retail experience for the future.”Kohl’s is facing a decline in comparable sales and challenges with profitability as customers pull back on discretionary spending. Its tie-up with the beauty retailer Sephora has helped buoy sales by bringing in younger customers. Still, the retailer has said it expects sales for this year to be down 4 to 6 percent.The retailer is set to announce its third-quarter earnings on Tuesday morning. More

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      Macy’s Discovers Employee Hid Millions in Delivery Expenses

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      The department store chain said it had found the erroneous accounting entries while preparing its results for the third quarter.Macy’s said Monday that an employee had misstated up to $154 million in delivery expenses over the past few years, forcing the retailer to delay a much-anticipated earnings report that Wall Street uses to gauge the strength of holiday shopping.The department store chain rushed to release an abridged set of financial results, which were a mixed bag, with signs of weakness and pockets of strength.Macy’s shares fell by more than 8 percent in premarket trading after the surprise preliminary report. But it quickly pared back some of its losses, as investors tried to make sense of the mixed results along with the company’s reassurance that the employee error did not affect its cash flow management or vendor payments.Macy’s sales in the third quarter fell 2.4 percent — below analysts’ expectations — to $4.74 billion. The company’s overall sales were dragged down by weak sales at Macy’s stores and its digital business.But comparable sales at 50 locations that represent the company’s future — based on geography, staffing and other factors — rose 1.9 percent, the third consecutive quarter of growth. And comparable sales rose at both Bloomingdale’s and Bluemercury, the company’s luxury brands. Those results are early signs that Macy’s latest strategy of investing in these parts of the business may be working.Macy’s said it had found the accounting error while preparing its results for the quarter, which ended Nov. 2. The results had been set to be released on Tuesday. An investigation was opened and the employee was no longer with the company, Macy’s said. The investigation has not identified involvement by any other employee.In the same time period of the accounting issue in which the employee hid up to $154 million, the retailer said it had incurred about $4.36 billion of delivery expenses. Macy’s declined to comment further.The chain said it would report earnings by Dec. 11.As part of a turnaround plan announced in February, Macy’s said it would close 150 of its stores over the next three years. The company said it had recorded asset gains of $66 million from the sale of closed stores. That was more than the company had expected.Macy’s decision to delay its full-year guidance added to uncertainty about winners and losers in the upcoming holiday shopping season. U.S. consumers are still spending, but executives at some of the biggest retailers, including Target, have recently flagged consumers’ continuing cautious spending patterns, with many shoppers trading down to lower-priced items. The National Retail Federation projected U.S. holiday sales to grow as much as 3.5 percent this year, in line with averages before the pandemic. More

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      Target’s Stock Sinks on Weak Sales Ahead of Holiday Shopping Season

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      The retailer’s downbeat earnings report, which included lower profit and larger inventory, fell far short of Wall Street’s expectations.Target rattled Wall Street on Wednesday with a downbeat earnings report showing a sales decline, lower profit and an unwelcome buildup of unsold inventory. The company also cut its forecast for the full year, a bad omen ahead of the critical holiday shopping season.Target’s stock plunged more than 20 percent in early trading, putting it on track for its biggest daily decline in more than two years.Sales at Target stores fell 1.9 percent last quarter, from the same period last year, offset somewhat by a 10.8 percent rise in online sales. The company said it expected sales to be flat this quarter and cut its forecast for full-year profit, almost entirely reversing an increase announced just three months ago.Jim Lee, Target’s chief financial officer, told analysts on a call that it was “prudent to take this conservative approach” and that the company would take “swift and disciplined action to position ourselves to win during the holidays and in 2025.”Target had recently made improvements that drew shoppers to its stores, but the earnings setback suggests that there is more work to do. Brian Cornell, Target’s chief executive, said in a statement that the retailer was navigating through “a volatile operating environment.”The weaker-than-expected report covered the period of back-to-school shopping and Halloween, which can signal more challenges during the holiday season, a crucial final weeks of the year. Retailers look to those seasonal events as indicators of how shoppers might spend around Thanksgiving and Christmas. We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More