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    Exxon Chief to Trump: Don’t Withdraw From Paris Climate Deal

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    Darren Woods was one of only a few Western oil executives attending a global climate conference in Baku, Azerbaijan.Darren Woods, the chief executive of Exxon Mobil, cautioned President-elect Donald J. Trump on Tuesday against withdrawing from the Paris agreement to curb climate-warming emissions, saying Mr. Trump risked leaving a void at the negotiating table.Mr. Woods, speaking at an annual U.N. climate summit in Baku, Azerbaijan, described climate negotiations as opportunities for Mr. Trump to pursue common-sense policymaking.“We need a global system for managing global emissions,” Mr. Woods said in an interview with The New York Times in Baku. “Trump and his administrations have talked about coming back into government and bringing common sense back into government. I think he could take the same approach in this space.”Mr. Woods also urged government officials to create incentives for companies to transition to cleaner forms of energy in a profitable way.“The government role is extremely important and one that they haven’t been successfully fulfilling, quite frankly,” he said.Mr. Woods’s presence in a stadium teeming with diplomats is all the more noteworthy because of who is not here in Azerbaijan, a petrostate on the Caspian Sea that was once part of the Soviet Union. Many heads of state, including President Biden, have taken a pass, as have the leaders of several big oil companies like Shell and Chevron.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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      Could the Bond Market Stymie Trump’s Economic Plans?

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      Some fiscal hawks worry that Trump’s policies would increase the deficit and fuel inflation.With Republicans poised to seize control of Congress, Donald Trump’s economic plans could face little legislative resistance. The president-elect has vowed to escalate tariffs, extend a corporate tax cut and introduce tax breaks on tips and Social Security benefits, policies that some fiscal hawks worry would increase the federal deficit, and with it, inflation.But even if Trump faces meager resistance on Capitol Hill, another force may temper his policies: the bond market.While stocks just pulled off a record-setting week, with the S&P 500 gaining roughly 5 percent since Election Day, a volatile bond market signals that investors have some worries that an unchecked Trump agenda might stimulate growth but worsen the country’s debt burden.“If the Trump administration runs excessively stimulative fiscal policy, with lots of spending and tax cuts, leading to even wider deficits, I think then that may cause the bond vigilantes to push yields up to levels that create problems for the economy,” Ed Yardeni, the president of Yardeni Research, told DealBook.Yardeni, a veteran Wall Street analyst, coined the term “bond vigilantes” in the 1980s to describe the influence that frustrated bondholders can have on the policy agendas of politicians and central bankers. He sees a potential for bond vigilantes to pose a risk to the Trump agenda, too.The United States sells Treasury bonds and notes to fund big parts of the federal government. These auctions provide the lifeblood of the U.S. economy, and the yields on Treasuries are viewed as a real-time gauge of the country’s financial health. Yields tend to climb when investors anticipate economic growth accelerating inflation, and expect the Fed may have to raise rates to slow the economy. Higher yields mean the government pays more to borrow.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 Stock Jumps After Trump’s Victory

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      Investors believe that the electric car company led by Elon Musk will benefit from his support of the president-elect.Elon Musk defied conventional corporate wisdom by committing wholeheartedly to Donald J. Trump’s presidential campaign, donating tens of millions of dollars and running a get-out-the-vote drive.Now that bet has paid off, giving Mr. Musk a direct line to the White House that he may be able to use to bend policy in ways that could benefit Tesla, his electric car company. Mr. Trump has even bandied the idea of appointing Mr. Musk to head a “government efficiency” commission.One indication of how much Tesla could benefit was evident on Wall Street Wednesday morning, when the company’s share price jumped about 10 percent.It is too early to say how much of Mr. Musk’s newly acquired political capital he will allocate to Tesla as opposed to his other businesses like SpaceX, a major government contractor, or xAI, an artificial intelligence start-up.But investors clearly believe that a Trump administration will be good for Tesla, despite the president-elect’s often-expressed disdain for electric vehicles and renewable energy.Mr. Musk’s top priority is likely to be easing regulations on self-driving software that he has described as pivotal to Tesla’s future. That could include pressuring the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to be less aggressive in scrutinizing the company’s technology. The safety agency is investigating whether a Tesla system that the company calls “full self-driving (supervised)” was responsible for four collisions, including one that killed a pedestrian.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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      Berkshire Continues Retreat From Stocks

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      The conglomerate reported on Saturday that it had cut its holdings in Apple and Bank of America and increased its cash to a record high in the third quarter.Berkshire Hathaway, the conglomerate headed by Warren E. Buffett, extended its retreat from stocks in the third quarter, cutting its holdings in Apple and Bank of America and increasing its cash to a record $325.2 billion.Berkshire also reported on Saturday a 6 percent decline in quarterly operating profit, largely the result of higher liabilities for its insurance companies, including for Hurricane Helene, and currency losses from a strengthening U.S. dollar.These costs offset improved profitability at the Geico car insurer, where accident claims and expenses fell. Profit also rose at the BNSF railroad, which shipped more consumer goods, and Berkshire Hathaway Energy, where operating expenses declined.In its quarterly report, Berkshire said it sold about 100 million of its Apple shares, or 25 percent, over the summer, ending with about 300 million shares.It has now sold more than 600 million Apple shares this year, though Apple remained Berkshire’s largest stock holding, at $69.9 billion.The sales represented a large portion of the $36.1 billion of stock, including several billion dollars of Bank of America shares, that Berkshire sold in the quarter.Mr. Buffett said in May that he expected Apple to remain Berkshire’s largest stock investment, but selling made sense because the 21 percent federal tax rate on the capital gains was likely to increase.Berkshire bought just $1.5 billion of stock in the quarter, the eighth straight quarter when it was a net seller of stocks.It also repurchased none of its own stock, suggesting that Mr. Buffett doesn’t view even his own company’s shares as a bargain.Operating profit from Berkshire’s dozens of businesses fell to $10.09 billion, from $10.76 billion a year earlier.Insurance underwriting profit fell 69 percent, hurt by rising claims, $565 million of losses from Helene and a bankruptcy court settlement related to the defunct talc supplier Whittaker Clark & Daniels. The costs more than offset a near doubling of underwriting profit at Geico. Berkshire also projected $1.3 billion to $1.5 billion in pretax losses in the fourth quarter from Hurricane Milton, which hit Florida in October.Net income for Berkshire totaled $26.25 billion compared with a loss of $12.77 billion a year earlier when falling stock prices reduced the value of Berkshire’s investments.Mr. Buffett has said operating results better reflect Berkshire’s performance. Accounting rules require Berkshire to report unrealized investment gains and losses when it reports net income, adding volatility that Mr. Buffett counsels investors to ignore.Mr. Buffett, 94, has led Berkshire since 1965, and is expected to eventually transfer leadership to Berkshire’s vice chairman, Greg Abel, 62.Berkshire, based in Omaha, owns and operates an array of businesses, including Berkshire Hathaway Energy, many industrial and manufacturing companies, a big real estate brokerage, and retail businesses like Dairy Queen, See’s Candies and Fruit of the Loom. More

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      Fears of Civil Unrest Stalk the Markets

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      Wall Street advisers say investors are increasingly anxious about the possibility of election-related violence.Wall Street strategists say their meetings with portfolio managers have taken a dark turn lately. All but gone are investors’ fears of a hard landing, replaced by a deeper anxiety that things could go very badly around Election Day.Investors are not just concerned about their investment portfolios or retirement funds. They’re worried about democracy. As in … will it hold up if the result of the election between Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris is contested?“The general consensus is that, one, it will take time to find the winner — so we might have to wait for weeks until the many contests and court challenges have played out,” Joachim Klement, the head of investment strategy at the investment bank Liberum, told DealBook. “And two, no matter who wins, there will be civil unrest.”Klement spoke with DealBook shortly after wrapping up a multicity investor roadshow. He said investors were worried about violence: Intelligence agencies have issued bulletins warning of possible election-related violence, and voters, too, are on high alert, some polls show.Investor pessimism may reflect the race’s increasingly negative tone. One of Trump’s former chiefs of staff said Trump met the definition of a fascist. And Harris called him a “petty tyrant.”In turn, Trump punctuates his rallies with a litany of grievances and has made ominous threats to deploy the military against “radical left lunatics” and “the enemies from within.”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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      Boeing Will Sell $19 Billion in Stock Amid Costly Strike

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      The aerospace company, locked in a standoff with striking workers, is seeking to shore up its balance sheet and avoid a credit rating downgrade.Boeing on Monday began to raise roughly $19 billion by selling stock, an attempt to shore up its finances as a costly and disruptive worker strike weighs on the plane maker’s balance sheet.The sale comes shortly after the aerospace giant reported a $6.1 billion loss in the last quarter and said it was cutting about 17,000 jobs. A weekslong strike by Boeing machinists is costing the company tens of millions of dollars each day, according to analyst estimates, adding to the financial strain created by long-running production and quality issues.The fund-raising aims to stave off a potential credit rating downgrade, which could make it more expensive for the company to borrow money. Boeing has about $58 billion in debt. S&P Global Ratings said this month that it was considering lowering Boeing’s credit rating to “junk” status, depending on how long the strike continues.Boeing’s shares fell about 1 percent Monday morning. The company’s stock has fallen more than 40 percent this year.Last week, Boeing’s largest union, which represents about 33,000 workers, rejected a tentative labor contract, extending a strike that began last month and has halted airplane production at crucial plants in the Seattle area. The proposed agreement did not address a frozen pension plan that workers were seeking to restore.Boeing indicated in regulatory filings this month that it planned to raise as much as $25 billion by selling stock or debt over the next three years, and the company entered into a $10 billion credit agreement with a group of banks. It described the plans as “two prudent steps to support the company’s access to liquidity.”The plane maker hasn’t reported an annual profit since 2018. Before the machinists’ strike started to weigh on the company, two fatal crashes of Boeing’s 737 Max in 2018 and 2019 cost it billions of dollars and severely damaged its reputation. Concerns about the safety of Boeing’s commercial planes resurfaced in January, when a door panel on a 737 Max 9 jet blew open during an Alaska Airlines flight.The stock sale on Monday covers only the company’s near-term needs, “without an extended strike or further production disruptions,” analysts at Wells Fargo said in a research note. More

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      CVS Ousts Karen Lynch as C.E.O. and Shares Fall

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      Shares of the health care conglomerate dropped after the sudden departure of Karen Lynch and a downbeat update on the state of the company’s finances.CVS Health abruptly ousted its chief executive, Karen S. Lynch, on Friday as the pharmacy and health care conglomerate struggled with sluggish growth and faced pressure from investors.The company appointed David Joyner, the head of CVS Caremark, its successful unit overseeing prescription drug benefits, as the new chief. The management change was accompanied by a dour financial update, with the company scrapping its previous forecasts because of “elevated medical cost pressures.” Shares of CVS fell sharply in early trading.The company’s earnings have disappointed investors in recent quarters, in part because of rising costs at Aetna, the company’s insurance arm. Activist investors have pushed the company for changes, prompting CVS to explore breaking itself up, potentially by separating its pharmacy business from its insurance unit.CVS employs about 300,000 people. Its sprawling portfolio includes the branded pharmacy chain, with more than 9,000 retail locations; Aetna, which it acquired in 2018, which has nearly 40 million policyholders and other customers; Caremark, the country’s largest pharmacy benefit manager, hired by employers and governments to oversee prescription drug benefits; and Oak Street Health, which runs more than 200 primary care centers for Medicare recipients.Ms. Lynch took over as the group’s chief executive in February 2021, after running Aetna. “I don’t want people to think about CVS Health as just that drugstore,” she told The New York Times in 2022. “I want them to think about it being a health care company.”Roger Farah, the chairman of CVS Health, said in a statement on Friday that “the board believes this is the right time to make a change.” He added that Mr. Joyner’s “deep understanding of our integrated business” would help steer the company through its challenges.During his tenure at Caremark, which he rejoined in 2023 after a few years away from the company, Mr. Joyner faced increased scrutiny of pharmacy benefit managers. He appeared at a Congressional hearing this summer, facing questions from lawmakers about the role of pharmacy benefit managers in rising drug costs for millions of Americans.This month, CVS said it would cut almost 3,000 jobs, mostly corporate employees. Its rival chains are also under pressure to cut costs: This week, Walgreens said it would close about 1,200 stores over the next three years.Shares of CVS, which dropped 7 percent on Friday, have fallen more than 25 percent this year. More

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      Is the Trump Trade Back?

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      Market observers see signs that investors increasingly believe Donald Trump will win the election, but there may be alternate explanations for a shift in sentiment. A rally in some stocks, cryptocurrencies and Donald Trump’s social media company are some signs of investors betting on the former president to win in November.Brendan Mcdermid/ReutersA trade makes a comeback The election polls may be deadlocked. But in the markets, some investors are indicating that they see Donald Trump as increasingly likely to win the White House, a belief that seems to mirror a swing in the prediction markets.Market observers see the return of the so-called Trump trade, which posits that certain industry sectors and financial assets — think oil drillers and cryptocurrencies — would benefit from the former president bringing in lower taxes and less regulation.The signs that the Trump trade is gaining steam: Stanley Druckenmiller, the billionaire financier, told Bloomberg yesterday that over the past 12 days, markets appeared “very convinced Trump is going to win.” (It’s worth noting that Druckenmiller said he didn’t plan to vote for either candidate.)Among the evidence Druckenmiller pointed to:A rally in bank stocks, which are up 8.5 percent over the past two weeks. (That said, banks have so far reported better-than-expected earnings.)Shares in Trump Media & Technology Group, the former president’s unprofitable social media company, have soared since late September, adding nearly $2 billion to its market value. But the stock’s volatile trading hasn’t always correlated with polls or prediction markets, and it’s unclear whether the company would draw more advertisers if Trump won. Some companies might flock to the platform to curry political favor; others might stay away.Bitcoin has risen about 13 percent in the past week. The cryptocurrency world has largely bet on a second Trump administration being friendlier to digital assets, though Vice President Kamala Harris has made appeals to the industry.Also, the dollar approached a two-and-a-half month high this morning as currency traders appear to be pricing in a Trump victory, betting that his economic policies would drive up inflation, lower the price of bonds and strengthen the dollar. (That said, Trump wants a weak greenback.)But there are potential pitfalls to betting on Trump. “It is a thing in the financial markets,” Holger Schmieding, the chief economist at Berenberg, a German bank, said of the Trump trade.He told DealBook: “I don’t agree with it in the long run. Higher tariffs and less immigration would hurt U.S. vitality.”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