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NEW YORK — A boost from Covid-19 treatment sales helped bush Pfizer to a better-than-expected third quarter and higher forecast for the year. Demand for the drugmaker's Paxlovid treatment spurred by the latest Covid wave and a U.S.
national stockpile delivery led to $2.7 billion in revenue for the drug, the company said Oct. 29.
Pfizer also cited sales growth from several other drugs, as total revenue climbed 31 percent to $17.7 billion in the recently completed quarter. Adjusted earnings totaled $1.
06 per share. Analysts expect earnings of 61 cents per share in the third quarter on $14.92 billion in revenue, according to FactSet.
NEW YORK — Value meals helped turn around McDonald’s U.S. sales in the third quarter, but that recovery could be dented by a deadly E.
coli outbreak tied to the company’s Quarter Pounders. The fast-food giant said Oct. 29 that its U.
S. sales at restaurant opens at least a year rose 0.3 percent in the July-September period, and total revenue increased 3 percent to $6.
87 billion. McDonald’s launched a $5 value meal in late June and it said the value message resonated with consumers. But last week, the company pulled Quarter Pounders off the menu in 3,000 U.
S. locations after a federal investigation tied an E. coli outbreak to the burger's raw onions.
WASHINGTON — American consumers are feeling quite a bit more confident this month as Election Day approaches, according to a business research group. The Conference Board said Oct. 29 that its consumer confidence index jumped to 108.
7 in October from 99.2 in September. It was the biggest monthly gain since March of 2021.
Analysts forecast a more modest reading of 99.3. The consumer confidence index measures both Americans' assessment of current economic conditions and their outlook for the next six months.
The proportion of consumers anticipating a recession in the next 12 months fell to its lowest level since the board first posed the question as part of its survey in July 2022. The number of respondents saying they planned to buy a home or car continued to rise. WASHINGTON — U.
S. job openings tumbled last month to their lowest level since January 2021, a sign that the labor market is losing some momentum. Still, openings remain well above pre-pandemic levels.
The Labor Department reported Oct. 29 that the figure dropped to 7.4 million in September from 7.
9 million in August. Economists had expected the level of openings to be virtually unchanged. The number of layoffs also rose.
And the number of Americans who quit their jobs fell below 3.1 million, the lowest level since August 2020, a sign that more workers are losing confidence in their ability to find better employment opportunities elsewhere. BRUSSELS — The European Union said it will impose duties on imports of electric vehicles from China by Oct.
31 after talks between Brussels and Beijing failed to find an amicable solution to their trade dispute. EVs have become a major flash point in a broader trade dispute over the influence of Chinese government subsidies on European markets and Beijing’s burgeoning exports of green technology to the bloc. According to the European Commission, sales of Chinese-built electric cars jumped from 3.
9 percent of the EV market in 2020 to 25 percent by September 2023, in part by unfairly undercutting EU industry prices. A commission spokesperson said the duties will remain in force for five years. HONG KONG — ByteDance founder Zhang Yiming tops the list of China's richest people, according to the Hurun Research Institute, although many of them have seen their net worth plunge over the past year.
The institute, which publishes the annual Hurun China Rich List, found that the total wealth of entrepreneurs on the list this year was $3 trillion, down 10 percent from the previous year. The number of billionaires based on their net worth in U.S.
dollars was also down 142, to 753. Hurun tallied 1,185 billionaires since 2021. "The Hurun China Rich List has shrunk for an unprecedented third year running, as China's economy and stock markets had a difficult year," said Rupert Hoogewerf, chief researcher of the Hurun report.
ByteDance's Zhang came in No. 1 for the first time this year, with a net worth of $49.3 billion, according to Hurun.
ByteDance, which is the parent company of popular short-video platforms Douyin and TikTok, saw its revenue grow to $110 billion last year. He is also the first individual born in the 1980s to top the Hurun list. Bottled water magnate Zhong Shanshan fell to second place in 2024 with $47.
9 billion, after his brand Nongfu Spring faced backlash in February when consumers accused it of disloyalty to China due to designs of its bottles. The backlash wiped out billions in market value for Nongfu Spring. Coming in third is Tencent founder Pony Ma with a net worth of $44.
4 billion, as the gaming firm saw its revenues rise. This year's China Rich List had just 54 new names added to the list, the lowest figure in two decades. New additions include Charlwin Mao and Miranda Qu Fang, the founders of Xiaohongshu, a social media and lifestyle platform popular with young users.
China's economy has lagged in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic as the country grapples with a real estate crisis and a volatile stock market. Policymakers are expected to unveil major stimulus measures to encourage consumption and spending, which have declined in recent months..
