WBD - Wall Street Breakfast Podcast: Hollywood Writers Reach Tentative Deal

2023-09-25 06:51:01 ET

Summary

• Writers Guild of America and Hollywood studios reach a tentative deal to end the strike that has been ongoing since May.
• Apple plans to increase its investment in India by over five times to around $40 billion over the next 4-5 years.
• Rite Aid offers to close a significant number of stores as part of potential bankruptcy terms.

Listen below or on the go on Apple Podcasts and Spotify

Studios, writers reach tentative agreement to end strike. (00:23) Apple ( AAPL ) to boost India production over five times to $40B - report. (01:21) Rite Aid ( RAD ) reportedly could close up to 500 stores as part of bankruptcy. (01:57)

This is an abridged transcript of the podcast.

The Writers Guild of America and Hollywood studios have come to a tentative agreement .

No word on exactly what is included in the deal.

It all happened Sunday night and paves the way to end the strike that has been going on since May.

In a letter to its members, the union noted that an agreement in principle had been reached on all major points.

The final contract language needs to be firmed up with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers. After that, the deal needs to be ratified.

Writers fought for regulating the use of artificial intelligence; an increase in pay; and more residual payments from streaming programs.

Although the strike is not yet over, picketing has now come to an end. Also, the potential agreement doesn't directly impact the ongoing actors strike .

AMPTP represents major studios including Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN ), Apple ( AAPL ), Disney (NYSE: DIS ), NBCUniversal (NASDAQ: CMCSA ), Netflix ( NFLX ), Paramount ( PARA ), Sony ( SONY ), and Warner Bros. Discovery ( WBD ).

According to Indian newswire PTI reported, citing government sources, Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL ) plans to increase production in India by more than five-fold to around $40 billion over the next 4-5 years.

According to the report , the iPhone maker crossed the $7 billion production mark in the last financial year.

Apple ( AAPL ) makes some of its iPhones in India and will start manufacturing AirPods in the country next year.

The company is on a multiyear project to branch out production away from China.

Earlier this year, Apple opened locations in Mumbai and New Delhi.

Rite Aid (NYSE: RAD ) has offered to close between 400 and 500 stores .

The offer is part of the terms of a potential bankruptcy.

The Wall Street Journal reported that Rite Aid creditors are negotiating the number of locations to shut down.

Rite Aid ( RAD ) has more than 2.1K stores and over $3.3B in debt as a result of opioid settlements.

Other headlines to look out for on Seeking Alpha:

Thinking of buying a used EV? Think very, very carefully

Once-hyped NFTs now are largely worthless, study finds

Amazon, Google, Microsoft could be required to disclose cloud customer info

Republicans divided on stopgap spending bill as U.S. govt shutdown looms

On our catalyst watch for the day,

• Huawei will hold a product event for the media. Analysts will be looking for info on the latest Mate 60 Pro 5G smartphone and on the chip used. The last Huawei phone used a chip made by China's Semiconductor Manufacturing International ( OTCQX:SIUIF ), which caused concern in the U.S. National security adviser Jake Sullivan said recently that the U.S. needed to get more information on the character and composition of the chip powering Mate 60 Pro.

U.S. stocks on Friday stumbled through an uncertain trading session to end lower, with Wall Street's major averages wavering after holding onto gains through most of the day.

The Nasdaq ( COMP.IND ) closed 0.09% lower. The S&P 500 ( SP500 ) retreated 0.23%, while the Dow ( DJI ) fell 0.31%.

Nine of the 11 S&P sectors ended in negative territory. Tech and Energy were the two gainers.

On a weekly basis, the S&P ( SP500 ) and the Nasdaq ( COMP.IND ) had their worst performance since early March, ending 2.93% and 3.62% lower, respectively. The Dow ( DJI ) was down 1.89%.

Now let’s take a look at the markets as of 6 am. Ahead of the opening bell today, Dow, S&P and Nasdaq futures are in the red. The Dow is down 0.1%, the S&P 500 is down 0.1% and the Nasdaq is down 0.1%. Crude oil is up 0.6% at more than $90 a barrel. Bitcoin is down 2%.

In the world markets, the FTSE 100 is down 0.6% and the DAX is down 0.7%.

The biggest stock movers for the day premarket: Li Auto (NASDAQ: LI ) is down 6% due to increased competition fears following rival Huawei's new product launch event. Huawei has been expanding into the electric vehicle market and investors are concerned that this could lead to increased competition for Li Auto.

On today’s economic calendar, at 8:30 Chicago Fed National Activity Index and at 10:30 Dallas Fed Manufacturing Survey.

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