Trump vows to 'reciprocate' against EU tariffs after Harley reports nearly 27% drop in profit - CNBC

President Donald Trump appeared to reverse course on Harley Davidson on Tuesday, pledging to retaliate against "unfair" European Union tariffs that the company partially blamed for its nearly 27% drop in first-quarter profit.

Trump, who called for a boycott against the motorcycle company last year amid a spat over steel, said that the EU tariffs have forced the company to move U.S. jobs overseas. "So unfair to U.S. We will Reciprocate!" he said in a tweet citing comments by Fox Business' Maria Bartiromo.

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Harley announced plans last year to move production of its motorcycles destined for the EU to overseas facilities from the U.S. to avoid EU tariffs imposed in retaliation against Trump's duties on aluminum and steel imports. In response, Trump called for a boycott of the company and threatened higher taxes as retaliation.

The White House and Harley did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Tuesday. The company is holding a conference call with analysts and the press at 9 a.m. ET.

Harley said Tuesday that falling demand, higher costs from U.S. tariffs on raw materials and European taxes on imports of its motorcycles hurt its earnings.

Here's how the company did compared with what Wall Street expected:

• Adjusted earnings: 98 cents per share vs. 65 cents per share forecast in a survey of analysts by Refinitiv.

• Revenue: $1.19 billion vs. $1.19 billion forecast by Refinitiv.

Harley said first-quarter net income was $127.9 million on consolidated revenue of $1.38 billion, compared to $174.8 million on consolidated revenue of $1.54 billion in 2018, a decline of 26.8%.

Its revenue from motorcycles and related products fell 12.3 percent from a year earlier to $1.19 billion.

Excluding the impact of tariffs and restructuring costs, the company said its net income fell to $127.9 million, or 80 cents per share, in the first quarter ended March 31 from $174.76 million, or $1.03 per share, a year earlier.

Its shares rose by 0.7 percent in premarket trading.

Harley has struggled with a drop in sales in the U.S. amid fears that younger buyers are less interested in big motorcycles than previous generations. Last quarter, the company's shares tanked after it released earnings that missed analysts' expectations.

The company has been trying to get more people excited about riding motorcycles again. In November, it started to preview its LiveWire electric motorcycle in the U.S. and Europe in an attempt to attract more riders overall, including younger ones.

Harley also unveiled a 10-year plan in 2017 to attract 2 million new riders by 2027. In addition to investing in electric bikes, it has set up schools across the country to teach people how to ride.

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https://www.cnbc.com/2019/04/23/harley-davidson-q1-2019-earnings.html

2019-04-23 12:35:27Z
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Twitter stock surges 7% on earnings beat - CNBC

Twitter's first-quarter earnings report crushed expectations, sending the stock surging 7% in premarket trading.

The pop is set to add around $1.8 billion to Twitter's market cap, bringing it over $28 billion.

Here's what Twitter reported Tuesday:

• Earnings per share: adjusted 37 cents vs. 15 cents expected in a Refinitiv survey of analysts
• Revenue: $787 million vs. $776.1 million expected in the Refinitiv survey
• Monthly active users (MAUs), excluding SMS users: 330 million vs. 318 million expected in a FactSet consensus estimate

This quarter will be the last for which Twitter reports monthly active users (MAUs), the company announced during its last earnings report. As a replacement, Twitter began to report what it calls monetizable daily active users (mDAUs) last quarter, which it said would better reflect its audience. This metric includes "Twitter users who log in and access Twitter on any given day through Twitter.com or our Twitter applications that are able to show ads," according to the company.

Twitter reported 134 million average mDAUs for the first quarter, compared with 120 million a year earlier. In the fourth quarter, Twitter said it had 126 million mDAUs.

In the U.S., Twitter reported 28 million average mDAUs forthe first quarter, compared with 26 million a year earlier. It reported 105 million average international mDAUs for the first quarter, compared with 94 million a year earlier.

The shift to a new metric came after Twitter reported MAUs that fell short of analyst estimates for two straight quarters during its fiscal year 2018. Twitter previously blamed the shortfall in part on a July purge of "locked" accounts that was meant to get rid of bots and fake users, among other factors. Twitter said the 330 million average MAUs it reported for the first quarter was a decrease of 6 million year over year.

Twitter forecast second-quarter revenue of $770 million to $830 million, compared with analyst estimates of $783.9 million to $853.6 million in the Refinitiv survey. The company reiterated its announcement from last quarter that it expects cash operating expenses to increase about 20% year over year in 2019 as it continues to invest in "health, conversation, revenue product and sales, and platform."

Twitter's stock slid after its previous earnings report when it provided light guidance for the first quarter, but it is still up about 10% over the past 12 months. Twitter has been toying with the best way to optimize the experience on the platform for user well-being rather than purely based on engagement metrics. CEO Jack Dorsey told Rolling Stone in an interview published in January that his team has considered "what happens if we remove the 'like' counts from tweets."

Twitter rolled out a public beta test through a separate app last month where it has tested new features, including hiding some replies by default to unclutter conversations and hiding engagement options until a user taps on a tweet, TechCrunch reported.

In Twitter's earnings release, Dorsey said the company is "taking a more proactive approach" to abuse on its platform.

"We are reducing the burden on victims and, where possible, taking action before abuse is reported," Dorsey said. Twitter now removes 2.5 times more tweets sharing personal information, and about 38% of abuse tweets taken down each week are detected by machine learning models, he said.

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Watch: Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey was paid $1.40 in 2018

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https://www.cnbc.com/2019/04/23/twitter-q1-2019-earnings.html

2019-04-23 12:13:05Z
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Trump vows to 'reciprocate' tariffs against EU after Harley reports 26.7% drop in profit - CNBC

President Donald Trump said Tuesday that European Union's tariffs hitting Harley Davidson were "unfair," and pledged to reciprocate after the company posted first-quarter profit that fell 26.7%.

The U.S. motorcycle company said falling demand, higher costs from U.S. tariffs on raw materials and European taxes on imports of its motorcycles hurt its earnings, which released before the markets opened Tuesday.

Trump, who has previously criticized Harley for its plans to shift some production overseas, said in a tweet that EU tariffs have forced the company to move U.S. jobs overseas. "So unfair to U.S. We will Reciprocate!" he said.

TWEET

Here's how the company did compared with what Wall Street expected:

• Adjusted earnings: 98 cents per share vs. 65 cents per share forecast by Refinitiv.

• Revenue: $1.19 billion vs. $1.19 billion forecast by Refinitiv.

Excluding the impact of tariffs and restructuring costs, the company said Tuesday its net income fell to $127.9 million, or 80 cents per share, in the first quarter ended March 31 from $174.76 million, or $1.03 per share, a year earlier.

Revenue from motorcycles and related products fell 12.3 percent to $1.19 billion.

Its shares jumped by about 2 percent on the better-than-expected earnings.

The motorcycle maker has struggled with a drop in sales in the U.S. amid fears that younger buyers are less interested in motorcycles than previous generations. Last quarter, the company's shares tanked after it released earnings that missed analysts' expectations.

The company has been trying to get more people excited about riding motorcycles again. In November, it started to preview its LiveWire electric motorcycle in the U.S. and Europe in an attempt to attract more riders overall, including younger ones.

Harley-Davidson also unveiled a ten-year plan in 2017 to attract 2 million new riders by 2027. In addition to investing in electric bikes, it's set up schools across the country to teach people how to ride.

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https://www.cnbc.com/2019/04/23/harley-davidson-q1-2019-earnings.html

2019-04-23 11:21:13Z
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Twitter reports surprise quarterly user growth, revenue beats - Reuters

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Twitter Inc on Tuesday posted better-than-expected first-quarter revenue and a surprise rise in the number of monthly active users, a sign that the social media platform may be on a sustainable path after a year of stagnant user growth.

FILE PHOTO: A 3D-printed logo for Twitter is seen in this picture illustration made in Zenica, Bosnia and Herzegovina on January 26, 2016. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo

The company’s quarterly monthly active user (MAU) count rose 9 million to reach 330 million from previous quarter, while analysts on average had expected 318.8 million, a loss of 2.2 million users, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.

Twitter, which has been focusing on improving the quality of its platform by removing thousands of spam and suspicious accounts, would no longer disclose MAUs from next quarter.

Instead, it plans to only provide the number of “monetizable” daily active users, a metric the company created to measure only users exposed to advertising on a daily basis.

Monetizable daily active users or mDAU rose to 134 million in the first quarter, up 12 percent from a year ago, Twitter said.

For the first quarter of 2019, Twitter’s revenue rose 18 percent from a year ago to $787 million, surpassing Wall Street expectations of $776.1 million.

Revenue was boosted by ad sales that also jumped 18 percent to $679 million. In the United States, ad revenue rose by 26 percent year-on-year, thanks to its video ad formats that continued to show strength in 2019.

However, it forecast current quarter revenue largely below Wall Street targets. Twitter expects revenue to reach between $770 million and $830 million, compared with $819.5 million estimated by analysts polled by Refinitiv.

Twitter also sees more operating costs as it cleans up its platform to minimize abusive user behavior.

“We are now removing 2.5x more Tweets that share personal information and 38 percent of abusive Tweets that are taken down every week are being proactively detected by machine learning models,” Chief Executive Officer Jack Dorsey said in a statement.

Total operating expense including cost of revenue, rose by 18 percent to $693 million from the first quarter a year ago.

Twitter reported quarterly profit of $191 million, or 25 cents a share, compared with $61 million, or 8 cents per share, a year earlier.

Excluding a $124.4 million tax benefit, the company earned 9 cents per share.

Reporting by Angela Moon; Editing by Lisa Shumaker, Bernard Orr

Our Standards:The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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https://www.reuters.com/article/us-twitter-results/twitter-reports-surprise-quarterly-user-growth-revenue-beats-idUSKCN1RZ12C

2019-04-23 11:07:00Z
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Twitter stock rises 7% on earnings beat - CNBC

Twitter released earnings for its first quarter of 2019 Tuesday morning. The stock jumped more than 7% in premarket trading following the report. The pop is set to add around $2 billion to Twitter's market cap, bringing it over $28 billion.

Here's what Twitter reported:

• Earnings per share: adjusted 37 cents vs. 15 cents expected, per Refinitiv survey of analysts
• Revenue: $787 million vs. $776.1 million expected, per Refinitiv survey
• Monthly active users (MAUs), excluding SMS users: 330 million vs. 318 million expected, according to FactSet consensus estimate

This quarter will be the last for which Twitter reports Monthly Active Users (MAUs), the company announced during its last earnings report. As a replacement, Twitter began to report what it calls monetizable daily active users (mDAUs) last quarter, which it said would better reflect its audience. This metric includes "Twitter users who log in and access Twitter on any given day through Twitter.com or our Twitter applications that are able to show ads," according to the company.

Twitter reported 134 million average mDAUs for the first quarter, compared to 120 million in the same period last year. In Q4 2018, Twitter said it had 126 million mDAUs.

In the U.S., Twitter reported 28 million average mDAUs for Q1, compared to 26 million the same period last year. Twitter reported 105 million average international mDAUs for the first quarter, compared to 94 million in the same period last year.

The shift to a new metric came after Twitter reported MAUs that fell short of analyst estimates for two straight quarters during its fiscal year 2018. Twitter previously blamed the shortfall in part on a July purge of "locked" accounts that was meant to get rid of bots and fake users, among other factors. Twitter said the 330 million average MAUs it reported for Q1 was a decrease of 6 million year over year.

Twitter forecast Q2 revenue between $770 million to $830 million, compared to analyst estimates of $783.9 million to $853.6 million, according to Refinitiv. The company reiterated its announcement from last quarter that it expects cash operating expenses to increase about 20% year over year in 2019 as it continues to invest in "health, conversation, revenue product and sales, and platform."

Twitter's stock slid on its last earnings report when it provided light guidance for Q1, but it's still up about 10% over the past 12 months. Twitter has been toying with the best way to optimize the experience on the platform for user well-being rather than purely based on engagement metrics. CEO Jack Dorsey told Rolling Stone in an interview published in January that his team has considered "what happens if we remove the 'like' counts from tweets."

Twitter rolled out a public beta test through a separate app last month where it has tested new features, including hiding some replies by default to de-clutter conversations and hiding engagement options until a user taps on a tweet, TechCrunch reported.

In Twitter's earnings release, Dorsey said the company is "taking a more proactive approach" to abuse on its platform.

"We are reducing the burden on victims and, where possible, taking action before abuse is reported," Dorsey said in the release. Twitter now removes 2.5 times more tweets sharing personal information and about 38% of abuse tweets taken down each week are detected by machine learning models, he said.

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https://www.cnbc.com/2019/04/23/twitter-q1-2019-earnings.html

2019-04-23 10:31:10Z
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Procter & Gamble tops analyst expectations, boosts 2019 forecast - CNBC

Procter & Gamble on Tuesday reported quarterly earnings and revenue that beat analyst expectations.

Shares of the company were roughly flat in premarket trading.

Here's what the company reported compared with what Wall Street was expecting, based on a survey of analysts by Refinitiv:

• Earnings per share: $1.06 adjusted, vs. $1.03 expected
• Revenue: $16.46 billion vs. $16.37 billion expected

Excluding items, P&G earned $1.06 per share, beating the $1.03 per share expected by analysts surveyed by Refinitiv

Net sales rose 1% to $16.46 billion, topping expectations of $16.37 billion.

The owner of Tide laundry detergent said on Tuesday it now expects its 2019 organic sales to grow 4%, rather than falling in a range of 2% to 4%. Total sales are expected to grow 1% over 2018.

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https://www.cnbc.com/2019/04/23/pg-earnings-q3-2018.html

2019-04-23 10:47:23Z
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Tesla's Elon Musk expects 'robotaxis' to start in US next year - BBC News

Elon Musk, the chief executive of electric car company Tesla, has said he expects the firm to have self-driving "robotaxis" on the road by 2020.

The entrepreneur made the pledge as he announced an improved microchip for its driverless vehicles.

Mr Musk told investors he expected regulators to approve ride-hailing in some areas for autonomous vehicles.

He added: "I feel very confident in predicting autonomous robotaxis next year."

Mr Musk said he expected the scheme to operate on a model similar to that of Uber or Airbnb.

• Tesla investigating China car explosion
• Tesla to raise prices worldwide

The company unveiled computer hardware for what it said was "full self-driving" capabilities in the form of the new microchip.

There are still technical and legal challenges ahead for driverless cars, which currently are not deemed as sophisticated or roadworthy as cars with drivers, nor safe enough for public roads.

Mr Musk said its custom-designed chip was the best available and a significant milestone in self-driving.

Tesla's vehicles are not yet at the standard of autonomy needed to earn the tag "self-driven".

Level 4 autonomy means a vehicle can drive itself with a human on standby, with level 5 the standard needed before it can be called truly autonomous of human agency.

No Tesla car is at either level so far.

Mr Musk had promised previously that self-driving cars would be on the road in 2018.

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https://www.bbc.com/news/business-48021380

2019-04-23 08:15:29Z
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