WeWork's new co-CEOs are planning to oust 20 of Adam Neumann's friends and family members - Business Insider

WeWork's new co-CEOS, Artie Minson, left, and Sebastian Gunningham, are reportedly moving quickly to overhaul its management.We Company; Samantha Lee/Business Insider

WeWork's new co-CEOs appear eager to make a sharp break from Adam Neumann's reign.

Artie Minson and Sebastian Gunningham plan to oust some 20 friends and family members of Neumann as part of an effort to overhaul the company and its management, The Wall Street Journal's Eliot Brown, Anupreeta Das, and Maureen Farrell reported Thursday. Among those in their sights: Michael Gross, a longtime friend of Neumann who serves as WeWork's vice chair, and Chris Hill, the company's chief product officer, who is also a brother-in-law of Neumann's wife Rebekah. 

Business Insider had previously reported that Hill was slated to leave, along with Roni Bahar, WeWork's director of development, and Zvika Shachar, its head of global security.

Read this: We just learned about the latest WeWork departures. 3 longtime members of Adam Neumann's inner circle are out. More key exits are likely coming.

In addition to Gross and Hill, The Journal reported that around 10 employees who directly reported to Neumann in a group dubbed the "oval office" will also be leaving the company. It was unclear if Bahar and Shachar were part of the "oval office." Also, Rebekah Neumann is stepping down from her roles at the company, Bloomberg reported earlier this week.

WeWork representatives did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

The new co-CEOs are cleaning up after WeWork's failed IPO

Minson and Gunningham are expected to go far beyond just pushing out Neumann's circle in trying to reshape the company. They're also expected to slash thousands of jobs and sell off businesses outside of WeWork's core office rental operation, The Journal reported. Additionally, they're planning to sell off the company's Gulfstream G650ER jet that the company purchased last year for $60 million, as Business Insider reported. Neumann used the jet often to fly between New York and the Bay Area, according to The Journal; he has homes in both places.

Read this: WeWork is selling the company's $60 million luxurious private jet that Adam Neumann and his family personalized and used to fly all over the world

The changes come after Neumann's abrupt downfall in the wake of WeWork's failed initial public offering. The company was planning on going public as soon as this month, but postponed the IPO after meeting stiff resistance from potential investors who were concerned about its governance and spiraling losses. Initially, the company said it still planned to go public later this year. Now, the company is potentially looking to push back the offering into next year, according to The Journal's report.

WeWork has $6 billion riding on the timing and success of its IPO. A collection of lenders, including JPMorgan, have promised to give it a credit line of up to that amount if it raises $3 billion in a public offering by the end of this year, although they could change the terms of that agreement.

Got a tip about WeWork or another company? Contact this reporter via email at twolverton@businessinsider.com, message him on Twitter @troywolv, or send him a secure message through Signal at 415.515.5594. You can also contact Business Insider securely via SecureDrop.

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2019-09-27 07:31:31Z
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US stocks look to bounce back following Trump impeachment concerns - Fox Business

U.S. stocks are pointing to a higher open on Friday when Wall Street opens, looking to rebound from losses spurred by concerns what impact an impeachment inquiry into President Trump will have on markets.

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The three major equity futures indexes are trading 0.3 percent higher.

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The congressional inquiry into Trump is throwing more volatility into a market that already was nervous over U.S.-Chinese trade tension.

While many analysts say the Trump probe isn't likely to affect the market significantly, it does add a degree of uncertainty and could complicate the White House's efforts to resolve trade disputes with China and other nations.

Also Thursday, the Commerce Department reported the U.S. economy grew at a modest 2 percent in the second quarter, sharply lower than the past year's 3 percent-plus growth rates.

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Ticker	Security	Last	Change	%Chg
I:DJI	DOW JONES AVERAGES	26891.12	-79.59	-0.30%
SP500	S&P 500	2977.62	-7.25	-0.24%
I:COMP	NASDAQ COMPOSITE INDEX	8030.660825	-46.72	-0.58%

On Wall Street, the Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 0.2 percent and the Dow Jones Industrial Average slid 0.3 percent. The Nasdaq dropped 0.6 percent.

In Asian markets, China's Shanghai Composite Index ended the day adding 0.1 percent, but lost 2.5 percent for the week. It was the final day of trading before Chinese markets close for a weeklong holiday.

Tokyo's Nikkei 225 closed down 0.8 percent and a loss of 0.9 percent for the week. Hong Kong's Hang Seng shed 0.3 percent.

Traders in Asia were encouraged by a Chinese Commerce Ministry announcement that importers had agreed to buy U.S. soybeans as the two sides make conciliatory gestures ahead of trade talks.

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Plans to go ahead with negotiations next month have helped to ease market jitters, but there has been no sign of progress toward resolving the bruising tariff war over trade and technology.

In Europe, London' FTSE added 0.8 percent, Germany's DAX gained 0.5 percent and France's CAC was up 0.3 percent.

The Associated Press contributed to this article.

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2019-09-27 07:26:29Z
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Asia stocks Friday as U.S. political turmoil takes a toll - MarketWatch

Asian stocks fell Friday as traders weighed data showing slower U.S. economic growth and also the possible impact of an impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump.

The congressional inquiry into Trump is throwing more volatility into a market that already was nervous over U.S.-Chinese trade tension.

“The impeachment of Trump will now become a drawn-out saga that feels like annoying supermarket music,” Jeffrey Halley of Oanda said in a report.

Also Thursday, the Commerce Department reported the U.S. economy grew at a modest 2% in the second quarter, sharply lower than the past year’s 3%-plus growth rates.

The Shanghai Composite Index SHCOMP, +0.11% flattened out on the last day of trading before Chinese markets close for a weeklong holiday.

China’s industrial profits dropped 2% in August from a year earlier, after rising 2.6% in July, the National Bureau of Statistics of China said Friday. Disruptions from strong storms last month also contributed to it, Zhu Hong, an economist with the bureau, said in a statement. For the first eight months, industrial profits declined 1.7% on year, the bureau said.

China’s producer prices fell further into deflation last month, piling pressure on manufacturers that had been struggling with the prolonged trade war between China and the U.S., official data showed earlier. Meanwhile, value-added industrial output grew at the slowest pace in more than a decade, underscoring sluggish demand and soft business confidence, the bureau said.

Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 NIK, -0.77% lost 1.3% as a long-dreaded Oct. 1 hike in Japan’s sales tax to 10% from the current 8% loomed.

Many stocks in the Nikkei also went ex-dividend on Friday, which is accounted for a good portion of the index’s decline, according to analysts. Kansai Electric Power 9503, -3.98%   and Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group SMFG, -0.14%   fell, while Japan Display 6740, -10.45%   slid after it said a key investor wanted to pull out of the bailout plan.

The Hang Seng in Hong Kong HSI, -0.35%  shed 0.3%, while Seoul’s Kospi 180721, -1.19%  dropped 1.3%, dragged down by large-cap technology shares. Despite renewed hopes for a U.S.-China trade deal, U.S. political uncertainty caused by an impeachment inquiry into President Trump weighs on investor sentiment, which could prompt profit-taking on recent gains, a KB Securities analyst said.

Sydney’s S&P-ASX 200 XJO, +0.58%  gained 0.4%.

Traders were encouraged by a Chinese Commerce Ministry announcement that importers had agreed to buy U.S. soybeans as the two sides make conciliatory gestures ahead of trade talks. That followed an earlier decision to list punitive tariffs on soybeans, the biggest Chinese import from the United States.

Plans to go ahead with negotiations next month have helped to ease market jitters but there has been no sign of progress toward resolving the bruising tariff war over trade and technology.

On Wall Street, the Standard & Poor’s 500 index SPX, -0.24%   fell 0.2% to 2,977.62 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, -0.30%  slid 0.3% to 26,891.12. The Nasdaq COMP, -0.58%  dropped 0.6% to 8,030.66.

While many analysts say the Trump probe isn’t likely to affect the market significantly, it does add a degree of uncertainty and could complicate the White House’s efforts to resolve trade disputes with China and other nations.

Benchmark U.S. crude CLX19, -0.43%  lost 31 cents to $56.11 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract gave up 8 cents to $56.41 on Thursday. Brent crude BRNZ19, -0.73%, used to price international oils, fell 60 cents to $61.18 per barrel in London. It retreated 31 cents the previous session to $61.74.

The dollar USDJPY, +0.01%  declined to 107.67 yen from Thursday’s 107.83 yen. The euro EURUSD, -0.0366%  rose to $1.0922 from $1.0920.

This story was compiled from Dow Jones Newswires and Associated Press reports.

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2019-09-27 05:16:00Z
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McDonald's to trial a Beyond Meat-made plant-based burger - MarketWatch

Shares of Beyond Meat Inc. BYND, -3.27% shot up 14% in premarket trading Thursday, after McDonald's Corp. MCD, +0.29% said it will trial a plant-based burger made by Beyond Meat. Starting Sept. 30, McDonald's will sell what it will called the P.L.T. -- Plant. Lettuce. Tomato. -- in 28 restaurants in Southwestern Ontario. The trial is slated to run for 12 weeks.

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2019-09-26 10:04:00Z
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GM Strike Starts to Ripple Through Michigan Economy - The Wall Street Journal

UAW strikers outside a GM assembly plant in Flint, Mich. Photo: Nick Hagen for The Wall Street Journal

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Kris Maher

Kris Maher
The Wall Street Journal
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Sept. 26, 2019 5:30 am ET

The United Auto Workers strike at General Motors Co. is starting to take a toll on businesses throughout Michigan, creating a growing threat to the state’s already-slowing economy.

Michigan’s economy faces the greatest exposure from a prolonged strike, because it has about 15 GM manufacturing facilities employing tens of thousands of workers, more than any other state. Lost earnings to workers will result in lower sales-tax and income-tax revenues for the state, and some local businesses near idled GM plants are already reporting lost sales.

“The impact to Michigan is noticeable, but it’s largely localized,” said Patrick Anderson, chief executive of Anderson Economic Group, a consulting firm based in East Lansing, Mich. “If the strike continues through this week, it’s going to go outside just auto workers” and cities with big factories.

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Michigan relies far more on the automotive industry for wage and salary income than the U.S. as a whole. The sector accounts for 7% of such income, compared with less than 2% nationally, according to Moody’s Investors Service.

In Flint, Jeanne Bonner, a manager at Latina Restaurant & Pizzeria, near GM’s truck assembly plant there, said business is off 10% to 20% since the strike began. Some servers have had their hours cut. Gone are more than half a dozen lunch orders that are called in every day, and dinner traffic has declined, she said.

“It’s affecting everybody,” said Ms. Bonner. “A lot of people’s business is from the shop.”

The work stoppage had cost GM hourly workers and others in Michigan not working due to the strike a total of about $9.3 million a day in lost wages by the end of last week, according to the Anderson Economic Group. For the state, that meant about $400,000 in income-tax revenue a day.

GM has approximately 49,000 salaried and hourly employees in Michigan, with more than 17,000 represented by the UAW.

Parts suppliers in Michigan and elsewhere have begun idling plants and laying off workers, extending the ripple effects from the strike by 46,000 UAW members, which centers on a dispute over wages and health care and giving temporary employees full-time status.

“The suppliers are not going to build the parts and put them on the truck,” Mr. Anderson said.

Supplier Magna International Inc. of Troy, Mich., which makes everything from seats to powertrains, has instituted temporary layoffs at some operations in the U.S. and Canada, half of which have been affected by the strike. In other cases, workers are getting training or conducting maintenance, said Scott Worden, a spokesman. “We are encouraged to see both sides continuing to work towards an agreement,” he said.

Michigan’s economy could be vulnerable to a prolonged strike because it has already been slowing, several economists said.

Employers added an average of 75,000 nonfarm jobs a year in the state between 2010 and 2017. That rate slowed to 43,000 jobs a year during 2017 and 2018. From January through August this year, just 3,500 jobs were added.

“If you squint, nothing has happened. No jobs have been added in Michigan since January,” said Charles Ballard, a professor of economics at Michigan State University. “Now you add this additional headwind. It has the potential to put us into job losses.”

“There is some risk of recession in the state or a contraction that hurts state tax revenues,” Moody’s analyst Ted Hampton said in an interview, though he and other economists said the strike probably would have to last at least a month for that to happen.

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, is facing off with the Republican-controlled legislature over the state budget as an end-of-month deadline looms. GOP lawmakers have offered to spend less on infrastructure projects than the governor wants, and on Tuesday she accused them of playing “shell games” with the budget.

Other GM suppliers such as Kirchhoff Automotive, which has two manufacturing plants and one engineering and sales office in Michigan, are taking a wait-and-see approach. “At the moment, it’s kind of hard to say what’s going to happen,” said Nathalia Abreu, Kirchhoff’s communication and marketing manager for North America.

The strike is stressing some cities where plants are located. In Warren, home to a big GM facility, Mayor Jim Fouts said policing the picket lines and plant entrances is costing money and manpower and keeping officers from patrolling streets.

Mr. Fouts said he has fielded complaints about traffic and safety from both sides of the strike and finds himself caught in the middle. He grew up in a union household and is sympathetic to the UAW, he said, while he appreciates GM’s investments in his city.

“It’s a tough situation,” he said. “It looks like it could be a long strike because everyone is digging in their heels.”

Write to Kris Maher at kris.maher@wsj.com

Copyright ©2019 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8

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2019-09-26 09:30:00Z
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Tobacco giant's stock crashes on vaping crackdown warning - Yahoo Finance

A man uses a vape as he walks on Broadway in New York City, US. Photo: Andrew Kelly/Reuters

Shares in tobacco giant Imperial Brands (IMB.L) crashed by 10% on Thursday after it warned of a slowdown in the US vaping market.

Imperial said that revenue growth was set to be slower than expected this year due to the “challenging” US vaping market and changes in Africa, Asia, and Australia.

“Whilst this is disappointing for the current year, we believe that NGP [next generation products] provides a significant opportunity to deliver additive growth to complement our Tobacco business,” Imperial said in a statement.

Imperial owns brands like Lambert & Butler cigarettes, Rizla rolling papers, and Golden Virginia tobacco. It’s “next generation products” include vaping product Blu.

Imperial said “environment has deteriorated considerably over the last quarter with increased regulatory uncertainty, including individual US state actions.”

Regulators in the US have been cracking down on vaping amid reports of deaths potentially linked to the tobacco alternative. Earlier this month Donald Trump announced that the US Food and Drug Administration would ban all flavoured vapes and last week the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention advised people to avoid vaping until possible health risks were better understood.

“This has prompted a marked slowdown in the growth of the vapour category in recent weeks, with an increasing number of wholesalers and retailers not ordering or not allowing promotion of vaping products,” Imperial said on Thursday.

READ MORE: Cigarette giant behind Lucky Strike cuts 2,300 job amid shift to vaping

Nicholas Hyett, an equity analyst at investment platform Hargreaves Lansdown, said: “Vaping’s only a small contributor to revenues and profits at the moment, which is why full year earnings per share look set to come in flat year-on-year, but hopes had been high that the vaping segment would drive growth as traditional tobacco declines.”

Imperial is not the only company to have suffered from the US vaping crackdown in recent weeks.

The CEO of Juul, America’s biggest vaping company, resigned earlier this week as the company agreed to stop marketing, amid pressure over its marketing to teens.

Tobacco giants Philip Morris (PM) and Altria (MO), which owns 35% of Juul, also ended merger talks on Wednesday. Analysts said the vaping crackdown was likely a factor in ending the $200bn deal.

“It is not a good time to be a vaping company,” Russ Mould, investment director at stockbroker AJ Bell said. “Political and regulatory pressures are coming down hard on the sector.

“While the public has been slowly switching from cigarettes to smoke-free products, there is a growing negative backlash in other circles caused by concerns over the large number of younger people vaping and the potential health threats.”

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2019-09-26 08:45:00Z
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Asian markets mostly rise on trade optimism - CNN

Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index (HSI) gained 0.2%, after US President Trump suggested a trade deal with China might come soon.

Trump told reporters Wednesday at the United Nations in New York that a US-China deal could come sooner "than you think," according to multiple reports.

The news cheered American investors on Wednesday, with US stock markets having their best day in two weeks.

"Investors have been 'trade war' bearish for so long that any sliver of optimism is cheered," wrote Stephen Innes, a market strategist for Asia Pacific at AxiTrader.

Japan's Nikkei (N225) also edged up 0.2%, after Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe signed a trade deal Wednesday, which reduced tariffs on some agricultural and industrial goods for both sides.

"We welcome these achievements as tangible evidence of the strength of the relationship between our two nations," the two leaders said in a joint statement.

China's Shanghai Composite Index (SHCOMP) opened higher, but slid into negative territory in the morning trade and lost 0.7%.

On Wednesday, the US imposed sanctions on several Chinese companies and their executive officers for alleged involvement in transporting oil from Iran.

"We're telling China and all nations, know that we will sanction every violation of sanctionable activity," Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said at a conference organized by the group United Against Nuclear Iran.

Elsewhere in the regions, Korea's Kospi (KOSPI) added 0.1%.

CNN's Nicole Gaouette and Jennifer Hansler contributed to the report.

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2019-09-26 05:06:00Z
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