CNN – Business/Consumer

By Frank Pallotta, CNN Business It’s May the 4th, a day for Star Wars nerds to geek out on Luke Skywalker, lightsabers and the Millennium Falcon. So why are so many sci fi fans talking about Spock, phasers and the USS Enterprise? Even though May 4th is known as “Star Wars Day” (as in, “May

CNN, CNN BUSINESS Opinion by Paul Hockenos for CNN Business Perspectives Russia’s announcement last week that it was halting all gas deliveries to Poland and Bulgaria may have sounded like a bombshell, perhaps even presaging a complete suspension of gas flows to all of Europe. This certainly was Russian president Vladimir Putin’s intent: to strike

By Jordan Valinsky, CNN Business Intuit, the owner of tax filing software TurboTax, has agreed to pay $141 million in a settlement with all 50 states for allegedly steering millions of low-income Americans away from free tax-filing services. The settlement, announced Wednesday by New York Attorney General Letitia James, said about 4.4 million customers were

By Matt Egan, CNN Business JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon said Wednesday that the Federal Reserve should have moved sooner to raise interest rates and conceded the odds do not favor taming inflation without sparking a recession. “We’re a little late but remember two years ago we had 15% unemployment and no vaccine. People should

By Julia Horowitz, CNN Business The Federal Reserve is finally getting aggressive in its bid to fight decades-high inflation. What’s happening: The central bank is expected to hike interest rates by half a percentage point on Wednesday for the first time since 2000. Investors think it will deliver hikes of the same magnitude in June

By Laura He, CNN Business BYD, the Warren Buffett-backed Chinese electric vehicle maker, had a bumper month in the world’s largest car market, despite strict Covid lockdowns that have disrupted production and sales for many of its major rivals. The company reported Tuesday that its sales of electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids soared 313% in

By Anneken Tappe, CNN Business The Federal Reserve said Wednesday it is raising interest rates by a half-percentage point to get a handle on the worst inflation America has seen in 40 years. It’s the first time in 22 years that the central bank has hiked rates this much. The decision was unanimous, with all

By Laura He, CNN Business Hong Hao, a prominent market analyst in China, has left the state-owned bank he worked for just days after his social media accounts were shut down following downbeat remarks he made about the economy. Tencent’s WeChat froze Hong’s public account over the weekend, after he posted about huge outflows of

By Mark Thompson, CNN Business The European Union is proposing to ban all oil imports from Russia by the end of this year and remove the country’s biggest bank, Sberbank, from the SWIFT international payments network. But the plan immediately ran into opposition from EU countries seeking a longer transitional period, including Hungary, which has

By Laura He, CNN Business Didi says it is facing an investigation by US regulators into its botched IPO last year. The Chinese ride-hailing giant said in a regulatory filing this week that it is cooperating with the investigation by the US Securities and Exchange Commission about its share offering, “subject to strict compliance with

By Allison Morrow, CNN Business Millions of women in more than 25 states face an abortion ban if the Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 decision that legalized the procedure nationwide. For many of those women, employers’ benefit packages may be the only way they can soon afford a legal abortion. Amazon

By Anneken Tappe, CNN Business The US labor market remained on fire in March with a record 4.5 million workers quitting their jobs, new data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed Tuesday. The number of quits increased most significantly in the professional and business services sector, as well as construction. The overall quits rate

Opinion by Erik Lundh and Dana Peterson for CNN Business Perspectives If you grimaced at the most recent US GDP report, you weren’t alone. At first glance, it suggested that the US economy may have entered a recession. Growth nosedived in the first quarter of the year, shrinking by an annualized rate of 1.4%. Bizarrely,

By Jordan Valinsky, CNN Business Ulta Beauty is apologizing for sending a newsletter to customers with a subject line containing a “very insensitive choice of words.” In an email sent Sunday, the chain wrote “Come hang with Kate Spade” promoting the brand’s line of perfumes. That prompted some subscribers to share the email on social