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The Harris-Biden matchup is turning Americans into homebodies, according to one hotel chain.
Marriott International (MAR) CFO Kathleen Oberg said the election has curtailed demand to a greater degree than prior election cycles. Marriott has “meaningfully lower” bookings for this week and the next, Oberg said Monday on an earnings call Monday.
“The election impact on U.S. and Canada [revenue per available room] is forecasted to be around negative 300 basis points in November and negative 100 basis points for the quarter, double that of past election cycles,” Oberg said on the call, a transcript of which was made available by AlphaSense. (A basis point is a hundredth of a percentage point.)
Marriott on Monday reported $584 million in profit in the third quarter, down from $752 million a year ago. Diluted earnings per share were $2.07, compared to $2.51 a year prior, the company said. The hotelier’s global revenue per available room, which grew 3% year-over-year in the third quarter, is expected to flatten in the fourth, CEO Anthony Capuano said.
Some other travel and hospitality businesses have said demand was down heading into the presidential election, as Americans vote and await results in the race between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump.
“What happens during a national election is that people tend to stay home,” Avis Budget Group (CAR) President and CEO Joseph Ferraro said during his company's conference call on Monday.
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A Federal High Court in Abuja has struck out the suit against persons charged over the nationwide #EndBadGovernance protest.
The Trial Judge, Justice Obiora Egwuatu, on Tuesday, struck out the suit following an application by the counsel to the Attorney General of the Federation, M. D Abubakar, to take over and discontinue the suit.
The Attorney General of the Federation, Lateef Fagbemi, who was represented by the Director of Public Prosecution of the Federation (DPPF) Mohammed Abubakar had at the proceedings announced the exercise of his power of section 174 of the 1999 Constitution to take over the case from the Inspector General of Police. After granting the request by Justice Egwuatu, the AGF proceeded to request the invocation of the same section of the Constitution to discontinue the trial of the 119 accused persons.
Following no objections to the request from various lawyers representing the accused persons, Justice Egwuatu granted the request and struck out the charges. Although the accused persons were not in court, the judge ordered their immediate release from prison.
President Bola Tinubu had on Monday directed the AGF to terminate the charges against the accused persons, most of who are said to be minors and prohibited by law from facing such trial.
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A man has reported how his fellow man asked his doctor wife to choose between her job and their marriage just because they haven’t spent a solid five hours together since they got married.
He said this man just called his wife and asked her to pick between her job and their marriage. She’s a doctor working with an NGO, and he mentioned that they haven’t spent a solid 5 hours together since they got married.
A Twitterati has shared his observation on the ‘workout videos’ involving Equatorial Guinea’s financial crime chief and over 300 women.
He said the s£x tape saved him from being falsely accused of r@ping the women involved.
Rapper Phyno has posits a question following a trending report about ‘praise and worship videos’ involving Equatorial Guinea’s financial crime chief and over 300 women.
He asked if he was praying to convince the women, but reply that apart from the influence and money he has, has also checked his working tool?
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Third-quarter earnings season enters the home stretch this week. The quarter appears to have been mixed for corporate America, with companies broadly beating estimates while scaling back fourth-quarter guidance.
Three-quarters of the companies that had reported earnings as of Friday night had beaten earnings estimates, just below the five-year average of 77%, according to FactSet Research. In aggregate, the index has topped expectations by 4.6%, also below the average.
On the plus side, last week was better than those that came before it. The index as of Friday had reported earnings growth of 5.1%, up from 3.6% a week earlier. Earnings got a boost from better-than-expected results from Alphabet (GOOG; GOOGL), Meta Platforms (META), and Amazon (AMZN). Apple (AAPL) and Intel (INTC), both of which missed earnings estimates, were a drag on growth.
Alphabet and Meta have made the Communications Services sector the fastest-growing sector in the S&P 500, with earnings up more than 20% from last year. Excluding the tech giants, the sector’s earnings growth falls to about 7%. But even at that rate, it would still be the index’s third-fastest- growing sector, behind just Health Care and Consumer Discretionary.
The energy sector has been the worst-performing sector so far. Profit is down more than 25% from a year ago, the largest decline of any sector. Three of five sub-industries have reported lower earnings: Oil & Gas Refining and Marketing (-81%), Oil & Gas Exploration and Production (-15%), and Integrated Oil & Gas (-13%).
Companies are being more cautious with their earnings outlooks than Wall Street expected. Of the 55 companies that have forecast fourth-quarter earnings, about 67% have issued guidance below the Street’s consensus.
About one-fifth of the S&P 500 is slated to report this week, after which less than 10% of the index will be left to announce results.
This week’s marquee earnings include several companies with AI stories, including one of the index’s newest components: Palantir Technologies (PLTR), which reports after the closing bell on Monday. The company is expected to report double-digit sales and earnings growth in the quarter.
Chip giant Qualcomm (QCOM) is scheduled to report Wednesday afternoon. The results could be an indication of demand for AI devices, an area that Qualcomm is pursuing with its own AI chips. Qualcomm stock is up about 15% since the start of the year.
Arista Networks (ANET), which develops and sells computer networking equipment to data-center and cloud computing clients, is set to report Thursday afternoon. Tech giants Microsoft and Amazon last week said that demand for AI and cloud computing is so strong that they’re having trouble keeping up with it. Arista’s earnings are expected to reflect the strength of that demand. Arista Networks shares have risen nearly 70% so far this year.
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