Check out the companies making headlines in midday trading: Altus Power — The commercial solar power provider soared as much as 28% after agreeing to a $5 per share buyout from a unit of TPG that valued Altus at $2.2 billion, including debt. The deal is expected to close in the second quarter. Ford — The automaker fell 6.5%, hitting its lowest level in four years, after it issued soft 2025 guidance . Management cited “headwinds related to market factors.” Ford beat consensus estimates in the fourth quarter. Honeywell International — Shares lost 6% after the conglomerate said on Thursday it would split into three independent companies , under pressure from activist investor Elliott Management. Separately, Honeywell forecast adjusted earnings of $10.10 to $10.25 per share in 2025, falling short of the $10.92 analysts had expected, according to FactSet. Eli Lilly — Shares gained 3% following the pharmaceutical company’s mixed fourth-quarter results . Adjusted earnings came in at $5.32 per share, topping the $4.95 consensus estimate, according to LSEG. Revenue of $13.53 billion trailed the $13.57 billion analysts had estimated. The results were consistent with preliminary results Eli Lilly released last month. Skyworks Solutions — Shares tumbled 24% after the semiconductor company said president and CEO Liam Griffin would step down. Inseego executive chairman Philip Brace will take over the role starting on Feb. 17. Separately, Skyworks’ fiscal first-quarter earnings topped estimates, while revenue matched what analysts polled by LSEG had expected. Arm Holdings — The British semiconductor designer slipped 5% despite beating analysts’ estimates in its fiscal third-quarter earnings and revenue. Arm trimmed the top end of its full-year revenue outlook from its previous forecast, now expecting full-year revenue of $3.94 billion to $4.04 billion versus a previous forecast of $3.80 billion to $4.10 billion. Yum Brands — The Taco Bell and KFC chain surged 8.5% after fourth-quarter earnings came in higher than analysts’ estimates. Yum posted adjusted earnings of $1.61 per share while analysts polled by FactSet were looking for $1.60. Yum revenue of $2.36 billion matched analysts’ estimates. Molina Healthcare — The health insurance stock slumped 9% after fourth-quarter adjusted earnings of $5.05 per share lagged analysts’ estimate of $5.88, according to FactSet. Revenue of $10.5 billion topped the $10.28 billion estimate, however. Helmerich & Payne — The oil and gas drilling company saw shares sliding more than 15% to a 52-week low after disappointing quarterly revenue. Helmerich & Payne’s fiscal first-quarter revenue of $677.3 million was weaker than the FactSet consensus estimate of $692.6 million. Adjusted earnings beat expectations. Peloton — The exercise equipment company rallied more than 17% after reporting better-than-expected revenue in its latest quarter. Peloton reported revenue of $674 million, while analysts polled by LSEG forecast $654 million. Peloton also raised its full-year earnings outlook and inched closer to turning a profit. Roblox — The video game stock sank 11% after fourth-quarter results missed expectations by several measures. Roblox reported $1.36 billion in bookings, while analysts had projected $1.37 billion, according to FactSet. Roblox also reported 85.3 million daily active users, below the 88.2 million expected. Coherent — Shares advanced 13% after the semiconductor company posted a fiscal second-quarter beat on the top and bottom lines. Coherent reported adjusted earnings of 95 cents per share on revenue of $1.44 billion, higher than the 69 cents on $1.37 billion in revenue that analysts were expecting, per FactSet. Bausch Health — The eye health stock fell 6% after its Bausch & Lomb unit, which supplies contact lenses, said it will not be taken private. The parent, however, said in a statement that “full separation remains the goal.” Shares of Bausch & Lomb fell 9%. Ralph Lauren — The luxury fashion company popped 11% after third-quarter adjusted earnings and revenue beat estimates. Ralph Lauren hit a fresh all-time high Thursday, and is on pace for its best day since Feb. 2024, when it climbed nearly 17%. Lyft — The ride-hailing platform popped 4% after it announced on Thursday it would work with Anthropic , an Alphabet -backed startup, to incorporate new artificial intelligence products to improve users’ ride-share experience. Lyft said it has already incorporated Amazon ‘s Bedrock Gen AI tool into its customer care AI assistant. Tapestry — Shares added 13%, hitting an all-time high, after the Kate Spade and Coach parent reported fiscal second-quarter adjusted earnings and revenue that topped estimates. Tapestry also raised its full-year outlook. Canada Goose — The winter coat manufacturer slipped 5% after posting fiscal third-quarter adjusted earnings that missed analysts’ estimates. Canada Goose’s revenue for its last quarter also trailed expectations. Philip Morris International — Shares rallied more than 8%. The cigarette producer is on pace for its biggest one-day advance since October. The move comes after the Marlboro owner reported better-than-expected results for the fourth quarter, boosted by sales of smoke-free products such as Zyn nicotine pouches. Huntington Ingalls — The shipbuilder plummeted 17% after fourth-quarter earnings and revenue missed estimates. The stock is on pace for its worst day since Oct. 31, when it tumbled 26%. ArcelorMittal — Shares popped 12% after the steel manufacturer raised its dividend and said demand will increase in 2025. Fourth-quarter adjusted earnings and revenue missed analysts’ estimates. Freddie Mac , Fannie Mae — The government-sponsored mortgage lenders jumped 12% and 13%, respectively, after recently confirmed U.S. housing secretary Scott Turner said he was planning to privatize the two, The Wall Street Journal reported . Qualcomm — The chipmaker lost more than 4% after some Wall Street analysts pointed to growth headwinds on the horizon. Fiscal first-quarter results were better than the Street expected, with earnings per share at $3.41 beating an estimate of $2.96 on revenue of $11.67 billion against a consensus estimate of $10.93 billion, based on analysts polled by LSEG. — CNBC’s Brian Evans, Michelle Fox, Fred Imbert, Hakyung Kim, Yun Li, Jesse Pound, Scott Schnipper and Pia Singh contributed reporting.
In a year that hasn’t been kind to many big-name stocks, Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway is standing near the top. Berkshire shares have posted a 17% return year-to-date, while the S&P 500 index is down 6%.
That performance places Berkshire among the top 10% of the U.S. market’s large-cap leaders, and the run has been getting Buffett more attention ahead of next weekend’s annual Berkshire Hathaway shareholder meeting in Omaha, Nebraska. It’s also good timing for the recently launched VistaShares Target 15 Berkshire Select Income ETF(OMAH), which holds the top 20 most heavily weighted stocks in Berkshire Hathaway, as well as shares of Berkshire Hathaway.
“It’s a really well-balanced portfolio chosen by the most successful investor the world has ever seen,” Adam Patti, CEO of VistaShares, said in an appearance this week on CNBC’s “ETF Edge.”
Berkshire’s outperformance of the S&P 500 isn’t limited to 2025. Buffett’s stock has tripled the performance of the market over the past year, and its 185% return over the past five years is more than double the performance of the S&P 500.
Berkshire Hathaway is one of 2025’s top performing stocks.
In addition to this long-term track record of success in the market, Berkshire Hathaway is getting a lot of attention right now for the record amount of cash Buffett is holding as he trimmed stakes in big stocks including Apple, which has proven to be a great strategy. The S&P 500 has experienced extreme short-term volatility since President Donald Trump’s inauguration on January 20. Even after a recent recovery, the S&P is still down 8% since the start of Trump’s second term.
“The market has been momentum driven for many years, the switch has flipped and we’re looking at quality in terms of exposure, and Berkshire Hathaway has performed incredibly well this year, handily outperforming the S&P 500,” said Patti.
Berkshire Hathaway famously doesn’t pay a dividend, with Buffett holding firm over many decades in the belief that he can re-invest cash to create more value for shareholders. In a letter to shareholders in February, Buffett wrote that Berkshire shareholders “can rest assured that we will forever deploy a substantial majority of their money in equities — mostly American equities.”
The lack of a dividend payment has been an issue over the years for some shareholders at Berkshire who do want income from the market, according to Patti, who added that his firm conducted research among investors in designing the ETF. “Who doesn’t want to invest like Buffett, but with income?” he said.
So, in addition to being tied to the performance of Berkshire and the stock picks of Buffett, the VistaShares Target 15 Berkshire Select Income ETF is designed to produce income of 15% annually through a strategy of selling call options and distributing monthly payments of 1.25% to shareholders. This income strategy has become more popular in the ETF space, with more asset managers launching funds to capture income opportunities and more investors adopting the approach amid market volatility.
People shop for produce at a Walmart in Rosemead, California, on April 11, 2025.
Frederic J. Brown | Afp | Getty Images
A growing number of Americans are using buy now, pay later loans to buy groceries, and more people are paying those bills late, according to new Lending Tree data released Friday.
The figures are the latest indicator that some consumers are cracking under the pressure of an uncertain economy and are having trouble affording essentials such as groceries as they contend with persistent inflation, high interest rates and concerns around tariffs.
In a survey conducted April 2-3 of 2,000 U.S. consumers ages 18 to 79, around half reported having used buy now, pay later services. Of those consumers, 25% of respondents said they were using BNPL loans to buy groceries, up from 14% in 2024 and 21% in 2023, the firm said.
Meanwhile, 41% of respondents said they made a late payment on a BNPL loan in the past year, up from 34% in the year prior, the survey found.
Lending Tree’s chief consumer finance analyst, Matt Schulz, said that of those respondents who said they paid a BNPL bill late, most said it was by no more than a week or so.
“A lot of people are struggling and looking for ways to extend their budget,” Schulz said. “Inflation is still a problem. Interest rates are still really high. There’s a lot of uncertainty around tariffs and other economic issues, and it’s all going to add up to a lot of people looking for ways to extend their budget however they can.”
“For an awful lot of people, that’s going to mean leaning on buy now, pay later loans, for better or for worse,” he said.
He stopped short of calling the results a recession indicator but said conditions are expected to decline further before they get better.
“I do think it’s going to get worse, at least in the short term,” said Schulz. “I don’t know that there’s a whole lot of reason to expect these numbers to get better in the near term.”
The loans, which allow consumers to split up purchases into several smaller payments, are a popular alternative to credit cards because they often don’t charge interest. But consumers can see high fees if they pay late, and they can run into problems if they stack up multiple loans. In Lending Tree’s survey, 60% of BNPL users said they’ve had multiple loans at once, with nearly a fourth saying they have held three or more at once.
“It’s just really important for people to be cautious when they use these things, because even though they can be a really good interest-free tool to help you kind of make it from one paycheck to the next, there’s also a lot of risk in mismanaging it,” said Schulz. “So people should tread lightly.”
Lending Tree’s findings come after Billboard revealed that about 60% of general admission Coachella attendees funded their concert tickets with buy now, pay later loans, sparking a debate on the state of the economy and how consumers are using debt to keep up their lifestyles. A recent announcement from DoorDash that it would begin accepting BNPL financing from Klarna for food deliveries led to widespread mockery and jokes that Americans were struggling so much that they were now being forced to finance cheeseburgers and burritos.
Over the last few years, consumers have held up relatively well, even in the face of persistent inflation and high interest rates, because the job market was strong and wage growth had kept up with inflation — at least for some workers.
Earlier this year, however, large companies including Walmart and Delta Airlines began warning that the dynamic had begun to shift and they were seeing cracks in demand, which was leading to worse-than-expected sales forecasts.
Check out the companies making headlines in midday trading: T-Mobile — Shares pulled back 11% after the company’s wireless subscribers for the first quarter missed Wall Street estimates. T-Mobile reported 495,000 postpaid phone additions in the first-quarter, while analysts polled by StreetAccount were looking for 504,000. Alphabet — The Google parent company gained about 2% on the heels of better-than-expected first-quarter results . Alphabet reported $2.81 per share on revenue of $90.23 billion, while analysts polled by LSEG forecast $2.01 in earnings per share and $89.12 billion in revenue. Skechers — Shares fell 4.8% after the footwear maker posted weaker-than-expected revenue for the first quarter and withdrew its 2025 guidance due to ” macroeconomic uncertainty stemming from global trade policies .” The company’s earnings for the quarter came in above analysts’ estimates, however. Gilead Sciences — The biopharmaceutical stock fell 2.5% after first-quarter revenue came in at $6.67 billion, missing the consensus forecast of $6.81 billion from analysts polled by LSEG. However, the company earned $1.81 per share, excluding items, in the quarter, beating Wall Street’s estimate of $1.79 a share. Saia — Shares of the shipping company fell 31% after first-quarter results missed estimates and showed a slowdown in March. Saia reported $1.86 in earnings per share on $787.6 million in revenue. Analysts surveyed by FactSet were expecting $2.76 in earnings per share on $812.8 million in revenue. BMO Capital Markets downgraded the stock to market perform from outperform and said the issues were “company specific.” Intel — The chipmaker declined 7% after Intel’s current quarter missed investors’ expectations. Intel forecast revenue in the June quarter of $11.8 billion at the midpoint, while consensus forecasts called for $12.82 billion, per LSEG. Management anticipates earnings will break even. Intel also announced plans to reduce both its operational and capital expenses. Boston Beer — Shares of the Samuel Adams brewer were more than 1% higher after better-than-expected first-quarter results. Boston Beer notched earnings per share of $2.16 on revenue of $453.9 million, while analysts polled by FactSet were looking for 56 cents per share on revenue of $435.6 million. Boston Beer cautioned that tariffs could hurt full-year earnings. Tesla — The Elon Musk-helmed electric vehicle company surged 10%. Shares have advanced more than 17% this week as the broader market tries to recover from a steep sell-off for much of April. — CNBC’s Jesse Pound, Alex Harring and Sean Conlon contributed reporting. Get Your Ticket to Pro LIVE Join us at the New York Stock Exchange! Uncertain markets? Gain an edge with CNBC Pro LIVE , an exclusive, inaugural event at the historic New York Stock Exchange. In today’s dynamic financial landscape, access to expert insights is paramount. As a CNBC Pro subscriber, we invite you to join us for our first exclusive, in-person CNBC Pro LIVE event at the iconic NYSE on Thursday, June 12. Join interactive Pro clinics led by our Pros Carter Worth, Dan Niles and Dan Ives, with a special edition of Pro Talks with Tom Lee. You’ll also get the opportunity to network with CNBC experts, talent and other Pro subscribers during an exciting cocktail hour on the legendary trading floor. Tickets are limited!