(NEW YORK) — Uber will soon allow customers to book plane tickets directly through its app.
The new feature powered by online travel agent Hopper will roll out for users in the United Kingdom this summer. Customers can enter their destination and travel dates, select their desired flights and then pay directly on the Uber app. The company said users will also be able to choose their seat assignments in the app on flights with major carriers.
U.K. users can already book cars, buses, trains and boat transportation through the app.
Uber would not say if the program will be launched in the U.S.
“For now, we’re focused on piloting this ticketing feature in the U.K. and we’ll be closely monitoring customer engagement before we commit to a timeline to expand the feature to other markets,” a spokesperson from Uber told ABC News.
(NEW YORK) — Consumer prices rose 4.9% last month compared to a year ago, extending a monthslong slowdown and bolstering hopes that inflation will continue its return back to normal levels.
The fresh data aligns with the Federal Reserve’s effort to slow the economy and slash prices while averting a recession.
The Fed last week escalated an aggressive series of interest rate increases with a quarter-point hike as it aims to slash inflation by slowing the economy.
The move came days after the seizure and forced sale of First Republic Bank, the latest spasm of banking unrest that has arisen in part from the Fed’s rate hikes.
Consumer prices rose 5% in March compared to a year ago, recording inflation well below a summer peak, but leaving it more than double the target rate of 2%.
Economists expect year-over-year inflation to have stood flat at 5% in April, halting the progress in inflation reduction and placing pressure on the Fed to further hike its benchmark interest rate even as it risks deepening the financial unrest and plunging the economy into a recession.
Data released earlier this month showed that economic growth slowed at the outset of this year, suggesting the rate hikes have helped put the brakes on business activity.
U.S. gross domestic product grew by a 1.1% annualized rate over the three months ending in March, according to government data.
A better-than-expected jobs report on Friday, however, defied fears that rate hikes have substantially weakened the economy.
Instead, the U.S. added 253,000 jobs in April, marking a slight decline from an average of 290,000 over the previous six months. The unemployment rate fell to 3.4%, matching a 54-year low, government data showed.
Meanwhile, U.S. retail sales have fallen moderately but remained solid over the course of this year, suggesting that households still retain some pandemic-era savings.
While resilient economic measures offer policymakers some leeway as they weigh further rate hikes and invite a deeper slowdown, an extension of the Fed’s series of rate increases could worsen banking distress.
As the Fed aggressively hiked interest rates over the past year, the value of long-term Treasury and mortgage bonds dropped, punching a hole in the balance sheets at some banks.
Three of the nation’s 30-largest banks have failed since March. While high interest rates contributed to the collapses, each of the banks also retained a sizable portion of uninsured depositors, who tend to panic without a government backstop for their funds.
Last week, in response to a question about additional rate hikes, Fed Chair Jerome Powell noted the removal of a sentence that appeared in the Fed’s previous rate hike announcement in March that said “some additional policy increases might be appropriate.”
Powell described the omission in the announcement on Wednesday as “meaningful,” saying a decision about any additional rate hikes would be “data dependent.”
(NEW YORK) — Fresh inflation data on Wednesday will show whether price hikes slowed for the tenth consecutive month in April, easing financial pain for U.S. households and bolstering hopes that price increases are on their way back to normal levels.
The data arrives one week after the Federal Reserve escalated an aggressive series of interest rate increases with a quarter-point hike as it aims to slash inflation by slowing the economy.
The move came days after the seizure and forced sale of First Republic Bank, the latest spasm of banking unrest that has arisen in part from the Fed’s rate hikes.
Consumer prices rose 5% in March compared to a year ago, recording inflation well below a summer peak, but leaving it more than double the target rate of 2%.
Economists expect year-over-year inflation to have stood flat at 5% in April, halting the progress in inflation reduction and placing pressure on the Fed to further hike its benchmark interest rate even as it risks deepening the financial unrest and plunging the economy into a recession.
Data released earlier this month showed that economic growth slowed at the outset of this year, suggesting the rate hikes have helped put the brakes on business activity.
U.S. gross domestic product grew by a 1.1% annualized rate over the three months ending in March, according to government data.
A better-than-expected jobs report on Friday, however, defied fears that rate hikes have substantially weakened the economy.
Instead, the U.S. added 253,000 jobs in April, marking a slight decline from an average of 290,000 over the previous six months. The unemployment rate fell to 3.4%, matching a 54-year low, government data showed.
Meanwhile, U.S. retail sales have fallen moderately but remained solid over the course of this year, suggesting that households still retain some pandemic-era savings.
While resilient economic measures offer policymakers some leeway as they weigh further rate hikes and invite a deeper slowdown, an extension of the Fed’s series of rate increases could worsen banking distress.
As the Fed aggressively hiked interest rates over the past year, the value of long-term Treasury and mortgage bonds dropped, punching a hole in the balance sheets at some banks.
Three of the nation’s 30-largest banks have failed since March. While high interest rates contributed to the collapses, each of the banks also retained a sizable portion of uninsured depositors, who tend to panic without a government backstop for their funds.
Last week, in response to a question about additional rate hikes, Fed Chair Jerome Powell noted the removal of a sentence that appeared in the Fed’s previous rate hike announcement in March that said “some additional policy increases might be appropriate.”
Powell described the omission in the announcement on Wednesday as “meaningful,” saying a decision about any additional rate hikes would be “data dependent.”
(NEW YORK) — Customers at the bakery Nothing Bundt Cake, in Memphis, Tennessee, choose items from snickerdoodle, red velvet and blueberry bliss, among other flavors. But patrons cannot avoid the surging prices.
Amy Lupo, who runs three Memphis-area company franchises, said a jump in the cost of ingredients over the past year has caused her to hike the price of an individual-sized cake from $4.50 to $5.25, a staggering 16% increase.
“It’s a tough choice to raise prices,” Lupo told ABC News. “Our customers, for the most part, have been understanding because people go to the grocery store and see it everywhere.”
Lupo is hardly the only baker lifting prices. The cost of baked goods has jumped 14% over the last year — a rate nearly double the pace of food inflation and triple the rate of overall price hikes, government data shows.
The soaring prices stem from supply shortages imposed by the Russia-Ukraine war and lower-than-expected crop yields, experts said, noting that resilient consumer demand in the face of high prices has exacerbated the problem.
“If all the stars could align in a bad way — it happened,” Naomi Blohm, a senior market advisor for Total Farm Marketing, told ABC News.
Consumer prices overall rose 5% in March compared to a year ago, extending a months-long slowdown of price increases, government data showed.
Bakery items and ingredients, however, have defied the slowdown. The price of margarine has jumped 33% over the past year, while the cost of flour has leapt 17%. Cookie prices are up 16% and bread costs have spiked 13%, the data said.
An avian flu outbreak, meanwhile, has sent egg prices up 36% over the past year.
In recent years, a weak yield of crops like wheat, soybeans and corn snarled the global supply, leaving the food system vulnerable last February when Russia invaded Ukraine, the world’s fifth-largest exporter of wheat, Blohm said.
“We have not had an abundant crop here in the U.S. and around the world,” Blohm said. “Then the Ukraine-Russia war just ignited the wheat price.”
The price of wheat rose to as much as $11 per bushel last June, far higher than the typical cost of between $5 and $6 per bushel, elevating prices throughout the baked goods supply chain, Blohm added.
“When you’re feeding a dairy cow high-priced grain, milk prices go higher and butter prices go higher,” Blohm said.
Rather than scoff at high prices for baked goods and ingredients, U.S. consumers have borne them, drawing on savings accumulated during the pandemic when hundreds of millions received stimulus checks but were stuck at home with little to buy, David Ortega, a food economist at Michigan State University, told ABC News.
The resilient consumer demand, as well as uncertainty about the duration of the Russia-Ukraine war and the avian flu outbreak, have left food price hikes “very sticky,” Ortega told ABC News.
“Food prices tend to rise up very quickly but take much longer to come down,” he said.
Price increases for baked goods and ingredients will likely remain high this year, since the time it takes for production and distribution means that consumers are currently encountering the results of previous disruption, Blohm said.
However, the prices could cool at the outset of next year if Ukraine and Russia agree to allow grain from the region to reach the global market, she said, emphasizing the added importance of strong global crop yields this summer.
“We need cooperation from Mother Nature,” Blohm said.
The easing of costs would be welcome news for Lupo, of Nothing Bundt Cake, who said she wants to pass along the potential savings to customers.
“I would love to be able to roll back prices,” she said. “That would certainly be my hope.”
(NEW YORK) — Although it’s been over 20 years since Marisa Bardach Ramel’s mom Sally died in 2002, the Colorado-based author said she’s caught by surprise every year when Mother’s Day rolls around.
“Each year, I think I’m far enough away from it where it’s not going to bother me, and each year, it bothers me,” Bardach Ramel said of the holiday’s impact on her grief journey.
Early on, Bardach Ramel said she couldn’t walk into a drugstore this time of year without being bombarded with Mother’s Day reminders and messages. The ubiquitous marketing has since shifted online, but in 2019, she also noticed something new: A U.K. based florist started to let customers opt out of Mother’s Day emails — and other companies began to follow suit.
“I’m part of a lot of motherless daughters groups through Facebook, and there was a lot of hubbub in those groups of all of us motherless daughters being like, ‘Oh my gosh, people see us, people know that we exist. People know that this isn’t a happy holiday for some of us,'” Bardach Ramel told ABC News’ Good Morning America.
For Bardach Ramel, the Mother’s Day marketing emails don’t bother her as much as social media posts and tributes, but as she pointed out, grief doesn’t look the same for everyone, and it can change over time.
“It depends on where you are in your personal journey with your grief. But I think overall, it’s nice to have options,” the mom of two said.
Ron Hill, the Dean’s Professor of Marketing and Public Policy at American University in Washington, D.C., said the onslaught of marketing emails can trigger potential emotional reactions for some people.
“Holidays like this can be overwhelming for people … What happens if we’re not a mother? What happens if a mother [is no longer living]? There are lots of reasons why we might want to give people an opportunity not to have to listen to these messages, because they don’t fit,” Hill said.
“Since we get so many of these messages, the ability to not get some of them that aren’t targeted properly to us really can make a difference, because it reduces the clutter,” Hill added.
Some of the companies offering the option to opt out include beverage retailer Boisson, the graphic design platform Canva and the delivery service company DoorDash, which told GMA it’s had more than 80,000 consumers opt out of Mother’s Day marketing this year since emails started getting sent out at the end of April.
Fenot Tekle is the global head of communications at Canva and told GMA the Australian company started sending out opt-out emails to subscribers last year, and repeated the strategy again this year.
“Our core values are about being a force for good, and we, in this instance, prioritize being a good human and showing sensitivity to our community,” Tekle said. “Mother’s Day seemed like one that really does have a lot of emotions around it, and so we started with that holiday, but have expanded into other areas as well.”
The trend has caught on and doesn’t appear to be going away anytime soon.
Bardach Ramel said she noticed “with COVID in 2020, that’s when a lot of companies really joined in on that effort to be sensitive.”
“Because there was just so much loss, I think every company, when they went to send any kind of communication, whether it was through email or social media, just took that extra step of sensitivity because loss was affecting so many people. Loss became so much more universal,” she said.
Hill agreed, telling GMA, “My guess [is] it will continue. I think this is a recent attempt to try to connect with consumers in a way that shows a positive emotional response to the person.”
Tekle said Canva is planning to roll out similar marketing efforts seasonally and with other holidays too, such as Father’s Day and Christmas, as part of a larger push to be more inclusive.
“There’s a recognition that we’re really acting in an empathy-first way in our marketing efforts, and at the end of the day, I think that resonates with people and gives them a good sense of who we are as a company and what we stand for,” Tekle said.
“I think more and more companies are thinking about how to be more inclusive in the way they market to their audiences,” Tekle added. “It’s no longer sort of a ‘nice-to-have’ to be inclusive in the work that you’re doing. It’s table stakes. And this belief is an extension of that effort.”
For customers, Hill explained that opting out can be an empowering move and restore a semblance of control for people.
“We tend to feel that we’re inundated by marketers and these kinds of promotions and communications,” Hill said. “By marketers giving us some agency, they actually allow us to feel more empowered and then we can remove some of those things that we really aren’t very interested in.”
Bardach Ramel also pointed out that as much as it can be healthy to opt out, there’s also a case to be made about facing one’s grief triggers when time has passed.
“The truth is, we can never opt out of Mother’s Day fully,” she said.
She added, “I don’t think we should avoid all the triggers. Because we have a lot of emotions, and grief especially has a lot of emotions. And we need to feel them at some point. It’s important to feel them. Otherwise we just keep shoving them down.”
(NEW YORK) — Millions of Americans are planning summer trips in what could be the busiest summer travel season in years. Where you go and how you get there will determine if this summer’s trip will be the most expensive yet.
This summer will mark the first without most pandemic-era travel restrictions. Demand for travel to Europe and Asia is surging and prices are the highest in five years, according to travel app Hopper. Flights to Europe are running about 36% more than this time last year. Delta Airlines added 20% more seats on its international routes and 75% of all its seats were sold by early April, according to CEO Ed Bastian.
In March, travelers spent $9.6 billion on upcoming spring and summer flights, breaking the previous $9.3 billion record in March 2019, according to Airlines Reporting Corp.
There is relief for domestic flights. The average airfare is down about 20% to $306 roundtrip, but still up 6% from 2019, according to Hopper. Airline industry analyst Henry Harteveldt says travelers should set price alerts for itineraries even after they book their flight in case the price of the flight drops.
“If you haven’t booked a summer trip yet, don’t waste time to do so. Do your shopping, book your flights now, check the fare carefully, because in many cases, that fare may be refundable in the form of a travel credit on the airline where you booked your flight,” Harteveldt explained. “Let’s say you find a fare that costs $500 per person, but a few weeks from now, that fare has dropped to $350 per person. You can cancel the initial reservation, get a travel credit for each ticket for the full amount you paid, rebook at the lower fare, and you’ll have that travel credit to use on that airline for a future trip.”
But some airlines still have change fees on certain fares, even business class fares, and some fares, such as basic economy fares are completely nonrefundable. They are use it or lose it. So do your flight shopping and booking very carefully, “but don’t wait,” Harteveldt explained.
Expedia says its summer flight searches are up 12% since last year. The most searched destinations include Cancun, Riviera Maya, Punta Cana and Cabo. Hopper says its top domestic destinations are New York, Orlando and Las Vegas. London, Paris and Tokyo top its international list.
If you’re not planning on flying, there is good news for rental car prices. Hopper says the prices are down and are averaging about $46 per day, a 17% drop since last year. However, hotel prices are up 11% from last year and are averaging $237 per night, according to Hopper.
Vacation rental company VRBO says 60% of its vacation homes in July are already booked. The company also says if you plan to rent for the Fourth of July, it’s best to book no later than May 10. If you’re hoping for a Labor Day vacation, you should book no later than July 14.
(NEW YORK) — Sam Bankman-Fried on Monday sought to dismiss most of the criminal charges he faces in connection with the collapse of FTX, the crypto exchange he founded.
Bankman-Fried filed a motion to dismiss 10 of the 13 counts he faces, including fraud, conspiracy and foreign bribery.
The two-page motion included a reference to declarations from two of Bankman-Fried’s attorneys that would give the underlying reasons why he thinks the charges should be dismissed. The motion said at least some of the charges failed to properly state an offense.
Bankman-Fried was arrested in December 2022 in the Bahamas, where FTX was based. He has been confined to his parents’ home in Palo Alto, California, since his extradition to the United States.
He has pleaded not guilty to the charges contained in the indictments returned in Manhattan, New York, where federal prosecutors said he misappropriated billions of dollars from FTX before it went bankrupt. Prosecutors allege he used the money to cover losses at his hedge fund, Alameda Research, to buy lavish real estate and to make political donations.
In a November 2022 interview with ABC News, before his arrest, Bankman-Fried said he was ultimately responsible for the downfall of both companies, but denied that he knew “that there was any improper use of customer funds.”
Prosecutors have until the end of the month to respond to Bankman-Fried’s motion to dismiss.
(KEMMERER, Wyo.) — TerraPower, founded by billionaire and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates in 2008, is opening a new nuclear power plant in Kemmerer, Wyoming. The plant will be the first of its kind, with the company hoping to revolutionize the nuclear energy industry in the U.S. to help fight climate change and support American energy independence.
“Nuclear energy, if we do it right, will help us solve our climate goals,” Gates told ABC News. “That is, get rid of the greenhouse gas emissions without making the electricity system far more expensive or less reliable.”
Gates met with ABC News’ chief business, economics and technology correspondent Rebecca Jarvis in Kemmerer to talk about the project.
“Nuclear has some incredible pluses,” Gates said. “It’s not weather dependent, you can build a plant, but the amount of energy coming out of a very small plant is gigantic.”
While nuclear energy is well known for having a lot of potential, the safety risks associated with it have historically concerned some investors; however, Gates said he’s confident TerraPower can build an innovative nuclear reactor that is safe and practical for the future.
Most nuclear reactors in the U.S. use water to cool the system, but water is not the best at absorbing heat, and there are pressure risks associated with overheating, which could eventually lead to a meltdown. This new reactor, which is set to open in 2030, will use liquid sodium instead of water to cool it. Sodium’s boiling point is eight times higher than water, and, unlike water, liquid sodium does not need to be continually pumped back into the system.
“We’ve solved all the areas where there have been safety challenges. And we have dramatically less waste,” Gates said. “A great thing is that the regulator in the United States is the best in the world and they do a very good job. So part of the process between now and 2030 is an immensely detailed review with that safety commission about how this design is far safer than anything that came before.”
The new plant, which has been in the works for 15 years, faced delays at the end of 2022, after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February of that year resulted in the loss of a special fuel source made in Russia. But Gates assured these issues are temporary.
“A lot of uranium mines and processing factories got shut down because people expected Russia to stay as a supplier. We do need to build that up domestically,” Gates said. “But we have uranium domestically. We have the ability to do the processing domestically… In the long run, because of our uranium deposits here, because of the efficiency of the reactor, this thing can have a completely domestic supply chain.”
Kemmerer, once the site of a booming coal industry, has since seen a decline in recent years, with the coal plant scheduled to shut down after operating for almost 60 years. Gates emphasized the importance of reintegrating older energy industries of the U.S. into future energy industries as a way of revitalizing communities. The nuclear plant plans to employ hundreds of construction workers and previous employees from the coal plant where skills overlap, while providing energy to hundreds of thousands of homes, the TerraPower said in a recent press release.
Gates on artificial intelligence
Gates also spoke with ABC News about his opinions on AI and what it means for the future of the world. He said he views the technology as game-changing, saying “it’s pretty fundamental.”
“We’re often surprised how good it is. Sometimes we’re surprised at what it can’t do right. Early days, but revolutionary,” Gates said.
He said he sees big potential for AI to create shockwaves in all industries where it will change the way we think about things.
“In health and education, used properly, it will be fantastic,” Gates said. “That’s a big deal. Improving education, you know, making sure students who are in private schools or even suburban schools, that they have this way of getting great feedback. You know, I’m excited.”
Gates also said how impressed he was at OpenAI’s ChatGPT software and the leaps it had made within the last year, telling ABC News: “I was surprised last year that going from GPT-3 to GPT-4, it improved so much.”
The risk of AI safety has also been on Gates’ mind, he said, and he voiced some of his concerns regarding the rapid advance of the technology and the negative consequences if it were to be used with bad intentions.
“We’re all scared a bad guy could grab it,” Gates said, adding: “If you just pause the good guys, and you don’t pause everyone else, you’re probably hurting yourself.”
And while Gates said he doesn’t believe government regulators are up to speed about the technology and prepared to make big decisions yet, he does believe that the pros of AI outweigh the cons, and that the conversation around it is headed in the right direction.
“The field, more than any field I know, is actually putting in a lot of the smart people into, OK, what comes next and how do we make sure that’s beneficial,” Gates said. “I see the AI, used properly, is providing a lot of benefits that, no, I wouldn’t want to throw those away.”
(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg on Monday plan to announce a new rulemaking process to look at requiring airlines to compensate passengers who experience inconvenience because of “controllable airline cancellations or significant delays.”
The process is expected to include compensation, along with refunds and other amenities, in certain situations, according to the White House.
“When an airline causes a flight cancellation or delay, passengers should not foot the bill,” Buttigieg said in a statement.
He said the process would require airlines “for the first time in U.S. history” to compensate passengers and additional expenses, including meals and hotels.
They’d also be required to cover rebooking when they have “caused a cancellation or significant delay,” he said.
The president will also announce that the Department of Transportation will launch “an expanded Airline Customer Service Dashboard” at FlightRights.gov that will highlight “which airlines currently offer cash compensation, provide travel credits or vouchers, or award frequent flyer miles and cover the costs for other amenities,” according to a White House official.
According to the official, the dashboard will show no airlines currently provide compensation in addition to refunds if passengers experience significant delays or cancelations due to something the airline can control, like mechanical issues.
(NEW YORK) — McDonald’s customers are more reluctant to add fries to their order, grocery shoppers are less willing to swallow the elevated price of Unilever mayonnaise and Target customers are balking at some high-priced items.
Executives from each of these companies mentioned the respective observations in recent earnings calls or reports, suggesting an emerging trend: some consumers are pushing back on inflation.
Despite more than two years of higher-than-usual inflation, consumers remain resilient. Retail sales slid in recent months but stood well above the same period last year; while consumer sentiment inched upward in April, Conference Board data showed.
Still, consumers have begun to refuse some high prices as pandemic-era habits change and some buyers fear an economic downturn, analysts told ABC News. Consumers are putting off big-ticket purchases, they said, though analysts differed on buyers’ willingness to tolerate high prices for food.
The consumer pushback could continue if price hikes remain elevated, they added, noting that the healthy state of U.S. households would continue to fuel spending in the near term.
“Consumers are generally starting to slow spending and become a bit price sensitive,” Randy Konik, a retail analyst at financial services firm Jefferies, told ABC News.
“Inflation is going to keep putting pressure on consumer wallets,” he added.
Consumer prices rose 5% last month compared to a year ago, extending a monthslong slowdown of price increases, but leaving inflation more than double the target rate of 2%.
The price hikes for some consumer staples stand significantly higher than the overall rate, however. The cost of flour has jumped more than 17% over the past year; while the price of cookies has risen over 16%, government data showed.
In all, food prices climbed 8.5% over the past year, a pace more than 50% faster than the overall rate.
The price hikes have stuck around despite an aggressive set of rate hikes at the Federal Reserve that aim to cut prices by slowing the economy.
The combination of inflation and high interest rates has put a squeeze on consumers, who bear the burden of elevated prices but face expensive borrowing costs if they want to take out a loan to ease the financial pain, said Konik, of Jefferies.
The resistance toward high prices, Konik added, has particularly manifested for two sets of goods: in-store food and big-ticket purchases such as cars and boats.
The two groups of items make up a “price sensitivity barbell,” he said, adding that frustration has arisen from repeatedly encountered grocery prices on one end of the spectrum and one-time sticker shock for major purchases on the other.
Simeon Siegel, a retail analyst at BMO Financial Group, echoed the observation about consumer intolerance centered on big-ticket items and durable goods, tracing the current reluctance back to a pandemic-era wave of purchases for items like exercise bikes and couches.
“During the pandemic, everyone over-purchased,” he said. “The question is: What did they over-purchase?”
“Pelotons and patio furniture are big-ticket items,” he added. “They don’t need to be replenished.”
However, consumers have been forced to tolerate high prices for recurring purchases and they’ve remained willing to do so, Siegel added.
“Someone who has bought a carton of milk and consumed it has gone on to purchase it many times over,” he said.
Consumers will spend on high-priced essentials for the foreseeable future, Siegel said. “People spend on items they need,” he added.
Konick, however, said he expects a continued slowdown in consumer spending on goods with elevated prices, both big and small.
“We’re not going to see the consumer crash,” he said. “But because inflation is going to stay somewhat sticky and because interest rates aren’t going down anytime soon, we’re going to see a slow erosion.”
