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Catherine Baab

Catherine Baab

Quartz

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UnitedHealth's 'recovery' reveals what's really sick in American healthcare

UnitedHealth’s earnings are a powerful reminder that the country's healthcare math, whether corporate or federal, just does not add up

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Quartz

Catherine Baab

Ray Dalio sees a vast American underclass increasingly dependent on the top 1%

The billionaire hedge fund manager says that U.S. economic strength now rests on high-productivity workers, with the bottom 60% “unproductive”

yesterday 20

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Catherine Baab

The Dow plunges 1,000 points and the Nasdaq reels as Trump attacks Powell again

Tesla stock slides and markets go backwards as earnings season meets trade war chaos

23.10.2025 1

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Catherine Baab

Hedge fund assets just hit a record $5 trillion. Here's why

Hedge funds are seeing their best growth in years, driven by a mix of fresh money, strong returns, and a flight to uncorrelated performance

23.10.2025 3

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Catherine Baab

Luxury travel is booming as Delta and Hilton thrive on wealthy spenders

The skies may not be friendly for everyone, but for those still flying — and sleeping — at the top end, they remain remarkably cloudless

22.10.2025 3

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Catherine Baab

Walmart and Target are cutting back for the holidays. That's bad news for Mattel

For toy companies, the quarter preceding the holiday season functions as a preview — with Walmart and Target revealing their holiday sales estimates

22.10.2025 8

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Catherine Baab

GM shows it can navigate tariffs and EV woes — and the stock soars 10%

GM’s profits still come from a very old-fashioned source — gas-powered pickups and SUVs built in North America

21.10.2025 1

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Catherine Baab

A hiccup at Amazon Web Services briefly broke half the internet

The widespread failure highlights just how centralized the internet-as-we-know-it has become. It also highlights AWS’s critical role

20.10.2025 1

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Catherine Baab

China's economic growth slows — even as it wins the trade war

China's factories are booming, but a deepening real estate slump is weighing on the country's economic growth

20.10.2025 10

Quartz

Catherine Baab

The student loan 'default cliff' is coming

Millions of Americans are in trouble with their student loans. But the Department of Education remains largely shuttered during the government...

16.10.2025 3

Quartz

Catherine Baab

Bank of America earnings show why the whole banking sector is flying high

A blowout quarter from America's second-largest bank illustrates larger trends in data and the economy

15.10.2025 3

Quartz

Catherine Baab

Bank earnings tell a story of 2 economies

Wall Street's banks posted strong profits on the back of dealmaking and trading activity. But consumer business lines raise the prospect of...

14.10.2025 2

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Catherine Baab

Trump is threatening more tariffs. But it looks like China is winning the trade war

New data shows China's dependence on American consumers is shrinking, offering an early verdict on Trump's renewed trade wars

14.10.2025 20

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Catherine Baab

Wall Street's biggest banks are about to report earnings. Washington is paying attention

As bank CEOs take the mic during a government shutdown, their coded messages to policymakers may carry extra weight

13.10.2025 2

Quartz

Catherine Baab

Ray Dalio warns that America's 'deficit-and-debt bomb' is 'like plaque in the arteries'

At the same time, Nassim Nicholas Taleb called the federal debt a “white swan,” or a crisis hiding in plain sight

10.10.2025 2

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Catherine Baab

Retail investors are snatching up stocks — and that has Wall Street on edge

Is this the bull market's final act? As mom-and-pop investors pile in, Wall Street observers hear echoes of past bubbles

10.10.2025 20

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Catherine Baab

Delta's latest results signal friendly skies, even amid the shutdown

Delta's Q3 results show the business increasingly looks like an airline-financial services hybrid. Here's why

09.10.2025 4

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Catherine Baab

The job market is flashing warning signs even as stocks keep climbing

With the government shut down, Wall Street's own data sources are flashing warning signs for job seekers, even as stocks rocket to new highs

08.10.2025 3

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Catherine Baab

Elon Musk’s xAI raises $20 billion — but won’t call it a raise

The raise uses a special-purpose vehicle to keep debt off Musk's balance sheet and hardware in investors’ hands

08.10.2025 3

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Catherine Baab

Gold's surge has Wall Street worried. Here's why

Gold keeps shattering records, an extreme move for an asset that typically posts single-digit annual gains. Citadel's Ken Griffin calls it “really...

07.10.2025 40

Quartz

Catherine Baab

Wall Street's rally makes no sense — and perfect sense at the same time

Gold is soaring, Bitcoin is back, and the dollar is sliding — even as jobs vanish and the government shuts down. What gives?

06.10.2025 2

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Catherine Baab

OpenAI just became the world's most valuable startup

Big-name investors are lining up to buy OpenAI employees' shares, valuing the startup at $500 billion

02.10.2025 3

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Catherine Baab

Horror is hot right now

From TikTok to the box office, fear is selling better than ever

02.10.2025 10

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Catherine Baab

Taiwan says Trump’s chip production demand wasn't even discussed in recent talks

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick had floated the idea that half of chips for the U.S. market would need to be produced domestically

01.10.2025 10

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Catherine Baab

Trump's new timber tariffs could drive up housing costs

The tariffs include a 10% duty on lumber and timber, plus a 25% tariff on upholstered wood products such as kitchen cabinets and vanities

30.09.2025 3

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Catherine Baab

September stock slump? Not this year

A Fed rate cut, tech’s AI surge, and expanding corporate margins have stocks rallying in the month that usually drags them down

30.09.2025 6

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Catherine Baab

Trump wants Taiwan to move half of its U.S. chip supply to America. Don't count on it

The White House is pressing Taiwan to relocate fabs and suppliers to the U.S. in a bid to counter China. But the numbers strain credulity

29.09.2025 20

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Catherine Baab

Intel hopes Apple will make a deal

The chipmaker has raised billions from Nvidia, SoftBank, even the government. Now it's courting an old partner

25.09.2025 3

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Catherine Baab

'My heart sank.' Trump’s $100,000 fee for H-1B visas blindsides workers and companies

The president's proposal to overhaul the H-1B visa program has left companies scrambling and workers reeling

25.09.2025 6

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Catherine Baab

Micron's monster year puts AI's big potential and persistent risks on full display

The Idaho-based chipmaker records another blowout, but Wall Street hesitates before the bell

24.09.2025 4

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Catherine Baab

Powell warns tariffs are squeezing jobs and weighs in on frothy stock market

Fed chair Jerome Powell spoke in somewhat stronger terms about the effects of tariffs on the job market

23.09.2025 2

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Catherine Baab

Tariffs are still coming for the U.S. economy, the OECD warns — and AI won't save us

Firms have absorbed much of the trade war shock by taking hits to their profits and using up existing inventories. But that cushion won't last, the...

23.09.2025 2

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Catherine Baab

The career ladder is collapsing. Gen Z is feeling it first

Thanks to AI and a sluggish economy, the first rung of the career ladder is disappearing for many young workers

23.09.2025 10

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Catherine Baab

Amazon Prime is on trial. Here's what to know

The FTC alleges that Amazon used "dark patterns" to encourage Prime signups and discourage cancellations

22.09.2025 3

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Catherine Baab

You used to work here. Want to do the same job for half? Inside the rise of 'boomerang' job offers

From tech to schools, employers are courting former staffers — but with downgraded titles, no benefits, and a fraction of the salary

21.09.2025 10

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Catherine Baab

Stocks set to roar to fresh highs following the Fed's rate cut

Stock futures point to fresh records after Powell delivers a cut—and a sober warning on jobs, inflation, and politics

18.09.2025 2

Quartz

Catherine Baab

The Fed cuts interest rates for the first time this year

The Federal Reserve delivered a modest rate cut as Trump demands more and bulls bet on good times to come

17.09.2025 3

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Catherine Baab

The Fed faces a high-stakes decision as the economy shows cracks and political heat grows

Fed Chair Jerome Powell will face reporters today in what may be the most politically charged moment of his carer

17.09.2025 20

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Catherine Baab

A 'jobless expansion' is now the bull case for stocks. But consumers are the question mark

Markets are celebrating weak jobs data as a guarantee of Fed interest rate cuts and fatter corporate margins. But are record highs here to stay?

16.09.2025 3

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Catherine Baab

Trump revives a push to end quarterly earnings reports. We've seen this before

Making earnings reports more infrequent could slow the flow of information to investors and the public. Trump's call also fits a broader pattern

15.09.2025 2

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Catherine Baab

Wall Street is already racing ahead of the Fed

Prediction markets see a small interest rate cut as a lock this week. Now Wall Street is racing to predict the Fed's next several moves

15.09.2025 5

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Catherine Baab

I might get $3,000 from the Anthropic AI settlement. Here's why I'm not celebrating yet

Anthropic, maker of the popular AI chatbot Claude, has proposed to pay authors $1.5 billion in a landmark settlement. But the checks are not in the...

12.09.2025 10

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Catherine Baab

Inflation accelerated last month, putting the Fed in a bind and undercutting Trump

Trump's claims that "prices are down on just about everything" conflicts with data showing steady rises in the cost of housing, food, gas, and more

11.09.2025 3

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Catherine Baab

Trump can't fire Fed Governor Lisa Cook, judge rules — at least for now

The ruling came late Tuesday and preserves Cook's role at the central bank for now. But a swift appeal is expected

10.09.2025 6

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Catherine Baab

The problem with all those personality tests

Corporate personality tests don’t measure what they claim to measure — even as the corporate appetite for them remains voracious

09.09.2025 20

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Catherine Baab

Wall Street braces for a big downgrade in jobs numbers. Here's what to expect

Wall Street eyes a Fed rate cut with the next job number revisions as workers clings to jobs amid cratering confidence

09.09.2025 30

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Catherine Baab

The economy is flashing warning signs from both jobs and inflation

As job growth stalls and prices rise, stagflation looms, leaving the Federal Reserve in a tricky position

08.09.2025 5

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Catherine Baab

Wall Street cheers and workers fear as layoffs overshadow earnings

Big tech companies are richer than ever and Wall Street is happy. But they're still laying off thousands of workers

05.09.2025 10

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Catherine Baab

Salesforce beats on earnings. But the stock slumps anyway as its AI story gets shakier

Salesforce posted a solid quarter, but Wall Street remains hooked on megacap growth stories for tech stocks

04.09.2025 3

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Catherine Baab

How Warren Buffett pioneered the modern fan economy

The Oracle of Omaha, who turns 95 today, mastered superfan selling strategies decades before TikTok, Instagram, or Patreon

30.08.2025 10

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Catherine Baab