Deep Dive
Shownotes Transcript
Welcome to Seeking Alpha's Wall Street Breakfast, where we cover the top news for investors every morning. Warning labels, longer movie previews, and a new way to swipe. Today is Wednesday, June 4th. It's good to have you here. I'm Julie Morgan.
Texas could soon require packaged food and drinks to display prominent warning labels on ingredients that are not recommended for human consumption by authorities in the European Union, the UK, Canada, and Australia. A bipartisan bill dubbed Make Texas Healthy Again and backed by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. passed the state Senate unanimously last month and was sent to the governor to be signed into law.
If signed, the bill would take effect on September 1st of this year, and the new warning labels would be required starting in 2027. This would apply to 44 ingredients such as synthetic food dyes, preservatives, and bleach flower. Products that would be impacted, barring changes in formulation, include Doritos, Fruit Loops, M&M's, Gatorade, and Mountain Dew.
The mandate would not apply to products not intended for human consumption, food labeled, prepared, or served in restaurants or retail establishments, and drug or dietary supplements. Products regulated by the Food Safety and Inspection Service, which oversees meat, poultry, and eggs, would also be exempt. Sweeteners like high-fructose corn syrup and aspartame had been listed in the bill, but were removed after industry pushback, according to the Texas Tribune.
A coalition of industry groups and companies such as PepsiCo, Mondelez, and Walmart called on Texas lawmakers to scrap the new label requirement. The coalition wrote in a letter last month that this casts an incredibly wide net of
triggering warning labels on everyday grocery items based on assertions that foreign governments have banned such items, rather than on standards established by Texas regulators or the FDA. The letter went on to say that the move could destabilize local and regional economies.
AMC Entertainment will play even more commercials in its theaters before the start of each movie, according to a Bloomberg report from Tuesday. The move by the company is expected to add more advertising minutes to the existing 20 minutes of pre-show material that is shown between the published showtime and the start of a movie.
The report, citing people familiar with the matter, said AMC reached an agreement to run additional commercials with National Cinemedia, which owns and operates an ad network in major theater chains, including AMC, Cinemark Holdings, and Regal Cinemas.
Sources told Bloomberg that AMC theaters will feature a platinum spot, which will be shown on screens right before the start of a film. And the theater chain will get a cut of the revenue for the additional ads shown. The extra ad revenue is expected to help the struggling theater chain, which also recently cut prices by half on Wednesdays in the U.S., in a push to get more people in the seats.
Buy Now, Pay Later firm Klarna announced on Tuesday the pilot launch of its new card, which combines debit and pay-over-time features in collaboration with Visa. The Klarna card allows consumers to pay immediately or pay later, online or in-store at over 150 million places worldwide that accept Visa.
The company said the card, which comes with an FDIC-insured wallet, is currently in a trial phase in the U.S., and a broader rollout of the product in the U.S. and Europe is expected later this year. Klarna paused its planned IPO in the U.S. in April following Trump's tariff announcement.
Now for a look at a few other articles that are trending on Seeking Alpha. President Trump calls Xi Jinping extremely hard to make a deal with as trade talks falter. Wells Fargo's asset caps is lifted by the Federal Reserve after seven years. And Capital One faces affiliate marketing litigation over allegedly misappropriating influencers' commissions.
Our Catalyst watch looks very light today. Management with Kraft Heinz and Ulta Beauty will present at the Deutsche Bank DB Access Global Consumer Conference.
On Wall Street today, ahead of the opening bell, Dow S&P and Nasdaq futures are in the green. Crude oil is up 0.1% at $63 a barrel. Bitcoin is also up 0.1% at $105,000. Gold is up 0.2% at $3,360, just a dollar more than yesterday at this time.
The FTSE 100 is up 0.2% and the DAX is up 1%. CrowdStrike is on our list of the biggest movers of the day pre-market. CRWD is down 6% after the company reported mixed Q1 results and a disappointing outlook, despite strong 20% year-over-year revenue growth.
On today's economic calendar, at 8.15 a.m., the ADP Jobs Report. At 8.30 a.m., the Fed's Raphael Bostic gives welcome and closing remarks before a Fed Listens event. And at 2 p.m., the Fed's Beige Book.
That's it for today's Wall Street Breakfast. Thanks for listening. To take full advantage of Seeking Alpha, join the highest quality community of real investors discussing stocks and ETFs at seekingalpha.com slash subscriptions. I'm your host, Julie Morgan. Go out and make it a great day.