6 Most Important Things in Business Today

By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Mar 13, 3:37PM EDT · Published May 8, 5:03AM EDT

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6 Most Important Things in Business Today — © Thinkstock

The controlling owners of NASCAR may sell the company. According to Reuters:

The majority owners of NASCAR, the company which operates the namesake U.S. car-racing series and other motorsport events, are exploring options that include the sale of a majority stake, people familiar with the matter said on Monday.

The move comes as NASCAR grapples with an aging fan base, stricter safety rules and a competitive media landscape that have weighed on its popularity and made it less attractive to advertisers and sponsors.

The France family, which controls NASCAR, is working with investment bank Goldman Sachs Group Inc to identify a potential deal for the company, three sources said, cautioning that the deliberations are at exploratory stage and no agreement of any kind is certain.

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Comcast Corp. (NASDAQ: CMCSA) may bid for part of Twenty-First Century Fox Inc. (NYSE: FOXA) in a challenge to a Walt Disney Co. (NYSE: DIS) offer. According to The Wall Street Journal:

Cable giant Comcast Corp. is getting the pieces in place to make a hostile bid for 21st Century Fox’s entertainment assets should it choose to do so, according to people familiar with the situation.

Fox agreed in December to sell the assets in question to Walt Disney Co. for $52.4 billion in stock.

Comcast is considering making a play to break up that deal, and has lined up around $60 billion in financing to make an all-cash offer for the Fox assets, the people say.

China’s trade balance ballooned. According to CNBC:

Last month saw major growth in China trade.

China’s April imports jumped 21.5 percent and its exports grew 12.9 percent against the prior year-ago period.

Both of those figures, denominated in U.S. dollars, topped analysts expectations: A Reuters poll had predicted 16 percent import growth and 6.3 percent export growth.

Overall, China’s April trade balance was a positive $28.78 billion, topping a Reuters poll prediction of $24.7 billion.

Pedestrian deaths in the United States rose in 2016. According to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety:

A total of 5,987 pedestrians were killed in crashes in 2016, accounting for 16 percent of all crash fatalities. The number of pedestrians killed each year has declined 20 percent since 1975, but the 2016 toll was the highest since 1990.

Apple Inc.’s (NASDAQ: AAPL) stock reached an all-time high as its market cap approached $1 trillion. According to CNNMoney:

Apple is basking in the afterglow of Warren Buffett’s ringing endorsement.

The stock hit an all-time high Monday, and the company moved closer to a milestone — the first $1 trillion market value.

Apple stock surged on Friday, when Buffett revealed on the eve of the Berkshire Hathaway annual shareholder meeting that Berkshire had acquired 75 million more shares.

Airline passenger fees moved higher last year. According to 24/7 Wall St.:

The 23 U.S. airlines with scheduled passenger service reported after-tax net income of $15.5 billion in 2017, up 10.7% from $14.4 billion in 2016. That marks the fifth consecutive year that the U.S. carriers have posted a net profit based on net income reports to the U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS).

Checked baggage fees totaled a record $4.6 billion last year up a whopping 45.4% compared with $3.15 billion in 2016 baggage fees. Reservation change fees rang up $2.6 billion revenues.

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.