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As travel industry executives tout the rapid resurgence of tourism and entertainment, the pandemic stock portfolio is getting turned upside down.

Airlines stocks are rallying alongside online booking sites, ride-hailing companies and Airbnb, after earnings reports showed clear signs of a recovery in travel. At the same time, stay-at-home stocks are sagging as borders reopen and health experts indicate that an end to the Covid-19 pandemic could come sooner than expected.

“We’ve seen it everywhere,” Expedia CEO Peter Kern told analysts on an earnings call Thursday after his company reported a 97% jump in revenue from a year earlier. “Cities are picking up. International has picked up. Virtually every area has seen growth.”

Expedia shares soared 16% on Friday and rival Booking Holdings jumped over 7%. Airbnb surged 13% and closed out its best week since its IPO late last year, after the home-sharing company reported better-than-expected revenue and a 280% increase in profit.

Airlines are finally back. Delta had its best week in about a year, climbing 13%, as the U.S. prepares to lift international travel bans. American Airlines jumped 14% and Southwest Airlines rose more than 10% for the week.

The across-the-board rally in travel followed an announcement from Pfizer, which said on Friday that its Covid-19 pill, when combined with a common HIV drug, cut the risk of hospitalization or death by 89% in high-risk adults exposed to the virus. Dr. Scott Gottlieb, a Pfizer board member, told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” that Covid-19 could end in the U.S. by early January, when President Biden’s workplace vaccine mandate goes into effect.

“These mandates that are going to be put in place by Jan. 4 really are coming on the tail end of this pandemic,” said Gottlieb, who’s also a former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration. 

Meanwhile, Peloton had its worst day on the market since the home workout company’s IPO in 2019. Peloton reported a wider-than-expected quarterly loss late Thursday as it copes with waning demand from the reopening of gyms as well as supply chain constraints.

Peloton shares tumbled 35% on Friday to their lowest level since June 2020.

“We anticipated fiscal 2022 would be a very challenging year to forecast, given unusual year-ago comparisons, demand uncertainty amidst re-opening economies, and widely-reported supply chain constraints and commodity cost pressures,” Chief Executive Officer John Foley said in a letter to shareholders. 

During an all-hands meeting on Friday, Peloton halted hiring across all departments effective immediately, CNBC has learned.

While not as dramatic as Peloton’s plunge, Netflix dropped 6.5% this week, the worst stretch since April for the streaming-video company. Zoom, the video-chat company that headlined everyone’s pandemic portfolio as revenue in 2020 soared 326%, fell over 6% on Friday. Food-delivery provider Doordash, which became a household name last year, fell more than 4%.

Workers returning to the office and consumers going back to the movie theaters, concerts and restaurants could very well spell some trouble for Netflix, Zoom, Doordash and other stay-at-home companies. To get from place to place, people will need rides, which helps explain why investors are rotating into Uber and Lyft.

On Thursday, Uber reported 72% revenue growth from a year earlier, with the number of active mobility drivers increasing nearly 60%. Lyft, which has also invested millions into incentives, said drivers are coming back. Lyft shares jumped 17% this week and Uber climbed almost 8%.

Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said on the company’s earnings call that some of the supply and demand challenges that emerged during the pandemic are working themselves out. Surge pricing incidents have come down by roughly half, and wait times are averaging less than five minutes, he said.

“The rebound is unmistakable,” Khosrowshahi told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on Friday, adding that airport and business travel are both coming back, though the magnitude of the rebound varies by geography. “The human condition of wanting to move, of wanting to travel, of wanting to get out of the house, it’s true for everyone and it’s universal.”

Broadway shows began reopening in September, while movie ticket sales are up and theaters and concert venues have thrown open their doors. Shares of Live Nation Entertainment surged 15% on Friday after the company reported strong third-quarter earnings, and Eventbrite rose more than 5%.

“Live music roared back over the past quarter,” said Michael Rapino, CEO of Live Nation, on the company’s earnings call. Rapino said ticket sales for major festivals were up 10% in the quarter from 2019 levels, and said “many of our festivals selling out in record time.”

WATCH: Pent up demand for entertainment is driving the sector

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Huawei launches second trifold smartphone at $2,500 as it looks to cement comeback

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Huawei launches second trifold smartphone at ,500 as it looks to cement comeback

Huawei launched its second generation trifold phone called the Mate XTs on September 4, 2025.

Huawei

Huawei on Thursday launched the second generation of its trifold smartphone, as the Chinese tech giant looks to cement its comeback in its home market and dip its toe back overseas.

The Shenzhen-headquartered tech firm took the wraps off of the Huawei Mate XTs, which starts at 17,999 Chinese yuan ($2,520) and goes up to 21,999 yuan for the model with the largest memory.

Foldable smartphones typically have one hinge that allows a user to fold the device in half. Huawei’s Mate XTs is dubbed a trifold — meaning it has two hinges that allow it to be folded at two points. The phone turns into a tablet-like device when opened up.

Huawei pioneered the concept last year when it launched the Mate XT, which was the first device of its kind. The product initially debuted in China, before hitting select overseas markets earlier this year.

The company will be hoping the Mate XTs will help it sustain the momentum it has rekindled in the Chinese smartphone market since late 2023.

Huawei’s market share in China jumped to 18% in the second quarter versus 15% in the same period last year, and the company is now the biggest smartphone vendor in China, Counterpoint Research data showed. In the Chinese foldable phone category, Huawei dominates with a 75% share of the market, according to the International Data Corporation (IDC).

Huawei sold 470,000 units of the Mate XT device since launch to the end of the second quarter of this year, generating over $1.3 billion of revenue, IDC added.

“The performance is quite strong considering it’s one of the most expensive smartphones available and this shows there is a demand for something innovative,” Francisco Jeronimo, a vice president covering devices at IDC, told CNBC.

Huawei is looking to show it can still innovate, after its smartphone business was crippled in 2020 by U.S. sanctions that cut the company off from key software and chips. Since then, Huawei has developed its own operating system and managed to get some less-advanced chips manufactured in China for its more recent devices, allowing it to make a comeback.

Still, Huawei’s market share remains tiny outside of China, as it faces a number of challenges.

Huawei Mate XTs details

Huawei’s Mate XTs will run HarmonyOS 5.1, the latest version of the company’s own operating system.

The company is positioning the handset as a productivity-focused device and will bring PC-grade apps that are optimized for the smartphone’s trifold screen.

Just as with a PC, users can stack, resize and move different windows around on the phone’s large screen.

The phone will come in four colors and pack a so-called 5600 milliampere-hour (mAh) battery, which is comparatively large relative to current devices on the market.

To entice buyers, Huawei is offering at least 50% off screen replacements, as well as two free appointments to service the phone at home or at a preferred location.

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Trump to host tech CEOs over dinner for inaugural event in renovated Rose Garden

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Trump to host tech CEOs over dinner for inaugural event in renovated Rose Garden

U.S. President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump walk to the Rose Garden of the White House to hold a signing ceremony for the Take it Down Act, in Washington, D.C., U.S., May 19, 2025.

Kevin Lamarque | Reuters

U.S. President Trump will host two dozen high-profile tech and business leaders for an inaugural event in the White House’s renovated Rose Garden on Thursday. 

Invitees include Meta founder Mark Zuckerberg, Apple CEO Tim Cook, Microsoft founder Bill Gates and OpenAI founder Sam Altman, according to a list confirmed by a White House official. 

The meeting is expected to be held over dinner after a separate White House event on artificial intelligence hosted by first lady Melania Trump.

The gathering underscores what has been a close but complicated relationship between Trump and the Big Tech sector in his second administration. 

Many of the aforementioned executives have sought friendlier ties with Trump, often appearing at events alongside the president to announce moves that align with the administration’s goals on emerging technologies and American reshoring. 

Invitees to the event also include other tech leaders, such as OpenAI president Greg Brockman; Google co-founder Sergey Brin; Palantir chief technology officer Shyam Sankar; and co-founder of Scale AI and head of a superintelligence team at Meta, Alexandr Wang.

CEOs such as Google’s Sundar Pichai, Microsoft’s Satya Nadella, Oracle‘s Safra Catz, and Micron Technology‘s David Limp have also been invited. 

Unsurprisingly, David Sacks, a venture capitalist serving as the White House’s crypto and AI czar, is expected to be at the event. Jared Isaacman, founder of Shift4, is also expected to attend despite Trump withdrawing his nomination to run NASA in June.

Notably, Tesla CEO and SpaceX founder Elon Musk, who previously served as a special government employee in the first few months of the latest Trump administration and later had a public falling out with the president, was not on the invitation list.

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C3 AI reports declining revenue, announces new CEO to replace Siebel

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C3 AI reports declining revenue, announces new CEO to replace Siebel

The C3.ai logo is seen near a computer motherboard in this illustration taken on Jan. 8, 2024.

Dado Ruvic | Reuters

Shares of the enterprise artificial intelligence company C3 AI fell 14% in extended trading on Wednesday after it announced fiscal first-quarter results and the appointment of Stephen Ehikian as its new CEO.

C3 AI reported $70.3 million in revenue for the quarter, down from $87.2 million during the same period last year. The company’s GAAP net loss widened to an 86-cent loss from a 50-cent loss a year ago.

Ehikian is a long-time tech executive who built two companies that were both acquired by Salesforce, C3 AI said. C3 AI said Ehikian assumed the new role on Sept. 1.

C3 AI kicked off a search for a new chief executive in July after its former CEO, Thomas Siebel revealed that he was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease earlier this year that resulted in “significant visual impairment.”

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“C3 AI is one of the most important companies in the AI landscape and enterprise software, with a platform and applications that are unmatched,” Ehikian said. “I am confident that we will be able to capture an increasing share of the immense market opportunity in Enterprise AI.”

The company has had a rocky few months since Siebel’s diagnosis.

Shares plunged in August after C3 AI announced disappointing preliminary financial results and a restructuring of its global sales and services organization.

Siebel said in an August statement that sales results during the quarter were “completely unacceptable.” He attributed the performance to the “disruptive effect” of the reorganization, as well as his ongoing health issues.

C3.ai shares plummet 14% after withdrawing previous guidance and new CEO announcement

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