A spate of fresh data this week showed consumers are feeling the sting from high inflation. While that likely means more pain for retail stocks, new Wall Street research suggests club holding Amazon (AMZN) is consumers’ most preferred online shopping platform, buttressing the Club’s long-term belief in the e-commerce giant. Consumer spending was flat month-over-month in September, according to an estimate of retail sales for the month provided by the Commerce Department on Friday. But those figures were not adjusted for inflation, indicating that consumer spending on retail actually fell last month. The retail sales data came on the back of the latest consumer price index survey , which showed consumer prices rose 0.4% in September, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Thursday, all but ensuring another 75 basis point interest rate hike from the Federal Reserve next month. Meanwhile, a consumer survey from the University of Michigan showed inflation expectations were increasing, sending stocks lower Friday. The S & P 500 closed down more than 2%. The Wall Street view In this environment of rising prices, Baird surveyed roughly 1,000 online shoppers, with a majority saying they plan to spend less on holiday purchases this year compared to last year. But while consumers are tempering their discretionary budgets this holiday season, Amazon remains their shopping platform of choice, according to Baird. Amazon is the “clear leader” in the online shopping internet space among U.S. consumers, capturing almost 60% of market share, Baird analysts wrote in a research note Friday. In a separate note Thursday, Cowen said its shopping survey of Gen Z and Millennials showed Amazon to be their “most preferred” shopping website. Respondents said speed of delivery and convenience were key factors for shopping on Amazon, outweighing price concerns, according to analysts at Cowen. The new research comes the same week as Amazon’s two-day Prime Early Access Sale , the initial results of which showed that while Amazon may remain a top online retail destination it’s not immune from inflationary pressures. Amazon said Prime members bought more than 100 million items during the sales event, compared to the record 300 million items purchased during Amazon’s July Prime Day event. Bank of America estimated Amazon’s sales event brought in $8 billion in gross merchandise value (GMV), down 25% from July’s $10.7 billion in GMV, according to a research note published Friday. Shares of Amazon, which have fallen more than 35% year-to-date, closed down 5% Friday, at $106.9 a share. The Club take We’re happy to see that Amazon is the preferred platform for consumer shopping — but we also know its so much more than that. For example, its cloud business, Amazon Web Services, consistently posts robust revenue growth and delivers high profit margins, allowing us to be bullish on the company despite growing macroeconomic headwinds. Furthermore, Amazon’s nascent agreement with the National Football League to stream “Thursday Night Football” on Prime Video has attracted a record number of Prime signups and should support advertising revenue growth. The Club continues to rate Amazon a 1, meaning we’d buy the stock here. (Jim Cramer’s Charitable Trust is long AMZN. See here for a full list of the stocks.) As a subscriber to the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer, you will receive a trade alert before Jim makes a trade. Jim waits 45 minutes after sending a trade alert before buying or selling a stock in his charitable trust’s portfolio. If Jim has talked about a stock on CNBC TV, he waits 72 hours after issuing the trade alert before executing the trade. THE ABOVE INVESTING CLUB INFORMATION IS SUBJECT TO OUR TERMS AND CONDITIONS AND PRIVACY POLICY , TOGETHER WITH OUR DISCLAIMER . NO FIDUCIARY OBLIGATION OR DUTY EXISTS, OR IS CREATED, BY VIRTUE OF YOUR RECEIPT OF ANY INFORMATION PROVIDED IN CONNECTION WITH THE INVESTING CLUB. NO SPECIFIC OUTCOME OR PROFIT IS GUARANTEED.
An Amazon Prime truck is pictured as it crosses the George Washington Bridge on Interstate Route 95 during Amazon’s two-day “Prime Early Access Sale” shopping event for Amazon members in New York, October 11, 2022.
Mike Segar | Reuters
A spate of fresh data this week showed consumers are feeling the sting from high inflation. While that likely means more pain for retail stocks, new Wall Street research suggests club holding Amazon (AMZN) is consumers’ most preferred online shopping platform, buttressing the Club’s long-term belief in the e-commerce giant.
Artificial intelligence robot looking at futuristic digital data display.
Yuichiro Chino | Moment | Getty Images
Artificial intelligence is projected to reach $4.8 trillion in market value by 2033, but the technology’s benefits remain highly concentrated, according to the U.N. Trade and Development agency.
In a report released on Thursday, UNCTAD said the AI market cap would roughly equate to the size of Germany’s economy, with the technology offering productivity gains and driving digital transformation.
However, the agency also raised concerns about automation and job displacement, warning that AI could affect 40% of jobs worldwide. On top of that, AI is not inherently inclusive, meaning the economic gains from the tech remain “highly concentrated,” the report added.
“The benefits of AI-driven automation often favour capital over labour, which could widen inequality and reduce the competitive advantage of low-cost labour in developing economies,” it said.
The potential for AI to cause unemployment and inequality is a long-standing concern, with the IMF making similar warnings over a year ago. In January, The World Economic Forum released findings that as many as 41% of employers were planning on downsizing their staff in areas where AI could replicate them.
However, the UNCTAD report also highlights inequalities between nations, with U.N. data showing that 40% of global corporate research and development spending in AI is concentrated among just 100 firms, mainly those in the U.S. and China.
Furthermore, it notes that leading tech giants, such as Apple, Nvidia and Microsoft — companies that stand to benefit from the AI boom — have a market value that rivals the gross domestic product of the entire African continent.
This AI dominance at national and corporate levels threatens to widen those technological divides, leaving many nations at risk of lagging behind, UNCTAD said. It noted that 118 countries — mostly in the Global South — are absent from major AI governance discussions.
UN recommendations
But AI is not just about job replacement, the report said, noting that it can also “create new industries and and empower workers” — provided there is adequate investment in reskilling and upskilling.
But in order for developing nations not to fall behind, they must “have a seat at the table” when it comes to AI regulation and ethical frameworks, it said.
In its report, UNCTAD makes a number of recommendations to the international community for driving inclusive growth. They include an AI public disclosure mechanism, shared AI infrastructure, the use of open-source AI models and initiatives to share AI knowledge and resources.
Open-source generally refers to software in which the source code is made freely available on the web for possible modification and redistribution.
“AI can be a catalyst for progress, innovation, and shared prosperity – but only if countries actively shape its trajectory,” the report concludes.
“Strategic investments, inclusive governance, and international cooperation are key to ensuring that AI benefits all, rather than reinforcing existing divides.”
Altimeter Capital CEO Brad Gerstner said Thursday that he’s moving out of the “bomb shelter” with Nvidia and into a position of safety, expecting that the chipmaker is positioned to withstand President Donald Trump’s widespread tariffs.
“The growth and the demand for GPUs is off the charts,” he told CNBC’s “Fast Money Halftime Report,” referring to Nvidia’s graphics processing units that are powering the artificial intelligence boom. He said investors just need to listen to commentary from OpenAI, Google and Elon Musk.
President Trump announced an expansive and aggressive “reciprocal tariff” policy in a ceremony at the White House on Wednesday. The plan established a 10% baseline tariff, though many countries like China, Vietnam and Taiwan are subject to steeper rates. The announcement sent stocks tumbling on Thursday, with the tech-heavy Nasdaq down more than 5%, headed for its worst day since 2022.
The big reason Nvidia may be better positioned to withstand Trump’s tariff hikes is because semiconductors are on the list of exceptions, which Gerstner called a “wise exception” due to the importance of AI.
Nvidia’s business has exploded since the release of OpenAI’s ChatGPT in 2022, and annual revenue has more than doubled in each of the past two fiscal years. After a massive rally, Nvidia’s stock price has dropped by more than 20% this year and was down almost 7% on Thursday.
Gerstner is concerned about the potential of a recession due to the tariffs, but is relatively bullish on Nvidia, and said the “negative impact from tariffs will be much less than in other areas.”
He said it’s key for the U.S. to stay competitive in AI. And while the company’s chips are designed domestically, they’re manufactured in Taiwan “because they can’t be fabricated in the U.S.” Higher tariffs would punish companies like Meta and Microsoft, he said.
“We’re in a global race in AI,” Gerstner said. “We can’t hamper our ability to win that race.”
YouTube on Thursday announced new video creation tools for Shorts, its short-form video feed that competes against TikTok.
The features come at a time when TikTok, which is owned by Chinese company ByteDance, is at risk of an effective ban in the U.S. if it’s not sold to an American owner by April 5.
Among the new tools is an updated video editor that allows creators to make precise adjustments and edits, a feature that automatically syncs video cuts to the beat of a song and AI stickers.
The creator tools will become available later this spring, said YouTube, which is owned by Google.
Along with the new features, YouTube last week said it was changing the way view counts are tabulated on Shorts. Under the new guidelines, Shorts views will count the number of times the video is played or replayed with no minimum watch time requirement.
Previously, views were only counted if a video was played for a certain number of seconds. This new tabulation method is similar to how views are counted on TikTok and Meta’s Reels, and will likely inflate view counts.
“We got this feedback from creators that this is what they wanted. It’s a way for them to better understand when their Shorts have been seen,” YouTube Chief Product Officer Johanna Voolich said in a YouTube video. “It’s useful for creators who post across multiple platforms.”