Every weekday, the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer releases the Homestretch — an actionable afternoon update, just in time for the last hour of trading on Wall Street. (We’re no longer recording the audio, so we can get this new written feature to members as quickly as possible.) As we gear up for the CNBC Investing Club’s annual meeting on Saturday, I asked Jim Cramer for some quick thoughts on some of the day’s portfolio movers. ” Ford seems really interesting as the electric vehicle market slows down,” Jim said. One of the key points from Ford’s fourth quarter was a greater push into hybrid vehicle production with a pullback EV spend. ” Disney ‘s strategy is too much like Warner Bros. Discovery for my liking,” Jim said. “They need some sort of change agent there,” he added, alluding to the proxy battle between Disney and Train’s Nelson Peltz. “Lost in all the semi talk is the continued strength of Costco . I think we can hold it,” Jim said. “But I think that Stanley Black & Decker has gotten too cheap versus everything else in the sector.” “I don’t want to get too excited but the way Starbucks and Estee Lauder trade it is like China has hit bottom,” Jim said. We’ll be running through many more of the stocks in the Club portfolio during Saturday’s meeting, which members can watch live starting at 1:30 p.m. ET on our website . Conference call update : Coterra Energy reported earnings Thursday evening but held its conference call Friday morning. The main takeaway from the call was that the oil and natural gas producer has plenty of flexibility to shift investment to where it will generate the highest return. For 2024, that means pulling back on natural gas production and focusing on oil. While the near-term fundamentals around nat gas look bleak, management is optimistic about the outlook 12 to 18 months from now. The main reason: lots of new LNG export capacity is expected to come online toward the end of the year into early 2025. This coupled with the possibility of cold weather gives the team hope for a price recovery. Coterra plans to keep a watchful eye on the commodities market and will be ready to act when gas fundamentals improve. But in the interim, it plans to stay disciplined. After all, it is hard to predict how long downswings in commodity cycles will last. “We will be patient and watch for recovery in the gas macro,” CEO Tom Jorden explained. He added the company would rather wait a few months for a recovery before investing too early. We appreciate this focus on returns instead of chasing production and activity. Club earnings: Two companies in the portfolio are scheduled to report next week. Both are out Wednesday: off-price retailer TJX Companies before the opening bell and enterprise software giant Salesforce after the closing bell. Outside the portfolio, some of the more interesting earnings reports will come from Elanco Animal Health , Unity , Zoom , Lowe’s , American Electric Powe r, Cava , Snowflake , Paramount Global , Best Buy and Zscaler . Economic calendar: the data point likely have the most influence on the bond market is the Federal Reserve’s favorite inflation gauge: the personal consumption expenditures (PCE) price index. (See here for a full list of the stocks in Jim Cramer’s Charitable Trust.) 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.
Every weekday, the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer releases the Homestretch — an actionable afternoon update, just in time for the last hour of trading on Wall Street. (We’re no longer recording the audio, so we can get this new written feature to members as quickly as possible.)
China just laid out a plan to roll out over 100,000 ultra-fast EV charging stations by 2027 – and they’ll all be open to the public.
The National Development and Reform Commission’s (NDRC) joint notice, issued on Monday, asks local authorities to put together construction plans for highway service areas and prioritize the ones that see 40% or more usage during holiday travel rushes.
The NDRC notes that China’s ultra-fast EV charging infrastructure needs upgrading as more 800V EVs hit the road. Those high-voltage platforms can handle super-fast charging in as little as 10 to 30 minutes, but only if the charging hardware is up to speed.
China had 31.4 million EVs on the road at the end of 2024 – nearly 9% of the country’s total vehicle fleet. But charging access is still catching up. As of May 2025, there were 14.4 million charging points, or roughly 1 for every 2.2 EVs.
Advertisement – scroll for more content
To keep the grid running smoothly, China wants new chargers to be smart, with dynamic pricing to incentivize off-peak charging and solar and storage to power the charging stations.
To make the business side work, the government is pushing for 10-year leases for charging station operators, and it’s backing the buildout with local government bonds.
The NDRC emphasized that the DC fast chargers built will be open to the public. This is a big deal because a lot of fast chargers in China aren’t. For example, BYD’s new megawatt chargers aren’t open to third-party vehicles.
As of September 2024, China had expanded its charging infrastructure to 11.4 million EV chargers, but only 3.3 million were public.
If you live in an area that has frequent natural disaster events, and are interested in making your home more resilient to power outages, consider going solar and adding a battery storage system. To make sure you find a trusted, reliable solar installer near you that offers competitive pricing, check out EnergySage, a free service that makes it easy for you to go solar. They have hundreds of pre-vetted solar installers competing for your business, ensuring you get high quality solutions and save 20-30% compared to going it alone. Plus, it’s free to use and you won’t get sales calls until you select an installer and share your phone number with them.
Your personalized solar quotes are easy to compare online and you’ll get access to unbiased Energy Advisers to help you every step of the way. Get started here. –trusted affiliate link*
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links.More.
A U.S. Justice Department logo or seal showing Justice Department headquarters, known as “Main Justice,” is seen behind the podium in the Department’s headquarters briefing room before a news conference with the Attorney General in Washington, January 24, 2023.
Kevin Lamarque | Reuters
Federal prosecutors have charged two men in connection with a sprawling cryptocurrency investment scheme that defrauded victims out of more than $650 million.
The indictment, unsealed in the District of Puerto Rico, accuses Michael Shannon Sims, 48, of Georgia and Florida, and Juan Carlos Reynoso, 57, of New Jersey and Florida, of operating and promoting OmegaPro, an international crypto multi-level marketing scheme that promised investors 300% returns over 16 months through foreign exchange trading.
“This case exposes the ruthless reality of modern financial crime,” said the Internal Revenue Service’s Chief of Criminal Investigations Guy Ficco. “OmegaPro promised financial freedom but delivered financial ruin.”
From 2019 to 2023, Sims, Reynoso and their co-conspirators allegedly lured thousands of victims worldwide to purchase “investment packages” using cryptocurrency, falsely claiming the funds would be safely managed by elite forex traders, the Department of Justice said.
Prosecutors said the pair flaunted their wealth through social media and extravagant events — including projecting the OmegaPro logo onto the Burj Khalifa, Dubai’s tallest building — to convince investors the operation was legitimate.
A video posted to the company’s LinkedIn page shows guests in evening attire posing for photos and watching the spectacle in Dubai.
Read more CNBC tech news
In reality, authorities allege, OmegaPro was a pyramid-style fraud.
When the company later claimed it had suffered a hack, the defendants told victims they had transferred their funds to a new platform called Broker Group, the DOJ said. Users were never able to withdraw their money from either platform.
The two men face charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering, each carrying a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.
The Justice Department, FBI, IRS-Criminal Investigation, and Homeland Security Investigations led the multiagency investigation, with help from international partners.
Tesla is starting to experience some consequences for misleading Full Self Driving customers – at least that’s the finding of one arbitration ruling that has Tesla refunding one customer $10,000 plus legal fees for failing to deliver on their promises. Find out more on today’s legally challenging episode of Quick Charge!
An arbitration “court” found that Tesla misled customers with its Full Self Driving product, and has now been forced to refund at least one person’s $10,000 payment (plus legal fees) for the not-quite autonomous driving software. France, too, is piling on claims of deceptive business practices – but there’s some good news for FSD fans! If you’re still willing to pay for it, Tesla will thrown in 0% financing on a brand new Cybertruck.
Check out the relevant links, below, to learn more.
New episodes of Quick Charge are recorded, usually, Monday through Thursday (and sometimes Sunday). We’ll be posting bonus audio content from time to time as well, so be sure to follow and subscribe so you don’t miss a minute of Electrek’s high-voltage daily news.
Got news? Let us know! Drop us a line at tips@electrek.co. You can also rate us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify, or recommend us in Overcast to help more people discover the show.
If you’re considering going solar, it’s always a good idea to get quotes from a few installers. To make sure you find a trusted, reliable solar installer near you that offers competitive pricing, check out EnergySage, a free service that makes it easy for you to go solar. It has hundreds of pre-vetted solar installers competing for your business, ensuring you get high-quality solutions and save 20-30% compared to going it alone. Plus, it’s free to use, and you won’t get sales calls until you select an installer and share your phone number with them.
Your personalized solar quotes are easy to compare online and you’ll get access to unbiased Energy Advisors to help you every step of the way. Get started here.
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links.More.