STOCK MARKET NEWS: Wall Street kicks-off 2023, Tesla shares slide, Sam Bankman-Fried in court

Electric vehicle maker Rivian Automotive just missed its full-year production target of 25,000 vehicles in 2022, the company said in a filing late on Tuesday.

After cutting its initial 50,000 production forecast in half in mid-2022, Rivian said it produced 24,337 vehicles last year at its Normal, Illinois, plant, and delivered 20,332. In the fourth quarter, it built 10,020 and delivered 8,054.

Like other EV makers, supply-chain disruptions have pressured Rivian, which also shelved a plan in December to build delivery vans in Europe with Mercedes-Benz. Rivian earlier pushed back the production startup of its smaller R2 vehicle family to 2026 at the company's planned $5 billion plant in Georgia.

In an email sent to employees on Tuesday, Chief Executive R.J. Scaringe said the company built 25,051 vehicles in Normal but counted only 24,337 as "factory gated" — that is, cleared for delivery to customers.

More than 700 vehicles at year-end were awaiting parts, software validation, wheel alignment and charging, Scaringe said, and thus "can’t count toward our official figure."

South Korea's antitrust regulator said it would impose a 2.85 billion won ($2.2 million) fine on Tesla Inc for failing to tell its customers about the shorter driving range of its electric vehicles (EVs) in low temperatures.

The Korea Fair Trade Commission (KFTC) said that Tesla had exaggerated the "driving ranges of its cars on a single charge, their fuel cost-effectiveness compared to gasoline vehicles as well as the performance of its Superchargers" on its official local website since August 2019 until recently.

The driving range of the U.S. EV manufacturer's cars plunge in cold weather by up to 50.5% versus how they are advertised online, the KFTC said in a statement on Tuesday.Tesla could not be immediately reached for comment.

Sam Bankman-Fried pleaded not guilty on Tuesday to criminal charges that he cheated investors in his now-bankrupt FTX cryptocurrency exchange, causing billions of dollars in losses in what prosecutors have called an epic fraud.

The 30-year-old defendant entered his plea through his lawyer to eight criminal counts, including wire fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering, before U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan in Manhattan federal court.

Kaplan set an Oct. 2 trial date. A federal prosecutor, Danielle Sassoon, estimated that a trial could take four weeks, and said the government will soon turn over hundreds of thousands of documents of evidence to defense lawyers.

Southwest Airlines has been sued by a passenger who said it failed to provide refunds to passengers left stranded when an operational meltdown led the carrier to cancel more than 15,000 flights late last month.

In a proposed class action filed on Dec. 30 in New Orleans federal court, Eric Capdeville accused Southwest of breach of contract after a fierce winter storm that swept across the United States shortly before Christmas upended the carrier's schedule.

Though Southwest has promised to reimburse passengers for expenses, Capdeville said it offered only a credit to him and his daughter after scrapping their Dec. 27 flight to Portland, Oregon from New Orleans and being unable to book alternative travel.

In a statement on Tuesday, Southwest had no comment on the lawsuit, but said it had "several high priority efforts underway to do right by our customers, including processing refunds from canceled flights, and reimbursing customers for expenses incurred as a result of the irregular operations."

A Russian court has ordered nearly $500 million of assets belonging to German industrial gases company Linde to be frozen at the request of a Russian joint venture building a gas complex at the Baltic Sea port of Ust-Luga, court filings showed on Monday.

RusKhimAlyans, the joint venture which is 50% owned by Russia's Gazprom, asked the Court of Arbitration of St Petersburg and the Leningrad Region to freeze Linde assets worth 35 billion roubles ($488 million) as a preventative measure.

In 2021, Linde and Renaissance Heavy Industries signed an engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract with Gazprom and its partners for the Ust-Luga gas complex. Linde notified the customer in May and June 2022 that it had suspended work under the contract due to European Union sanctions imposed after Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

RusKhimAlyans alleges, according to the document, that EU sanctions ban supplying equipment for the liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant but do not cover equipment required for the other part of the Ust-Luga complex — a gas processing plant.RusKhimAlyans intends to apply to the Hong Kong International Arbitration Centre to recover advance payment and losses worth around 972 million euros ($1 billion) and 7.6 billion roubles, according to the court filings.

Linde did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

Ford Motor’s F-series extended its streak as the best-selling U.S. pickup truck. The automaker said it sold more than 640,000 trucks in 2022, making the F-series the top selling truck for 46 years.

From F-150 to F-550 chassis cab, entry level XL to well-equipped Limited, EcoBoost to the all-electric F-150 Lightning, lined bumper to bumper, all of the Ford F-Series trucks sold last year would stretch approximately 2,400 miles, or further than the driving distance from Los Angeles, Calif. to Detroit, Mich.

U.S. construction spending unexpectedly rebounded in November, lifted by gains in nonresidential structures, but single-family homebuilding continued to be hammered by higher mortgage rates.

The Commerce Department said on Tuesday that construction spending climbed 0.2% in November after falling 0.2% in October.

Economists polled by Reuters had forecast construction spending would decrease 0.4%. Construction spending increased 8.5% on a year-on-year basis in November.

Spending on private construction projects advanced 0.3% after declining 0.7% in October.

Investment in private non-residential structures like gas and oil well drilling jumped 1.7%.

But outlays on residential construction fell 0.5%, with spending on single-family housing projects plunging 2.9%. Outlays on multi-family housing projects increased 2.4%, benefiting from strong demand for rental housing.

Nvidia is teaming up with China’s Hon Hai Technology Group (Foxconn) to develop automated and autonomous vehicle platforms, the companies announced.

As part of the agreement, Foxconn will be a tier-one manufacturer, producing electronic control units (ECUs) based on NVIDIA DRIVE Orin for the global automotive market. Foxconn manufactured electric vehicles (EVs) will feature DRIVE Orin ECUs and DRIVE Hyperion sensors for highly automated driving capabilities.

The partnership with Foxconn will allow Nvidia to further scale its efforts and meet growing industry demand as more transportation leaders select DRIVE Orin for intelligent vehicles. In addition, by building EVs on the DRIVE Hyperion qualified sensor set, Foxconn will speed up its time-to-market and time-to- cost strategies.

Americans are coming together to pray for and support Damar Hamlin after the Buffalo Bills safety collapsed during a Monday Night Football game. Hamlin went down after tackling Cincinnati Bengals wide receiver Tee Higgins.

The incident sparked a surge in donations for Hamlin’s toy drive. At the start of the night, there was about $100,000 raised and as of early Tuesday morning on the East Coast, there was more than $3 million raised for his charity.

The NFL postponed the game after it was temporarily suspended.

Entravision has announced that Walter Ulloa, the company’s chair and CEO, passed away of a sudden heart attack on Dec. 31, 2022. He was 74 years old.

The board appointed Chris Young, Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer, as Interim Chief Executive Officer, effective immediately.

The board of the radio and TV station owner will continue to meet to discuss matters related to the orderly transition and is currently conducting a search for a full-time replacement for the role of CEO.

In a separate announcement, Carrols Restaurant Group announced the passing of president and CEO Paulo Pena.

Pena died unexpectedly in the hospital on Dec. 31, 2022. He was 50 years old.

Pursuant to the CEO Succession Plan, the board of the largest Burger King franchisee in the U.S. appointed Anthony Hull, Carrols’ Vice President, Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer, to serve as Interim President and CEO until a successor has been identified.

Hull will continue serving as Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer of the Company while serving as Interim President and CEO. The board will be initiating a search for a successor shortly.

InterDigital and Samsung Electronics have agreed to have a panel of arbitrators establish the royalties to be paid by Samsung for a worldwide license to certain of the company’s patents from and after Jan. 1, 2023, as well as any other terms to a patent license agreement on which the parties are unable to agree, the company said in a regulatory filing.

The determination by the panel will be in the form of a patent license agreement and will be final, binding and non-appealable, subject to certain limited exceptions.

The parties have agreed to conduct the arbitration in a diligent manner. The company expects the arbitration to conclude within approximately 18 months.

Each of the parties has also agreed not to initiate certain claims against the other party during the arbitration. Any licenses under our joint licensing program with Sony relating to digital televisions and standalone computer display monitors will not be included in the scope of the arbitration.

InterDigital is a provider of wireless and video technologies used in mobile devices, networks, and services.

The dollar headed for its largest one-day rise in over three months on Tuesday, while equities rallied in a macro-packed week that could offer a steer on when, and at what level, U.S. interest rates might peak.

The MSCI All-World index was roughly unchanged, although European stocks, led by hefty gains in anything from financials, to oil and gas stocks, to healthcare, bounced to two-week highs.

“The FTSE 100 moved 2% higher to 7,604, led by Shell and BP which were lifted by ongoing strength in the oil price. Brent Crude has risen by 14% since 9 December as markets started to expect higher demand from China as it moves to drop strict Covid rules and reopen its economy as well as a move by the US to replenish its emergency stockpile of oil," said Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell.

Typically, stocks tend to fall when the dollar gains, but that negative correlation between the two softened on Tuesday to its weakest since early September. The dollar index was last up 1% at 104.69.

The euro was the worst-performing currency against the dollar, falling by the most since late September, after German regional inflation data showed consumer price pressures eased sharply in December, thanks in large part to government measures to contain natural gas bills for households and businesses.

Reuters contributed to this report.

U.S. stock futures are up ahead of the opening bell on Tuesday as oil and gold mix.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average futures is up roughly 139 points, or 0.42%, while the S&P and Nasdaq futures are approximately 0.47% and 0.67% higher, respectively.

Over the last month, the Dow remains off around 1.72%, the S&P is still off around 3.16% and the tech-heavy Nasdaq is still roughly 6.09% lower as tech stocks struggle to hold gains.

Pre-market, shares of Meta are up approximately 1.38%, Apple is up roughly 0.68%, while Microsoft is around 0.87% in the green.  

In commodities, West Texas Intermediate crude futures slipped 1.33% to $79.19 a barrel, as gold jumped 0.82% to $1,841.10 an ounce.

Cryptocurrency prices were higher early Tuesday.

At approximately 4:45 a.m. ET, Bitcoin was trading at nearly $16,740 (+0.31%), or higher by $52.

For the week, Bitcoin was trading lower by nearly 1.2%. For the month, the cryptocurrency was lower by more than 2.25%.

Ethereum was trading at approximately $1,217.6 (+0.17%), or higher by about $2.1.

For the week, Ethereum was trading lower by 0.80%. For the month, it was trading lower by approximately 6%.

Dogecoin was trading at $0.071788 (+0.37%), or higher by approximately $0.000267. 

For the week, Dogecoin was lower by almost 5.45%. For the month, the crypto was lower by slightly more than 30%.

The price of gasoline continued to tick higher early Tuesday.

The nationwide price for a gallon of gasoline bumped up on Tuesday to $3.228. On Monday, the price of a gallon of regular gasoline was $3.216. On Sunday, the price was $3.208, according to AAA.

A year ago, the price for a gallon of regular gasoline was $3.288.

One week ago, a gallon of gasoline cost $3.104. A month ago, that same gallon of gasoline cost $3.425.

Gas hit an all-time high of $5.016 on June 14.

Diesel has been rising, but remains below $5.00 per gallon at $4.679.

On Monday, that same gallon of diesel cost 4.678. On Sunday, it stood at  $4.681, but that is still a far cry from the $3.571 of a year ago.

A busy week of economic data kicks off with a relatively slow start on Tuesday and winds up the week with vital data on Friday. 

Beginning Tuesday at 9:45 a.m. ET, S&P Global is out with its final manufacturing PMI for December, which fell further into contraction territory in the flash reading two weeks ago (50 is the dividing line between expansion and contraction; there is no Refinitiv estimate for the final reading).

In addition, Tuesday at 10 a.m. ET watch for a 0.4% slide in construction spending for the month of November.

Investors will also await the JOLTS report on Wednesday at 10 a.m. ET, telling them how many job openings there were in the U.S. at the end of November.

And on Thursday payroll processing firm ADP is out with its tally of new private-sector nonfarm jobs for December at 8:15 a.m. ET, while the Labor Department posts the number of new jobless claims for the final week of 2022 at 8:30 a.m. ET. 

The first major economic report of the new year, December’s employment data, will be released at 8:30 a.m. ET Friday morning. The report will give investors further insight into the impact that higher borrowing costs are having on a tight labor market. 

Economists surveyed by Refinitiv say the U.S. economy likely added 200,000 new nonfarm jobs. That’s down from a stronger-than-expected tally of 263,000 in November and would mark the weakest job growth since December 2020. 

While the pace of job growth is slowing, the labor market is still tight with employers, at least those outside of the high-tech sectors, reluctant to lay off workers. The unemployment rate is anticipated to hold steady at 3.7% for the third month in a row.

For perspective, September’s 3.5% unemployment rate, along with the pre-pandemic levels of 3.5% in January and February 2020, were the lowest since May 1969. The manufacturing sector likely added a meager 10,000 jobs in December. That would be the lowest since April 2021 and down from a disappointing 14,000 jobs the prior month. 

Private sector payrolls are anticipated to increase by 175,000, trailing November’s gain of 221,000 and the lowest since December 2020. 

Finally, look for hourly earnings to rise 0.4% for the month and jump 5.0% from December 2021. That would be down slightly from November’s 5.1% surge, which was well above the 4.6% forecast, but still half a percentage point below the 2-year high of 5.6% in March.

 U.S. stocks were higher early Tuesday morning ahead of the first trading day of 2023.

Coming off a year of big declines for major stock markets, traders worry the Federal Reserve and other central banks might be willing to push the world into recession to cool inflation that is at multi-decade highs.

Investors also are uneasy about the impact of Russia's war on Ukraine and China's COVID-19 outbreaks. “Almost everyone is going into 2023 with a healthy dose of trepidation,” Craig Erlam of Oanda said in a report.

On Wall Street, the futures for the benchmark S&P 500 index and the Dow Jones Industrial Average were up 0.5% ahead of 2023's first day of U.S. trading. The S&P 500 ended 2022 down 19.4%, its biggest decline since the 2008 financial crisis.

The week's most closely watched data point is notes from the Fed's latest meeting due to be released Thursday. That will give traders an update on the U.S. central bank's thinking about the possible need for more rate hikes. 

It will be followed Friday by U.S. employment data. Forecasters expect monthly job gains to decline in December, which they hope might encourage the Fed to dial back plans for more rate hikes.

But the Fed has a “clear focus on keeping inflation under check,” which “could still leave pricing data as the key driver of market moves,” Yeap Jun Rong of IG said in a report. 

Traders also are looking ahead to corporate earnings reports in mid-January. The Fed’s key lending rate stands at a range of 4.25% to 4.5%, up from close to zero after seven increases last year.

The U.S. central bank forecasts it will reach a range of 5% to 5.25% by late 2023, with no rate cut before 2024. 

Meanwhile, European and Asian shares were mixed, with Frankfurt, Shanghai and Hong Kong advancing and Seoul declining. The DAX in Frankfurt opened up 0.2% at 14,093.38 while the CAC-40 in Paris was unchanged at 6,594.63. 

In Asia, the Shanghai Composite Index gained 0.9% to 3,116.51 and the Hang Seng in Hong Kong rose 1.8% to 20,145.29.

Japanese markets were closed. 

Seoul's Kospi shed 0.3% to 2,218.68 after South Korea's 2022 exports fell 9.5% from the previous year and the country recorded its biggest trade deficit ever. 

Sydney's S&P-ASX 200 lost 1.3% to 6,946.20 after Australian house prices fell 1.1% in December and an index of manufacturing activity declined. India's Sensex gained 0.5% to 61,167.79.

Singapore declined while Bangkok and Jakarta advanced. New Zealand markets were closed.

Oil prices held in a narrow range on Tuesday , though the outlook for demand was clouded by a weak manufacturing activity survey from China, and a warning from the head of the International Monetary Fund that the global economy faced a tough year ahead. 

Brent crude futures recovered from their early weakness, when prices fell by $1 a barrel, rebounding to $86.29 a barrel by 0737 GMT, an increase of 38 cents, or 0.44%. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude was at $80.77 a barrel, up by 51 cents, or 0.64%. 

"This is likely (to be a) volatility play," said head of APAC analysis at Vortexa Serena Huang. Vandana Hari, founder of Vanda Insights in Singapore, said little had changed during the last weeks of December. "But there are a few factors in flux, major among them being the economy and China's COVID exit, and factoring that in isn't easy," she added. 

The weak factory survey from China, the world's largest crude importer and second-largest oil consumer, was a bearish factor.

The Caixin/Markit manufacturing purchasing managers' index fell to 49.0 in December from 49.4 in November. The index has stayed below the 50-point mark that separates growth from contraction for five straight months.

Further darkening the outlook, IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva said on Sunday that the United States, Europe and China - the main engines of global growth - were all slowing simultaneously, making 2023 tougher than 2022 for the global economy. 

Oil prices had settled more than 2% higher on Friday, with Brent and WTI ending 2022 up 10.5% and 6.7% on a year before, respectively. 

Societe Generale analysts said in a note dated Jan. 3 that the week that ended on Dec. 27, had seen the single largest weekly flow of funds into commodities during 2022. They said that out of $12.3 billion that flowed into commodities that week some $3.4 billion went into Brent, largely in reaction to Russia's combative response to the EU and G7 imposed price cap on Russian crude exports to third parties. 

President Vladimir Putin banned the supply of crude and oil products from Feb. 1 for five months to nations that abided by the cap. His decree also included a clause that allowed him to overrule the ban in special cases. 

Russian crude has been diverted to India and China from Europe. Traders said Moscow planned to increase diesel exports from the Baltic sea port of Primorsk to 1.81 million tonnes in January, but exports from Tuapse were expected to fall to 1.333 million tons.