BBVA Issues Midterm Targets After Profit Beat
The Spanish bank expects to make around 48 billion euros ($54.75 billion) in cumulative net profit in the four years to 2028 and reach an average return on tangible equity—a key profitability measure—of 22% on average over the course of the period.
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CBS News
33 minutes ago
- CBS News
Profits at Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway drop as it writes down its Kraft Heinz investment
Warren Buffett's company reported less than half as much profit in the second quarter as it took a $3.76 billion writedown on the value of its stake in Kraft Heinz, as that iconic food producer considers largely undoing the merger that Berkshire Hathaway helped bankroll. Berkshire said it earned $12.37 billion, or $8,601 per Class A share, during the quarter. That's down from $30.248 billion, or $21,122 per Class A share, a year ago, because it recorded a much smaller paper investment gain this year. Berkshire's earnings can swing wildly from quarter to quarter because it must record the current value of its massive investment portfolio, even though it doesn't sell most of the stocks. That's why Buffett has long recommended that investors pay more attention to Berkshire's operating earnings, which exclude those investment gains. Although last year Berkshire did surprised shareholders by selling off a huge chunk of its Apple stake, which inflated the investment gains then. By that measure, Berkshire's operating earnings were only down slightly at $11.16 billion, or $7,759.58 per Class A share. That compares with $11.598 billion, or $8,072.16 per Class A share, a year ago. Most of Berkshire's myriad assortment of companies — major insurers like Geico, BNSF railroad, a group of utilities and a collection of manufacturing and retail businesses — generally performed well despite the uncertainty about the economy and President Trump's tariffs. The four analysts surveyed by FactSet Research expected Berkshire to report earnings per Class A share of $7,508.10, so the Omaha, Nebraska-based conglomerate's results were ahead of that. Berkshire owns more than 27% of Kraft Heinz' stock and, for years, it has had representatives on the company's board. Buffett has said previously that he believes the company's iconic brands will do well over time, but in hindsight, he overpaid for the investment and underestimated the challenges branded foods face from retailers and the growth of private label products. This spring, Berkshire's representatives resigned from the Kraft Heinz board shortly before the company announced it is exploring strategic options that may include spinning off a large part of its portfolio of brands. Over the years since Berkshire helped Kraft buy Heinz in 2015, the company has been hurt by changing consumer tastes and a shift toward healthier options than Kraft's core collection of processed foods. Buffett's is still sitting on a massive pile of $344.1 billion in cash, although the company's reserves dipped slightly from the $347.7 billion cash it was holding at the end of the first quarter. Buffett told shareholders in May he just isn't finding any attractive deals for companies he understands. Buffett surprised shareholders at the annual meeting when he announced that he plans to give up the CEO title at the end of the year and hand over operations to Vice Chairman Greg Abel, but Buffett will remain Chairman. Berkshire shareholders might be disappointed that the company didn't repurchase any of its shares this quarter, even though the price has fallen more than 12% since just before Buffett announced his retirement. Many investors are watching Berkshire's BNSF closely after rival Union Pacific announced a plan to buy Norfolk Southern earlier this week to create the nation's first transcontinental railroad. The speculation is that BNSF needs to pursue a merger with Eastern Rail CSX to be able to compete. But CFRA Research analyst Cathy Seifert said it isn't Buffett's style to jump into a deal just because the market thinks he should. Over the decades, he has built Berkshire by finding strong companies selling for less than they are worth. CSX is trading near its 52-week high at $35.01 amid all the deal speculation. "He wants to do it because he found an undervalued franchise -- not because the market says you need to do a deal," Seifert said. "I think one of the reasons why that cash hasn't been deployed is that valuations run through the Berkshire M-and-A model tend to be too rich. But if there's a logical case to be made they'll accept it." And BNSF appears to be doing fine right now on its own. The railroad recorded a 19% jump in its operating profit this quarter at $1.47 billion as it cut costs and delivered about 1% more shipments.
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Wall Street is finally embracing crypto—but the real payoff will come when it embraces DeFi
The global financial system, or what we broadly refer to as TradFi (Traditional Finance), is a $30+ trillion behemoth. Its reach spans commercial banking, global banking assets, insurance, capital markets, wealth management, and asset servicing. It touches every person, business, and institution, underpinning how value flows through the world. Meanwhile, DeFi (Decentralized Finance), despite being the most transformational innovation to hit financial services in decades, remains a mere rounding error in that picture. Depending on how you measure it, via Total Value Locked (TVL), DeFi token market cap, protocol revenue, or institutional activity, DeFi's footprint barely scratches $150 billion on a good day. That's less than half a percent of TradFi's scope. This is not a failure. It is a testament to just how early we are. Seen more optimistically, it is an opening that holds the blueprint for the future of finance. Already, we've seen DeFi recreate core banking functions entirely on-chain, including borrowing, lending, insurance, trading, asset management, and structured products. And it's working. Millions of users, thousands of developers, and hundreds of projects are coalescing around this future. DeFi's growth, however, has been largely inward-looking, driven by crypto-native users rather than institutional money. And despite DeFi's rapid-fire innovation, leading TradFi figures have mostly elected to watch from the sidelines, or worse, confine themselves to dismissive skepticism. This underscores the need for a bridge between the old and the new. TradFi must integrate with DeFi, not just observe it. Not to co-opt it, but to scale it. Fortunately, there is a precedent for such integration. Consider BlackRock's game-changing embrace of Bitcoin ETFs in 2023–2024 (and later ETH). It didn't just lend legitimacy, it unlocked institutional access at scale. Today, BlackRock has become the single largest TradFi driver of crypto adoption. It manages over $87 billion in spot Bitcoin ETF assets and $10 billion in ETH ETFs. BlackRock is also leading in DeFi-adjacent areas. Its BUIDL fund, a tokenized U.S. Treasury fund issued mostly on Ethereum via Securitize, holds over $2.4 billion, almost 10% of the $25 billion tokenized asset market on-chain. It's a direct example of TradFi using DeFi infrastructure without compromising regulatory standards. Meanwhile, JP Morgan's Kinexys division is working to bring financial assets on-chain. It has tested on-chain FX, repo, and tokenized bonds using permissioned DeFi liquidity pools. It is building infrastructure that mimics DeFi mechanics while staying within institutional compliance rails. This isn't a crypto experiment; it's the beginning of institutional DeFi. Then there is Fidelity, long known for its crypto-forward stance, which is quietly expanding its digital assets platform and exploring staking, custody, and tokenized financial products. It has the trust of pension funds and family offices—the very cohort most likely to embrace DeFi once it's wrapped in a familiar product interface. Fidelity could lead by building regulated DeFi index products or permissioned vaults for clients. Goldman Sachs and BNY Mellon are also making moves with pilot projects to tokenize money market funds, with fast settlement and interoperability across digital networks. Goldman's private blockchain and BNY's LiquidityDirect are testing tokenized fund redemptions, a gateway to replicating DeFi yield mechanics inside TradFi. UBS, Citi, HSBC, and Standard Chartered have participated in tokenized bond issuances, on-chain settlement pilots, and custody infrastructure projects. These banks are particularly well-positioned to onboard emerging-market clients and sovereign wealth with DeFi-wrapped TradFi products. Not every TradFi sector, though, is equally ripe for a shift to DeFi. The two verticals where adoption is most likely to break through are the Asset Management and Treasury Markets, as well as the Securities Lending and Repo Markets. Tokenized treasuries, like BlackRock's BUIDL, are just the beginning. Expect asset managers to create programmable yield products, combining DeFi vault strategies with real-world assets (RWAs). This is attractive for institutions sitting on large cash balances, because DeFi-native strategies offer higher yields and transparent collateralization. On the Lending and Repo side, DeFi can enable instant, auditable, and programmable collateral exchanges with reduced counterparty risk. JPMorgan's experiments in tokenized repo trading are just the start. A permissioned version of Aave or Morpho could gain traction here. Just as crypto exchanges wrapped peer-to-peer transactions in slick UX, TradFi needs to wrap DeFi in user-friendly and compliant interfaces. That's the blueprint for TradFi and DeFi collaboration. TradFi doesn't need to reinvent the wheel. But it can add polish, regulatory clarity, and scale to existing DeFi primitives. Custodians can integrate liquid staking. Banks can offer tokenized money market funds on-chain. Asset managers can issue yield-bearing DeFi vaults with KYC wrappers. All of the ingredients are in place. For now, TradFi has the balance sheets and DeFi has the blueprints. The future belongs to those who build the bridge. This story was originally featured on
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
What's going on with the Unilever share price?
The Unilever (LSE: ULVR) share price has barely budged after today's first-half results, with the stock market reacting with a familiar lack of excitement to another mixed update from the FTSE 100 giant. That feels par for the course. Unilever shares are down 5.8% over the last 12 months and 4.2% over five years. Not exactly thrilling for a business of this size and reputation. Personally, I'm relieved. I gave up on Unilever back in March and dropped the stock from my Self-Invested Personal Pension. Today's numbers haven't made me regret the move. Growth steady Unilever's headline numbers weren't awful. Underlying sales growth hit 3.4%, with a reasonable balance between price increases (1.9%) and volume gains (1.5%). That group isn't just passing costs onto shoppers but shifting more product too. Its personal care division led the way with 4.8% growth, while ice cream sales rose 5.9% ahead of November's planned demerger. Emerging market growth is expected to pick up speed in the second half, particularly in Asia. Developed markets performed better, with underlying sales up 4.3%. Gross margins climbed to a chunky 45.7%, helping fund increased brand and marketing investment. CEO Fernando Fernandez sounded bullish, with a focus on core brands and premium segments. But not everything was upbeat. Turnover fell 3.2% to €30.1bn year on year, hit by adverse currency moves and business disposals. Underlying operating profits slipped 4.8% to €5.8bn, with margins down 30 basis points to 19.3% Free cash flow halved to €1.1bn, hit by working capital demands and separation costs from the ice cream spin-off. Those aren't disasters, but they're not a reason for me to feel like I've missed out either. FTSE 100 farewell When I sold Unilever in March, I noted the shares had climbed just 10% over five years. That's a poor showing from a £109bn global consumer goods colossus. The company had seemed sprawling and unfocused, and even its plan to concentrate on 30 'Power Brands' hadn't fully convinced me. The shares have slipped since, yet the price-to-earnings ratio remains above the FTSE 100 average at 22.5. That's not unusual for the stock, and confirms its strong reputation among investors, but I'm not convinced it's justified by the growth outlook. The trailing dividend yield is 3.32%, which is fine but not standout. Analysts are more upbeat than I am. The 19 setting forecasts have produced a median share price growth forecast of 12.7% over the next year, lifting the stock from today's 4,467p to 5,038p. Forecasts aren't guarantees, of course. Better value elsewhere? Of 22 analysts, 14 rate it a Buy, five call it a Hold, and only three a Sell. I'm happy to be in the minority on this one. I have no regrets over selling Unilever, and no plans to buy. I don't think the growth outlook is strong enough or the dividend quite juicy enough to tempt me back in, given what's on offer elsewhere in the FTSE 100. That said, investors looking for a portfolio cornerstone or a little diversification might consider buying Unilever. It's a stable business, with a solid footprint in essential goods and long-term brand equity. But for my stocks and shares ISA, I'm currently chasing higher dividends or faster growth. And a bit more excitement. The post What's going on with the Unilever share price? appeared first on The Motley Fool UK. More reading 5 Stocks For Trying To Build Wealth After 50 One Top Growth Stock from the Motley Fool Harvey Jones has no position in any of the shares mentioned. The Motley Fool UK has recommended Unilever. Views expressed on the companies mentioned in this article are those of the writer and therefore may differ from the official recommendations we make in our subscription services such as Share Advisor, Hidden Winners and Pro. Here at The Motley Fool we believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. Motley Fool UK 2025 Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
