Walmart company has reported a higher net income now reaching $3.7 billion from July to September this year, a growth of $0.1 billion since the same quarter during 2012.

It seems like the giant company started cutting prices of its products, while investing as much as $250 million to improve the quality of its products and stores.
It also says that sales have been affected negatively by currency fluctuations, while the chief executive Mike duke thinks sales are affected mainly due to customers being uncertain about the economy, causing their spending to drawback as people prefer to save.

Still it seems like Walmart is setting up new offers and cheaper deals to costumers, in order to deal with competition which is becoming every time stronger. The main problem is that during the economic recovery process people have less time to spent as jobs start to recover while they still tend to save more rather than spend.

source:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24941498

The blog post describes how McDonald’s has been one of few companies to become globally well known, on top of having a big consumer loyalty and being profitable. The reasons come down to having franchises all over the world which are shaped to different patterns in consumption. For example in India instead of meat they use chicken with typical food of that specific country as demand in South America isn’t the same as in India. Also the company by going public in 1965 allowed bigger investment into the company, allowing more ideas regarding market segments and consumer taste to enter the business. Then lately this company has reshaped again by consumption trends leading to healthier lifestyles given the big amount of people realizing fast foods are killing people all over the world, causing their products to change into salads and other healthier choices.

What we understand from this is that the reason for many companies’ success is due to the constant reshaping of products offered to consumers with constant changes in ideas opening up to different market segments at many different prices. An important point i think is that business become obsoletes when they are stuck in giving the same product without different approaches to consumers, which goes along to the amount of investment in market research.

Source:

https://blogs.ubc.ca/zeenaaltaher/2013/10/14/mcdonalds-how-does-the-company-do-it/

The reason behind Blackberry’s failure was due to the company’s internal factors, like failing to cope with technological advances of competitors like Samsung and Apple, which captured market demand with modern and more attractive devices.
Examples were the Z7 and Z10 models which were irrelevant for consumers and way behind competitors products.

What this demonstrates s that big falls in demand to even bankruptcy can happen to any profitable and well known business globally. In this case was mainly due to the inability to progress with new ideas and advancements which brought blackberry back. Still technology might not be the only reason why companies may stay behind, as resources and costs are of big importance, but its a main factor of why companies take over their competitors. Another good example is Blockbuster in the industry of video cassettes, facing bankruptcy by not being able to cope with technological advances taken over by modern DVD’s.

Sources:

https://blogs.ubc.ca/vivekthakkar/2013/10/07/blackberry-in-doom/

Tim Hortons is experiencing growths of 8% in profits for the last quarter of the year, as sales have improved in the United States. The company has experienced same-store sales increases of 3% in the US and 1.7% in Canada, while opening 13 restaurants in the US and 34 in Canada in this last quarter.
Tim Hortons has also introduced a new coffee option “Dark Roast”, aiming to increase consumption by possibly aiming at a new market segment.
The company’s net income rose to $113.9 million at the end of the third quarter from $105.7 million a year earlier and total revenue rose  3 percent to $825.4 million. Suggesting market research has been successful.

On the other hand Tim’s is experiencing fierce competition from McDonald’s Corp and Starbucks Corp as it remains under pressure from shareholders to boost returns as they might invest in other companies. Still Tim Horton’s shares listed on the Toronto stock exchange state that these have risen by 22% this year.

Source:

http://www.bnn.ca/News/2013/11/7/Tim-Hortons-posts-higher-profit.aspx

Canadian housing has lately started to increase with 198,282 housing starts last month, after a slowdown in the housing market in 2012, when the government mortgage lending rules became tighter, in order to prevent home buyers from taking on high debts. The many who feared (mainly economists at Canada’s big banks who are the major mortgage lenders) that there could be a bubble in the housing market are starting to suspect the creation of another one, now that housing prices are starting to accelerate quickly together with house starts increasing greatly.
Mathieu Laberge, deputy chief economist at CMHC says that in Ontario, Canada’s most populous province, together with British Columbia is where the biggest activity increase has been recorded, while the total projected units should be between 179,300 and 190,600.

In my opinion banks are the main drivers of housing prices to go up, given that loans in most of the cases is what allows people to buy houses by a mortgage. For Canada its a great business to buy a house and rent it, given the big number of immigrants that come to take advantage of Canada’s resources which bring various job opportunities. This makes hard for the government to tighten lending policies.

Source:

http://www.bnn.ca/News/2013/11/8/Housing-starts-climb-in-October.aspx

Twitter is soon turning public with the debate between a higher or lower IPO. With a provisional range value between $17-$20 for it’s stock, which would value the firm up to $11.1 billion. Speculation is lately arising about the overvalued price per stock, causing Twitter’s IPO to decline. Yet on the other hand, some investors like Doug Kass who claims that the share value will rise in the first month of trading, and consumers are willing to pay $32.50 per share. In my opinion regarding a firm’s IPO, the share value shouldn’t be overvalued, as there are numerous consequences to that. First and foremost, a continuous fall in the stock price would not only lead to bad reputation but   causes firm’s to focus in the short term growth instead of the long term growth. Managerial decisions may turn out to be riskier given investor’s pressure on immediate profit results.

On the other hand, a firm must consider not having the IPO valued too low, as it would reduce the possibilities of maximizing profits. In the case of ‘Twitter’, less money towards market research and development would be available.

reference:

http://www.economist.com/news/business/21588940-microblogging-firms-shares-may-not-be-bargain-investors-are-hoping-going-cheep

Ford Motor Corporation has decided that in order to keep emerging in strong markets, its important to analyze the production method line to make it faster and more efficient, while reducing plant downtime, meaning the time period where the company is not producing anything, hence not adding value.
In 2011 Ford started an expansion project in where assembly plants would reach China and India, while power-train plants in Brazil, China India and Russia. A very well thought idea given that cheap labor would reduce costs and these countries are becoming More economically developed countries allowing exports around the world to be possible.
It’s also said that the company will start reducing the global vehicle platforms from 15 to 9 by 2017, on top of plans of increasing the number of vehicles per plant in order to improve efficiency as workers will be focused on less similar pieces, reduce costs and respond more quickly to changes in consumer tastes.
The company also aims to improve manufacturing flexibility and speed by investing in new technology (3D printing of prototype parts).
Its said that Ford plans to run 90 percent of its global factories virtually on three shifts a day by 2017 boosting production run time by more than 30 percent.

reference:

http://www.bnn.ca/News/2013/10/7/Ford-aims-to-make-its-factories-more-flexible-efficient.aspx

Lately the US crisis has caused federal workers to suffer from furloughs meaning in times of crises workers stop getting paid until the situation improves. As a result banks have stepped forward to offer loans to workers equally to their monthly pay, as long as they show their governmental ID and furlough papers, for them to cover up their bills and basic needs.
Loan amounts will consist of up to monthly payments to workers, excluding interests together with fees or taxes, lasting since October 10th till November 2nd unless the government shutdown ends before expected.
Some examples are Capital One bank which has a financial hardship program in order to waive fees out and defer payments for governmental employees. Other banks like Chase, Well Fargo, Bank of America, Citi, Discover and US bank will work in a direct case by case with customers.
The government shutdown started in Tuesday and there is an estimated 800,000 workers affected.
Regarding this issue i think given that its the government there is not much to be claimed or do, but definitely its unmoral to leave workers without pays affecting their families, which should be taken in consideration in a near future to compensate affected workers.

Reference:

http://money.cnn.com/2013/10/03/pf/banks-shutdown/index.html

Recently the British food Industry has been facing volatile food prices specifically for bread and milk, given that demand for food is rising while supermarket wars are becoming tougher. Companies sometimes drop prices even below the cost of production, known as predatory prices, which is considered illegal in many economies. So you might be wondering how can supermarkets be losing that much profits by selling with such elevated costs? While prices of some foods are dropping scandalously, other are rising to cover up loses, causing misunderstandings over market prices and confusion for consumers.
The biggest concern is when analyzing low income level consumers, who strongly depend on inferior goods like bread, who now need to pay higher prices for these, while other superior goods which they cant afford in the first place, are having prices over the roofs in order for companies to balance profits. Overall i think this idea benefits the “B and A classes” middle and high income classes, who turnout to have daily trade offs between buying superior or inferior goods able to analyze prices and make choices. But others within the low income class have no choice but to accept higher prices for inferior goods given that these are their only choice.

reference:

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/oct/01/dont-worry-david-cameron-price-bread

Powerful brands often symbolize comfortable working areas with high wages together with safe working conditions along with health insurance coverage. But what about the so called sportswear brand Nike, which employs 650,000 workers worldwide and exploits labor by making them work for more than 60 hours a week in sweatshops while punishing those workers who refuse to do overtime. 25% to 50% of factories restrict access to drinking water and toilets. The irony is that for a company to avoid decline and grow profitably it must keep stakeholders satisfied and have a certain benefit which leads not only the company but everyone involved to accomplish a similar goal. Still Nike is growing profitably while excluding the wellbeing of one very important group of stakeholders called employees. What I think comes next will be up to the managers to cope with the media alerts and possible government intervention onto improving welfare of Nike’s workers. Also Nike should try to avoid bad reputation as ethical issues can bring up strikes from workers and high negative impacts on demand

Reference:

http://www.organicconsumers.org/clothes/nike041505.cfm