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The Federal Reserve cut its benchmark interest rate Wednesday for the first time in nine months. Since the last cut, progress on inflation has slowed while the labor market has cooled. That means Americans are dealing with both high prices and a challenging job market.The federal funds rate, set by the Federal Reserve, is the rate at which banks borrow and lend to one another. While the rates that consumers pay to borrow money aren’t directly linked to this rate, shifts in Fed policy affect what people pay for credit cards, auto loans, mortgages, and other financial products.Wednesday’s quarter-point cut is the first since December and lowers the Fed’s short-term rate to about 4.1%, down from 4.3%. The Fed projected it will cut rates two more times before the end of the year.The Fed has two goals when it sets the rate: one, to manage prices for goods and services, and two, to encourage full employment. This is known as the “dual mandate.” Typically, the Fed might increase the rate to try to bring down inflation and decrease it to encourage faster economic growth and more hiring. The challenge now is that inflation is higher than the Fed’s 2% target but the job market is weak, putting the Fed in a difficult position.“The dual mandate is always a balancing act,” said Elizabeth Renter, senior economist at personal finance site NerdWallet.Here’s what to know: A cut will impact mortgages gradually For prospective homebuyers, the market has already priced in the rate cut, which means it’s “unlikely to make a noticeable difference for most consumers at the time of the announcement,” according to Bankrate financial analyst Stephen Kates.“Much of the impact on mortgage rates has already occurred through anticipation alone,” he said. “(Mortgage) rates have been falling since January and dropped further as weaker-than-expected economic data pointed to a cooling economy.”Still, Kates said a declining interest rate environment will provide some relief for borrowers over time.“Whether it’s a homeowner with a 7% mortgage or a recent graduate hoping to refinance student loans and credit card debt, lower rates can ease the burden on many indebted households by opening opportunities to refinance or consolidate,” he said. Interest on savings accounts won’t be as appealing For savers, falling interest rates will slowly erode attractive yields currently on offer with certificates of deposit (CDs) and high-yield savings accounts.Right now, the best rates on offer for each have been hovering at or above 4% for CDs and at 4.6% for high-yield savings accounts, according to DepositAccounts.com.Those are still better than the trends of recent years, and a good option for consumers who want to earn a return on money they may want to access in the near-term. A high-yield savings account generally has a much higher annual percentage yield than a traditional savings account. The national average for traditional savings accounts is currently 0.38%.There may be a few accounts with returns of about 4% through the end of 2025, according to Ken Tumin, founder of DepositAccounts.com, but the Fed cuts will filter down to these offerings, lowering the average yields as they do. Auto loans are not expected to decline soon Americans have faced steeper auto loan rates over the last three years after the Fed raised its benchmark interest rate starting in early 2022. Those are not expected to decline any time soon. While a cut will contribute to eventual relief, it might be slow in arriving, analysts say.“If the auto market starts to freeze up and people aren’t buying cars, then we may see lending margins start to shrink, but auto loan rates don’t move in lockstep with the Fed rate,” said Bankrate analyst Stephen Kates.Prices for new cars have leveled off recently, but remain at historically high levels, not adjusting for inflation.Generally speaking, an auto loan annual percentage rate can run from about 4% to 30%. Bankrate’s most recent weekly survey found that average auto loan interest rates are currently at 7.19% on a 60-month new car loan. Credit card rate relief could be slow Interest rates for credit cards are currently at an average of 20.13%, and the Fed’s rate cut may be slow to be felt by anyone carrying a large amount of credit card debt. That said, any reduction is positive news.“While the broader impact of a rate reduction on consumers’ financial health remains to be fully seen, it could offer some relief from the persistent budgetary pressures driven by inflation,” said Michele Raneri, vice president and head of U.S. research at credit reporting agency TransUnion.“These savings could contribute to a reduction in delinquency rates across credit card and unsecured personal loan segments,” she said.Still, the best thing for anyone carrying a large credit card balance is to prioritize paying down high-interest-rate debt, and to seek to transfer any amounts possible to lower APR cards or negotiate directly with credit card companies for accommodation. The Associated Press receives support from Charles Schwab Foundation for educational and explanatory reporting to improve financial literacy. The independent foundation is separate from Charles Schwab and Co. Inc. The AP is solely responsible for its journalism. Cora Lewis, Associated Press
Category:
E-Commerce
Shares in the four largest publicly traded quantum computing companies (which Ill refer to as the Quantum Four for short) are currently having a good 24 hours. Yesterday, the stock prices of D-Wave, IonQ, Quantum Computing Inc., and Rigetti all saw impressive single-day gains. In premarket trading this morning, the stock prices of the Quantum Four are even higher. Heres what you need to know. Quantum Four share prices up across the board When it comes to publicly traded quantum computing companies, there are four big ones: D-Wave Quantum Inc. (NYSE: QBTS) IonQ, Inc. (NYSE: IONQ) Quantum Computing Inc. (Nasdaq: QUBT) Rigetti Computing, Inc. (Nasdaq: RGTI) Yesterday, all of these companies saw their stock price rise by a healthy amount. D-Wave Quantum was the biggest gainer, with QBTS surging nearly 19% in a single session. QBTS shares closed at $22.54. And today, QBTS are on the rise again. In premarket trading as of the time of this writing, QBTS shares are up another 3.2%. Shares in IonQ, Inc. also rose a respectable amount yesterday. IONQ shares closed the day up more than 5%, hitting a closing price of $65.44. IONQ shares are up another 5.5% in premarket trading as of the time of this writing. Rigetti Computing likewise had a great Wednesday, with RGTI shares surging 9.95% to close at $21.99. Today, RGTI shares are continuing upwards. They are currently up 3.7% in premarket trading. Finally, Quantum Computing Inc. shares rose a healthy amount on Wednesday. QUBT shares closed up nearly 5% to end the day at $17.71. Today, QUBT shares are currently up another 4.3% in premarket trading. These gains over the past 24 hours suggest that investors are once again interested in the companies that make the technology that could one day be as transformative to computing as artificial intelligence has been in recent years. Why have quantum computing stocks been rising? Its hard to pinpoint why exactly investors seem to have a renewed interest in quantum computing stocks this week. However, there are two events within the industry that have happened recently that could be part of the reason the Quantum Four are rising. The first event is that yesterday, the U.S. Department of Energys (DOE) Office of Technology Commercialization (OTC) announced the expansion of the Quantum-in-Space Collaboration. The collaboration is a joint venture between the U.S. government and quantum computing and space companies designed to deploy quantum-based technologies in space, which could be particularly useful for advanced communications systems and cybersecurity. Announcing the expanded collaboration, the DOE revealed that IonQ was a new signatory, along with the Electric Power Board of Chattanooga (EPB), and aerospace giant Honeywell. There was a second event that happened yesterday, too. IonQ separately announced that it intends to buy Vector Atomic, a California company that makes quantum sensors for navigation. Vector Atomic currently has $200 million worth of government contracts. The common theme between these two events is not just IonQ, but the governments clear interest in quantum technologies, particularly in the realm of communications and security. As quantum computing becomes more critical to government plans, the companies that operate in the quantum spacenamely the Quantum Fourstand to benefit. Of course, its impossible to say that these events yesterday are the exact reason why quantum stocks are lifting. But they are the latest signs of increased activity in the quantum computing industry. Also, in addition to the two events yesterday, one of the quantum computing industrys most prominent events is being held this week. Quantum World Congress 2025 began on Monday and ends today. The congress brings together major players from the quantum computing world to share information through keynotes and boot camps. Excitement generated by the event could be drawing more attention to quantum stocks this week. Quantum computing stocks have had great returns since 2024 This week hasnt been the only banner period for Quantum Four stocks. Since 2024, the share prices of the four companies have surged. Heres how each of the Quantum Four have performed over the past 12 months as of yesterday’s close: D-Wave Quantum Inc. (NYSE: QBTS): up 2,158% IonQ, Inc. (NYSE: IONQ): up 705% Quantum Computing Inc. (Nasdaq: QUBT): up 2,517% Rigetti Computing, Inc. (Nasdaq: RGTI): up 2,448% What quantum investors will be hoping is that these incredible gains will be as nascent as the quantum computing industry is now. But even a quantum computer cant guess where the Quantum Fours share prices go from here.
Category:
E-Commerce
Weve seen black cards. Gold cards. Platinum cards. Pink cards. Now, Amex is debuting the first credit card thats a mirror. The new, limited edition Platinum Mirror Card is a piece of metal polished to a reflective finish. In an increasingly digital world, its an industrial design object intended to redefine what a premium credit card meansbut owning it also unlocks an exclusive (and ever-so modernist) UX in Amexs own app. In 2024, Amex hit record revenues of $65.9 billion, which is projected to grow by 8-10% in 2025. That’s no small feat for a legacy payments company. Much of its success is due to the positioning of its Platinum Card. The card comes with a hefty $695/year fee. But despite the price, it boasts 98% year to year retentionand 75% of the people signing up are Millennials and Gen Zers. It’s part of a greater premium credit card race, and a bid for Amex to distinguish itself in a competitive businessagainst JPMorgan in particular. Amex is courting younger customers by positioning itself, not simply as a credit card to buy stuff, but as an all-access pass for experiences, ranging from cutting the line to buy concert tickets to hanging in dozens of exclusive airport lounges it runs worldwide. The company is building these perks through partnerships, but also key acquisitions: Amex bought the digital reservations company Resy in 2019 to get its customers into restaurants more easily. The strategy matches what airlines, amusement parks, and others are doing more and more: Charging a bit more to offer those with an expandable income a VIP version of everyday life. Designing the Amex Platinum card [Photo: Courtesy of American Express] While a reflective slab of metal is a simple enough idea, its still somewhat enchanting to behold, as far as credit cards go. Its core concept also reinforces the brand ethos. According to Reanna Gross, VP and head of American Expresss internal creative agency OnBrand, its built to be a portal to experiences. It reflects things youre, and even your own face while having them. When I call it the selfie card, Gross offers a polite laugh. (I’m only half kidding: what better way to woo generations that grew up on Instagram, Snapchat, and TikTok?) Designed in-house, the project required several months of development and testing. The team landed on UV lasers to etch customer names and numbers on the card, while printing elements like the brands centurion logo in ink. It experimented with several finishes to protect the surface to resist smudges and scratches, and then, the team attacked it mercilessly with keys. We actually had prototypes and tried to, like, really, really break them and use them and smudge them, and then iterated from there, says Gross. Translating the card to the app [Photo: Courtesy of American Express] From the earliest stages of development, the Amex team knew that the card had to be more than a card, and Gross worked closely with Evan English, VP of Product Design and Research at American Express, dropping into her office for long whiteboard sessions on how this unified strategy could work. Members will see that in the newly designed Amex app, which for Platinum users, will shift from Amexs beloved blue to white during the day, or a more stoic black with gunmetal highlights at night. Truthfully, its a pretty typical Dark Mode approach to UX. But as English explains, it intentionally creates a vibe that the user ladders up to Platinum, a sort of graphical implication of a business class experience. The app has also been redesigned to deprioritize spending information lower on the screen. Instead, the user is greeted with a graphic of their Platinum card, and a large lifestyle-centric photo that teases all of the experiential benefits (dining, travel, etc). Amex wants its users to explore the benefits they can sign up for, caroseling through various registrations, to communicate the services its providing front and center. But if you scroll down, youll still get to that typical transaction data youd expect, along with information about someones upcoming reservations. We’re on a rolling path forward to start bringing a lot more content into this screen that really reflects that membership value, says English. Branding the VIP experience [Photo: Courtesy of American Express] As a final step, Amex is translating the entire reflective idea to its own brand marketing. Teasers have been running for weeks, capturing bits and pieces of the card with an almost iridescent intensity. Soon ads will run across social that captures the card set at a beautiful cafe table, reflecting the flowers of al fresco dining. Another add shows two mirror cards toasting like wine glasses, with a metallic clink. All-in-all, nothing Amex has executed across these designs is out of reach for most big companies. Its just a highly coordinated system, drawing a clear brand narrative across physical product, to UX, to advertising. Its certainly filigree, but its also a most certain vibe, reimagining a forgettable piece of plastic as a path to posh adventure. And for Amex, positioning its value is important. Rumor has it that Amexs Platinum subscription is set to increase significantly, again, in the coming year or two. With a cost thats more in line with a cellphone plan than a credit card, Amex needs to keep convincing you that its worth it to spend a little more. Theres just one potential flaw. If credit card debt keeps rising and the middle class tires of feeling left out, all of these VIP experiences and fancy cards may feel less like a perkand more like a social liability.
Category:
E-Commerce
Cracker Barrel reported earnings Wednesday for the first time since the company ignited a cultural firestorm by revealing a modern rebrand of its old-timey logo in August. Julie Masino, the restaurant chain’s CEO, referenced the ordeal repeatedly in Wednesdays earnings call, noting that Cracker Barrel is working to regain its footing as it grapples with declining foot traffic from the rebranding controversy. The feedback we’ve received from our guests in recent weeks on our brand refresh and store remodel has shown us just how deeply people care about Cracker Barrel, Masino said on the call. We thank our guests for sharing their voices and love for the brand and telling us when we’ve misstepped. Cracker Barrel plans to tread carefully for future changes and will introduce a new front porch feedback plan to check in with its customers more often. Masino said that while traffic is down since 8/19the day of the infamous rebrandloyalty signups are soaring. Impact from the backlash expected Cracker Barrel expects to see the fallout from the August controversy show up in its next quarter results. The company revised its expected 2026 fiscal year revenue down from previous estimates, from $3.5 billion to $3.45 billion, noting that it anticipates a 7% decline in store traffic. The company said that its over-55 customer base has remained mostly consistent, but that it has seen declining traffic in younger cohorts, particularly in the Southeast. Cracker Barrel on Wednesday reported $868 million in revenue in the quarter that ended on August 1, prior to its logo fiasco. Same-store restaurant sales were up 5.4% from a year ago, with retail sales dipping by around 1%. While the company bested revenue estimates of $855 million, it fell short on earnings per share. Shares of Cracker Barrel Old Country Store (Nasdaq: CBRL) dropped after the earnings report and were down about 7.6% in premarket trading Thursday as of this writing. Not yet over the barrel Designed to modernize a drab brand and bring in new audiences, Cracker Barrels $700 million marketing overhaul instead became a lightning rod among traditionalists who denounced the cleaner logo and rejected updates to make its cluttered dining spaces brighter and more welcoming. Among the offenses, the restaurant even tweaked the language on the iconic peg game that customers play while they wait for their food, removing the classic text that declares a poor player an “EG-NO-RA-MOOSE. Conservatives slammed Cracker Barrels planned update as woke and soulless and framed it as cultural capitulation, a pushback that dented the companys value by $100 million. The backlash escalated all the way to the president of the United States, who waded into the furor to decry the changes. Cracker Barrel should go back to the old logo, admit a mistake based on customer response (the ultimate Poll), and manage the company better than ever before, President Trump wrote in a Truth Social post, adding that if the company played its cards right it would have a billion dollars in free publicity. On X, Trumps deputy White House chief of staff said that he had spoken with the companys leadership, which thanked Trump for expressing his opinion of the rebrand. Shortly after Trump weighed in, Cracker Barrel said it would roll back the update, restoring its 1977 logo featuring the old timer known as Uncle Herschel and vowing to reverse aesthetic updates at a handful of its 660 locations. We want longtime fans and new guests to experience the full story of the people, places, and food that make Cracker Barrel so special, Masino said on the call. That’s why our team pivoted quickly, switched back to our old timer logo, and has already begun executing new marketing, advertising, and social media initiatives, leaning into uncle Hershel and the nostalgia around the brand. The incident may ultimately prove to be a win for Cracker Barrel, a brand thats more accustomed to being a background feature in Americas endless landscape of mediocre chain eateries than a topic of national conversation. The rebrand flopped spectacularly, but it sparked a massive outpouring of nostalgia for the corporate chain in the process. More than a month later, were still talking about Cracker Barrel.
Category:
E-Commerce
It’s not just youyou really have been seeing a lot more of Gap lately. Over the last few years, the brand has embarked on a broad business turnaround. It hired Richard Dickson, Mattel’s former CEO who turned Barbie into a phenomenon. Then it brought on Zac Posen as its new creative director. It launched an elevated sub-brand, GapStudio, and it’s bringing back nostalgia-driven styles like low-rise jeans. But perhaps more effective than any single business decision has been Gap’s unabashed embrace of collaborations. Again and again, Gap’s partnerships have surprised shoppers by tapping into corners of culture and fashion that expand the audience for the classic American brand. There have been collabs with womens fashion brands Cult Gaia and Dôen (twice), Black design advocacy platform Harlems Fashion Row, luggage company Béis, and cool golf-wear brand Malbon. For people who doubted Gap’s fashion bona fides, these collabs were meant to prove them wrong. Is Gap actually plugged in? Mark Breitbard, the president and CEO of Global Gap Brand, has been trying to answer that question with a resounding yes for the last five years. When Brietbard joined Gap in 2020, he was dealing with a crisis of relevance. “Having been around the business for a long time, I always felt that the brand just needed more, he says. The brand deserved better, and the brand had good creative just dying to get out. Now, dozens of collabs later, a different company has emerged from the cryogenic freezerone that consumers are starting to actually care about. A new era for Gap Step by step, the Gap brand started to carry cachet. That’s really the storymore than one partner, one campaignit’s the story of all of it, says Breitbard, referring to the steady drumbeat of storytelling he and his team are building through its partnerships and marketing campaigns. Relative to the story that a revived Gap is trying to tell, all of this creative is the narrative, he says. And is intrinsic to its aim of restaking our claim as an American icon. [Photo: Courtesy of The Gap] But strong creative requires a solid foundation to work from. In 2020, when Breitbard moved from his role as president and CEO of Banana Republic to join Gap in his current role, the casual-wear brand had nowhere to go but up. In fact, the last time Gap was in the conversation, low-rise jeans were in style (think 2000 to 2010). Breitbard has incredibly broad responsibilities. I lead the Gap brand business. It means everything that you see that is Gap is under my purview, he says. Product, marketing, stores, e-commerce, partnerships, and all the experiences that go along with that, he adds. The Gapaissance is made up of many creative decision-makers, but at the end of the day, Breitbard is the one who makes the final call. When he stepped into the role, he first noticed that the brand needed a cleanup. Gap had a number of problems, starting with relevance, Breitbard recalls of the companys health when he first joined. The business model was broken in some ways. A brief summary of his to-do list: Reduce the Gap’s overstored retail footprint (they closed 350 stores) Reinvent product Cut the number of stock-keeping units (SKUs) Reinvest in quality Multiple rounds of layoffs, all of which took place through 2022 Followed by new creative hires in 2023, including its head of creative, Calvin Leung, and agency partner, Invisible Dynamics. CEO Dickson, credited with Barbies pink tsunami of a comeback during his time as president and COO at Mattel, also joined in 2023. At that point, the company felt established enough to move on from digging itself out and start building up positive momentum. In 2024, Gap tapped Posen to head up its new, higher-price-point sub-brand, GapStudio, itself a relevance play through red carpet and celebrity dressing. Thats also when the collaboration strategy started in earnest. (There were a few early collabs: the ill-fated, 10-year YZY partnership in 2020, which ended in 2022, followed by the more successful Gap x Dapper Dan collab in 2022.) According to Gap, the company rarely engaged in brand partnerships prior to Breitbards onboarding: about 24 collaborations over a span of 40 years, from 1979 to 2019. Since Breitbard joined the company, Gap has launched more than 15 partnerships (about three per yeara five-fold increase over the prior average of about two every three years). By mid-2025, Gap is running six to eight major partnerships per year. [Photo: Courtesy of The Gap] In 2024, Gap started to drop more frequentand surprisingly covetablecollabs, like with Dôen and Cult Gaia. The kind that might cause you to text your friend a link with at least five question marks: “Gap????? The company also began launching classic Gap ads with new talent: Troye Sivan, Tyla, and most recently Katseye, choreographed by Robbie Blue. All of this offers multiple approaches to reinvent its icons, as Breitbard describes it. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Robbie Blue (@itsrobbiesworld_) The strategy is meant to reestablish its own core styles and its own brand relevance through affiliation with partners that carry fashion and cultural credibility. We had the business starting to fire in 23 with a lot of the pieces there, he says. Then a combination of all the different moves we’ve been making. We ramped every single one of them upramped up the marketing campaigns, ramped up the collabs, ramped up the storytelling, and got more and more focused. That includes a focused partnerships strategy. According to Breitbard, any new partnership requires a few things: a clear internal understanding of established brand codes (described as rooted in denim and the authentic voice of Americana), value alignment with potential partners, a strong creative team, and a differentiated story and audience. That happens when a story can only be told with that partner, and that the partner can only tell with us, he says. But for Breitbard, it ultimately coms down to a basic relevance formula, which I call the group chat litmus test: Is it new? Is it unexpected? And is it cool? he asks. Relevance and its cousin, authenticity, are brand qualities that are both difficult to define and universally chased. Every brand wants to be part of the cultural conversation, because that ultimately establishes credibility in the eyes of the consumer and creates a wide marketing funnel through which to engage potential customers. Think of it as branding soft power. What unites all of these partnerships is the idea of authenticity and upholding Gaps DNA. We do go through great pains to ensure that the brand codes remain upheld in everything we do, Breitbard says. But having a strong creative team very locked in on who we are allows us to take more risks; it allows us to have interesting partnerships that feel new and unexpected. So that’s it. We rely on great creative talent. [Photo: Courtesy of The Gap] The halo effect Brand relevance leads to brand equity, which leads to sales. Collaborations help establish that: 29% of customers who make a collab purchase are new to the brand, according to Gap. But partnerships also offer a halo effect for its core product: 20% of consumers who made a collab purchase also added a Gap item to their cart, according to the company. And partnerships have also proven important to establishing longtail business leads. Collab customers skew youngerunder age 40. I questioned friends about their current perception of Gap. Ive noticed how Zac Posen has turned the ship. But not until this Katseye ad, have I been interested in actually buying from them, a 33-year-old PR professional based in L.A. told me. Froth, says a 35-year-old Australian consultant based in New York. I loved the [Katseye] ad and walked into a Gap store for the first time in my life. I think its getting cooler again, and they have trendier things in store, a 39-year-old New York-based fashion designer told me. Ive bought a few things recently. According to Breitbard, no one partnership best captures the resurgent era of Gap. Rather, its the strategy as a whole. Great creative begets great creative in the same way with talent and bringing more talent, he says of his team and its recent output. Reflecting on the recent partnerships and distinct campaigns, he says: All of this creative is the narrative. Right now, the creative is setting the paceand its adding up to a comeback no one saw coming.
Category:
E-Commerce
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