(Bloomberg) — The human cost of producing 99-cent chickens and affordable burgers during a pandemic is pushing U.S. meatpackers to eye major operational changes that will likely make American meat more costly.Some plants are already running slower than normal to adhere to social distancing. But companies are also considering how best to redesign their operations to prevent infections, including by automating some lines altogether. The likely result: higher costs for an industry dominated by the likes of Tyson Foods Inc. and JBS SA that’s been very efficient at pumping out cheap meat.The changes are arriving as concerns mount over mega-plants staffed with low-paid workers operating elbow-to-elbow. More than 10,000 meat workers have been infected by the coronavirus, and at least 30 have died, according to the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union.“Americans want to buy cheaper and cheaper and cheaper food,” said Matthew Wadiak, founder of Cooks Venture, a small chicken producer selling directly to consumers. “We need to figure out how to pay a little bit more, because what’s the cost of a human life? It’s a lot more than 25 cents at the checkout.”Workers at meatpacking plants continue to fall ill, even with barriers placed between them, more protective equipment and enhanced social-distancing measures in common areas including cafeterias and locker rooms.While President Donald Trump has ordered plants to reopen, many are running at slower-than-usual rates to try to reduce the spread. Reducing plants to a third of their capacity and distributing the adequate protective equipment could boost chicken prices at grocery stores by 25% to 30%, according to Sanchoy Das, a professor at the New Jersey Institute of Technology.“The 99-cents per pound chicken could be in short supply very quickly,” said Das, whose research focuses primarily on supply chain modeling and analysis.The bulk of America’s beef and pork are processed in a few dozen giant plants that handle thousands of animals in lines that have been allowed to run faster and faster. Tyson, JBS and Cargill Inc. control about two-thirds of America’s beef. Pork and chicken production is similarly concentrated.The outbreak could also help accelerate automation plans companies have already in the works. Tyson has said it is investing “aggressively” in automating the most difficult tasks within its plants. The company is installing robots in the deboning areas of its poultry plants, and also has initiatives in beef and pork.“You are going to see a bifurcation where the larger, more profitable facilities are going to move toward a vastly more automated meat processing facility,” said Decker Walker, an agribusiness expert at Boston Consulting Group. “Incentives for automation have never been higher.”Pilgrim’s Pride Corp. was increasing its use of automation and robotics even before the pandemic. The company invested more than $30 million in automation last year, projects that are helping plants to run efficiently in the midst of the coronavirus crisis.“We believe in automation, we believe in robotics, and we’re going to continue to move down that path,” Chief Executive Officer Jayson Penn said in an April 30 call with analysts.Meat processing is usually a low-margin business, meaning companies will be wary of overspending. While there’s probably going to be a lot of change in the way packers do business, consumers will pay for it in the long run, said Steve Meyer, an economist at consultancy Kerns & Associates.“This whole system was designed to produce quality products at the most reasonable cost possible, so you don’t go and add a lot of extra cost to go handle a once-in-a-100-year situation,” Meyer said. “But you also don’t turn a blind eye to the fact that people are sick and some people died. So I think there will be some changes made.”Another way to reduce infections, especially in poultry plants, would be to produce more whole chickens, as cutting up birds into legs and thighs requires more labor, said Das of the New Jersey Institute of Technology.Consumers in the U.S. can afford to pay a bit more for their meat, said Wadiak of Cooks Venture. That would increase wages and help avoid shared living accommodation, which has been a challenge for meat plant workers looking to adhere to social-distancing practices.“When the budget iS tight, it’s hard to put food on the table, it’s hard to feed your family, I really, really get that,” he said. “But if that means you are putting food on your table at the cost of someone else’s life, it’s not worth it.”For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

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Stock futures reversed course during the overnight session and rose Wednesday, as traders awaited commentary from Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell later in the morning.

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Chinese social media, entertainment and games giant Tencent managed a 6% increase in profits in the first quarter of the year – a period which contained two months of coronavirus-induced turmoil. The powerhouse company on Wednesday reported revenues increased by 26% year on year to $15.3 billion (RMB108 billion), and net profits up to $4.15 […]

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Boeing Co (BA) said that it did not receive a single order in April, while it was also grappling with 108 order cancelations for its grounded 737 MAX plane.Last month, the ailing plane maker delivered 6 planes adding up to a total of 56 in first four months of this year, which represents a 67% decline year-on-year, as air travel demand has been halted in an effort to contain the coronavirus pandemic.The planemaker’s stock dropped 2.7% to $125.22 in U.S. trading on Tuesday, taking its year-to-date plunge to more than 60%.The April cancellations of its 737 MAX jets were from clients including China Development Bank Financial Leasing Co and General Electric’s (GE) aircraft unit GECAS.Commercial airline travel has fallen off a cliff due to coronavirus-induced lockdown restrictions forcing many airlines around the world to ground the majority of their fleets and suspend aircraft deliveries. Boeing is cutting 10% of its workforce and announced reductions in its plane production rates as it braces for years-long industry recovery from the aviation crisis.Following the report, five-star analyst Cai von Rumohr at Cowen & Co. maintained the stock’s Hold rating with a $150 price target“BA is seeing some improvement in circumventing travel restrictions, but they likely will remain an issue in May,” Von Rumohr wrote in a note to investors.TipRanks data shows that overall Wall Street analysts are sidelined on Boeing shares. The Hold consensus is based on 11 Holds and 6 Buys and 1 Sell. The $163.18 average price target implies 30% upside potential in the stock in the next 12 months. (See Boeing’s stock analysis on TipRanks).Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun warned this week that he is anticipating a slow recovery for airline traffic over the coming months, and that this could result in one of the major airlines “folding”, according to a NBC interview.Related News: Boeing CEO Says ‘Likely’ A Major Airline Could Fold In 2020 Colombian Carrier Avianca Files for Bankruptcy Protection Due to Coronavirus Woes Qantas Said to Halt Plane Deliveries From Boeing, Airbus Amid Travel Freeze More recent articles from Smarter Analyst: * Intel, Taiwan Semiconductor Said to Be in Talks with Trump to Build U.S. Plants * 3M Holds Good On Its Promise To Prioritize Dividend * Atlassian Snaps Up Halp For Slack-First Ticketing * Tesla’s California Auto Plant Gets Go-Ahead to Reopen Next Week

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(Bloomberg) — Tencent Holdings Ltd. reported better-than-expected sales after pandemic-induced lockdowns helped spur growth in its suite of online offerings from gaming to social media.The WeChat operator’s revenue rose 26% to 108.1 billion yuan ($15.2 billion) after gaming sales rose at their fastest pace since 2017 during the coronavirus-stricken March quarter. That compared with the average estimate of 101.07 billion yuan. Net income rose 6% to 28.9 billion yuan from a year earlier, when Tencent booked an 11 billion yuan one-time gain on investments.Tencent, which never offers precise financial guidance, warned that the boost to its gaming business from Covid-19 could be short-lived, while marketing budgets remain stretched. “We expect in-game consumption activities to largely normalise as people return to work, and we see some headwinds for the online advertising industry,” the company said in its filing.Shares in Prosus NV, the entity controlled by major shareholder Naspers Ltd. that serves as a proxy for Tencent, rose more than 2%.Tencent is among the most resilient of players in a Chinese internet sector emerging from the worst of the outbreak. It’s gained more than $42 billion in market value since Covid-19 first broke out, defying a global market rout and a record Chinese economic contraction. A surge in social media and gaming traffic drew new ad revenue to help offset shrinking traditional online marketing budgets.“Brands weren’t sure about how the virus would impact their future, so the first thing they did when they put marketing budgets on hold was to stop buying ads on news portals and video sites, where conversion rates are low,” Connie Gu, an analyst at Bocom International, said before the earnings announcement. Social ads were a bright spot in the quarter thanks to increased inventory on WeChat Moments, the messaging apps’ semi-public feed, she added.But longer term, the world’s largest game publisher is contending with renewed challenges from the likes of ByteDance Ltd. and Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.While Tencent’s core online entertainment business must convince consumers to keep splurging on aging cash cows like Honor of Kings, rival ByteDance is luring users and advertisers away and into its viral social networks. It’s also preparing to enter hardcore gaming.Revenue at Tencent’s burgeoning fintech division slid from the previous quarter after merchants shut their doors, but began recovering from April as China went back to work. And as feared, lockdowns disrupted its cloud service by postponing projects and hampering efforts to win over new customers.It’s in cloud and fintech where Tencent faces possibly its fiercest battle with Alibaba. Parts of those units, which made up more than a quarter of the company’s revenue in 2019, went into hiatus during Covid-19 but are expected to bounce back over 2020 and resume driving its longer-term expansion. Alibaba-backed Ant Financial’s Alipay is also seeking to attract more merchants and transactions in part by replicating the lite-app model WeChat pioneered.What Bloomberg Intelligence SaysThe company’s social-ad business could continue to grow strongly, despite challenging industry conditions, on high demand and new inventory released in mid-February, but its fintech and business services segment could deliver slower growth as offline payments declined during the pandemic and some cloud computing projects were delayed.\- Vey-Sern Ling and Tiffany Tam, analystsClick here for the research.(Updates with details from the results announcement throughout.)For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

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Top news and what to watch in the markets on Wednesday, May 13, 2020.

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(Bloomberg) — Tencent Holdings Ltd. reported better-than-expected sales after pandemic-induced lockdowns helped spur growth in its suite of online offerings from gaming to social media.The WeChat operator’s revenue rose 26% to 108.1 billion yuan ($15.2 billion) after gaming sales rose at their fastest pace since 2017 during the coronavirus-stricken March quarter. That compared with the average estimate of 101.07 billion yuan. Net income rose 6% to 28.9 billion yuan from a year earlier, when Tencent booked an 11 billion yuan one-time gain on investments.Tencent, which never offers precise financial guidance, warned that the boost to its gaming business from Covid-19 could be short-lived, while marketing budgets remain stretched. “We expect in-game consumption activities to largely normalise as people return to work, and we see some headwinds for the online advertising industry,” the company said in its filing.Shares in Prosus NV, the entity controlled by major shareholder Naspers Ltd. that serves as a proxy for Tencent, rose more than 2%.Tencent is among the most resilient of players in a Chinese internet sector emerging from the worst of the outbreak. It’s gained more than $42 billion in market value since Covid-19 first broke out, defying a global market rout and a record Chinese economic contraction. A surge in social media and gaming traffic drew new ad revenue to help offset shrinking traditional online marketing budgets.“Brands weren’t sure about how the virus would impact their future, so the first thing they did when they put marketing budgets on hold was to stop buying ads on news portals and video sites, where conversion rates are low,” Connie Gu, an analyst at Bocom International, said before the earnings announcement. Social ads were a bright spot in the quarter thanks to increased inventory on WeChat Moments, the messaging apps’ semi-public feed, she added.But longer term, the world’s largest game publisher is contending with renewed challenges from the likes of ByteDance Ltd. and Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.While Tencent’s core online entertainment business must convince consumers to keep splurging on aging cash cows like Honor of Kings, rival ByteDance is luring users and advertisers away and into its viral social networks. It’s also preparing to enter hardcore gaming.Revenue at Tencent’s burgeoning fintech division slid from the previous quarter after merchants shut their doors, but began recovering from April as China went back to work. And as feared, lockdowns disrupted its cloud service by postponing projects and hampering efforts to win over new customers.It’s in cloud and fintech where Tencent faces possibly its fiercest battle with Alibaba. Parts of those units, which made up more than a quarter of the company’s revenue in 2019, went into hiatus during Covid-19 but are expected to bounce back over 2020 and resume driving its longer-term expansion. Alibaba-backed Ant Financial’s Alipay is also seeking to attract more merchants and transactions in part by replicating the lite-app model WeChat pioneered.What Bloomberg Intelligence SaysThe company’s social-ad business could continue to grow strongly, despite challenging industry conditions, on high demand and new inventory released in mid-February, but its fintech and business services segment could deliver slower growth as offline payments declined during the pandemic and some cloud computing projects were delayed.\- Vey-Sern Ling and Tiffany Tam, analystsClick here for the research.(Updates with details from the results announcement throughout.)For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

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Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE) is planning to significantly expand clinical trials of its novel coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccine candidate by September, the company's chief executive officer Albert Bourla told CNBC on Tuesday.Pfizer Aims For October Approval The pharmaceutical company is currently testing four different variations of its BNT 162 COVID-19 vaccine, as part of the phase one trials, Bourla said at the CNBC "Healthy Returns Virtual Summit."Pfizer is expecting to test up to 360 people in the trial, and if one or two vaccine versions signal progress, it will launch a wider study involving thousands of volunteers by September, according to Bourla.The CEO added that the company would have conclusive data on which vaccine can move forward in June or July. "We are collecting data as we speak in real time so we know, we are monitoring the safety of the doses," he told CNBC.Bourla reiterated the company's earlier stance that its COVID-19 vaccine candidate, co-developed with Germany's BioNTech SE (NASDAQ: BNTX), could be ready by October."If things go well, and we feel that the product is safe and efficacious, and the FDA [Food and Drug Administration] and EMA [European Medicines Agency] and other regulatory agencies feel the same, we will be able to deliver millions of doses in the October time frame," he said at the CNBC virtual summit.Why It Matters Pfizer and BioNTech began the clinical trials of their vaccine in the United States last week and in Germany in late April.There's currently no approved prevention or cure for COVID-19. Vaccine candidates, including those of Moderna Inc. (NASDAQ: MRNA), and Inovio Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ: INO), are also currently undergoing clinical trials.White House Coronavirus Task Force lead member Anthony Fauci on Tuesday in his testimony to the Senate warned that it can't be said at the moment if any of the COVID-19 vaccines in clinical trials will prove successful.Price Action Pfizer shares closed 1.9% lower at $37.36 on Tuesday and dropped another 0.8% at $37.05 in the after-hours session.See more from Benzinga * 'Hamilton' Movie To Stream On Disney+ In July * Gilead Shares Drop As It Agrees To 'Royalty-Free' Coronavirus Drug Licence With Generic Drugmakers In 127 Countries * Facebook To Pay M In Settlement With Content Moderators Who Suffered Mental Injuries(C) 2020 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.

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(Bloomberg) — Tencent Holdings Ltd. reported better-than-expected sales after pandemic-induced lockdowns helped spur growth in its suite of online offerings from gaming to social media.The WeChat operator’s revenue rose 26% to 108.1 billion yuan ($15.2 billion) after gaming sales rose at their fastest pace since 2017 during the coronavirus-stricken March quarter. That compared with the average estimate of 101.07 billion yuan. Net income rose 6% to 28.9 billion yuan from a year earlier, when Tencent booked an 11 billion yuan one-time gain on investments.Tencent, which never offers precise financial guidance, warned that the boost to its gaming business from Covid-19 could be short-lived, while marketing budgets remain stretched. “We expect in-game consumption activities to largely normalise as people return to work, and we see some headwinds for the online advertising industry,” the company said in its filing.Shares in Prosus NV, the entity controlled by major shareholder Naspers Ltd. that serves as a proxy for Tencent, rose more than 2%.Tencent is among the most resilient of players in a Chinese internet sector emerging from the worst of the outbreak. It’s gained more than $42 billion in market value since Covid-19 first broke out, defying a global market rout and a record Chinese economic contraction. A surge in social media and gaming traffic drew new ad revenue to help offset shrinking traditional online marketing budgets.“Brands weren’t sure about how the virus would impact their future, so the first thing they did when they put marketing budgets on hold was to stop buying ads on news portals and video sites, where conversion rates are low,” Connie Gu, an analyst at Bocom International, said before the earnings announcement. Social ads were a bright spot in the quarter thanks to increased inventory on WeChat Moments, the messaging apps’ semi-public feed, she added.But longer term, the world’s largest game publisher is contending with renewed challenges from the likes of ByteDance Ltd. and Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.While Tencent’s core online entertainment business must convince consumers to keep splurging on aging cash cows like Honor of Kings, rival ByteDance is luring users and advertisers away and into its viral social networks. It’s also preparing to enter hardcore gaming.Revenue at Tencent’s burgeoning fintech division slid from the previous quarter after merchants shut their doors, but began recovering from April as China went back to work. And as feared, lockdowns disrupted its cloud service by postponing projects and hampering efforts to win over new customers.It’s in cloud and fintech where Tencent faces possibly its fiercest battle with Alibaba. Parts of those units, which made up more than a quarter of the company’s revenue in 2019, went into hiatus during Covid-19 but are expected to bounce back over 2020 and resume driving its longer-term expansion. Alibaba-backed Ant Financial’s Alipay is also seeking to attract more merchants and transactions in part by replicating the lite-app model WeChat pioneered.What Bloomberg Intelligence SaysThe company’s social-ad business could continue to grow strongly, despite challenging industry conditions, on high demand and new inventory released in mid-February, but its fintech and business services segment could deliver slower growth as offline payments declined during the pandemic and some cloud computing projects were delayed.\- Vey-Sern Ling and Tiffany Tam, analystsClick here for the research.(Updates with details from the results announcement throughout.)For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

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