A member of his staff, Taylor said, “could hear President Trump on the phone asking Ambassador Sondland about ‘the investigations.’ Ambassador Sondland told President Trump that the Ukrainians were ready to move forward.” Taylor continued: “Following the call with President Trump, the member of my staff asked Ambassador Sondland what President Trump thought about Ukraine. Ambassador Sondland responded that President Trump cares more about the investigations of [Joe] Biden, which [Trump’s persona

Not clear if Big Machine can block Taylor Swift at the VMAs, says Variety senior music editorJem Aswad, Variety senior music editor, and CNBC’s Julia Boorstin join ‘The Exchange’ to discuss Taylor Swift taking her feud with record label Big Machine to the public stage.

Confetti falls as Lyft CEO Logan Green (C) rings the Nasdaq opening bell celebrating the company’s initial public offering (IPO) on March 29, 2019 in Los Angeles, California. Wall Street is not giving newly public ride hailing company Lyft enough credit, according to J.P. Morgan. Following its third-quarter earnings, Lyft just landed a spot on J.P. Morgan’s top internet picks list, alongside streaming company Netflix, e-commerce giant Amazon and tech titan Facebook.

Kudlow: A deal is ‘getting close’White House economic advisor Larry Kudlow said Thursday night that China and the U.S. were “getting close” to signing a phase-one trade agreement. That was all Wall Street needed to push stocks to new all-time highs on Friday. The S&P 500 posted its sixth straight week of gains, while the Nasdaq notched a seven-week winning streak. JC Penney, Applied Materials jump on earningsShares of J.C. Penney and Applied Materials jumped 6.36% and 8.95%, respectively, follow

Microsoft has hired former United States Attorney General Eric Holder to conduct an audit of facial recognition company AnyVision to determine whether it complies with Microsoft’s ethical principles on how the biometric surveillance technology should be used. Under the terms of the deal, Microsoft stipulated that AnyVision should comply with its six ethical principles to guide its facial recognition work: fairness, transparency, accountability, nondiscrimination, notice and consent, and lawful s

Kyle Walsh | CNBCPillPack, the Internet pharmacy that Amazon acquired in 2018, has updated its logo and other paperwork to include a new “Amazon Pharmacy” brand, and sources say its CEO has been promoted to vice president within Amazon. Specifically, the group’s branding has changed from “PillPack, an Amazon company” to “PillPack by Amazon Pharmacy.” It’s the first public reference to Amazon Pharmacy, an entity that many analysts expect will eventually do more than mail delivery of medicines thr

Jim Cramer’s week ahead: Home Depot, Target and Macy’s earnings — plus US-China trade developmentsThe “Mad Money” host explains what he is going to be monitoring closely next week, including earnings reports from Kohl’s and Foot Locker.

The meeting that wasn’tPhase one of the US-China trade deal was initially expected to be signed this weekend at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Santiago. Aramco IPOOn Sunday, Saudi Aramco is expected to begin its IPO roadshow for what could end up being the largest public offering in history. Aramco plans to list its shares beginning in December on the Saudi Stock Exchange, which is known as the Tadawul. Aramco President and CEO Amin Nasser recently told CNBC that the company’s p

Powell also testified in the past week, on both Wednesday and Thursday, before congressional committees. Walmart in the past week raised its outlook and said consumers looked healthy going into the holiday season. In the past week, stocks barely budged when trade news pointed to a possible lack of progress and the focus was on demands by the Chinese to roll back tariffs. As stocks rallied to new highs in the past week, Treasury yields backed off recent highs. Emanuel and other strategists say th

T-Mobile Chief Executive Officer John Legere isn’t taking the WeWork CEO job, according to people familiar with the matter. Legere, who became CEO of T-Mobile in 2012, has no plans to leave the company, said the people, who asked not to be named because the matter is confidential. CNBC and The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this week that Legere was a candidate to be WeWork’s next CEO. If Legere were to leave T-Mobile for WeWork, it could raise at least the perception of a conflict of inte

It turns out President Donald Trump’s long-running demand that NATO countries pay more for their own defense isn’t just about Europe. According to one South Korean lawmaker Esper wants much more, as in five times more or $5 billion annually. But let’s face it, defending the free world isn’t cheap. But cutting the number of U.S. bases isn’t, or shouldn’t be such a controversial idea in many other parts of the world. The U.S. currently has about 800 military bases in more than 70 countries.

President Donald Trump arrives at Morristown municipal airport for a weekend at the Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey, August 2, 2019. Attorneys for President Donald Trump returned to the Supreme Court on Friday to ask the justices for the second day in a row to block a demand for his income tax returns — this one from House Democrats. The Supreme Court is expected to decide whether to grant the stay before Wednesday, when the subpoena would otherwise be enforced. He is the firs

Tim Armstrong: Twitter’s political ad announcement was smartTwitter is expected to unveil its policy today on banning political ads from its platform. Tim Armstrong, former CEO of AOL and Oath, joins “Squawk Box” to discuss.

Food delivery is booming — in 2017, investment firm Cowen projected the U.S. food delivery market will surge to $76 billion in 2022. Thursday, food delivery start-up DoorDash — which is backed by SoftBank and is reportedly raising a new round of funding at a nearly $13 billion valuation — released its first year end trend report. To find the most popular foods it delivered in 2019 and what to expect in 2020, the company analyzed orders from January 2019 through November 2019 and from January 201

The House Ethics Committee has revealed separate probes into two congressmen over possible violations of House rules. Democratic Rep. Alcee Hastings of Florida is under investigation for his relationship with a subordinate staffer, the committee said Thursday. “We plan to cooperate fully with the Justice Department on this matter,” a Thursday press release from his office said. “As I’ve said before, we acknowledged that mistakes were made with respect to the campaign loans, but those mistakes we

Elizabeth Warren aims to transition the U.S. to “Medicare for All” in her first term, moving to the single-payer health-care system through two pieces of legislation, her campaign said. In a proposal outlined Friday, the Warren campaign said the 2020 Democratic presidential hopeful would take several steps in her first 100 days to expand insurance coverage. She wouldn’t move to eliminate private insurance until her third year, when Warren hopes to pass another measure to fully transition to Medi

An assembly line worker works on the production line at Midwest Automotive Designs in Bristol, Indiana, April 16, 2019. The U.S. economy will barely grow at all in the fourth quarter, if two Federal Reserve gauges that track gross domestic product are correct. With some recent data coming in below expectations, both the Atlanta and New York Fed’s trackers have lowered their expectations for the last three months of 2019. According to the Atlanta Fed’s GDPNow, growth is likely to come in at just

David Heinemeier Hansson, a well-known software engineer, recently slammed the Apple Card on Twitter as sexist. His complaint: He was given a credit limit 20 times larger than his wife, even though she has the better credit score. Up until the 1970s, single or widowed women could find they needed a man on their credit card applications to be approved. More from Personal Finance:Chase forgives debts of certain credit card holdersHere’s one easy way to pay less to your credit card companyThese mov

Scott Olson | Getty Images News | Getty ImagesEven if you haven’t actively been seeking gun stocks, you could still be an investor in them. Stocks to look forThere are two gun manufacturers that are publicly traded U.S. companies: American Outdoor Brands, parent of gunmaker Smith & Wesson, and Sturm, Ruger & Co. You could own a total market index fund, extended market fund or a small cap index fund that includes those two companies, Hale said. A traditional S&P 500 index fund would focus on larg

Nike’s decision to stop selling merchandise to Amazon is just the “tip of the iceberg” of brands opting to go directly to consumers, internet entrepreneur Tim Armstrong told CNBC on Friday. Brands are often fearful that by partnering with Amazon they will lose control over how they’re represented on the site. On Wednesday, Nike confirmed to CNBC that a pilot program, launched in 2017, to sell a limited product assortment to Amazon, in exchange for stricter policing of the Nike brand on the platf