Wall Street Breakfast Podcast: Tavares Exits As Stellantis Sales Slump

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Stellantis (STLA) CEO Carlos Tavares resigns amid sales slump. (00:25) Fidelity marks up value of its stake in Elon Musk’s X by 32%: report. (01:32) BlackRock (BLK) close to deal to acquire HPS Investment Partners for at least $12B: report. (02:41)

This is an abridged transcript of the podcast.

The CEO of Stellantis (NYSE:STLA) has resigned.

The carmaker is battling a profit slump and weakened U.S. sales.

Carlos Tavares will hand over the reins to a newly created interim committee headed by chairman John Elkann. The company will name a new CEO in the first half of 2025.

An independent director Henri de Castries said Tavares will leave his position earlier than expected after differences in views emerged between him and the board. He was previously expected to step down in early 2026 at the end of his contract.

Tavares has been under pressure since Stellantis (STLA) slashed its profit forecast in September and forecast a cash burn of up to 10 billion euros. The automaker mostly blamed slowing sales and bloated inventories in its crucial North American market.

Shares of Stellantis (STLA), the world’s fourth largest automaker by sales, have tumbled over 43% so far this year.

The automaker reaffirmed its financial guidance for the year.

Fidelity marked up the value of its holdings in the social media company X by 32.37% in October.

Axios reported on Sunday that despite the markup, Fidelity still values the platform formerly known as Twitter at a 72% discount to the $44 billion Elon Musk purchased it for in 2022.

Despite being a shareholder, Fidelity does not necessarily possess any inside information on X’s financial performance, the report added.

Fidelity did not immediately respond to a Seeking Alpha request for comment.

According to the report, the markup is related to X’s stake in artificial intelligence startup xAI. Fidelity invested in xAI’s $6 billion Series B funding round earlier this year. The investment firm held xAI shares at cost for months until marking them up by about 70% in October, the report added.

It also highlighted that Fidelity reports on a one-month lag, which means that the new valuation does not reflect the reelection of Donald Trump or Musk’s prominence in his upcoming administration.

BlackRock (NYSE:BLK) is close to a deal to acquire HPS Investment Partners (HPS).

A deal, which could be announced as early as this week, could value HPS at $12B or higher.

Bloomberg reported Sunday, citing people with knowledge of the matter that the sources reportedly said that BlackRock would pay for the deal in cash and stock.

The Financial Times reported last week that an agreement was near.

BlackRock declined comment when reached by Seeking Alpha. HPS did not immediately respond to a request for comment by Seeking Alpha.

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Catalyst watch:

• Goldman Sachs Industrials and Materials Conference begins. Companies presenting this week include BorgWarner (BWA), Honeywell (HON) and 3M Co. (MMM). Other notable conferences include the UBS Global Technology and AI Conference with Block (SQ), Visa (V) and Sofi (SOFI) expected to present.

Now let’s take a look at the markets as of 6 am. Ahead of the opening bell today, Dow, S&P and Nasdaq futures are in mixed territory. Crude oil is flat at $68/barrel. Bitcoin is down 1.7% at $95,000.

In the world markets, the FTSE 100 is flat and the DAX is up 0.5%.

The biggest movers for the day premarket: Despite missing the consensus mark in FQ3, MINISO Group (NYSE:MNSO) shares soared 16%, driven by robust financial performance and operational growth.

On today’s economic calendar:

• 10:00 am Construction Spending

• 3:15 pm Federal Reserve Board Governor Christopher Waller to speak on the economic outlook before the American Institute for Economic Research Monetary Conference,”Building a Better Fed Framework”

• 4:30 pm New York Federal Reserve Bank President John Williams to participate in a conversation organized by the Queens Chamber of Commerce.