Micron’s revenue almost tripled in the latest quarter as results topped analysts’ estimates and guidance sailed past expectations. The stock, which is up more than 350% in the past year, slipped in extended trading.

Here’s how the company did relative to LSEG consensus:

• Earnings per share: $12.20 adjusted vs. $9.31 expected
• Revenue: $23.86 billion vs. $20.07 billion expected

Micron is benefiting from soaring demand for Nvidia graphics processing units that run generative artificial intelligence models. Each generation of Nvidia chip packs in more memory, creating a supply crunch. Micron has been working to add capacity, as have competitors Samsung and SK Hynix.

Revenue in the fiscal second quarter increased from $8.05 billion a year earlier, according to a statement.

For the current period, the company expects about $33.5 billion in revenue, up from $9.3 billion a year ago, implying growth of over 200%. Adjusted earnings per share will be about $19.15, Micron said. Analysts polled by LSEG had expected $12.05 in adjusted earnings per share on $24.3 billion in revenue.

“The step-up in our results and outlook are the outcome of an increase in memory demand driven by AI, structural supply constraints and Micron’s strong execution across the board,” CEO Sanjay Mehrotra said in prepared remarks the company issued at the time of the release.

Micron’s stock has been on a tear. The shares tripled in 2025 and have jumped another 62% year to date as of Wednesday’s close. Among the 10 most valuable U.S. tech companies, Micron is the only one that’s up. Oracle is the leading decliner, down 22%, and Microsoft and Tesla have also seen double-digit percentage drops.

“Looking at how the shares were trading going into this earnings report, I thought the biggest risk was high investor expectations,” said Hendi Susanto, a portfolio manager at Gabelli Funds, in an email. “However, fiscal third-quarter guidance is strong, well above analysts’ and my own expectations.”

Mehrotra said that AI and conventional servers are facing a “lack of adequate DRAM and NAND supply.” That refers to the company’s traditional memory products that have long been used in data centers and devices.

Memory companies have been shifting production capacity largely to high-bandwidth memory, which is embedded onto Nvidia’s latest GPUs and many other chips powering AI. Those products have higher margins.

The company’s GAAP gross margin, the profit left after accounting for the cost of goods sold, more than doubled in the past year to 74.4% from 36.8%, and increased from 56% in the prior quarter.

Net income climbed to $13.8 billion, or $12.07 per share, from $1.58 billion, or $1.41 per share, in the same quarter last year.

Micron said revenue in its cloud memory business rose more than 160% to $7.75 billion. The mobile and client unit saw even steeper growth, with revenue jumping to $7.71 billion from $2.24 billion a year ago.

Memory is typically a commodity business, which comes with lower margins than other silicon products and short-term contracts. In the past few months, memory companies have signed longer-term contracts as semiconductor makers work to ensure future capacity.

“As AI evolves, we expect compute architectures to become more memory-intensive,” the company said in an earnings presentation. “This is why we strongly believe that Micron is one of the biggest beneficiaries and enablers of AI.”

Mehrotra said on the earnings call that volume production of HBM4 for Nvidia’s Vera Rubin started in the fiscal first quarter, and next-generation HBM4e products will ramp in 2027. Nvidia has said it will utilize custom HBM in its next-generation Feynman GPU coming in 2028.

Mehrotra added that capital expenditures will “step up meaningfully” in fiscal 2027, with construction-related costs increasing by over $10 billion.

Micron is building two giant new campuses of fabrication plants in Idaho and New York to increase its memory manufacturing capacity in the U.S. Mehrotra said on the call that initial production at the Idaho site is expected by mid-2027. Micron broke ground in January on the massive $100 billion New York campus, and expects wafer output by the second half of 2028.

WATCH: How Micron is building the biggest-ever U.S. chip fab, despite China ban

Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav‘s potential payout of more than $800 million from the Paramount Skydance deal highlights an obscure tax rule originally designed to limit CEO pay.

According to SEC filings, Zaslav could collect hundreds of millions of dollars in severance and other stock awards and payments following Paramount’s acquisition of WBD. The payments include about $500 million in share awards, about $115 million in vested stock awards and $34 million in cash, according to the filings.

The deal also includes up to $335 million in potential payments to Zaslav for what’s known as the “golden parachute” excise tax. The tax was originally created by Congress in the 1980s to limit what many considered to be outsized payouts to chief executives upon a change of control or sale of their companies. The tax, of 20%, kicks in when an executive’s payout exceeds three times their typical base salary and target annual bonus.

As part of the acquisition, Paramount agreed to pay Zaslav’s excise tax if his other payments trigger the tax. The reimbursement declines over time and drops to zero if the deal closes in 2027. Paramount has said it is aiming to close the deal, pending regulatory approval, by this fall.

The Paramount board said the reimbursement would be paid by Paramount, not Warner shareholders.

Without the payment, known as a “gross up,” the board said “Mr. Zaslav would be at a substantial disadvantage in terms of excise tax exposure relative to the previously proposed transaction with Netflix,” which wouldn’t have involved a golden parachute tax.

Zaslav’s payout from the deal is expected to be around $667 million without the tax.

Management experts have said that rather than limiting pay, the golden parachute rules have instead incentivized CEOs to sell their companies and reap ever-higher rewards. The tax has also led companies, and their shareholders, to spend even more to pay the special taxes.

“Over time, especially as executive compensation radically shifted toward stock-based pay, golden parachutes have become increasingly lucrative, platinum in many cases,” Jeffrey Gordon, co-director of Columbia Law School’s Ira M. Millstein Center for Global Markets and Corporate Ownership, wrote in a paper. “Even if there is pain among those who are laid off when the firm is sold and layoffs occur, there is plainly one winner: the CEO with a golden parachute.”

Correction: Paramount Skydance is acquiring Warner Bros. Discovery. A previous version of this story mischaracterized the deal.

Wall Street banks may finally be getting a long-awaited opening to claw back market share from private credit lenders.

After a decade in which private credit lenders grew rapidly and took over a large share of financing for leveraged buyouts, signs of strain in that sector, along with easing bank rules, may now be shifting the balance.

“This is an opportune time for banks to regain market share from private credit funds,” Moody’s chief economist Mark Zandi told CNBC in an email.

“Interest rates have declined and banking regulation has eased. Private credit lenders are also struggling with the fallout from their previously aggressive lending,” he highlighted.

Private credit’s rapid ascent was fueled in part by banks’ retreat. Following the Federal Reserve’s aggressive rate hikes and the 2023 banking crisis, lenders tightened underwriting and pulled back from riskier deals. Borrowers, particularly private equity firms, increasingly turned to direct lenders offering faster execution and looser terms.

At its peak, the shift was dramatic. According to PitchBook data, banks’ share of buyout financings above $1 billion fell to just 39% in 2023, down from about 80% in the five years prior. That share has since recovered to just over 50% in 2025.

And the tide may be turning further.

Private credit is facing mounting challenges. Years of aggressive lending are starting to backfire, as higher interest rates make it harder for heavily indebted borrowers to repay loans and increase default risks. Investor demand for liquidity is also rising, with some clients seeking to pull money after years of locking up capital.

Moody’s Zandi expects the sector to “experience more credit problems in the coming months,” citing fallout from geopolitical tensions, higher borrowing costs and structural pressures in industries such as software. Consumer and healthcare borrowers may also come under strain.

Blackstone and Ares, for example, were among 33 lenders that reportedly provided about $5 billion in financing to back investment firm Thoma Bravo’s acquisition of logistics company WWEX Group, underscoring how private credit firms can still fund large buyout deals even as banks begin to re-enter the market.

Pitchbook’s global head of credit and U.S. private equity Marina Lukatsky noted that the expected rebound in buyouts and dealmaking has yet to materialize this year, as uncertainty around trade policy, interest rates and geopolitics has slowed activity. With fewer deals taking place, demand for financing has declined across both banks and private credit.

For banks to make a meaningful comeback, borrowing costs in syndicated loans, which are large loans arranged by banks and funded by a group of lenders, need to become more competitive, she added. Additionally, large buyout activity needs to pick up, and the broader economic outlook needs to improve.

Crucially, private credit retains structural advantages that are difficult for banks to replicate, including speed, certainty of execution and flexible conditions, which some borrowers may continue to value in volatile markets, noted some experts.

That said, a comeback is on the cards.

“The tug of war is just starting,” said Jeffrey Hooke, senior lecturer in finance at Johns Hopkins Carey Business School 

“The rules have been relaxed, so it’s only natural that banks want to get back some of their market share in private credit.”

FedEx on Thursday reported strong fiscal third-quarter results that beat Wall Street’s expectations.

The company also raised its guidance for fiscal 2026, projecting revenue growth of 6% to 6.5% compared with analyst estimates of up 5.6%.

Shares of FedEx rose roughly 9% in extended trading.

Here’s how the company performed in the fiscal third quarter, compared with what analysts were expecting, according to LSEG:

• Earnings per share: $5.25 adjusted vs. $4.09 expected
• Revenue: $24 billion vs. $23.43 billion

For the quarter, FedEx reported adjusted operating income of $1.68 billion, beating estimates of $1.39 billion. It reported net income of $1.06 billion, or $4.41 a share, up from $909 million, or $3.76 a share, a year ago. Adjusted for spin-off costs and other one-time items, FedEx reported EPS of $5.25.

The company also raised its fiscal 2026 adjusted EPS expectations, now projecting earnings of $19.30 to $20.10 per share compared with previous guidance of between $17.80 and $19 a share.

“Team FedEx delivered another quarter of strong financial results and excellent service for our customers, powered by disciplined operational execution, the resilience of our global network, and the accelerating impact of our advanced digital solutions,” CEO Raj Subramaniam said in a statement.

The company previously said it expected roughly $1 billion in cost reductions from its “Network 2.0” initiative, which is focused on optimizing efficiency of its package processes by leveraging automation and artificial intelligence. FedEx now expects those savings to exceed $1 billion.

FedEx said its freight business, FedEx Freight, remains on track to be spun off into a separate publicly traded company on June 1.

Subramaniam said on a call with analysts that the company expects “modest” headwinds from disruptions from the Iran war and that the Middle East is a “relatively small part” of total revenue.

Investors may want to take a step back as stocks swing amid rising geopolitical tensions.

DBi’s Andrew Beer suggests the market’s crystal ball is broken.

“It’s not normal for big markets to move as much as they are right now,” the firm’s managing member told CNBC’s “ETF Edge” this week. “Something is deeply wrong in the market’s ability to forecast the state of the world… The only thing we can all do as investors is: This is the moment to plan and to prepare for the worst. You hope for the best.”

Beer, who has spent more than three decades in the hedge fund industry, thinks it’s remarkable the number of stresses on the financial system over the past 12 to18 months hasn’t caused things to spin out of control.

“You just you have more geopolitical risks stacked on top of each other today [and] more economic risk factors than I remember at any time in my career,” he added.

Beer urges investors to ask themselves how they would act if a 2008 or 2022 market downturn happens again.

“These financial assets are, they’re an investment, but they’re also what you need to survive, to live on, to retire, and so it’s the very real human side of it that I hope people will focus on,” he added.

According to Beer, investing like it’s 2025 could turn into regret.

“The best thing to do in 2025 was just turn off your computer beginning of the year and come back at the end of the year, and you’ve made money, your stocks and your bonds and everything else,” he said. “It won’t continue like that. We will go through a more difficult period.”

Recent moves in gold, silver, bitcoin and crude oil underscore how difficult it has become for investors to calibrate portfolios, especially as sharp reversals unfold over short periods of time, according to Beer.

“No one has a playbook for that,” said Beer, who is also watching for signs of strain in private credit, insurance company portfolios and other corners of the market where unusual stress could begin to spread.

NovaDius Wealth Management’s Nate Geraci highlighted exchange-traded funds that are designed to offer portfolio protection — particularly managed futures ETFs.

“This is absolutely something that is a longer-term allocation, and I almost view it as portfolio insurance,” the firm’s president said in the same interview. “You want that insurance when something goes bad in the market, and maybe that’s stocks and bonds going down together.”

Salesforce announced this week that it executed the first steps in its debt-fueled $25 billion accelerated stock buyback plan. That’s half of the bigger $50 billion repurchase authorization approved in February.

Raising debt to repurchase stock is a move that deserves scrutiny.

After all, equity comes with neither the financial obligations nor the consequences of issuing debt. If a company misses a stock dividend payment, it doesn’t look good, and the stock will get hit. However, there are no legal consequences or claims to be filed. If a company defaults on debt, it will face legal issues and claims from bondholders.

We know why Salesforce wants to repurchase stock — management believes that last month’s brutal sell-off on AI disruption fears has made the share price attractive — because, as CEO Marc Benioff said in Monday’s press release: “We are so confident in the future of Salesforce.” (Salesforce insiders are also buying. Board member and Williams-Sonoma CEO Laura Alber purchased about $500,000 worth of Salesforce stock on Thursday, and David Kirk, also a director and former chief scientist at Nvidia, picked up roughly $500,000 worth of Salesforce stock on Wednesday.)

So, why is Salesforce issuing debt to buy back stock? Part of it may be that Benioff and company want to conserve cash. But mainly, it comes down to the cost of equity versus the cost of debt. CNBC Investing Club Reporter Paulina Likos and I actually touched on this concept briefly in a recent video about discounted cash flow valuation modeling. While the video was more focused on terminal value, we did cover the concept of a discounted rate, or the required rate of return an investor demands for investing in a given security. We noted that individual investors can and should use whatever rate they deem appropriate for the risk they are considering.

For companies on Wall Street, however, the discount rate is often their own “weighted average cost of capital,” or WACC. The WACC is the weighted average of the cost of debt and equity required to fund the company.

(Jim Cramer’s Charitable Trust is long CRM. See here for a full list of the stocks.)

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