Category: 3. Business

US car buyers are showing a surge in interest in electric vehicles after Donald Trump’s decision to attack Iran helped cause a major jump in gasoline prices.

The cost to refuel a vehicle in the US is at its highest level in nearly three years, with the average national price of gas standing at $3.90 a gallon on Friday.

This increase has been driven by the rising global cost of oil in the wake of the US and Israel’s bombing of Iran, a major oil producer. The conflict has resulted in the strait of Hormuz, a vital waterway that conveys around a fifth of the world’s oil, being shut off by Iran.

Drivers in the US have responded to this situation with a surge of fresh interest in EVs, which do not require gas and do not emit the pollution that is dangerously overheating the planet. Searches for electric car models are up by 20% since the attack on Iran started three weeks ago, according to CarEdge, a car-buying platform.

“You saw that within 48 hours of the war starting a spike started – it is directly connected to that news,” said Justin Fischer, an automotive analyst at CarEdge. “If we see these higher gas pries dragging on for a month or more we will see bigger and bigger numbers.”

The rise in gas prices is “at the forefront of buyers minds right now, they are thinking about how do they avoid these fluctuations,” said Jessica Caldwell, head of insights at Edmunds, which has also recorded a jump in the amount of online research activity into EVs by people looking for a new or used car.

“Gas isn’t something you can hide from, it’s right in your face, you see the cost as you fill up each time,” Caldwell added. “It’s a conversational point for a lot of people, too. I live in Los Angeles and there are a lot of memes being sent around by EV drivers on how they are happily watching other people being worried about the gas price right now.”

It’s currently unclear if the new interest in EVs will endure and how it will translate into market share. The US lags behind many other wealthy countries in electric car sales and charging infrastructure, with sales badly hit last year by a Republican spending bill that phased out Joe Biden-era incentives to purchase non-polluting cars.

Trump has also rolled back regulations governing the fuel efficiency and pollution emissions of new cars, helping prompt major automakers to focus even further on the hulking, gas-guzzling SUVs and pick-ups that now dominate US roads. Ford, Nissan and Honda have all recently dropped or scaled back their EV models in the US.

But for people on lower incomes who are most affected by the gas price increase, used EVs are becoming an attractive option. Used Teslas, Chevy Equinoxes and Nissan Leafs are all now becoming affordable to many Americans, Caldwell said.

“You can get a fairly decent used EV for under $25,000, which is pretty decent considering what the new vehicles sell for,” she said. “We are now in an era where there are desirable, inexpensive EVs. I expect they will be snapped up now.’

Hybrid cars, such as Toyota’s Camry and Rav4, are also set to do well among Americans concerned about going fully electric and being stuck without a charging point, Fischer said. “I think hybrids will jump out of the water, we will see a huge spike in sales there,” he said.

New EVs remain expensive compared to gas cars, with EV owners a disproportionately wealthy slice of the US population. Just 7.8% of all car sales last year were electric, down slightly on 2024.

The Trump administration has sought to further stall EV growth by halting separate fuel efficiency standards in California. Last week, amid surging gas prices, Pam Bondi, the US attorney general, said the administration is suing California over “oppressive, expensive electric vehicle mandates (that) drive up costs for American consumers and violate federal law”.

However, electric cars are making major headway in the rest of the world. EVs account for one in five new sales globally, with some countries almost eliminating the need for new gas cars – in January, just seven traditional petrol cars were sold in Norway.

“American automakers realize EVs are definitely the long-term strategy but they can make a lot of money in the short term with SUVs and pick-up trucks,” said Caldwell.

“A lot of the technology for EVs is developed in the US but China is very good at scaling and making them inexpensive. The policy changing every four years in the White House doesn’t help, either – car companies can’t operate like that.”

Don Francis, president of the EV Club of the South, said many people are still hesitant to purchase an EV due to concerns about their range. “There is interest but people aren’t being pushed over the edge yet,” he said. “There may be a tipping point, though, if these gas prices remain high.”

Francis said that he has two sons in the military and wants the US to achieve “energy independence” to avoid conflicts related to oil. But Francis doesn’t fault Trump, who he voted for three times, for the war and its ramifications.

“My one greatest concern has been if an Islamic terrorist organization got its hands on nuclear weapon we will be in serious trouble,” he said. “Do I like everything (Trump’s) done? No. Do I like most of what he’s done? Yes.”

United States law enforcement this week took down the Aisuru, Kimwolf, JackSkid, and Mossad botnets, a slate of cybercriminal tools that have infected more than 3 million devices around the world, including many inside home networks, and have been used to carry out record-breaking cyberattacks. Meanwhile, hundreds of millions of iPhones are currently vulnerable to takeover by a new tool called DarkSword that Russian hackers used to steal victims’ data.

Customer service calls and chats with the Sears Home Services AI bot Samantha were exposed and publicly accessible until a researcher reported the situation—revealing personal details from calls and chats, including, in some cases, hours of extra audio seemingly recorded after customers thought a call had ended. And WIRED reviewed dozens of Telegram channels containing job listings for “AI face models.” The people who land the jobs are mostly women and are likely being used as the face of AI scams to steal victims’ money.

Meta recently announced that it will eliminate end-to-end encryption protections for Instagram Direct Messages on May 8, citing low adoption of the feature. The company had long promised the protection as a default for Instagram chat, and experts fear that the bait and switch could set a dangerous precedent in the tech industry. In other Meta encryption news, though, Signal creator Moxie Marlinspike announced this week that he will collaborate with the tech giant to integrate his encrypted AI platform Confer into Meta AI in some form.

And there’s more. Each week, we round up the security and privacy news we didn’t cover in depth ourselves. Click the headlines to read the full stories. And stay safe out there.

Imagine trying to explain this one to your boss: You can’t get to work because your court-mandated breathalyzer won’t let you start the vehicle—not because you’ve been drinking, you swear, but because that alcohol-vapor-detecting device has been disabled by a cyberattack on the company that makes it.

Intoxalock, an automotive breathalyzer maker that says it’s used daily by 150,000 drivers across the US, this week reported that it had been the target of a cyberattack, resulting in its “systems currently experiencing downtime,” according to an announcement posted to its website. Meanwhile, drivers that use the breathalyzers have reported being stranded due to the devices’ inability to connect to the company’s services. “Our vehicles are giant paperweights right now through no fault of ours,” one wrote on Reddit. “I’m being held accountable at work and feel completely helpless.”

The lockouts appear to be the result of Intoxalock’s breathalyzers needing periodic calibrations that require a connection to the company’s servers. Drivers who are due for a calibration and can’t perform one due to the company’s downtime have been stuck, though the company now states on its website that it’s offering 10-day extensions on those calibrations due to its cybersecurity disruption, as well as towing services in some cases. In the meantime, Intoxalock hasn’t explained what sort of cyberattack it’s facing or whether hackers have obtained any of the company’s user data.

Back in March 2023, FBI director Christopher Wray confirmed, for the first time, that the agency had purchased US phone location data. While the FBI had previously paid for phone data from commercial data brokers—instead of seeking a warrant—it had stopped doing so, Wray said. “That’s not been active for some time,” Wray claimed. Fast-forward three years, and the FBI is once again purchasing location data that can be used to track Americans.

At a Senate hearing on Wednesday, FBI director Kash Patel confirmed that the agency is buying “commercially available information” that he claimed was “consistent with the Constitution” and other laws. “It has led to some valuable intelligence for us,” Patel said. The practice involves the FBI buying information from commercial data brokers, which sell huge volumes of data, including phone location information, that is collected by advertising technology baked into apps.

In a statement to Sea Shepherd, dm confirmed that it has stopped using krill oil in all its private-label products and will discontinue sourcing all krill-based products across its entire range, in alignment with its sustainability commitments.

As one of Europe’s largest drugstore chains, dm operates more than 4,000 retail stores across the continent, making it the largest drugstore retailer to date to drop the sale of krill products.

The Sea Shepherd vessel Allankay is currently in Antarctica, facilitating the work of an independent team of scientists, studying the impact of the krill fishery on whale populations. Media captured by Sea Shepherd has sent shockwaves through the health and wellness sector, and dm is the latest drugstore that has acted on this evidence and withdrawn from the krill market. 

The decision follows constructive dialogue with Sea Shepherd and heightened scrutiny of the Antarctic krill fishery brought about by four consecutive Sea Shepherd expeditions to the Southern Ocean. During these campaigns, Sea Shepherd routinely documented industrial supertrawlers operating among foraging whale pods inside a proposed marine protected area. Photographic evidence gathered at sea was submitted to dm-drogeri markt, alongside concerns about weakening regulations governing the rapidly expanding krill fishery.

Krill are a keystone species in the Southern Ocean, converting energy captured by phytoplankton into a food source that sustains whales, penguins, seals, and countless other species. When krill populations decline, the entire Antarctic ecosystem is destabilized. Scientific evidence suggests that krill densities around the Antarctic Peninsula — where much of the fishing occurs — may have declined by as much as 80 percent since the 1970s.

Last year, a key conservation measure requiring krill fishing activity to be distributed across a wider geographic area — in order to reduce the risk of localized depletion — was not renewed. As a result, fishing effort has become increasingly concentrated in biodiversity hotspots, accelerating exploitation and intensifying pressure on Antarctic wildlife.

This combination of evidence gathered at sea and sustained advocacy on land is now beginning to shift market forces.

In email correspondence with Sea Shepherd, Kerstin Erbe, Managing Director of dm-drogerie markt responsible for private labels and sustainability, stated:

“As a retailer with a clear commitment to sustainability, we want to play an active and positive role in shaping the future. The wishes and needs of our customers are at the heart of everything we do. Against this backdrop, we decided last year to stop using krill oil in our dm private-label products. Additionally, we have removed krill oil products from other manufacturers from our range. These products are currently being sold off. This decision aligns with our understanding of sustainable business practices and our conviction that we should offer a carefully curated and forward-looking product range.”

The announcement by dm comes just months after Holland & Barrett, a leading health and wellness retailer in the United Kingdom, declared its intention to fully exit the krill category by April 2026. It is the first major retailer in the United Kingdom to do so. The company also introduced the Antarctic Krill Pledge together with Sea Shepherd Global —  a co-authored call to action encouraging retailers to end sales of all krill-based products, and a commitment not to reintroduce them in the future.

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• Wondering if Expedia Group at around US$235 per share is still priced for opportunity or already assuming the best case? This article breaks down what the current market price might be implying.

• The stock has had a mixed run recently, with a 3.0% return over the last 7 days, 15.4% over the past month, a 16.9% decline year to date, and a 36.4% return over the last year, set against a much stronger 162.4% return over 3 years and 34.7% over 5 years.

• Recent headlines around online travel demand, competition among booking platforms, and shifting consumer travel patterns have kept Expedia Group in the spotlight. This backdrop helps explain why the share price has seen meaningful moves across shorter and longer timeframes as investors reassess risk and opportunity.

• Expedia Group currently has a valuation score of 3/6, which puts it in the middle of the pack and sets up a closer look at how metrics like P/E, cash flows, and assets compare with an even more complete way of thinking about value that appears at the end of this article.

Expedia Group delivered 36.4% returns over the last year. See how this stacks up to the rest of the Hospitality industry.

A DCF model estimates what a business could be worth by projecting its future cash flows and then discounting those projections back to today, using a required return rate to reflect risk and the time value of money.

For Expedia Group, the model uses a 2 Stage Free Cash Flow to Equity approach. The latest twelve month Free Cash Flow is about $3.03b. Projections, which combine analyst estimates for the earlier years and Simply Wall St extrapolations thereafter, point to Free Cash Flow of $3.29b in 2026 and $3.81b by 2030. Further estimates extend out to 2035, remaining in the low to mid single digit billions in dollar terms.

When all those projected cash flows are discounted back and summed, the model arrives at an estimated intrinsic value of about $507.13 per share. Compared with the current share price of around $235, this implies the stock is 53.6% undervalued according to this DCF framework.

Result: UNDERVALUED

Our Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) analysis suggests Expedia Group is undervalued by 53.6%. Track this in your watchlist or portfolio, or discover 52 more high quality undervalued stocks.

Head to the Valuation section of our Company Report for more details on how we arrive at this Fair Value for Expedia Group.

For profitable companies like Expedia Group, the P/E ratio is a useful way to gauge what you are paying for each dollar of current earnings. This is often how the market anchors day to day pricing decisions.

What counts as a “fair” P/E usually reflects how quickly earnings are expected to grow and how risky those earnings appear. Higher growth or lower perceived risk can support a higher multiple, while slower growth or higher risk tends to justify a lower one.

Expedia Group currently trades on a P/E of 22.27x. That sits above the Hospitality industry average of 20.98x and above the peer group average of 16.58x. Simply Wall St also provides a proprietary “Fair Ratio” of 31.02x for Expedia Group, which is the P/E that would be expected given factors such as its earnings growth profile, industry, profit margins, market capitalization and risk characteristics.

This Fair Ratio aims to be more tailored than a simple comparison with peers or the broad industry because it adjusts for company specific traits rather than assuming all firms deserve the same multiple. Since Expedia Group’s current P/E of 22.27x is below the Fair Ratio of 31.02x, the shares screen as undervalued on this metric.

Result: UNDERVALUED

P/E ratios tell one story, but what if the real opportunity lies elsewhere? Start investing in legacies, not executives. Discover our 20 top founder-led companies.

Earlier it was mentioned that there is an even better way to understand valuation, so this is where Narratives come in as a simple way for you to attach a clear story about Expedia Group to numbers like fair value, future revenue, earnings and margins, then see how that story translates into a price you think is reasonable.

On Simply Wall St’s Community page, Narratives are ready made tools that connect three pieces for you: what you believe about the business, the financial forecast that belief implies, and the resulting fair value per share, which you can then compare to the current market price to help decide if the stock looks expensive, cheap, or about right for your own view.

These Narratives are updated automatically when new information such as earnings or news arrives, and that is why you can see very different fair values for the same Expedia Group share. These range from a more optimistic community Narrative around US$366.92, or even US$366.92 plus that leans into AI efficiency, B2B strength and higher margins, through to a more cautious Narrative closer to US$225 that focuses on higher customer acquisition costs, direct bookings and margin pressure.

For Expedia Group, here are previews of two leading Expedia Group Narratives:

🐂 Expedia Group Bull Case

Fair value: US$345.94 per share

Implied discount to this fair value: 31.9% undervalued

Assumed annual revenue growth: 6.45%

• Frames Expedia Group as moving beyond basic bookings toward a full travel ecosystem focused on flexibility, authenticity, and experience led trips.

• Highlights Vrbo and longer stays, bundled trips, and cross selling across brands as ways to deepen engagement and support higher value travel spending.

• Emphasizes technology, data, and AI as tools to improve personalization, conversion, and margins while using global scale to stay competitive.

🐻 Expedia Group Bear Case

Fair value: US$225.00 per share

Implied downside to this fair value: 4.5% overvalued

Assumed annual revenue growth: 6.11%

• Focuses on pressures from higher customer acquisition costs, direct bookings with hotels and airlines, and lower commissions that may weigh on margins.

• Builds in assumptions for steady revenue and margin improvement but at valuation multiples that are lower than recent P/E levels and below some peers.

• Flags marketing intensity, regulatory costs, and competition for traffic as reasons the current market price could be baking in expectations that are hard to meet.

If you want to see how other investors are connecting these stories to the numbers, you can review the full range of community narratives, compare the fair values they produce, and decide which version of Expedia Group’s future feels closest to your own view.

Curious how numbers become stories that shape markets? Explore Community Narratives

Do you think there’s more to the story for Expedia Group? Head over to our Community to see what others are saying!

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.

Companies discussed in this article include EXPE.

Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com