Category: 3. Business

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According to Reuters, spot gold traded at $3,997.79 per ounce around 4:22 p.m. Eastern Time on October 31, down 0.7% from the previous session. On the COMEX exchange, December gold futures fell 5.7%, marking the biggest single-day drop in 12 years.

Fed’s Hawkish stance pressures gold

Much of the recent weakness comes from comments by Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, who signaled that interest rate cuts are not guaranteed in December. Powell’s hawkish tone reduced expectations for a near-term rate cut, saying it is “not a done deal.”

When U.S. interest rates stay high, investors often prefer the dollar over gold, as gold does not offer interest earnings. This shift has put downward pressure on the precious metal after months of gains.

Limited gains from US-China summit

At the same time, traders remain uncertain about the outcome of the US-China summit held in Busan on October 30. The two sides announced limited progress, including a 10 percentage-point reduction in U.S. tariffs on Chinese goods and a one-year delay in China’s restrictions on rare earth exports. Still, experts say the agreement did not fully resolve trade tensions.

Chinese President Xi Jinping later stressed the importance of a “multilateral trade system” at the APEC summit, a remark seen by analysts as a subtle warning to Washington.

Also read: Gold prices back above $4,000 after plunging on easing safe-haven demand

Temporary stability in relations

Bloomberg reported that while the Busan meeting helped reduce short-term risks, it only “bought time” for both nations to adjust their economic ties. Relations, it said, are likely to remain “stable only for a few months.”

Analysts predict further adjustment

Market analysts expect the gold price adjustment to continue. Robert Rennie, an analyst at Westpac Bank, said that “hawkish rate-cut expectations, a US-China trade truce, and large outflows from gold exchange-traded funds (ETFs)” are all weighing on sentiment. He warned that gold could drop further, possibly reaching $3,750 per ounce.

Despite some support from ongoing global uncertainty, experts agree that gold’s sharp rally has entered a pause phase, as investors adopt a wait-and-see approach on both the Federal Reserve’s next move and the true impact of the US-China trade truce.

FAQs

1. Why are gold prices declining despite being near $4,000?

Gold prices are falling due to a strong U.S. dollar and cautious comments from Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, who signaled that an interest rate cut in December is not guaranteed. Higher rates make non-yielding assets like gold less attractive.

2. How did the US-China trade talks affect gold prices?

The US-China summit in Busan brought only partial progress, such as a small tariff reduction and a delay in rare earth export controls. Since major trade issues remain unresolved, traders are taking a wait-and-see approach, limiting gold’s upward momentum.

3. What is the gold price outlook for the coming months?

Analysts expect gold to remain in an adjustment phase. With hawkish Fed policies and reduced demand from ETFs, prices could drop further, potentially to around $3,750 per ounce, unless new geopolitical tensions boost safe-haven demand.

The delivery firm DPD has been accused of “revenge” sackings after workers spoke out against a plan to cut thousands of pounds from their earnings, including their Christmas bonus.

The company, which reported pre-tax profits of nearly £200m last year and plays a significant role in the festive rush to have gifts and parcels delivered, has even threatened to withhold money from some staff to pay for the cost of replacing them, the Guardian has learned.

DPD confirmed it had dismissed workers after an estimated 1,500 self-employed drivers chose not to take on any work for a three-day period in protest at the plans.

It emerged earlier this month that the company had told workers it planned to cut 65p from the rate it pays for most of its deliveries on 29 September.

Drivers said the cut, which came to as much as £25 a day, and the loss of a £500 Christmas bonus, was likely to add up to more than £6,000 a year for each worker – and as much as £8,000 for those who take on a lot more deliveries over Christmas.

Many drivers indicated they were choosing not to work for the company for three days. After a meeting with workers’ representatives, the firm agreed to defer the rate-cut until after Christmas, but insisted it would still be implemented. Within weeks of the meeting, drivers have said, management have started to move against people they deemed “ringleaders”.

“Now that we have shown them up publicly they’re just trying to assert dominance and trying to control the free will of drivers they don’t want to employ,” said one of those let go, Dean Hawkins.

He was involved in organising the action and was told by a DPD manager he had been fired for allegedly breaching a gagging clause in his contract. “It’s a revenge act to assert dominance for us humiliating them,” he said.

A DPD spokesperson said: “We can confirm that we have terminated our relationship with eight supplier companies following a breach of contract.”

DPD Group UK’s highest-earning director was paid nearly £1.5m, including bonuses, last year, representing a pay rise of more than £90,000 from 2023.

The eight cases will probably affect many more individual workers because DPD’s pool of self-employed drivers includes individual contractors and those who run fleets of vans for the company.

One of the latter group was Jose Alves, whose contracts were terminated when management said he had breached a clause prohibiting involvement in “any newsworthy event or story or anything which would or in [DPD’s] opinion could damage [the firm’s] interests or reputation or any part of [its] business”.

Alves has asked the firm to provide evidence, but thus far has received none.

He was also told that DPD reserved the right to keep some or all of the £16,000 in deposits he had handed over when his contracts started. DPD said it would have “incurred costs by spending time sharing with you the benefit of our knowledge, skill and experience”, and that it would “also spend time and money finding a replacement for you”. “If that happens, we may keep your deposit to cover these costs,” it said.

DPD said: “With any case of supplier breach of contract, it is our normal procedure to hold on to the deposit for up to 30 days to allow for vehicles to be returned and assessed for damage. Unless there is damage, we would expect to return the deposit in full and within the agreed timescale.”

Hawkins was also dismissed over claims he had breached a gagging clause. He was shown a Facebook post from around the time the rate cuts emerged, in which he wrote: “Any threats of a strike or legal action, you’re terminated, DPD don’t allow you to stand up for yourself or have a voice … This is why so many drivers across the UK are looking into striking, because God forbid we ask for a fair wage to support our families.”

He said his dismissal was unfair because it was DPD – not he – who created the “newsworthy event” and that if DPD’s interests or reputation had been damaged it was the firm’s own actions that were responsible.

Asked if this was a reasonable view to take, the leading employment law barrister and Labour peer John Hendy KC said: “Absolutely. It’s their action which has damaged their reputation, not the action of those who’ve reports of it.”

Hendy called for a change in the law to protect drivers such as those fired by DPD. “The protection against dismissal or detriment for trade union activities only applies to the activities of an independent trade union,” he said, adding that the drivers may not enjoy such a status.

“This reveals a deficiency in the existing legislation which the government should consider fulfilling. Penalising workers for making representations against detrimental changes to their terms and conditions is, quite simply, outrageous. It should be unlawful.”

The DGCCRF watchdog said in a statement that the “description and categorisation” of the items on Shein’s website “make it difficult to doubt the child pornography nature of the content”.

Shortly after the statement, Shein announced that the dolls in question had been withdrawn from its platform and that it had launched an internal inquiry.

On its website, the Le Parisien daily published a photo of one of the dolls sold on the platform, accompanied by an explicitly sexual caption.

The dolls measure around 80 centimetres (30 inches) in height. In the photo, it was pictured holding a teddy bear.

“Imagine a child randomly clicking on and coming across these products while browsing the site looking for a doll,” DGCCRF official Alice Vilcot-Dutarte was quoted as saying by Le Parisien.

The news comes in the wake of Shein’s announcement in October that it intended to set up shop in a prestigious department store in central Paris — its first physical outlet.

Its outlet is due to open on Wednesday at BHV Marais, an iconic building that has stood across from Paris City Hall since 1856.

That decision provoked outrage among other clients of the upmarket store, BHV Marais, with some top fashion brands pulling their products from its shelves.

Three fines in France

Shein, which was originally founded in China, has faced consistent criticism over working conditions at its factories and the environmental impact of its ultra-fast fashion business model.

Yet the company, now headquartered in Singapore, has seen its share value skyrocket while overtaking many traditional fixtures of high street shopping in recent years.

The DGCCRF warned that “the dissemination, via an electronic communications network, of child pornography is punishable by up to seven years’ imprisonment and a fine of 100,000 euros ($116,000)”.

It said it had reported the case to French prosecutors and to Arcom, France’s online and broadcasting regulator.

France has already fined Shein three times in 2025 for a total of 191 million euros.

Those were imposed for failing to comply with online cookie legislation, false advertising, misleading information and not declaring the presence of plastic microfibres in its products.

The European Commission is also investigating Shein over risks linked to illegal products, while EU lawmakers have approved legislation aimed at curbing the environmental impact of fast fashion.

© 2025 AFP

France’s anti-fraud unit said on Saturday it had reported Asian e-commerce giant Shein for selling what it described as “sex dolls with a childlike appearance”.

The DGCCRF watchdog said in a statement that the “description and categorisation” of the items on Shein’s website “make it difficult to doubt the child pornography nature of the content”.

Shortly after the statement, Shein announced that the dolls in question had been withdrawn from its platform and that it had launched an internal inquiry.

On its website, the Le Parisien daily published a photo of one of the dolls sold on the platform, accompanied by an explicitly sexual caption.

The dolls measure around 80 centimetres (30 inches) in height. In the photo, it was pictured holding a teddy bear.

“Imagine a child randomly clicking on and coming across these products while browsing the site looking for a doll,” DGCCRF official Alice Vilcot-Dutarte was quoted as saying by Le Parisien.

The news comes in the wake of Shein’s announcement in October that it intended to set up shop in a prestigious department store in central Paris — its first physical outlet.

That decision provoked outrage among other clients of the up-market store, BHV Marais, with some top fashion brands pulling their products from its shelves.

Shein, which was originally founded in China, has faced consistent criticism over working conditions at its factories and the environmental impact of its ultra-fast fashion business model.

Yet the company, now headquartered in Singapore, has seen its share value skyrocket while overtaking many traditional fixtures of high street shopping in recent years.

The DGCCRF warned that “the dissemination, via an electronic communications network, of child pornography is punishable by up to seven years’ imprisonment and a fine of 100,000 euros ($116,000).

France has already fined Shein three times in 2025 for a total of 191 million euros.

Those were imposed for failing to comply with online cookie legislation, false advertising, misleading information and not declaring the presence of plastic microfibres in its products.

The European Commission is also investigating Shein over risks linked to illegal products, while EU lawmakers have approved legislation aimed at curbing the environmental impact of fast fashion.

mpa/sbk/jj

Recent updates from major research firms have put Lumentum Holdings (LITE) in the spotlight, following optimism around the company’s technology and increased demand from data center and telecom markets. Investor interest has ticked upwards even though some ongoing risks remain.

See our latest analysis for Lumentum Holdings.

Lumentum Holdings has seen impressive momentum in recent months, with a share price return of over 135% year-to-date as enthusiasm for its technology builds. The one-year total shareholder return is even more striking at 208%, signaling both strong recent gains and enduring investor confidence despite sector risks.

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But with the stock already soaring and analysts divided on future gains, the big question is whether Lumentum Holdings is still trading below its true value or if the market has already priced in the next wave of growth.

The most widely followed narrative signals Lumentum Holdings is trading well above its estimated fair value of $163.85, compared with a last close price of $201.56. With a valuation that overshoots analyst expectations, investors appear to be betting on a far more optimistic scenario than consensus projections suggest.

Rapid acceleration of demand for advanced optical components due to global AI, cloud computing, and hyperscale data center growth is positioning Lumentum for sustained top-line expansion. This is evidenced by 67% year-over-year growth in Cloud & Networking and marked increases in EML and laser shipments, directly supporting revenue growth and operating leverage.

Read the complete narrative.

Want to know what’s fueling such a bold premium? The narrative is betting on dramatic jumps in revenue, big margin improvements, and future profits scaling to aggressive new highs. Wondering which metrics push this price target so far above the rest? The biggest surprises lie in the growth and valuation assumptions powering this view.

Result: Fair Value of $163.85 (OVERVALUED)

Have a read of the narrative in full and understand what’s behind the forecasts.

However, risks such as heavy reliance on a few cloud customers or unexpected delays in manufacturing expansion could quickly challenge the current positive outlook.

Find out about the key risks to this Lumentum Holdings narrative.

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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 LITE.

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Those concerns linger even as fast chargers multiply. More than 12,000 have been added within a mile of U.S. highways and interstates just this year, an Associated Press analysis of data from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory shows. That’s about a fifth of quick-charging ports now in operation.

Yet a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research and the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago finds about 4 in 10 of U.S. adults still point to range and charging time as “major” reasons they wouldn’t buy an EV. That’s significant considering only about 2 in 10 Americans say they would be “extremely” or “very” likely to make a new or used electric vehicle their next car purchase.

That’s a perception Daphne Dixon, leader of a nonprofit that advocates for clean transportation, has been trying to fight. She has taken a coast-to-coast road trip in an EV each year since 2022. Always sporting hot pink and waving a bubblegum checkered race flag to match, Dixon posts snapshots of the charging experience along her 3,000-mile (4,828-kilometer) route, hoping to “bust” Americans’ anxiety about range and charging.

Dixon said she has repeatedly found that “range anxiety is stuck in people’s heads,” even though the gap in price between gas and electric cars is closing and more chargers are being installed.

“A lot of people still fear that there’s not enough chargers, but what they’re not seeing is that chargers are being put in every single day,” she said.

Fast chargers expand, but worries remain

Traveling on Interstate 80, the longest American interstate, a driver will encounter few stretches that are more than 10 miles (16 kilometers) away from a fast charger, all the way from New York City to Des Moines. Out West, coverage is spottier. But the miles on I-80 covered by fast chargers has increased by 44% since 2021, the AP analysis found.

Drivers would have a similar experience on other major roads. Nearly 70% of the combined length of the 10 longest interstates is within 10 miles of a fast charger — up from about half just five years ago.

Installing fast chargers is considered critical to supporting EV adoption because they can refill a fully electric vehicle in 20 minutes to an hour. Compare that to home chargers, which often take four to 10 hours.

In Dixon’s home state of Connecticut, drivers still fret about charging. In the fall, Dixon takes a shorter trip along Route 7, a scenic drive full of river bends and antiques barns. Fast chargers are scarce along the route, as they still are in many rural parts of the U.S.

The only plug in Kent, a town about 50 miles (80 kilometers) north of Norwalk, is an aging machine at town hall that’s long been defunct, said Lynn Mellis Worthington, chair of the town’s sustainability team.

Connecticut’s state government plans to use $1.3 million in federal funds to install eight fast-charging plugs at two stations in New Milford, about 15 miles (24 kilometers) down Route 7 from Kent. The Trump administration sought to cancel those federal funds earlier this year, before reinstating them in August after multiple states sued over the halt of the $5 billion program. Congress had approved the funds in 2021under the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.

Mellis Worthington and her husband considered an EV when they replaced their 15-year-old Pontiac Vibe this year. She said prices for cars with enough range to make her husband feel comfortable with his commute were still too high. So despite her high hopes of going full electric, they went with a hybrid instead.

“Our next car will definitely be an EV,” she said.

Vehicle price still top barrier for buyers

While many are concerned about charging, price is still the reason U.S. adults most commonly gave when asked why they would not buy one, the AP-NORC/EPIC poll shows. Only about 2 in 10 U.S. adults said the high cost is “not a reason” for holding off on an EV purchase.

Electric vehicles held about 8% of the U.S. market share in 2024, up from 1.9% five years prior, according to data from Atlas Public Policy.

In the long run, owning an EV may be cheaper due to lower maintenance costs and the lower price of electricity compared to fuel in many places, said Daniel Wilkins, a policy analyst at Atlas Public Policy.

Still, “everyday Americans are focused more on the sticker price upfront,” he said.

And with federal incentives expiring at the end of September, the final bill for many prospective buyers has effectively increased by $7,500 for a new EV.

Electric vehicle advocates are quick to point out the average U.S. resident drives no more than 30 miles (48 kilometers) per day, according to AAA, well within the range modern EVs offer. Most electric vehicle owners, like Bloomfield resident Jim Warner and his wife, do the majority of their charging at home.

Warner has one EV and one plug-in hybrid vehicle. He’s taken the EV, a Chevy Bolt with a roughly 250-mile (402 kilometer) range per charge, on a 400-mile (643-kilometer) trip to Maine twice since he bought it in 2022.

“The first trip, I turned the heat off. I made sure I drove 65,” Warner said. “The second time I just drove normally and had no problem.”