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Shares in big box retailer Walmart (WMT) move into focus on Tuesday after reported Monday evening that the company plans to cut hundreds of corporate roles and requests most remote workers return to offices.

The company, which is the country’s largest employer with thousands of corporate workers across the United States, will also require staff working out of smaller offices in Dallas, Atlanta, and Toronto to relocate to the retailing giant’s other central locations, such as its headquarters in Bentonville, Ark., as well as hubs in Hoboken, N.J., or Northern California, a person familiar with the matter told the .

The company will still permit part-time remote work, providing employees spend most of their time in offices, the report added.

The latest job reductions appear to form part of the retailer’s ongoing efforts to trim headcount and streamline operations.

In April last year, the company announced plans to slash more than 2,000 staff at its fulfilment centers and said it expects around 65% of its stores to be serviced by automation by the end of its 2026 fiscal year. Several months earlier, Walmart shuttered three of its tech hubs in Austin, Portland, and Carlsbad and told hundreds of staff they would need to relocate to central corporate hubs.

More recently, the retailing behemoth closed all of its 51 health clinics, abandoning its five-year push into the healthcare business, citing challenges from rising operating costs and a complex reimbursement environment. Investors will get a better read on the company’s outlook when it reports first-quarter earnings ahead of Thursday’s opening bell.

Since climbing to a new record high in early March, Walmart shares have consolidated within a narrow three-point trading range, with the price remaining slightly above the 50-day moving average as investors contemplate the stock’s next move. 

If the price breaks down below the range’s lower trendline, keep an eye on the $55.50 level, an area where the shares would likely find support from both a horizontal line and the 200-day moving average. Alternatively, if the price breaks above the range’s top trendline to a new all-time high (ATH), look for a potential measured move up to around $64.50. This is calculated by adding the trading range’s three-point move to the pattern's breakout area at $61.50.

Walmart shares were up 0.2% at $60.52 about two hours before the opening bell.

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Uzochukwu Davis Igboanugo, the son of businessman and founder of I.K.B Industries Limited, Chief I.K.B. Igboanugo, has been reportedly killed by a drunk driver in the United States of America.

The 32-year-old US-based Nigerian doctor was fatally injured three weeks ago while driving home from work.

The aggrieved father confirmed the tragic incident in a Facebook post on Monday, May 13.

According to his father, the accident occurred when a drunk driver, who reportedly fell asleep at the wheel while speeding on the highway, veered into incoming traffic and collided with Uzochukwu’s vehicle.

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Major U.S. equities indexes were mixed and little changed Monday to kick off a new trading week that will provide investors with a few key economic data points.

The latest monthly survey by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York released Monday showed that consumer expectations for inflation over the coming year rose in April. Inflation will likely remain in focus, with the Consumer Price Index (CPI) report set to be released on Wednesday, potentially influencing the Federal Reserve's upcoming policy moves.

The S&P 500 was essentially flat, ending the day less than 0.1% lower. The Dow slipped 0.2%, marking its first losing session following eight consecutive daily gains. Technology was the strongest-performing sector, helping the Nasdaq close 0.3% higher.

Vistra Corp. (VST) shares dropped 3.5%, marking the weakest performance in the S&P 500 Monday. The electric utility stock took off last week after it became the newest constituent of the benchmark index. However, the company recently reported a year-over-year decline in revenue for the first quarter.

Shares of GE Vernova (GEV), the energy division that completed its spinoff from the GE conglomerate in April, slid 3.4%. Over the weekend, former president and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump promised to issue an executive order restricting offshore wind energy should he return to the White House. GE Vernova is a key provider of wind turbine technologies and services.

Shares of precision instrument manufacturer Mettler Toledo (MTD) fell 3.2%. Monday's losses reversed a portion of the stock's gains Friday following a strong quarterly earnings report. The maker of scales and other analytical devices beat quarterly sales and profit estimates, driven by strength in its laboratory segment, but its revenue and net income dropped compared with the year-ago period.

Incyte (INCY) shares posted the strongest gains in the S&P 500, jumping 8.6% after the biopharmaceutical firm announced that it would buy back $1.67 billion worth of shares in a Dutch auction tender. Incyte's CEO said the repurchase authorization reflects the firm's strong confidence in its commercial product portfolio and clinical development pipeline.

Moderna (MRNA) shares gained 7.1%, clawing back the losses posted Friday after the biotech firm said the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had delayed its approval decision on mRNA-1345, the company's vaccine against respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). The delay puts Moderna at a disadvantage versus GSK (GSK) and Pfizer (PFE), whose RSV vaccines have already received approval, but Moderna still expects a commercial launch in the third quarter of 2024. In addition, Morningstar included Moderna on a list of undervalued stocks on Monday, projecting the firm will be profitable by 2026.

Shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance (WBA) advanced 5.4% amid reports that the pharmacy giant is seeking possible buyers for its U.K.-based Boots pharmacy chain. This is not the first time that Walgreens has explored options for selling Boots—in June 2022, the company announced that it was giving up on talks to sell the unit as volatile financial markets prevented prospective buyers from making offers Walgreens would find attractive.

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President Bola Tinubu and Vice President Kashim Shettima will henceforth pay the required fees at tollgates whenever they use the nation’s airports.

The Minister of Aviation, Festus Keyamo, who disclosed this on Tuesday, May 14, said this became mandatory after the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting in Abuja on Tuesday, approved that there should be no more exemption granted to users of the airports from paying tollgate fees.

Keyamo had earlier presented a memorandum where he argued that the government was losing over 82% of the revenue it should have earned from the e-tags that provide access to the tollgates.

He explained that the memoranda had initially prescribed an exemption for only the president and the vice president before Tinubu overruled and directed that both of them should be included among those who must pay.

Briefing journalists after the FEC meeting, Keyamo regretted that Very Important Persons (VIPs) with money who should pay are those who have not been paying, noting that only poor people had been charged for using the tollgates.

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Apple (AAPL) is reportedly nearing a deal with OpenAI that would bring artificial intelligence (AI) tech to the next iPhone, strengthening its position amid the AI boom and potentially increasing competition among big tech players such as Alphabet (GOOGL) and Microsoft (MSFT).

Under the partnership, Apple would integrate the ChatGPT maker's AI tech into Apple's next iPhone, according to . The partnership could help Apple establish itself as a major benefactor of the AI era while expanding OpenAI's reach.

Wedbush analysts led by Dan Ives said they expect the partnership will affect iOS 18 and the upcoming iPhone 16 expected in September.

The partnership "will consist of an OpenAI Chatbot with exclusive features" that build upon "on-device Apple LLMs" and "cloud-powered Apple LLMs" alongside "Apple powering AI on its own high end chips," the analysts wrote.

CFRA analysts noted that "most importantly" the OpenAI deal could catalyze "a slew of new revenue streams," including increased iPhone 16 sales, subscriptions, licensing revenue, new apps, and higher advertising revenue. They wrote the "partnership would significantly boost AAPL's AI capabilities, injecting excitement across its hardware, software, and services portfolio."

The news comes shortly after Apple unveiled an iPad Pro powered by its new AI-capable M4 chip, last week, marking a key milestone in Apple's push into AI. Before the iPad announcement, the iPhone maker had been quiet about its AI initiatives unlike many of its big tech peers though the company has indicated it views the emerging tech as a source of major opportunity.

Analysts said that the partnership could be the beginning of a major Siri upgrade.

Wedbush analysts said they anticipate Apple will "build out a next level Siri technology with OpenAI that can do complex tasks for Apple users and more advanced features that will eventually be a separate monthly subscription service along with other AI features."

They noted they don't expect Apple to make an official announcement at its annual developers conference set for June 10.

CFRA analysts said that "Siri is poised to get its biggest-ever upgrade and could be marketed as potentially being the best personal assistant to consumers."

The reports come as OpenAI announced its latest AI model, GPT-4o, at an event on Monday where the company showcased ChatGPT powered by GPT-4o's voice capabilities.

The report from also indicated that the iPhone maker has been in talks with Alphabet's Google about a similar deal to use its AI model, Gemini, but has not reached an agreement.

Wedbush analysts said that they expect an Apple and OpenAI deal would be exclusive, but CFRA said it might be too early to tell.

Alphabet shares fell following the release of the report, but CFRA analyst Angelo Zino told Investopedia that the sell-off "could be premature as an OpenAI/AAPL partnership doesn’t necessarily mean that AAPL won’t strike a separate partnership with GOOGL (Gemini) for different AI capabilities tied to search."

He did underline that "it does create more long-term risk to that search business if AAPL’s ties with OpenAI/Microsoft get stronger."

Microsoft has established itself as an early leader in the AI boom with its partnership with OpenAI through multi-billion dollar investments.

While Microsoft is positioned to share some of OpenAI's gains, the deal could have minimal impact on the company beyond relationship building with Apple.

It's "not a huge deal for MSFT at the moment," Zino told Investopedia, though he noted that depending on the outcome of the ongoing Department of Justice (DOJ) case against Google, Microsoft could become a better cloud option for Apple, which faces its own DOJ case.

Wedbush analysts said the partnership may benefit Microsoft, writing that the "OpenAI chatbox embedded in iPhone 16 will also open up avenues of growth and the all-important developers to flock to the Apple ecosystem along with the Microsoft developer ecosystem in tow."

"It changes the game having a tight partnership with OpenAI and for Microsoft/OpenAI" as it's a "smart strategic move to tie themselves in with the biggest consumer installed base in the world looking forward," the analysts said.

Apple, OpenAI, Google, and Microsoft did not immediately respond to Investopedia's requests for comment.

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