Good morning, Quartz readers!
What to watch for today
Investors look for Fed rate hike clues. The US central bank is not expected to announce any big changes to its plans to raise interest rates this year, but analysts will scour today’s statement for hints of a potential hike in June.
Yum! Brands serves up its latest financials. Analysts expect the owner of Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, and KFC to post a rise in first-quarter restaurant sales. Revenues in the quarter could be affected by the company’s refranchising initiative.
Tesla’s cash-burning update. The electric-car company is under pressure to increase production of its Model 3 sedan while also curbing costs. CEO Elon Musk has promised that Tesla doesn’t need to raise additional capital, but investors are dubious.
While you were sleeping
Apple’s numbers defied concerns over iPhone sales. Earnings rose 25% to $13.8 billion, revenue was up 16% to $61 billion, while the iPhone X was the best-selling model in every week of the quarter. Apple also announced that it would spend $100 billion buying back its own shares, which boosted its stock price in after-hours trading.
Xerox CEO Jeff Jacobson resigned. He agreed to go as part of a deal with two of the US printer company’s biggest shareholders, Carl Icahn and Darwin Deason, who have been trying to nix the $1.6 billion sale (paywall) of Xerox to Japan’s Fujifilm. Icahn and Deason agreed Tuesday night to end their proxy fight against the firm.
Donald Trump’s former doctor denied writing the president’s 2015 health note. Harold Bornstein told CNN that the then-presidential candidate Trump “dictated” his own doctor’s letter—it said he was in “astonishingly excellent” health. Bornstein also said Trump’s medical records were taken after his offices were raided in 2017.
Rusal got a reprieve. An amendment (paywall) from the US Treasury department will give the Russian aluminum giant time to take steps to come off a blacklist related to interference in the 2016 election. Russian tycoon Oleg Deripaska, a majority shareholder in Rusal’s parent and a target of the sanctions, must now reduce his holdings.
North Americans gave Hugo Boss a boost. The German fashion brand said sales were up 5% in the first quarter, thanks to a rebound in the Americas and China. Boss has changed its mind about trying to take the brand upmarket and expand its womenswear collections, concentrating instead on premium men’s clothing.
Quartz obsession interlude
Helen Edwards and Dave Edwards on how Tesla over-automated its factory. “Robots aren’t as flexible as humans; they aren’t as good as humans at adapting to product variants nor can they handle as many complex movements as humans. This means that, beyond a certain point, automation can raise costs, and contrary to what you’d expect, not help quality or productivity. Importantly, automation needs to be overlaid on a stable process to ensure that it’s not the errors that are being automated.” Read more here.
Matters of debate
Capitalism is obsolete. Today’s problems are far too complex for market economies to fix, and capitalism often makes them worse.
Society, not biology, makes men bad at friendship. Pressure to reject “feminine” ideals like empathy and vulnerability leads to increasing male loneliness.
Double-spacing is an abomination. It may slightly improve readability, but it’s really an anachronism from the monospace fonts of the typewriter era.
Surprising discoveries
Smart people literally have bigger brain cells. Learning that IQ is linked to neuron size (paywall) and performance could lead to new ways to enhance human intelligence.
Some of the world’s richest nations have the weakest passports. Canada and China have strong economies, but they “lock their citizens in” due to low visa accessibility.
Crowded airport lounges are irritating the 1%. One well-heeled traveler described recent arrivals as “farm animals” (paywall).
Swedish meatballs are actually Turkish. The country admitted that its national food was based on a recipe brought home by King Charles XII after a visit to Turkey.
Zora Neale Hurston has a new book out. The novelist and anthropologist died in 1960 but Barracoon, her account of one of the last-known survivors of the Atlantic slave trade, is about to be published.
Our best wishes for a productive day. Please send any news, comments, MENSA tests, and meatball recipes to hi@qz.com. You can follow us on Twitter for updates throughout the day or download our apps for iPhone and Android. Today’s Daily Brief was written by Jill Petzinger and edited by Lianna Brinded.