Business news in brief

By The Associated Press

Xi issues positive message at meeting with U.S. business leaders

BEIJING | China’s nationalist leader, Xi Jinping, called for closer trade ties with the U.S. during a meeting on Wednesday with top American business leaders in Beijing that came amid a steady improvement in relations that had sunk to the lowest level in years.

Xi emphasized the mutually beneficial economic ties between the world’s two largest economies, despite heavy U.S. tariffs on Chinese imports and Washington’s accusations of undue Communist Party influence, unfair trade barriers and theft of intellectual property.

Trump Media, Reddit surge despite questionable profit prospects

NEW YORK | Reddit and Trump Media are the first notable social media companies to begin trading publicly in the last five years. They’re also, thanks to the rabid reception among investors coupled with the companies’ fuzzy profit outlooks, the latest meme stocks. Meme stocks are typically shares in companies whose underlying business fails to justify a surge in their stock prices.

Analysts and academics are comparing the surge in Reddit and Trump Media to the meme stock craze in 2021 that boosted shares of companies such as video game retailer GameStop and movie theater operator AMC Entertainment.

MyPillow formally evicted from Minnesota warehouse

ST. PAUL, Minn. | A court has ordered the eviction of MyPillow from a suburban Minneapolis warehouse that it formerly used. But company founder and prominent election denier Mike Lindell said Wednesday that’s just a formality because the landlord wants to take the property back.

Lindell denied in an interview with The Associated Press that the eviction was another sign of his money woes. He says his financial picture is actually improving after a credit crunch last year disrupted cash flow at MyPillow. The company has lost one of its major advertising platforms and has been dropped by several national retailers.

—From AP reports