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The fast casual chain reported same-restaurant sales growth of 2.1%, well below analysts’ expectations

Cava reported second-quarter same-restaurant sales well below analysts’ expectations and lowered its full-year guidance for the metric, citing weaker consumer sentiment.

The Mediterranean fast casual restaurant reported same-restaurant sales growth of 2.1%, well below analysts’ expectations of 6.1%, according to FactSet. The company said the growth came primarily from price increases and product mix with customer traffic flat.

Shares plunged 22%, to $65.90, in after-hours trading.

Cava Chief Executive Brett Schulman said challenging comparisons to last year’s robust business contributed to the weaker same-restaurant sales, including when the chain launched grilled steak as a menu option nationwide. Deflated consumer sentiment also was a contributor, he said.

“The consumer isn’t as ebullient as they were last year,” Schulman said in an interview Tuesday. “They’re dealing with a lot of headwinds, a lot of fog and uncertainty.”

Cava lowered its full-year same-restaurant growth guidance to 4% to 6% from its previous forecast of 6% to 8%. Wall Street expects 7.3%.

Earlier this month, Sweetgreen posted a 7.6% decline in second-quarter same-store sales, citing diminished consumer spending particularly in its largest urban markets. In July, Chipotle reported a 4% decline in second-quarter same-store sales and said it was seeing declining consumer confidence.

Schulman said sales gained more momentum as the second quarter concluded, and Cava’s consumers continue to buy premium ingredients instead of trading down. The company doesn’t plan to raise menu prices for the rest of the year, he said.

Schulman said the company is watching the beef market amid a surge in prices, but said most of its beef is priced into contracts for now.

The company is also making what could become a $10 million investment in automated-kitchen company Hyphen to help advance automated food-production tools. Cava’s investment is part of a Series B funding round that also includes burrito chain Chipotle, according to Hyphen. Schulman said the company is exploring Hyphen’s automated bowl-building technology for the chain’s digital, to-go orders.

A Chipotle spokeswoman said the company made a $15 million investment in Hyphen in July 2024 through its Cultivate Next Fund.

On Tuesday, Cava reported second-quarter net income of $18.4 million, or 16 cents a share, down from $19.7 million, or 17 cents a share, the year prior.

Adjusted earnings were also 16 cents a share, beating the 13 cents expected by analysts.

Revenue was $280.6 million, up from $233.5 million the previous year. Wall Street expected $285.5 million. Top-line gains were fueled by 75 net new restaurant openings during or after the second quarter of last year.

Trump’s tariffs are forcing the home of Davos to consider appealing to the U.S. or forming closer ties with the EU

President Trump’s tariff policies have reordered global supply chains, redrawn investment maps and tested old alliances. In Switzerland, they have also spurred an uneasy audit of its role in the world.

Switzerland thrived as an honest broker and diplomatic powerhouse for centuries. The War of the Spanish Succession between France and the Holy Roman Empire finally ended in 1714 with a treaty signed in the small town of Baden. In 1872, an arbitration court in Geneva ordered the U.K. to pay the U.S. compensation for providing war ships to the Confederacy during the Civil War. It later played a role in setting navigation rights in the Black Sea and resolving conflicts from Indochina to Algeria.

But many in the Alpine country—which the U.S. recently slapped with one of the highest tariff rates in the world—are now questioning whether its centuries-old model of neutrality and exceptionalism is still fit for purpose in a transactional, power-driven world. In this new world, Switzerland, the home of Davos and multilateral organizations such as the World Trade Organization and the International Committee for the Red Cross, is a symbol of a globalism now out of fashion in many capitals.

The danger, Swiss officials, executives and observers say, is that this go-it-alone model might now be a liability for a nation of just nine million people.

Instead, Switzerland’s long history of democracy and peace could leave it with little more than the metaphorical cuckoo clock, to paraphrase Orson Welles’ Harry Lime character in “The Third Man,” and no more sway in the trade war than developing states such as Laos, Myanmar and Syria. As a result, calls are growing to forge a closer relationship with the European Union, which managed to secure a more favorable levy with the Trump administration. Some Swiss companies, meanwhile, are drawing up plans to relocate production to some of its bigger neighbors.

“Switzerland can no longer navigate between the blocs as before,” said Jon Pult, lawmaker and vice president of the Social Democratic Party of Switzerland. “That’s over, we no longer live in that world.”

Adrian Steiner, chief executive of coffee-machines maker Thermoplan that supplies Starbucks and McDonald’s, said Switzerland’s success came because “our system worked quite well in the old-rules world.”

“But we have a new type of politics now where this is all gone,” he said. “We are too small to play in the big boys’ game. In there it doesn’t matter so much if you are neutral or not.”

The imposition of a 39% levy last week—despite months of negotiations—stunned Switzerland, which counts the U.S. as its biggest individual export market for its wares including watches, chocolate, pharmaceuticals and machine tools. Thursday’s front page of the Blick daily newspaper was all black featuring 39% in a large white font with the inscription “A Black day for our country.”

The main reason for the high tariff rate is that Switzerland has one of the largest trade deficits in goods with the U.S., at $48 billion this year through June. The deficit has skyrocketed lately because of a rise in pharmaceutical and gold imports looking to get to the U.S. ahead of anticipated tariffs.

Politicians and analysts have floated various ideas to appease Trump—from buying more U.S. beef, liquefied natural gas and F-35 jet fighters, to relocating the headquarters of FIFA, soccer’s global governing body, from Zurich to Miami. But after a failed last-minute mission in Washington, D.C., last week to halt the tariffs, Switzerland’s President Karin Keller-Sutter said quick solutions weren’t forthcoming.

“We can’t say how long this situation will last,” Keller-Sutter said, adding that her negotiators will continue talks with the U.S. “Ultimately, however, it’s in the hands of the American president.”

That is a problem for Swiss companies who say they can’t compete when neighboring Germany and France pay 15%. Industry association Swissmem called it a “horror scenario” and said the levies could cost Switzerland tens of thousands of jobs.

Interprofession du Gruyère, a trade body representing 1,600 dairy farms making the eponymous cheese, said it expects the U.S. business—which eats up to a third of Switzerland’s Gruyère exports—to partly collapse. Medical-device maker Ypsomed said it would relocate some of its U.S-bound production to its German site and accelerate plans to establish a U.S. production facility.

Steiner said Thermoplan, too, was assessing relocating production because “we either face a loss of business or we move the business.”

The tariffs crisis isn’t the first to chip away at Swiss identity.

After 2008, the U.S. enacted laws requiring Swiss banks to transfer information about American clients to the Internal Revenue Service, a hammer blow to its banking secrecy dating back to the 1700s when Geneva made it a civil offense to divulge the banking details of an aristocrat. A slew of banking scandals, including the collapse of Credit Suisse in 2023, has rocked the country in recent years.

Switzerland’s 200-year-old policy of neutrality has been also difficult to defend during Russia’s war on Ukraine. Pressured by its larger neighbors and the Biden administration, Switzerland joined EU sanctions against Moscow.

“It’s a myth that neutrality protects you from all security threats because neutrality is only worth something if the others accept you to be neutral,” said Stefanie Walter, professor of international relations and political economy at the University of Zurich.

Trump’s levies come as the Swiss are already debating whether to forge closer EU ties. Switzerland isn’t an EU member—and few think it ever will be—but it is deeply integrated through a web of bilateral agreements. A package of deals, which expand Switzerland’s access to the EU’s single market, will be subject to a referendum possibly next year.

The campaign is already inflamed. Marcel Dettling, president of the right-wing Swiss People’s Party which opposes closer EU ties, recently posted a video declaring the choice to be between “freedom and serfdom.” In it, he sets the pages of the EU agreement on fire and uses a medieval halberd to roast a sausage over the flames.

Analysts, however, say the tariff drama could boost the pro-EU campaign. “Suddenly that deal looks much more, much better than it looked just two weeks ago” Walter said.

Hans-Peter Portmann, lawmaker of the Free Democratic Party of Switzerland, said that while Switzerland can’t become an EU member and sacrifice its direct democracy model, it has to realign its geopolitical priorities.

“A small country like Switzerland is at risk of being squashed,” he said. “The tariff dispute with the U.S. opened the eyes of many in Switzerland.”

Energy giant among several clients claiming gas provider broke supply contracts to profit from higher prices

Venture Global has won an important arbitration case, defeating Shell’s claims that it broke contracts to profit from higher prices, in a boost to the one of the largest US suppliers of liquefied natural gas.

It is one of several arbitration cases pursued by customers of Venture Global, which allege it failed to deliver shipments under long-term supply contracts and instead sold them for higher prices on the spot market when gas prices soared following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.  

The customers — which include Shell, BP, China’s Sinopec and several European energy companies — lodged damages’ claims for between $6.7 to $7.4bn against the LNG provider and sought arbitration at the International Chamber of Commerce.

Venture Global has said contractual provisions limit the total liability for these claims to about $1.6 billion, although this is disputed by some of the customers.

Alex Munton, analyst at Rapidan Energy Group, a Washington-based consultancy, said the arbitration result was a significant win for Venture Global due to the financial stakes involved and would probably set a precedent in the other arbitration cases.

He said foundation customers within the LNG industry — who sign long-term supply contracts to enable providers to finance the construction of gas facilities — were already moving to tighten contractual terms.

Venture Global, which was founded by ex-banker Michael Sabel and lawyer Robert Pender, has shaken up the global LNG industry by expanding rapidly and becoming embroiled in a bitter public dispute with industry heavyweights, Shell and BP.

But the company, which has close ties with the Trump administration and contributed $1mn to the president’s inaugural campaign, faces challenges following a lacklustre initial public offering in January.

Venture Global shares rose around 6 per cent in after-hours trading following the decision, but still trade at less than half of its IPO price of $25.

The company has denied that it violated its supply contracts, arguing that it was not obliged to ship cargoes to its long-term customers because its LNG facility in Louisiana, called Calcasieu Pass, had not started commercial operations when it sold cargoes on the spot market.

The company declared force majeure on its contractual commitments on the grounds that the facility’s power supply equipment needed repair, despite shipping its first cargo in March 2022.

BP, Shell, Sinopec, Poland’s Orlen, Portugal’s Galp, Spain’s Repsol and Edison rejected this argument, noting that Venture Global sold hundreds of cargoes before finally commissioning Calcasieu Pass for full commercial operations in April 2025.  

On Tuesday, Venture Global said it was pleased with the ICC tribunal’s decision.

“We have consistently honoured these agreements without exception,” said the company. “Venture Global’s unique ability to incrementally export commissioning cargos during the construction of our facilities has brought LNG to market years faster than ever before and strengthened global security.”   

Shell said it was disappointed with the outcome but respected the tribunal’s decision.

“Trust in long-term contracts is the bedrock of the LNG industry and essential for continued investment and sustainable growth,” the company said.

Can Dubai keep its crown as the Middle East’s finance capital?

Offshore financial centre has boomed since the pandemic, but Abu Dhabi and Riyadh have the city in their sights

As the financial crisis infected economies across the globe in 2009, the Dubai International Financial Centre — with its office towers buttressed by ground floor restaurants — became so sleepy that the offshore district’s denizens jokingly dubbed the Gulf’s banking hub the “Dubai International Food Court”.

Back then, it took a $20bn bailout to pull Dubai out of its debt crisis. No such rescue was needed after the next great economic contagion. When Covid-19 hit, the autocratic emirate bet that a rapid reopening would lure hordes locked down elsewhere. While bankers in London, Hong Kong and Singapore endured isolation, those in Dubai got to work.

Today, the Dubai International Financial Centre is heaving. In four and a half years, the DIFC’s number of active registered companies has more than doubled to 7,700; the first half of 2025 was its best for new company registrations. It now counts 47,900 workers — 21,000 more than in 2020 — from gilet-wearing Canary Wharf transplants to traders from Mumbai.

Almost nobody seems to have expected that the DIFC would get this big — even those who championed its development. “I was here in those early years,” said Ian Johnston, who stepped down in May as head of the Dubai Financial Services Authority (DFSA). “We had no idea that the centre would grow to this size.”

With offices full, the centre is building 1.6mn sq ft of extra commercial space by 2027. A bald tract of land on its periphery points to further expansion plans.

But while Dubai has spent decades trying to build a financial centre to challenge the world’s best, the city long defined by boom and bust now has to fend off competition from ascendant cities in its own backyard.

Abu Dhabi, the United Arab Emirates’ oil-rich capital, dangles its estimated $1.7tn in sovereign wealth funds to attract asset managers and hedge funds. Saudi Arabia, the region’s biggest economy, wants bankers and consultants to make their base in the kingdom instead of flying into Riyadh from glitzy Dubai.

Dubai believes it has transcended its status as a regional business hub and become a global financial centre, and its relatively diverse and open economy — for decades, an anomaly in the region — has become a test case for mass immigration and a more liberal lifestyle.

The government is supportive of businesses as long as they “do things properly and work within their rules and regulations, and don’t get involved in politics or get involved in things that are disruptive to the economy or to the population”, said May Nasrallah, a Dubai dealmaker at advisory firm PJT deNovo.

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Both Dubai’s promise in terms of quality of life and its infrastructure are showing the strain of the tens of thousands that have relocated to the city, however.

Many junior employees feel that salaries have not kept up with rising living costs, while rocketing property prices may be unsustainable. “It’s surprising just how far prices have risen and it makes them more susceptible potentially to a correction,” said James Swanston of Capital Economics.

More foreign workers are choosing to stay in Dubai for longer, making the city feel less transient but increasing pressure on its road network. Bankers complain about the traffic, which is especially bad around the DIFC: everyone has a story of someone missing a meeting while trapped in gridlock just a few blocks from their destination.

Dubai’s “sharp rise in population . . . since the pandemic has increased domestic demand”, said Monika Malik, chief economist at Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank, “but also the need for increased critical infrastructure”.

The increasingly crowded feel has not stopped Chinese banks, for instance, flocking to open branches in the DIFC, along with hedge funds and asset managers. Beyond the DIFC, the emirate’s commodities centre — the Dubai Multi Commodities Centre — has also boomed.

Some of that growth has been for geopolitical reasons. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine triggered a wave of émigrés from both countries. Russian traders in particular quit Switzerland for a new base in the DMCC. Others have followed suit.

Those moves hint at some of the reputational issues Dubai has had to fend off.

The Russian influx troubled European nations looking to use financial sanctions to pressurise Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, and in 2022 the UAE was placed on a watchlist by the Financial Action Task Force, an anti-money laundering watchdog.

The country has since been returned to normal status by the FATF. But the low-tax jurisdiction has struggled to shed its image as a dirty money laundry and hub for sanctions-busting. Its multitude of free zones still provide little transparency, despite reforms that followed the UAE’s grey-listing.

“We’re in a jurisdiction and in a city in a country that’s very open and has an open economy. So we are always alive to the risk of financial crime,” said former regulator Johnston. “We’ve always recognised that it’s the greatest reputational risk.”

The DIFC has faced its share of scandals too, notably the high-profile collapse of Dubai-based private equity group Abraaj in 2018. The DFSA fined two Abraaj companies $315mn in 2019, accusing them of “serious wrongdoings” including misleading investors.

Dubai has nonetheless embraced new industries such as cryptocurrency, shunned by many regulators because of its volatility, secrecy and connections with illicit financing. Keen to project itself as an agile financial centre — and to attract freshly minted crypto millionaires — Dubai has introduced regulations to govern them.

Dubai wanting to be a cryptocurrency hub was “less about the asset class” than the emirate’s desire to establish itself as a centre for the “new economy”, said Deepa Raja Carbon of Dubai’s virtual assets regulator, Vara.

Among those it licenses is the world’s biggest cryptocurrency exchange Binance which was fined $4.3bn by US authorities in 2023 for money-laundering failings and international sanctions violations — although Vara only regulates its UAE business.

Kristian Ulrichsen, an academic who has authored a book on the UAE, said wagers on the new economy were not without risk.

“The concentration of many of the new arrivals in sectors such as AI or tech may leave the emirate vulnerable to a slowdown should the bets that have been made on the economy of the future fail to pay off,” Ulrichsen said.

If Dubai does stumble, Abu Dhabi has the Gulf’s original finance capital in its sights. Some executives think the wealthier emirate could benefit from mobile foreigners currently in Dubai who want to live in a quieter city. Abu Dhabi is also trying to outcompete Dubai on regulatory ease.

“I think DIFC is done, apart from being a nice place to have dinner,” quipped one fund executive, arguing that Abu Dhabi Global Market has a lighter regulatory regime that is more appealing to traders and dealmakers.

As regional competition becomes more acute, bankers and regulators think the expanding city is looking over its shoulder.

Dubai was “well aware of what’s happening in other places and other markets and other financial centres”, said Johnston. “They wouldn’t be complacent.”

Luckin’s recipe for success in China may not translate in the US

The coffee chain is coming after Starbucks but its business model is not easily replicated across the Pacific

It is unusual for a coffee shop opening in New York to make headlines around the world. The Chinese chain Luckin Coffee’s American debut earlier this summer is the culmination of an extraordinary turnaround story for a brand that had a fall from grace in the same city. But it has also garnered attention for what it says about the rising competitiveness of Chinese brands that leverage their country’s supply chain and manufacturing prowess to undercut western rivals.

Five years ago, the Chinese chain was publicly disgraced for fabricating sales ahead of its Nasdaq debut, a scandal that would have killed most brands. Luckin used the proceeds of that initial public offering to turbocharge growth in China, where it outgrew upmarket rival Starbucks to become the largest coffee chain by store count and revenue. It was helped by an economic downturn pushing consumers towards cheaper coffee. Now, it is coming after Starbucks in its home country.

Despite all that divides the US and China, their consumers have a surprisingly similar sweet tooth. Luckin’s signature coconut velvet latte drink has been a hit in New York. But that is about as far as the similarities go for the retail experience. The conditions that fuelled Luckin’s rapid expansion in China are not easily replicated across the Pacific.

In New York, the company is largely sticking to its proven formula: a digital-first model with a heavy emphasis on speed, convenience and data. There are a few adaptations, one person involved in the launch told me — machinery designed specifically for the US stores and local milk suppliers — but the core strategy is the same. Customers must order through the app, allowing Luckin to gather behavioural data and serve targeted promotions to encourage repeat orders.

This is not a coffee brand for connoisseurs. There are no baristas, no latte art and no cosy café interiors. Drinks are prepared quickly by automatic machines, with stores designed for pick-up or delivery. Luckin prefers to describe itself as a technology company that happens to sell coffee — one whose algorithms and logistics expertise can deliver growth regardless of the market. But this recipe book ignores the centrality of labour in its business.

Visitors to China often marvel at the seamlessness of its consumer experience. That platforms like Meituan can deliver anything from a $1 coffee to a tube of toothpaste within 20 minutes of ordering seems to many observers a uniquely Chinese triumph of technology.

But this marvel is hardly a product of technical prowess than an army of 84mn delivery workers, many of them young men from lower-income cities earning between Rmb20-30 per hour ($2.80-$4.17). In sharp contrast, the average delivery driver in the US makes about $19.52 an hour, according to the job site Indeed.

Luckin’s ability to leverage this workforce in China has been critical to its success. Its stores are often tucked into locations unlikely to attract walk-ins, inside banks, mobile phone retailers or dusty corners of shopping malls — cheap rentals ideal for delivery.

To its credit, Luckin has leveraged this infrastructure better than Starbucks, which has access to the same networks but has been slower to adapt. Luckin’s flavour innovation and partnerships with the likes of Duolingo and Pingu on themed drinks and merchandise have also struck a particular chord with Gen Z consumers.

In meetings with Chinese companies, I’m often greeted in conference rooms with a smorgasbord of Luckin coffees, an over-ordering ritual enabled by bulk discounts and promotions. It is difficult to imagine this habit taking off in the US.

Even so, early signs in America are encouraging. Online reviews have largely been positive and the brand is riding a wave of novelty. A $0.99 special for app downloads has driven foot traffic in Manhattan, where a speciality coffee can cost north of $10.

Yet signs of friction are emerging. Some New Yorkers are pushing back against Luckin’s app-only purchase policy, saying it violates the city’s regulation that mandates stores accepting cash, designed to protect shoppers without access to digital banking. The person involved in the launch said the company had found a way to be compliant. Luckin said its “internet-based transaction model has been legally validated to comply with applicable local laws and regulations”.

In the end, Luckin’s New York debut may tell us less about America’s coffee habits than about the limits of exporting a business model built for China’s unique conditions. For now, sugar sells. But without cheap labour and frictionless logistics, the buzz may not last.

Some investors are miffed at the prospect of ending up owning a reinsurance start-up

Daniel Loeb, the founder of Third Point, combines a reputation as a combative activist with a love of yoga and surfing. Critics of his latest deal could benefit from a similar approach: it’s fair to make noise about the combination he is proposing, but when the fight is over their best bet may be to just chill out.

Third Point Investors Limited — a London-listed feeder fund for Loeb’s New York hedge fund — is trying to combine with Malibu Life Reinsurance, which is owned by a different bit of Third Point. 

It has given up on being a feeder after years being valued far below its underlying holdings — it traded at an average discount of 18 per cent over the past five years.

But some investors who thought they were buying a hedge fund vehicle are understandably miffed at the prospect of ending up owning a reinsurance start-up. 

TPIL offered to buy out a fraction of the shares at a slight discount to book value. But, assuming the deal goes through, dissenters are likely to be left with at least some shares in the new business.

Until recently, this type of related party transaction would have needed approval by independent shareholders, which in this case would exclude Loeb. But now he can vote his 25 per cent shareholding, making the deal harder to block. Proxy advisers ISS and even TPIL’s own broker Deutsche Numis have criticised the terms.

But what was the alternative? Asset Value Investors, the hedge fund leading the opposition, would prefer TPIL wind down and return cash to investors. But that needs approval by 75 per cent of shareholders.

The board could try to apply reputational pressure but Loeb is unlikely to be cowed. So the actual choice for investors is to take a deal that they might profit from, or sit in a moribund fund that will keep trading at a deep discount. As it stands, AVI is still set to make a profit on its original investment.

It’s not like Loeb is taking advantage of some overlooked loophole. Regulators acknowledged the risk of weaker governance when they changed related party transaction rules, but decided it was a price worth paying for a more dynamic market.

Malibu may not be the tech unicorn rulemakers dreamt of attracting, but in the long run it is probably a more appealing constituent than a closed-end fund that trades a handful of shares each day.

TPIL warned investors last year it would consider M&A and “other innovative options” to close its discount, and shareholders knew they were backing a famous hedge fund manager who could block a liquidation and who relishes a fight. 

The regulator dived into these waters with open eyes. TPIL’s investors should have done the same — go swimming with sharks, and you should know you might get bitten.