Wall Street Breakfast Podcast: Port Strike Starts Tuesday

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East Coast port strike to begin early Tuesday, union says. (00:23) California Gov. Newsom is said to veto controversial AI safety bill. (01:33) Amazon plots 1st live news special for election night. (02:41)

This is an abridged transcript of the podcast.

The union representing 85,000 dockworkers at ports on the East and Gulf coasts of the US said Sunday it will go on strike early Tuesday.

“The United States Maritime Alliance (USMX) refuses to address a half-century of wage subjugation where Ocean Carriers profits skyrocketed from millions to mega-billion dollars, while ILA longshore wages remained flat,” the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) said in a statement.

The USMX, which represents the ports and shippers, did not immediately respond to a request for comment by Seeking Alpha.

The strike would begin at 12:01 a.m. on Tuesday and affect ports from Maine to Texas, ILA said.

A strike would be the first coast-wide strike by the ILA since 1977.

President Joe Biden told reporters earlier Sunday that he would not intervene to prevent the strike.

“It’s collective bargaining. I don’t believe in Taft-Hartley,” he said, referring to the federal law that gives presidents the power to impose an 80-day cooling-off period in labor disputes that could impact national security or safety.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed an artificial-intelligence safety bill that stirred controversy between some major tech companies and esteemed scientists who developed the technology.

The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday, citing a person with knowledge of his thinking, that the Democrat decided to bury the measure because it applies only to the biggest and most expensive AI models and leaves others unregulated.

The Journal reported, Smaller AI models could create problems, too, leading the governor to prefer a legal framework that’s all-encompassing.

The vetoed bill, SB 1047, would have required creators of large AI models to take “reasonable care” to ensure that the technology didn’t pose “unreasonable risk of causing or materially enabling a critical harm.”

Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) (NASDAQ:GOOGL), Meta (NASDAQ:META), Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) and OpenAI objected to the bill, claiming it imposed vague standards in the name of safety.

Computer scientists Geoffrey Hinton and Yoshua Bengio, who developed much of the technology on which current generative AI is based, were outspoken supporters of the bill, the Journal reported.

Amazon is planning to stream its first live news program on Prime Video.

The Los Angeles Times reported, citing people familiar with the arrangement, that the company is hiring former NBC News anchor Brian Williams to host special coverage of election night.

Amazon Prime Video in recent years has made a significant push into live sports programming, streaming “NFL Thursday Night Football.” It also will be the NBA’s streaming platform for the 2025-26 season.

Live news programming could become another way for Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) to boost advertising sales by expanding its inventory of available commercial slots.

More articles on Seeking Alpha:

Stocks to watch amid the threat of a major East Coast port strike this week

Israel downgraded by Moody’s as war weighs on economy

Economic growth, interest rates to dictate quality factor in stocks, Goldman says

Catalyst watch:

• All week – The start of the sale of trucking giant Yellow’s remaining properties could impact trucking stocks such as Saia (SAIA), Old Dominion Freight Line (ODFL), Knight-Swift Transportation (KNX), and Heartland Express (HTLD).

• Notable investor events include ResMed’s (RMD) Investor Day, EnerSys’ (ENS) update on its lithium cell factory, and Affirm Holdings’ (AFRM) fireside chat with its CFO and COO.

• A trial begins in Colorado with the state looking to block the merger of Albertsons Companies (ACI) and Kroger (KR). Several other lawsuits surrounding the merger are being heard across the U.S.

• REGENXBIO (RGNX), Dyne Therapeutics (DYN), Carisma Therapeutics (CARM), and Editas Medicine (EDIT) are some of the companies scheduled to participate at the two-day Chardan Genetic Medicines Conference.

Now let’s take a look at the markets as of 6 am. Ahead of the opening bell today, Dow, S&P and Nasdaq futures are in the red. Crude oil is down 0.2% at $68/barrel. Bitcoin is down 2.6% at $63,000.

In the world markets, the FTSE 100 is down 0.4% and the DAX is down 0.4%.

The biggest movers for the day premarket: Stellantis (STLA) is down 12% after the automaker slashed its 2024 guidance, citing worsening “global industry dynamics” and increased competition from China.

On today’s economic calendar:

• 8:50 am Fed’s Michelle Bowman will speak about the Economic Outlook and Monetary Policy at the Georgia Bankers Association Conference, Charleston, SC.

• 1:00 pm Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell will speak before the National Association for Business Economics Annual Meeting in Nashville, TN on “Finding Harmony in the Noise: Transitioning to a New Normal.”