Unifor has picked Ford Motor Co. as the lead company for negotiations with the Detroit Three automakers as it works to hammer out new contracts.
The bargaining with Ford will serve as a blueprint for workers at General Motors and Stellantis, the union’s national president said Tuesday, as it focuses on securing electric vehicle production investments.
Lana Payne said she is encouraged by Ford’s transparency with the union in key areas, but warned workers are prepared to strike if necessary.
“Ford Motor Company articulated to us its own vision and framework,” she said during a press conference.
“Although there are certain areas of disagreement, there were also areas of alignment and this is important.”
Unifor members at Ford voted 98.9 per cent in favour of a strike if the bargaining committee fails to secure a new collective agreement.
Payne said the strike mandate puts the union in a good position.
“We’re feeling strong, supported and ready to bargain,” Payne said.
The union kicked off negotiations with the major auto companies earlier this month as the contract for 18,000 autoworkers at the Detroit Three is scheduled to expire on Sept. 18.
It will now pause its discussions with GM and Stellantis while it focuses on Ford.
“We will approach these talks with Ford to secure the best possible contract for our members. That is our goal,” Payne told reporters and union leaders in Toronto.
“The tentative settlement we present will be the one that our committee can stand behind, an agreement that our members can be proud of,” she said.
“And if that can’t happen, then there will be no deal. And if anyone thinks that I’m bluffing right now, just follow what our union has been doing this past year, these past weeks.”
Payne may have been alluding to ongoing action by Unifor members at 27 Toronto-area Metro grocery stores, who have been on strike since July 29. The union has said it wants a strong deal with Metro that it hopes to repeat in contracts with other grocers, a tactic borrowed from auto negotiations.
Steven Tufts, an associate professor at York University, said the strong strike mandate “turned up the heat in this round of bargaining.”
Tufts said Unifor’s choice to target Ford shows the strong push for more investments in the transition to electric vehicles.
“If Unifor is serious about increasing the investment dollars, then what you’re seeing is potential of some production shifting to Canada,” he said.
Although, he said, the wage gains likely won’t be as strong as what the U.S. auto union is pushing to get.
In the U.S., members of the United Auto Workers are bargaining simultaneously for the first time in 25 years as their collective agreements expire days apart in September. The union south of the border voted in favour of a strike with 97 per cent mandate if the terms aren’t met.
Tufts said the two unions could exert more pressure on the Detroit Three if they were to target the same company.
While UAW has not announced their pick, Tufts said they are likely to target Stellantis, which is more profitable than GM and Ford.
“If UAW targets Stellantis, they’re going for huge wage gains,” he said. The union in the U.S. is pushing for a cumulative wage increase of 40 per cent.
“There was an opportunity, perhaps, to do some coordinated bargaining,” he said. “That’s not happening.
“The question then becomes, is it an opportunity lost?”
Payne said Unifor has maintained open communications with UAW but the priorities remain different.
“We are bargaining our own collective agreement here,” she said. “We have our own strategy and we have our own members to deliver for and their expectations are high.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 29, 2023.
TOKYO (AP) — Japanese technology group SoftBank swung back to profitability in the July-September quarter, boosted by positive results in its Vision Fund investments.
Tokyo-based SoftBank Group Corp. reported Tuesday a fiscal second quarter profit of nearly 1.18 trillion yen ($7.7 billion), compared with a 931 billion yen loss in the year-earlier period.
Quarterly sales edged up about 6% to nearly 1.77 trillion yen ($11.5 billion).
SoftBank credited income from royalties and licensing related to its holdings in Arm, a computer chip-designing company, whose business spans smartphones, data centers, networking equipment, automotive, consumer electronic devices, and AI applications.
The results were also helped by the absence of losses related to SoftBank’s investment in office-space sharing venture WeWork, which hit the previous fiscal year.
WeWork, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2023, emerged from Chapter 11 in June.
SoftBank has benefitted in recent months from rising share prices in some investment, such as U.S.-based e-commerce company Coupang, Chinese mobility provider DiDi Global and Bytedance, the Chinese developer of TikTok.
SoftBank’s financial results tend to swing wildly, partly because of its sprawling investment portfolio that includes search engine Yahoo, Chinese retailer Alibaba, and artificial intelligence company Nvidia.
SoftBank makes investments in a variety of companies that it groups together in a series of Vision Funds.
The company’s founder, Masayoshi Son, is a pioneer in technology investment in Japan. SoftBank Group does not give earnings forecasts.
Shopify Inc. executives brushed off concerns that incoming U.S. President Donald Trump will be a major detriment to many of the company’s merchants.
“There’s nothing in what we’ve heard from Trump, nor would there have been anything from (Democratic candidate) Kamala (Harris), which we think impacts the overall state of new business formation and entrepreneurship,” Shopify’s chief financial officer Jeff Hoffmeister told analysts on a call Tuesday.
“We still feel really good about all the merchants out there, all the entrepreneurs that want to start new businesses and that’s obviously not going to change with the administration.”
Hoffmeister’s comments come a week after Trump, a Republican businessman, trounced Harris in an election that will soon return him to the Oval Office.
On the campaign trail, he threatened to impose tariffs of 60 per cent on imports from China and roughly 10 per cent to 20 per cent on goods from all other countries.
If the president-elect makes good on the promise, many worry the cost of operating will soar for companies, including customers of Shopify, which sells e-commerce software to small businesses but also brands as big as Kylie Cosmetics and Victoria’s Secret.
These merchants may feel they have no choice but to pass on the increases to customers, perhaps sparking more inflation.
If Trump’s tariffs do come to fruition, Shopify’s president Harley Finkelstein pointed out China is “not a huge area” for Shopify.
However, “we can’t anticipate what every presidential administration is going to do,” he cautioned.
He likened the uncertainty facing the business community to the COVID-19 pandemic where Shopify had to help companies migrate online.
“Our job is no matter what comes the way of our merchants, we provide them with tools and service and support for them to navigate it really well,” he said.
Finkelstein was questioned about the forthcoming U.S. leadership change on a call meant to delve into Shopify’s latest earnings, which sent shares soaring 27 per cent to $158.63 shortly after Tuesday’s market open.
The Ottawa-based company, which keeps its books in U.S. dollars, reported US$828 million in net income for its third quarter, up from US$718 million in the same quarter last year, as its revenue rose 26 per cent.
Revenue for the period ended Sept. 30 totalled US$2.16 billion, up from US$1.71 billion a year earlier.
Subscription solutions revenue reached US$610 million, up from US$486 million in the same quarter last year.
Merchant solutions revenue amounted to US$1.55 billion, up from US$1.23 billion.
Shopify’s net income excluding the impact of equity investments totalled US$344 million for the quarter, up from US$173 million in the same quarter last year.
Daniel Chan, a TD Cowen analyst, said the results show Shopify has a leadership position in the e-commerce world and “a continued ability to gain market share.”
In its outlook for its fourth quarter of 2024, the company said it expects revenue to grow at a mid-to-high-twenties percentage rate on a year-over-year basis.
“Q4 guidance suggests Shopify will finish the year strong, with better-than-expected revenue growth and operating margin,” Chan pointed out in a note to investors.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 12, 2024.
TORONTO – RioCan Real Estate Investment Trust says it has cut almost 10 per cent of its staff as it deals with a slowdown in the condo market and overall pushes for greater efficiency.
The company says the cuts, which amount to around 60 employees based on its last annual filing, will mean about $9 million in restructuring charges and should translate to about $8 million in annualized cash savings.
The job cuts come as RioCan and others scale back condo development plans as the market softens, but chief executive Jonathan Gitlin says the reductions were from a companywide efficiency effort.
RioCan says it doesn’t plan to start any new construction of mixed-use properties this year and well into 2025 as it adjusts to the shifting market demand.
The company reported a net income of $96.9 million in the third quarter, up from a loss of $73.5 million last year, as it saw a $159 million boost from a favourable change in the fair value of investment properties.
RioCan reported what it says is a record-breaking 97.8 per cent occupancy rate in the quarter including retail committed occupancy of 98.6 per cent.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 12, 2024.
