Highlights for the morning: BP changed CEO, insider sold Nvidia shares, Micron supported the market

BP will change its CEO, putting a woman - Meg O'Neill - at the helm of a major oil and gas company for the first time in history. Nvidia board member Harvey Jones sold shares in the company, which he had owned for almost 30 years. The report of memory chip maker Micron supported the market after the collapse of the technology sector. These and other topics - in our review of key events for the morning of December 18.

BP has appointed Meg O'Neill as its new CEO - she will take the position in April and will become the first woman to head a major oil and gas company, Bloomberg reports. This comes amid BP's weak results after a failed pivot to renewable energy and under pressure from activist investor Elliott Investment Management, which is demanding a return to its core oil and gas business, cost cuts and asset sales. Until O'Neill starts, CEO Carol Howell will take over on an interim basis, replacing the outgoing Murray Okincloss.

O'Neill previously headed Australia's Woodside Energy and spent more than 20 years at Exxon Mobil. Analysts expect her to "go back to basics" - focusing on oil, gas and LNG. At Woodside, she expanded the gas portfolio, developed LNG projects and promoted gas as a transition fuel. The market believes that the arrival of an external executive could have a positive impact on BP's shares, although investors are waiting for more decisive steps to transform its strategy and portfolio, the agency said.

Nvidia board member Harvey Jones sold 250,000 shares of the company for more than $44 million, according to a regulatory disclosure released on Wednesday, Reuters reports . According to the document, the transaction was made on Dec. 15 at an average price of $177.33 per paper. The shares were part of a stake that Jones had owned since 1997 - that is, two years before Nvidia went public. He still owns more than 7 million securities through the H.C. Jones Living Trust, the document said.

Nvidia declined to comment to Reuters on the reasons for the sale.

Memory chip maker Micron Technology reported results for last quarter better than market expectations and gave a strong outlook for the current period, CNBC writes. The company posted earnings of $4.78 per share against a forecast of $3.95. Revenue increased 57% to $13.64 billion against expectations of $12.84 billion. Against this backdrop, Micron shares jumped nearly 8% in extended trading. In the current quarter, the company forecasts revenue of about $18.7 billion and earnings of $8.42 per share, which is almost twice as high as market estimates.

The growth in the figures was due to the boom in AI infrastructure and a sharp increase in demand for high-performance memory for data centers, the channel said. The company doubled sales of memory for cloud services, focusing on supplies for data centers and AI systems.

Shares of grocery delivery service Instacart fell more than 8% in the aftermarket following a report that the U.S. Federal Trade Commission has launched an investigation into the company's pricing policies, CNBC reports. According to Reuters, the regulator has asked Instacart for the documents it needs for the probe. A study released on Tuesday by the Groundwork Collaborative found that prices for the same items at the same supermarkets that work with Instacart can differ by an average of 7%, causing customers to overpay more than $1,000 a year.

Instacart denied the allegations, saying that the retailers themselves set prices on the app, and the company does not use dynamic pricing or pricing tied to user demographics or behavioral data.

Washington has approved the largest-ever military aid package to Taiwan for $11.15 billion amid China's growing military activity, CNBC reports. The package includes HIMARS systems, ATACMS missiles with a range of up to 300 kilometers, M109A7 self-propelled howitzers, anti-tank missiles and unmanned systems. The deal comes as part of Taiwan's $40 billion supplemental defense budget, which aims to improve military readiness by 2027.

Beijing sharply criticized the decision, reiterating that it considers Taiwan its territory and continues to increase military pressure in the region.

- Japan's broad Topix index was down 0.25 percent, while the Nikkei 225 was down 0.9 percent.

- Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index fell 0.5 percent, while mainland China's CSI 300 Index fell 0.4 percent.

- In South Korea, the Kospi index lost 1.2% and the Kosdaq lost almost 1%.

- Australia's S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.2 percent.

- S&P 500 futures rose 0.1 percent, Nasdaq Composite futures were up 0.3 percent and Dow Jones Industrial Average exchange-traded contracts fell 0.1 percent.

This article was AI-translated and verified by a human editor