• Bill Ackman's Pershing Square Capital has reportedly amassed a $1 billion stake in Lowe's.
• News of the investment comes one day after Lowe's tapped Home Depot veteran Marvin Ellison to lead the chain.
• Lowe's reported first quarter earnings on Wednesday that missed Wall Street expectations for profit, revenue, and comparable sales.
• Follow Lowe's stock price in real-time here.

Add billionaire investor Bill Ackman to those who welcome the hiring of Lowe's new CEO...

• JC Penney chief executive Marvin Ellison will be the new CEO of Lowe's.
• Shares of the embattled chain sank as much as 8%.
• Follow JCP stock in real-time here.

Shares of JC Penney fell as much as 8% in early trading Tuesday after it was announced that CEO and chairman Marvin Ellison resigned and is headed to Lowe’s home improvement chain...

• Steve Jurvetson, a member of Tesla's board since 2009, has been on a leave of absence for six months.
• Proxy firm Glass Lewis is advising shareholders to boot him from his position due to the absence.
• There is also pressure from investors to remove the board's director, as well as CEO Elon Musk's brother.
• Follow Tesla's stock price in real-time here.

Board seats are set to be a hot topic of discussion when Tesla shareholders vote at the company’s annual meeting next month...

• Tesla should remove Kimball Musk, James Murdoch, and Antonio Gracias from its board, an activist investor group said Wednesday.
• CtW Investment Group said the company's "continuing success looks more tenuous than ever."
• Follow Tesla's stock price in real-time here.

A group of activist investors wants to radically shake up Tesla's board of directors...

• Elliott Management has made a $160-per-share cash offer for AthenaHealth, the hedge fund confirmed Monday.
• Shares of Athena spiked more than 25% on the news.
• Follow the stock in real-time here.

Shares of AthenaHealth spiked nearly 25% Monday morning after Paul Singer's Elliott Management hedge fund made a cash offer of $160 per share — worth $6.9 billion — for the embattled healthcare IT company...

• Berkshire Hathaway has liquidated its entire stake in IBM, Warren Buffett said Friday.
• IBM sank about 1% on the news.
• Follow IBM’s stock price in real-time here.

Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway has sold its entire stake in IBM, the billionaire investor said Friday in an interview with CNBC.

"I think we have zero," Buffett said when asked if Berkshire owns any IBM shares. IBM's stock price fell about 1% after the news...

(RTTNews) - At its annual meeting of stockholders AT&T Inc. (T) announced that each of the 13 nominees to the company's board of directors were reelected for one-year terms. Each member received at least 94 percent of the shares voted. AT&T stockholders approved appointment of Ernst & Young LLP as the company's independent auditor...

• Pershing Square CEO Bill Ackman has cashed out his stake in Nike after making about $100 million, according to Dow Jones.
• Ackman recently exited a years-long bet in Herbalife that reportedly cost him hundreds of millions of dollars.
• The apparel maker is set to report earnings after the market close on Thursday.

Bill Ackman has dumped his stake in Nike after making about $100 million, Dow Jones reported on Thursday...

• Rite Aid's stock rose Monday after Albertsons announced a deal to acquire the drugstore chain in a cash-and-stock deal.
• The resulting merger will bring in an expected $83 billion in 2018 revenue.
• After the deal closes, Albertsons' shares will be listed on the New York Stock Exchange.
• View Rite Aid's stock price  in real time here...

• In an interview with Business Insider, CEO John O'Rourke called the report "one-sided" and a "hit piece" that has "wiped out significant shareholder value."
• Riot Blockchain fell 19% Friday after CNBC reported its annual shareholders meeting was never even booked...

• Elon Musk is the eccentric founder of Tesla, and will likely remain CEO for the next 10 years, as is required to claim the full $70 billion in pay from a new compensation package.
• The pay package eliminates production targets for the CEO.
• Tesla's stock is jumping on the news.

Shares of Tesla are up 2.82% to $361.47 on Tuesday after the company announced a new executive compensation plan for its CEO, Elon Musk...

• Shares of Twitter slid on Tuesday morning after the online lending startup SoFi announced that Anthony Noto, Twitter's chief operating officer, will be joining the company as its new CEO, effective March 1.
• Twitter has suffered from several departures of key executives in the past two years as the company struggles to bring value to shareholders.
• Noto was key to driving Twitter's live video push and inking partnerships with NFL, Time, and Bloomberg...

• Vanguard Group chairman F. William McNabb said Thursday that the ongoing cryptocurrency boom worries him “a little bit.”
• "If something’s too good to be true, it probably is," he told Bloomberg TV.

Vanguard Group chairman F. William "Bill" McNabb remains hesitant about the cryptocurrency craze, he told Bloomberg TV on Thursday...

• News that activist investor D.E. Shaw wants a potentially larger stake in Lowe's has caused its shares to climb.
• Seth Sigman, an analyst at Credit Suisse, sees additional upside for the home retailer, as there are three things that make the company attractive.
• Relative to its rival Home Depot, Sigman sees Lowe's as being a formidable investment opportunity...

• Shares of media conglomerate Viacom spiked as much as 12% just before the closing bell Friday after TheWrap reported it was in talks to merge with CBS. The stock closed up 7%.
• The news website said CBS chairman Les Moonves is now open to the consolidation, reversing his previous stance, citing three individuals with knowledge of the talks.
• Viacom was formed in 2005 out of a split from the previous iteration of the company, with the predecessor re-branded as the CBS Corporation...

• Shares of Aflac plummeted on Friday after the company was alleged to have "exploited workers, manipulated its accounting, and deceived shareholders and customers."
• Aflac's shares were down 7.84% to $84.50 a share on Friday.
• The investigative news site The Intercept first broke the news, interviewing nine former employees who have sued the company over the claims.
• Aflac released a statement calling the allegations false...

Pershing Square, Valeant asked to appear for hearing on insider trading suit (VRX, AGN) Reuters Jan. 3, 2018, 01:02 AM Jan 2 (Reuters) - A U.S. court on Tuesday asked Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc and activist investor Bill Ackman's Pershing Square to appear for a hearing to discuss the proposed settlement in an insider trading lawsuit.

• Disney and Fox are all set to announce the sale of Fox's entertainment assets to Disney later this week, CNBC's David Faber reports.
• The news sent shares of both the companies higher.
• Watch the price of Fox move in real time on Markets Insider.

Reports that 21st Century Fox is expected to announce the sale of its entertainment business to Disney on Thursday have sent shares of both companies higher...

21st Century Fox may be open to selling off many of its media assets amid troubles in its Sky Broadcasting acquisition and increased competition.

• Disney was the first interested buyer, with Comcast and Verizon coming in about a week later.
• 21st Century Fox's stock has risen each time a new interested buyer was reported, leading to speculation a bidding war could break out...

Procter and Gamble, the maker of household products like Tide and Crest, is sliding after claiming victory in a proxy battle with activist investor Nelson Peltz.

Shares were down as much as 2.66% after the company said investors had rebuffed the activist investor. P&G is trading at $91.10 as of 11 a.m. in New York on Tuesday...

General Electric's new CEO is making it clear who is in charge now.

John Flannery, GE's new CEO and chairman of the board, approved a new activist shareholder to the board just days after a chief financial officer shakeup, Bloomberg reports. The company's stock is down about 3% on Monday after the news.

On Monday, Flannery named Ed Garden, a founding partner of activist investing firm Trian Fund Management, to GE's board of directors, according to a report from Rick Clough of Bloomberg...

Twitter is tumbling in pre-market trading, trading down 9.73% at $17.71 a share.

The social media company reported no monthly active user growth in the second quarter, which was one of the main metrics investors were looking for.

The company missed on user growth, but grew its revenue in the second quarter. Twitter reported revenue of $574 million, which beat Wall Street's estimates of $537 million...

Nestle's stock price is getting a huge boost from an activist hedge fund.

Daniel Loeb, famous for being a successful activist investor in companies like Yahoo and Sony, has set his sights on the consumer conglomerate Nestle.

Loeb's hedge fund, Third Point, released a note Sunday disclosing its share in Nestle. The fund currently owns roughly 40 million shares, worth about $3.5 billion...

Amazon announced a huge move to buy Whole Foods for $13.7 billion Friday morning.

Trading of Whole Foods shares was temporarily halted shortly after the announcement and the stock saw a huge bump once trading resumed.

Shares of Whole Foods are currently trading at around the offer price of $42, which puts the grocer up about 27.5% on its opening price...