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Promotions from chief financial officer to chief executive reached a 10-year high in 2025, with just over one in 10 CEOs at Fortune 500 and S&P 500 companies coming directly from the CFO role, according to research by executive search firm Crist Kolder Associates. The share rose to 10.26% from 7.1% in 2024, with all such promotions made internally, underscoring the growing prominence of finance leaders in succession planning. The report shows CFOs increasingly taking on broader strategic and operational responsibilities, strengthening their candidacy for the top job, even as COO and president roles remain the most common stepping stones to CEO. CFO turnover was also the highest among tracked C-suite roles, while companies relied more on internal promotions for finance chiefs. Although female representation in senior roles has improved over the past decade, progress remains uneven, with a recent decline in women CFOs in the consumer sector highlighting ongoing diversity challenges. 

 

CFO

BDO USA has appointed Demetrios Frangiskatos as national managing principal of assurance and Mat DeMong as national managing principal of tax. Mr. Frangiskatos will oversee BDO's audit and financial accounting advisory services, focusing on innovation and quality to help clients navigate regulatory changes. Mr. DeMong will manage the tax practice and industry groups, aiming to deliver significant results for clients.

 

Bloomberg Tax

International Accounting Bulletin

LVMH has promoted Antoine Arnault, one of Bernard Arnault’s five children, to the luxury group’s executive committee as part of an ongoing leadership reshuffle at the family-controlled group. Antoine Arnault, 48, currently serves as director of image and environment and oversees group communications, making him one of LVMH’s most visible executives. The move comes as investors have increased scrutiny of LVMH’s governance and succession planning, given Bernard Arnault’s long tenure at the helm. Antoine becomes the second of Arnault’s children to join the group’s top decision-making body, following his sister Delphine Arnault, chief executive of Dior.

 

Reuters

The American units of China's BYD, the world's biggest electric vehicle manufacturer, have filed a lawsuit in the U.S. Court of International Trade arguing that executive orders underpinning U.S. President Donald Trump's import tariffs are invalid, thus making the collection of the duties unlawful. BYD said it has paid and continues to pay "significant" duties on materials it imports to sustain its operations in the U.S., where it designs and manufactures electric buses and trucks.  More than 1,000 corporate entities, including household names such as Costco Wholesale and Goodyear Tire & Rubber, are pushing to be refunded for their share of the billions of dollars in tariffs that the U.S. has collected so far.

 

Bloomberg

Lenders to Altice USA, including Apollo Capital Management, BlackRock Financial Management and Oaktree Capital Management, have asked a federal judge in New York to throw out a lawsuit which accuses them of colluding to shut the company - now known as Optimum Communications - out of the U.S. credit market. The motion argues that Altice is wrongly trying to block creditors from working together when a borrower tries to renegotiate. Altice USA is attempting “to weaponize the antitrust laws” to gain an advantage in debt talks, the petitioners said. “But antitrust law protects competition - not a borrower’s desire for leverage in renegotiating its liabilities in times of distress.” They argued that courts in similar cases have said that U.S. antitrust law does not apply.

 

Bloomberg

Taiwan’s top tariff negotiator, Vice Premier Cheng Li-chiun, has said it would be “impossible” to move 40% of Taiwan’s semiconductor capacity to the U.S., countering comments from American officials urging a large production shift. Cheng said Taiwan’s chip ecosystem, built over decades, “could not be relocated,” and emphasized that capacity and investment will keep growing at home. “Our overall capacity (in Taiwan) will only continue to grow,” she said, while noting Taiwan can expand its U.S. presence. U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has argued for bringing chipmaking back and cited a 40% leading-edge manufacturing target. Cheng said Taiwan will not relocate its science parks but is open to sharing cluster-building experience.

 

Reuters

Eddie Bauer has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, marking its third bankruptcy in over two decades. The company operates around 180 stores in the US and Canada and has entered a restructuring agreement with secured lenders. Chief executive Marc Rosen said: "This is not an easy decision", but he emphasised that the restructuring aims to optimise value for stakeholders. While some stores will wind down, retail locations will remain open, and e-commerce operations will continue unaffected. Authentic Brands Group retains ownership of the Eddie Bauer brand's intellectual property. 

 

CNN

USA Today

The Baltimore Sun

Wall Street Journal

U.S. container imports fell 6.8% year on year in January, reflecting a pullback from record levels seen a year earlier when companies rushed to bring in goods ahead of new tariffs, according to supply chain technology group Descartes. Despite the decline, total imports of 2.32m 20-foot equivalent units remained above the historical average for the month, pointing to a more normalized trade environment supported by steady underlying demand rather than tariff-driven frontloading. Imports from China dropped sharply, down 22.7% from January 2025, though China still accounted for about a third of total U.S. container volumes. 

 

Reuters

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency plans to scrap a landmark policy that provides the legal underpinning for rules regulating greenhouse gas emissions. The policy to be repealed is the Obama-era endangerment finding, a scientific conclusion which determined that carbon dioxide, methane and other greenhouse gases are supercharging storms, wildfires, drought, heat waves and sea level rise, and are therefore threatening public health and welfare. Bloomberg says a decision to repeal the finding is expected to lay the groundwork for a further unwinding of climate protections in the U.S.

 

Bloomberg

New York Times

A report claims the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's retreat from enforcement and regulatory work in the past year has cost Americans at least $19bn in financial relief. The authors of the report released by the office of Sen. Elizabeth Warren say the Trump administration's control of the CFPB has harmed consumers by ditching major consumer protections, stalling investigation and dismissing a number of lawsuits. “Trump’s attempt to sideline the CFPB has cost families billions of dollars over the last year alone,” said Warren, the top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee. “The CFPB may still be standing, but it’s essentially on life support,” commented Chuck Bell, advocacy program director at Consumer Reports.

 

AP News

Crypto-focused Erebor Bank has become the first lender to receive a national bank charter during the second term of the Trump administration. The bank's funders include Lux Capital, Andreessen Horowitz,  and Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund. Erebor plans to serve technology businesses in artificial intelligence, crypto, defense and manufacturing, according to its charter application.

 

Wall Street Journal

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) has proposed ending the right of fired federal employees to dispute their dismissal before the independent Merit Systems Protection Board, according to a government plan released on Monday. Instead, fired workers would need to appeal to OPM, an office whose director reports to U.S. President Donald Trump. The proposal would "give the administration free rein to terminate huge swaths of the federal workforce without meaningful independent oversight," said Everett Kelley, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, the largest union for U.S. federal workers.

 

Reuters

Wall Street Journal

Target is increasing investment in store staffing and training while cutting about 500 roles across distribution centres and regional offices, as the US retailer seeks to fix customer experience issues and return to growth. The move is one of the first major changes under new chief executive Michael Fiddelke, who took over this month after four years of largely flat annual sales. The company said it will simplify store oversight by reducing the number of store districts and redirect savings into more hours and labour for frontline employees, alongside new guest experience training. Around 100 roles will be cut at the district level and about 400 across supply chain sites, though starting wages for store workers will remain umchanged.

 

CNBC

Reuters

Anthropic has tasked philosopher Amanda Askell with shaping the moral compass and personality of its AI chatbot, Claude, in a rare effort to directly embed ethics, emotional intelligence and a coherent “sense of self” into an artificial intelligence system. Askell, an Oxford-educated philosopher, spends her days studying Claude’s reasoning, correcting failures and writing extensive guidance - sometimes hundreds of pages long - aimed at teaching the model how to behave helpfully, humanely and responsibly. Rather than treating AI as a purely technical system, Askell approaches Claude like a developing mind, training it to recognize nuance, resist manipulation, and respond with empathy without becoming submissive or evasive. She argues that how people treat AI will shape what it becomes, and that models raised in hostile or abusive interactions may develop unhealthy behaviors.

 

Wall Street Journal

Bangladesh will be able to export garments made with U.S. material to America tariff-free, offering it an advantage over competitors in India. Under a new agreement announced by Bangladesh’s interim leader Muhammad Yunus, a general 19% tariff will apply to Bangladeshi exports to the U.S., while selected textile and apparel products using U.S. inputs will face a zero tariff. The deal follows months of negotiations after the Trump administration initially imposed steep reciprocal tariffs on Bangladesh, raising fears for an industry that accounts for about four-fifths of the country’s export earnings. Officials say the agreement will significantly strengthen Bangladesh’s competitiveness, particularly against India, which still faces an 18% tariff on exports to the U.S. and has no similar concession tied to U.S. cotton use. 

 

Financial Times

Reuters

The Daily Star