Business News at a Glance

Disney Theme Parks Prepare for Liftoff

Disney is spending billions to supercharge its theme park division, which has emerged as a moneymaker. For the 2018 fiscal year, Walt Disney Parks and Resorts had an operating profit of $4.5 billion, an increase of more than 100 percent from five years earlier. For comparison, Disney Media Networks, home to ESPN and ABC, had a profit of $6.6 billion, a 3 percent decline. Each of Disney’s six theme park resorts is undergoing major expansion. Michael Nathanson, a media analyst, estimates Disney will spend $24 billion on new attractions, hotels and ships over the next five years. That’s more than Disney paid for Pixar, Marvel and Lucasfilm combined.

Campbell Soup’s Fate Hangs on Duel Between Founder’s Heirs and ‘Interloper’

Third Point, Daniel Loeb’s hedge fund in Manhattan, is pushing for the sale or restructuring of Campbell Soup Co., taking on the family who owns more than 40 percent of the firm. He’s up against the descendants of John T. Dorrance, a chemist who devised the formula for condensed soup. His hedge fund and the company have spent months exchanging barbed letters. Their battle will culminate Nov. 29, when Campbell shareholders vote on a proposal by Third Point to take five seats on the company’s board. Campbell's earnings were down 50 percent last quarter, soup sales have been eroding, and the company’s chief executive stepped down in May.

Google Cloud Executive Who Sought Pentagon Contract Steps Down

Diane Greene, whose pursuit of Pentagon contracts for artificial intelligence technology sparked a worker uprising at Google, is stepping down as chief executive of the company’s cloud computing business. Greene said she would stay on as chief executive until January. She will be replaced by Thomas Kurian, who oversaw product development at Oracle until his resignation in October. Her leadership of Google Cloud came under scrutiny this year when employees protested the company’s pursuit of a Defense Department contract for the Maven program, which uses artificial intelligence to interpret video images and could be used to improve the targeting of drone strikes.

First Black Entertainment Executive at a Major Network Is Leaving ABC

Channing Dungey, the first black executive to run the entertainment division at a major network, is leaving ABC, the company said Friday. The move was announced just a few months before the Walt Disney Co., ABC’s corporate parent, is scheduled to finish its acquisition of much of 21st Century Fox. The expanded Disney television empire will be overseen by incoming Fox executives. Dungey, who took over in February 2016, will be replaced by Karey Burke, a programming executive at the cable network Freeform. Burke will become the fourth person in eight years to hold the title of president of ABC entertainment.

California Utility Gets Reassurance on Wildfire Liability

After its stock plummeted over its possible role in California’s deadly wildfires, the state’s largest utility won back some investor confidence Friday after its chief regulator offered a backstop. Shares in Pacific Gas and Electric Co., which serves most of the state’s northern half, had plunged over concerns that it could face insolvency over liability claims arising from the fires. But analysts upgraded the stock after the president of the California Public Utilities Commission said it would take into account any financial liabilities PG&E incurred from the fires when setting rates. Michael Picker said the commission had authority to do so under a state law enacted in September.

Trump Calls China’s List of Trade Concessions ‘Not Acceptable’

President Donald Trump said Friday that a list of trade concessions offered by Chinese officials in recent days was not sufficient to resolve concerns about Beijing’s trade practices, suggesting that a deal remains unlikely when Trump meets with President Xi Jinping of China this month. Trump expressed optimism that an agreement with China would eventually be reached and acknowledged that negotiations had intensified in recent weeks. China recently gave Trump administration officials a list of about 140 concessions it was willing to make, but Trump said the list did not include “four or five” large items that needed to be resolved before a deal could be reached.

Judge Orders White House to Restore CNN Reporter’s Credentials

A federal judge Friday ordered the Trump administration to restore the press credentials of Jim Acosta of CNN, handing the cable network an early win in its lawsuit against the president and members of his administration. Judge Timothy J. Kelly of U.S. District Court in Washington ruled the White House had behaved inappropriately in stripping Acosta of his press badge shortly after a testy exchange at a news conference last week. Taking away the pass amounted to a violation of his right to a fair and transparent process, the judge ruled. Kelly declined to say whether the denial had amounted to a First Amendment issue.