Nissan will be the victim of cost-cutting “carnage” if it combines forces with Japanese peer Honda, former Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn told CNBC on Tuesday.

“I think, without any doubt, Honda is going to be in the driver’s seat, which is very sad to see after having led Nissan for 19 years [and] brought Nissan to the forefront of the industry, to see that they’re going to be the victim of a carnage, because there is total duplication between Nissan and Honda,” he told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Europe.”

Ghosn, who once led three automakers as part of the Nissan-Renault-Mitsubishi alliance, has been residing in Lebanon after being arrested in Japan in November 2018 and fleeing trial on charges of financial crimes. He denies misconduct.

“There is practically no complementarity here, which means, if they want to make synergy it is going to be through maybe cost reduction, duplication of plan, duplication of technology, and we know exactly who’s going to pay the price of it. It’s going to be the minor partner, and it’s going to be Nissan,” Ghosn said.

Nissan had greater complementarities with France’s Renault, Ghosn estimated, referencing a long-standing partnership that has been largely unwound.

Speculation about a potential Honda and Nissan merger began earlier this month, and the two companies confirmed the official start of talks over a business integration during a news conference on Monday. Under current proposals, a holding company would act as the parent of both firms and be listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, with Honda — which has a market capitalization around four times that of Nissan — nominating most board members of the new entity. Nissan’s strategic partner Mitsubishi is also engaged in talks over joining the group.

A $54 billion Nissan-Honda group would leapfrog South Korea’s Hyundai to become the world’s third-largest automaker by vehicle sales, behind Japan’s Toyota and Germany’s Volkswagen. The integrated group would also represent a landmark in automotive industry consolidation, which has been long expected in both Japan and worldwide as businesses struggle to shoulder the development costs of electric vehicles and autonomous driving technology.

Executives at both Honda and Nissan on Monday stressed that a combined company would be able to share the intelligence and resources necessary to compete in the EV transition and deliver economies of scale, boosting operating profit to a projected 3 trillion yen ($19.1 billion) in the long term.

Nissan is embarking on the ambitious merger while simultaneously undertaking a deep restructure it announced in November, which will reduce global production capacity by a fifth and cut 9,000 jobs.

Honda CEO Toshihiro Mibe on Monday acknowledged that some shareholders may feel his company would be supporting struggling Nissan as part of the deal, but stressed that the business integration talks will “not come to fruition” if the two automakers fail to stand on their own.

Ghosn nevertheless told CNBC that the merger plan suggests “Nissan is in panic mode, looking for somebody to save them from the situation, because they are unable to generate the solution by themselves.”

He expressed “high doubts” that the turnaround at Nissan will be successful, without providing details.

Kei Okamura, senior vice president and portfolio manager at Neuberger Berman, echoed the sentiment that details of the merger plan still need to be ironed out.

“If you’re an investor you’re going to be thinking about the three to five earnings outlook. What was announced [Monday] was the near term, so the timeline, and the long-term vision. The only issue is how is this merged entity going to get there, and that’s where there are a lot of uncertainties ahead,” Okamura told CNBC’s “Street Signs Asia” on Tuesday.

“The post-merger integration is going to be absolutely essential … unless these companies are able to really full integrate themselves together in terms of the people, the assets and of course the culture, these deals have the potential to unwind, and we have to take into consideration that this deal may not happen if [Nissan] doesn’t come through with its turnaround program,” Okamura added.

Nissan declined to comment on this story beyond its statement out on Monday. Honda did not immediately respond to a CNBC request for comment.

Top CEOs and their companies are pledging to donate millions of dollars to President-elect Donald Trump’s inaugural committee, as they seek to get on his good side and make inroads before he takes office.

Some of the planned donations reportedly include $1 million each from Jeff Bezos’ Amazon, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Facebook parent company Meta, led by Mark Zuckerberg. Others include $2 million from Robinhood Markets and $1 million each from both Uber and its CEO, Dara Khosrowshahi.

Ford is reportedly coupling its own $1 million donation with a fleet of vehicles.

Hedge fund manager Ken Griffin also said he plans to give $1 million to the tax-exempt inaugural committee, Bloomberg reported. Other donations from finance leaders are reportedly in the works.

Empowered by a decisive electoral victory, Trump has vowed to revamp U.S. economic policy in a way that could have outsized benefits for a few favored industries, like fossil fuels.

At the same time, he has telegraphed the value, both personal and political, that he places on face-to-face meetings and public praise from chief executives of the world’s largest companies.

“EVERYBODY WANTS TO BE MY FRIEND!!!” Trump wrote Thursday in a post on Truth Social, the social media app run by his own tech company.

Many of those CEOs have already made, or are planning to make, trips to Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s Palm Beach, Florida, resort and de facto transition headquarters, as they seek to gain influence with and access to the incoming administration.

To that end, Trump’s inaugural committee presents a “unique opportunity,” said Brendan Glavin, director of research for the money-in-politics nonprofit OpenSecrets, in an interview.

Inaugural committees, which are appointed by presidents-elect, plan and fund most of the pomp and circumstance that traditionally surrounds the transition of power from one administration to the next.

While the money is ultimately benefiting a recent political candidate, it doesn’t carry the same connotation as a donation to, say, a super PAC, which can fund partisan political activities that risk stoking controversy.

And unlike a direct contribution to a candidate’s campaign, there are no limits on how much an individual — or a corporation or labor group — can give to an inaugural committee.

Moreover, since Trump already won the election, an inaugural contribution carries no risk for a high-profile executive of backing a losing candidate.

“It really is a great opportunity for them to curry favor with the incoming administration,” Glavin said.

While it’s nothing new for corporations and power brokers to shower big money on inaugural committees, experts told CNBC the Trump factor changes the calculus.

“It’s all heightened now,” Glavin said. “None of these people, they don’t want to be Trump’s punching bag for four years.”

Trump’s inaugural committee and his transition team did not respond to requests for comment.

Trump’s 2017 inaugural committee raked in about $107 million, by far the most of any in U.S. history. The previous record had been set in 2009 during the first inauguration of Barack Obama, whose committee raised $53 million.

Trump’s second inauguration is on pace to shatter that record, with pledged contributions already surpassing a $150 million fundraising goal, ABC News reported.

President Joe Biden’s inaugural committee, by comparison, raised nearly $62 million.

“One of the oldest adages in Washington is that if you’re not at the table, you’re on the menu, and the price of admission to have a seat at the table keeps going up,” said Michael Beckel, research director of Issue One, a political reform advocacy group.

The boost in funding for Trump’s second inaugural committee comes in part from tech giants, many of whom largely steered clear of supporting his first inauguration.

Other than GoDaddy.com founder Robert Parsons, who gave $1 million, few other leaders in Big Tech donated to Trump’s 2017 committee.

Trump once openly clashed with some of them, including Zuckerberg and Bezos, who also owns The Washington Post, a frequent target of the president-elect’s ire.

Not so this time around. As Trump vows to tear up reams of federal regulations, but also continues to accuse Big Tech of stifling competition, industry leaders could have more riding on their relationship with the White House than ever before.

“I’m actually very optimistic,” Bezos said of a second Trump presidency in a Dec. 4 interview at The New York Times’ DealBook conference. “I’m very hopeful. He seems to have a lot of energy around reducing regulation. And my point of view, if I can help him do that, I’m going to help him. Because we do have too much regulation in this country.”

The comments came in the wake of a scandal at The Washington Post in October, when the paper reported that Bezos decided not to publish its editorial board’s endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris over Trump. Bezos in an op-ed defended the paper’s decision to no longer endorse presidential candidates, but the reversal spurred an exodus of subscribers and prompted numerous staffers to resign in protest.

Nowhere is Trump’s newfound friendliness with the tech world more pronounced than in his blossoming relationship with Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, who spent more than $250 million helping elect Trump.

Musk, the world’s richest person, has frequently appeared by Trump’s side before and after his election victory, and has reportedly been involved in all aspects of Trump’s transition planning. He and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy have been tapped to lead an advisory group tasked with cutting government costs.

This could put OpenAI’s Altman, who is currently embroiled in a breach-of-contract lawsuit brought by Musk, in an awkward position.

Along with his million-dollar inaugural donation, Altman heaped praise on Trump earlier this month. “President Trump will lead our country into the age of AI, and I am eager to support his efforts to ensure America stays ahead,” he said.

Craig Holman, government affairs lobbyist for the progressive nonprofit Public Citizen, told CNBC that these figures “very much fear that Donald Trump may take retribution against them.”

“So they’re throwing money” at his feet “in order to curry favor,” Holman said.’

Four days after the presidential election, Trump announced the formation of the “Trump Vance Inaugural Committee, Inc.,” a 501(c)(4) nonprofit. It is co-chaired by real estate investor Steve Witkoff and former Republican Sen. Kelly Loeffler of Georgia, who is also Trump’s pick to lead the Small Business Administration.

Reince Priebus, who was one of Trump’s White House chiefs of staff during his first term, said in an X post that he has been tapped to serve as the committee’s finance chair.

Priebus also shared a screenshot of an invitation that listed the names of other finance chairs. They include Miriam Adelson, the GOP megadonor who spent $100 million this year on a pro-Trump super PAC, and billionaire Trump donor Diane Hendricks.

Inaugural committees are required to publicly disclose the names of donors who give $200 or more, but those filings aren’t due until 90 days after the inaugural ceremony.

If the committee has a surplus after all the festivities, finding out just how much is left can be a challenge.

Trump’s 2017 inauguration was a smaller affair than Obama’s in 2009, although Trump raised more than twice as much money for his as Obama had. As a result, Trump’s committee was widely expected to have tens of millions of dollars left over after it paid for balls and hotels.

But years after the fact, it was unclear what happened to much of that money.

Federal filings show that roughly a quarter of all the funds raised, $26 million, were paid to a newly created firm that was run by an advisor to first lady Melania Trump.

“We take a look through the history of the financing of inaugurations, and clearly it comes from very large donors, wealthy special interests and corporations, almost all of whom have business pending before the federal government,” said Holman, of Public Citizen.

He added, “This is a real cesspool of buying favors.”

If the Covid era marked a boom time for digital health companies, 2024 was the reckoning.

In a year that saw the Nasdaq jump 32%, surpassing 20,000 for the first time this month, health tech providers largely suffered. Of 39 public digital health companies analyzed by CNBC, roughly two-thirds are down for the year. Others are now out of business.

There were some breakout stars, like Hims & Hers Health, which was buoyed by the success of its popular new weight loss offering and its position in the GLP-1 craze. But that was an exception.

While there were some company-specific challenges in the industry, overall it was a “year of inflection,” according to Scott Schoenhaus, an analyst at KeyBanc Capital Markets covering health-care IT companies. Business models that appeared poised to break out during the pandemic haven’t all worked as planned, and companies have had to refocus on profitability and a more muted growth environment.

“The pandemic was a huge pull forward in demand, and we’re facing those tough, challenging comps,” Schoenhaus told CNBC in an interview. “Growth clearly slowed for most of my names, and I think employers, payers, providers and even pharma are more selective and more discerning on digital health companies that they partnered with.” 

In 2021, digital health startups raised $29.1 billion, blowing past all previous funding records, according to a report from Rock Health. Almost two dozen digital health companies went public through an initial public offering or special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, that year, up from the previous record of eight in 2020. Money was pouring into themes that played into remote work and remote health as investors looked for growth with interest rates stuck near zero.

But as the worst waves of the pandemic subsided, so did the insatiable demand for new digital health tools. It’s been a rude awakening for the sector.  

“What we’re still going through is an understanding of the best ways to address digital health needs and capabilities, and the push and pull of the current business models and how successful they may be,” Michael Cherny, an analyst at Leerink Partners, told CNBC. “We’re in a settling out period post Covid.”

Progyny, which offers benefits solutions for fertility and family planning, is down more than 60% year to date. Teladoc Health, which once dominated the virtual-care space, has dropped 58% and is 96% off its 2021 high.

When Teladoc acquired Livongo in 2020, the companies had a combined enterprise value of $37 billion. Teladoc’s market cap now sits at under $1.6 billion.

GoodRx, which offers price transparency tools for medications, is down 33% year to date. 

Schoenhaus says many companies’ estimates were too high this year.

Progyny cut its full-year revenue guidance in every earnings report in 2024. In February, Progyny was predicting $1.29 billion to $1.32 billion in annual revenue. By November, the range was down to $1.14 billion to $1.15 billion.

GoodRx also repeatedly slashed its full-year guidance for 2024. What was $800 million to $810 million in May shrank to $794 million by the November.

In Teladoc’s first-quarter report, the company said it expected full-year revenue of $2.64 billion to $2.74 billion. The company withdrew its outlook in its second quarter, and reported consecutive year-over year declines.

“This has been a year of coming to terms with the growth outlook for many of my companies, and so I think we can finally look at 2025 as maybe a better year in terms of the setups,” Schoenhaus said.  

While overzealous forecasting tells part of the digital health story this year, there were some notable stumbles at particular companies. 

Dexcom, which makes devices for diabetes and glucose management, is down more than 35% year to date. The stock tumbled more than 40% in July — its steepest decline ever — after the company reported disappointing second-quarter results and issued weak full-year guidance. 

CEO Kevin Sayer attributed the challenges to a restructuring of the sales team, fewer new customers than expected and lower revenue per user. Following the report, JPMorgan Chase analysts marveled at “the magnitude of the downside” and the fact that it “appears to mostly be self-inflicted.” 

Genetic testing company 23andMe had a particularly rough year. The company went public via a SPAC in 2021, valuing the business at $3.5 billion, after its at-home DNA testing kits skyrocketed in popularity. The company is now worth less than $100 million and CEO Anne Wojcicki is trying to keep it afloat.

In September, all seven independent directors resigned from 23andMe’s board, citing disagreements with Wojcicki about the “strategic direction for the company.” Two months later, 23andMe said it planned to cut 40% of its workforce and shutter its therapeutics business as part of a restructuring plan. 

Wojcicki has repeatedly said she intends to take 23andMe private. The stock is down more than 80% year to date. 

Investors in Hims & Hers had a much better year.

Shares of the direct-to-consumer marketplace are up more than 200% year to date, pushing the company’s market cap to $6 billion, thanks to soaring demand for GLP-1s. 

Hims & Hers began prescribing compounded semaglutide through its platform in May after launching a new weight loss program late last year. Semaglutide is the active ingredient in Novo Nordisk’s blockbuster medications Ozempic and Wegovy, which can cost around $1,000 a month without insurance. Compounded semaglutide is a cheaper, custom-made alternative to the brand drugs and can be produced when the brand-name treatments are in shortage.

Hims & Hers will likely have to contend with dynamic supply and regulatory environments next year, but even before adding compounded GLP-1s to its portfolio, the company said in its February earnings call that it expects its weight loss program to bring in more than $100 million in revenue by the end of 2025. 

Doximity, a digital platform for medical professionals, also had a strong 2024, with its stock price more than doubling. The company’s platform, which for years has been likened to a LinkedIn for doctors, allows clinicians to stay current on medical news, manage paperwork, find referrals and carry out telehealth appointments with patients. 

Doximity primarily generates revenue through its hiring solutions, telehealth tools and marketing offerings for clients like pharmaceutical companies.

Leerink’s Cherny said Doximity’s success can be attributed to its lean operating model, as well as the “differentiated mousetrap” it’s created because of its reach into the physician network. 

“DOCS is a rare company in healthcare IT as it is already profitable, generates strong incremental margins, and is a steady grower,” Leerink analysts, including Cherny, wrote in a November note. The firm raised its price target on the stock to $60 from $35. 

Another standout this year was Oscar Health, the tech-enabled insurance company co-founded by Thrive Capital Management’s Joshua Kushner. Its shares are up nearly 50% year to date. The company supports roughly 1.65 million members and plans to expand to around 4 million by 2027. 

Oscar showed strong revenue growth in its third-quarter report in November. Sales climbed 68% from a year earlier to $2.4 billion.

Additionally, two digital health companies, Waystar and Tempus AI, took the leap and went public in 2024. 

The IPO market has been largely dormant since late 2021, when soaring inflation and rising interest rates pushed investors out of risk. Few technology companies have gone public since then, and no digital health companies held IPOs in 2023, according to a report from Rock Health. 

Waystar, a health-care payment software vendor, has seen its stock jump to $36.93 from its IPO price of $21.50 in June. Tempus, a precision medicine company, hasn’t fared as well. It’s stock has slipped to $34.91 from its IPO price of $37, also in June.

“Hopefully, the valuations are more supportive of opportunities for other companies that have been lingering in the background as private companies for the last several years.” Schoenhaus said. 

Several digital health companies exited the public markets entirely this year. 

Cue Health, which made Covid tests and counted Google as an early customer, and Better Therapeutics, which used digital therapeutics to treat cardiometabolic conditions, both shuttered operations and delisted from the Nasdaq. 

Revenue cycle management company R1 RCM was acquired by TowerBrook Capital Partners and Clayton, Dubilier & Rice in an $8.9 billion deal. Similarly, Altaris bought Sharecare, which runs a virtual health platform, for roughly $540 million.

Commure, a private company that offers tools for simplifying clinicians’ workflows, acquired medical AI scribing company Augmedix for about $139 million.

“There was a lot of competition that entered the marketplace during the pandemic years, and we’ve seen some of that being flushed out of the markets, which is a good thing,” Schoenhaus said.

Cherny said the sector is adjusting to a post-pandemic period, and digital health companies are figuring out their role.

“We’re still cycling through what could be almost termed digital health 1.1 business models,” he said. “It’s great to say we do things digitally, but it only matters if it has some approach toward impacting the ‘triple aim’ of health care: better care, more convenient, lower cost.”