FIX Dessert Chocolatier: Sugar high in Dubai
It is very meet, right and possibly even our bounden duty to take a moment to reflect, after this past weekend when those of the Christian persuasion celebrated the resurrection of their Lord, on the role of chocolate in the proceedings.
Somehow the passion of the Christ has become intertwined with the consumption of large numbers of eggs provided by the ever-generous Easter bunny, a mysterious creature who doesn’t make an appearance in a single gospel but who has subsequently assumed a prominent role.
Recently the chocolate market has been turned on its head by the meteoric rise of Dubai chocolate, which FIX launched on an unsuspecting world back in 2021. The offering is a milk chocolate bar stuffed with pistachio cream and shredded pastry, and it gained limited traction until a TikTok video extolling its virtues was posted in late 2023. About 120-million views later, demand for this unlikely taste sensation has reached such levels that the global pistachio market is seriously out of whack.
Pistachios are mostly grown in the US and Iran, and after a poor harvest in the US the price has shot up from $7.90 to $10.35 a pound, with chocolatiers the world over desperate to get their hands on enough nuts to satisfy the demand, especially given the disruption to normal trading patterns caused by the Trumpian tariff explosion.
FIX promises that its viral knafeh (a traditional Arab dessert) chocolate bar is a beautiful symphony of textures and flavours, not to mention a multisensory experience that delights from the first bite to the last, all for a mere 68 dirhams.
UnitedHealthcare: Into the casualty ward
It is quite a statement on sentiment about the health insurance industry in the US that Luigi Mangione, who is accused of fatally shooting UnitedHealthcare (UHC) CEO Brian Thompson in the middle of Manhattan in December, has been described by Forbes magazine as a “social media folk hero”.
A poll conducted soon after the killing found that 41% of people aged between 18 and 29 thought the murder was either “somewhat or completely acceptable”, which could give senior executives in a wide range of industries pause for thought.
The bullets used were inscribed with “deny, defend and depose” in a reference to the tactics employed by health-care companies to wriggle their way out of paying claims, but it appears that UHC has been falling down on this score. Its share price plunged 22% after it slashed its annual profit forecast and warned that it had been hit by a surge in demand for medical services from older clients that was way beyond expectations.
UHC is the largest health insurer in the US with about 50-million people covered and its member base is growing, but it is paying the price for policy changes under the Joe Biden administration that reduced government reimbursement rates for Medicare patients and passed more of the costs on to insurers.
The percentage of premiums collected that were paid out as medical costs rose from 83.2% to 85.5%, and the company is predicting a further rise to 87.5% on the back of patients inherited from other insurers whose health was in worse shape than it thought.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.