nytimes.com uses horizontal carousel on mobile very well, I feel. It's usually for a group of related stories, it's non-intrusive, uses scrolling instead of buttons, and the next story is always partially-visible, which I think is gold-star UI for letting users know it exists.

My understanding is that NY Times spends quite a lot of effort on user metrics, so I would guess, but can't say for sure, that they have evidence that their carousels work.