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The New Mexico Spring
Fri, 16 Apr 2021 10:00:52 +0000
How progressives took power in the state's Democratic Party.
The post The New Mexico Spring appeared first on The Intercept.
Web support has boomed as Covid forces people to change career. But it can cost thousands, for little in return
When the pandemic hit, self-employed customer care consultant Madeleine Fisher* saw her income evaporate. “My business predominantly works in the leisure, hospitality and non-essential retail sectors and they all closed, or they didn’t have any budget for customer care. I went into panic mode,” she says.
As a limited company boss she had no government support to fall back on. The business owner decided to use almost a third of the £4,500 she had applied for under the government’s bounce-back loan scheme (set up to enable smaller businesses to access finance more quickly during the pandemic) – to pay for a coaching package with a “design influencer”.
Continue reading...Putting conditions on U.S. aid to Israel has become a controversial topic — but it was the norm in Washington just a few decades ago.
The post Rep. Betty McCollum Leads Effort to Block Israel From Using U.S. Aid to Destroy Palestinian Homes appeared first on The Intercept.
Despite pledging to recuse herself from contracts involving her partner “as necessary,” the council member-turned-House-candidate approved $17 million to Perk.
The post Shontel Brown Approved Major Contract, Then Contractor Backed Her Campaign appeared first on The Intercept.
UK’s greater inequality levels made impact worse for the less well off, study suggests
British households were plunged into the Covid pandemic with lower savings, more debt and weaker welfare support than their French and German counterparts, according to analysis revealing how inequality increased the impact of the UK crisis.
High levels of income inequality also weakened the financial resilience of poorer households as the pandemic hit. The greater exposure of British households, revealed in an analysis by the Resolution Foundation thinktank to be published in full this week, comes despite similar levels of average income with our European neighbours.
Continue reading...Tesla could be in for a shock as far-eastern rivals use cheap money to gain traction among affluent western car buyers
Tesla boss Elon Musk is not known for admiring his competition, but when Chinese manufacturer Nio made its 100,000th electric car last week, he offered his congratulations.
It was a mark of respect from a chief executive who had been through “manufacturing hell” with his own company. Yet it is also a sign of the growing influence of China’s electric carmakers. They are hoping to stake out a spot among the heavyweights of the new industry and bring a significant new challenge to Tesla – and to the rest of the automotive industry as it scrambles to catch up.
Continue reading...U.S. stocks on Friday finished the week on a strong note, with the Dow and S&P 500 posting their second consecutive closing records and the Nasdaq Composite ending within a stone's throw of its record. Bullish investors point to a strong start to earnings season from the likes of JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Goldman Sachs Group coupled with blowout economic reports, notably a 10% rise in retail sales in March and weekly jobless claims figures falling to a pandemic low. Further helping lift buying momentum was a momentary pause in a climb for bond yields, which had previously been a sign of rising borrowing costs for investors and companies. The 10-year Treasury note yield finished at 1.571% on Friday, up on the day but down nearly 10 basis points on the week, marking its sharpest weekly drop in about 10 months. Against that backdrop, the Dow Jones Indusrtrial Average closed up by about 165 points, or 0.5%, to reach around 34,200, extending its climb beyond the 34,000 milestone achieved on Thursday. The S&P 500 index closed at a record high, up 0.4% to 4,185, while the Nasdaq Composite Index closed up 0.1% at 14,052, about 0.3% from its closing high or a little over 40 points. For the week, the Dow booked a 1.2% gain and the S&P 500 ended 1.4% higher, marking their fourth consecutive weekly climbs. The Nasdaq Composite closed up 1.1% for the week to mark its third straight weekly advance.
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Gold futures settled higher on Friday, with prices getting a boost from a weekly decline in U.S. Treasury note yields, which helped prices for the precious metal post a gain of about 2% from a week ago. June gold rose $13.40, or 0.8%, to settle at $1,780.20 an ounce. That was the highest finish for a most-active contract since Feb. 24, according to FactSet data.
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State legislators are crafting ever more extreme abortion restrictions designed to reach the Supreme Court. 2021 has already seen more than 500 bills filed across the country.
The post Oklahoma Lawmaker Calls Abortion Worse Than Slavery appeared first on The Intercept.
Investors cheered the public debut of Agilon Health Inc. , as shares of the California-based provider of support services for primary care physicians opened 23% above its initial public offering price, then extended gains. Agilon's IPO priced late Wednesday at $23.00 a share, at the top of the expected range of between $20 and $23 a share, to value the company at $8.85 billion. The company offered 46.6 million shares in the IPO to raise $1.07 billion. J.P. Morgan, Goldman Sachs and BofA Securities were the lead underwriters. The stock opened at $28.25 at 12:13 p.m. Eastern, and was recently trading 28.2% above the IPO price at $29.48, to push the valuation up to $11.34 billion. Agilon recorded a net loss of $60.1 million on revenue of $1.22 billion in 2020, after a loss of $282.6 million on revenue of $794.4 million in 2019. The company went public at a time that the Renaissance IPO ETF has slipped 3.4% over the past three months, while the SPDR Health Care Select Sector ETF has gained 3.2% and the S&P 500 has rallied 10.6%.
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This time last year, NHS bosses asked doctors and nurses to ‘wear aprons’ and work without protective full-length gowns when treating Covid-19 patients, as hospitals were within hours of running out of supplies.
This is just one example of how the UK government has been slammed for its handling of the pandemic, through a series of missteps, U-turns, lockdowns, denials – and more than 150,000 deaths.
Twelve months on, the Guardian's Pamela Duncan looks at three major areas where officials were out of line with the data on coronavirus infections and deaths available at the time.
A government spokesperson responded, saying: ‘Throughout the pandemic, our approach has been guided by data and the advice of scientific and medical experts … As new evidence emerged, we acted quickly and decisively to implement life-saving measures, including restrictions and lockdowns, to protect lives, livelihoods and our economy. We are doing everything we can to ensure care home residents and staff are protected, including providing more than 9.9 billion items of PPE to the frontline.’
Continue reading...Shares of Bank of New York Mellon Corp. were indicated up fractionally in premarket trading Friday, after the bank reported first-quarter profit and revenue that fell from a year ago, given the impact of low interest rates, but topped expectations. Net income declined to $858 million, or 97 cents a share, from $944 million, or $1.05 a share, in the year-ago period. The FactSet consensus for earnings per share was 87 cents. Total revenue fell 5% to $3.92 billion, above the FactSet consensus of $3.84 billion, as total fee revenue fell 1% to $3.27 billion and net interest revenue dropped 20% to $655 million. Total revenue for the bank's largest, investment services business fell 8% to $2.99 billion, while investment and wealth management revenue rose 10% to $991 million. The bank resumed share repurchases during the quarter, and spent $699 million to buy back 16.8 million shares. The stock has advanced 13.1% year to date through Thursday, while the SPDR Financial Select Sector ETF has rallied 19.2% and the S&P 500 has gained 11.0%.
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Squarespace Inc. filed paperwork Friday for a direct-listing that would enable shares of the website-design company to trade on the New York Stock Exchange without the company raising money through a traditional initial public offering. Squarespace, which makes tools for building and hosting websites, generated revenue of $621.1 million in 2020, up from $484.8 million in 2019. The company is profitable but saw its net income decline to $30.6 million in 2020 from $58.2 million a year earlier. Squarespace had 3.66 million unique subscriptions to its platform as of the end of December. The company said in a filing that it's benefitting from a rise in online commerce and a growing interest from brands to develop better direct relationships with consumers. The company intends to list on the NYSE using the ticker SQSP. The company has yet to disclose when it plans to conduct the direct listing or how many shares will be made available in the process. Squarespace's filing comes after Coinbase Global Inc. held its own direct listing earlier this week.
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The Biden administration will invest $1.7 billion to help states and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention track and fight COVID-19 variants, the White House announced Friday. The money is from the COVID-relief law enacted last month, and includes $1 billion for expanding genomic sequencing; $400 million for studying genomic epidemiology; and $300 million for a system for sharing and analyzing sequencing data. The administration says "new and potentially dangerous strains" of the virus make up about half of COVID cases in the U.S. today.
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Allegations made against workers at Mitie, a company contracted by the Home Office to deport people from UK
Home Office contractors who deport people from the UK have used the racist term “cotton pickers” to describe their black colleagues, a court has heard.
The Home Office uses the contractor Mitie to deport people to destinations including Jamaica, Pakistan, India, Nigeria and Ghana along with European countries and other locations. The escorts are only allowed to do this work if they have received accreditation from the Home Office.
Continue reading...Fraud can have devastating consequences on victims, and not only financially
Mary Higgins’s life changed the moment the phone rang one afternoon in November. The caller claimed to be from the Metropolitan police fraud department and told her that her bank cards had been compromised.
In an elaborate scam, involving two days of phone calls from fake officials, the 78-year-old was persuaded that she was helping police with a money-laundering sting in which her bank was complicit and agreed to transfer £10,000 from her Santander account to “safe” havens.
Continue reading...Comcast Corp. "possesses a notable COVID-recovery component with its stores, parks, and theatrical business," which could help its stock even as defensive cable names have lagged recently, according to Raymond James analyst Frank Louthan IV. He upgraded shares of Comcast to outperform from market perform Friday while setting a $61 price target. Louthan sees room for upside from the NBCUniversal business, noting that Universal Studios Hollywood is reopening this week at limited capacity and with some restrictions. NBC has other open theme parks that were running at about 35% capacity late last year, with room to head higher. "We believe the uncertain timing of Universal Studios Hollywood reopening had been an overhang on the business," Louthan wrote in a note to clients. Louthan also sees potential in the company's Peacock streaming business and its mobility business. Peacock could start showing benefits from its exclusive streaming deal for "The Office" and could eventually come to reap rewards from the postponed Olympics, due to take place this summer, he argued. The mobility side of the business could show some improvements from the reopening of Xfinity stores, he continued. "Comcast appears to be giving up some gains from the renegotiation with Verizon this week, cutting prices by up to $15/month per line, implying aggressive promotions," Louthan wrote. "That said, we believe subscriber gains drive investor interest and significantly reduce churn." Shares of Comcast are up 1.3% in premarket trading Friday. They've gained 9.2% over the past three months as the S&P 500 has risen 10.7%.
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Shares of Morgan Stanley fell 1.3% in premarket trading Friday, even after the financial services company reported first-quarter profit that more than doubled and revenue that jumped 60% to record levels, boosted by strength in the institutional securities business. Net income rose to $3.98 billion, or $2.19 a share, from $1.59 billion, or $1.01 a share, in the year-ago period. Excluding nonrecurring items, adjusted earnings per share came in at $2.22, above the FactSet consensus of $1.72. Revenue rose 60.7% to $15.72 billion, beating the FactSet consensus of $14.10 billion, as institutional securities (IS) revenue grew 65.6% to $8.58 billion to top expectations of $7.25 billion. Within IS, equity revenue increased 17.4% to $2.88 billion and fixed income revenue increased 43.8% to $2.97 billion. Net interest income rose 49.6% to $2.03 billion, above the FactSet consensus of $1.60 billion. The company said it repurchased $2.1 billion worth of its stock during the quarter. The stock has rallied 17.9% year to date through Thursday, while the SPDR Financial Select Sector ETF climbed 19.2% and the S&P 500 gained 11.0%.
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The S&P 500 and Dow clinched fresh records Thursday, after economic reports continued to affirm a healthy recovery from the pandemic, highlighted by retail sales surging in March on the back of fiscal stimulus checks to consumers and jobless benefit claims falling to a fresh low for the COVID period. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed up more than 300 points at a fresh milestone at 34,000, on a preliminary basis, the S&P 500 index notched a 1.1% advance to log its all-time closing high at around 4,170 and the Nasdaq Composite Index finished 1.3% higher at about 14,039, marking its first finish above 14,000 since February and its third-highest close in its history. U.S. retail sales surged almost 10% in March thanks to $1,400 stimulus checks paid to consumers by the federal government. Sales climbed 9.8% last month, the government said Thursday. Economists polled by Dow Jones and The Wall Street Journal had forecast a 6.1% increase.Adding to the market's optimism, weekly jobless benefit claims fell to a pandemic-era low. U.S. unemployment claims sank by 193,000 in the week of April 10, an unusually large decline that likely reflects both an improving economy but also continuing problems in processing applications for jobless benefits.
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The Guardian’s banking correspondent, Kalyeena Makortoff, and political correspondent Rajeev Syal discuss the unprecedented formal inquiry into lobbying by the former prime minister David Cameron on behalf of the collapsed finance company Greensill Capital
The Guardian’s banking correspondent, Kalyeena Makortoff, talks to Rachel Humphreys about Greensill, a company that specialised in supply-chain finance, and its relationship with the former prime minister David Cameron. Cameron joined Greensill as an adviser in 2018, two years after resigning as prime minister. It has emerged that last year he sent texts to Rishi Sunak, the chancellor, and “informally” phoned two other Treasury ministers, asking for Greensill Capital to get the largest possible allocation of government-backed loans under the Covid corporate financing facility, or CCFF. He also lobbied a No 10 aide, and in 2019 took Lex Greensill to a “private drink” with Matt Hancock, the health secretary.
Although Cameron hasn’t broken any rules, there have been questions raised over the fact that he appears to have used personal contacts to seek preferential treatment for a company in which he had a financial stake. On Monday No 10 said it was launching an independent investigation into Cameron’s lobbying, led by the corporate lawyer and government adviser Nigel Boardman. Rachel also hears from Guardian political correspondent Rajeev Syal about how Cameron has responded to the scandal and the wider role of lobbying in UK politics.
Continue reading...Simone Biles not ruling out the 2024 Paris Olympics, when she will be 27, is part of a trend of maturity showing benefits
After months of subtly indicating that the coming Olympics could be her last, Simone Biles recently changed her tune and refrained from ruling out the possibility that she could continue in some form until the Paris Olympics in 2024. Biles, already a veteran at 24, would be 27 by then – a competition age that was once unthinkable for an Olympic all-around gold medallist.
Continue reading...From climate to healthcare, fundamental challenges demand the US change with the times
America is about to revive an idea that was left for dead decades ago. It’s called industrial policy and it’s at the heart of Joe Biden’s plans to restructure the US economy.
Related: Republican ‘attacks’ on corporations over voting rights bills are a hypocritical sham | Robert Reich
Continue reading...A change in Border Patrol policies is straining human aid networks in one of the deadliest areas along the border.
The post “It’s Consumed Our Lives”: Volunteers Step In as Border Patrol Drops Migrants Off in Tiny Arizona Towns appeared first on The Intercept.
A new poll found most Americans want Biden to break drug companies' monopolies and end Covid-19 vaccine apartheid.
The post There Shouldn’t Be Vaccine Patents in a Health Crisis. Most Americans Agree: Waive Them. appeared first on The Intercept.
Josh Edgoose spent hours in the rain to capture this amusing juxtaposition that shows the capital in a colourful light
Josh Edgoose’s new book, Brilliant Parade, contains five years of his London pictures. Any spare time from his day job in merchandising he has used to walk the city with his camera, enjoying the meditative purpose of looking. He thinks of it as a form of gambling, but with time, not money - “you might put in eight hours and 20 miles and come back with nothing” - but occasionally his three graces – colour, coincidence and quiet comedy – align.
This picture was taken in Regent Street on a day when it was closed for a vintage car parade. Edgoose took the opportunity to crouch at the kerb to get the angle for the enormous shoes on the billboard to reflect in the puddle and create the ironies of perspective. Then all he had to do was wait. After an hour or two in the drizzle, in which he fielded questions from curious passers-by, the woman walked into his frame with the “right kind of silvery blue tones” and he had his picture.
Continue reading...The global death toll from the coronavirus-borne illness COVID-19 rose above 3 million on Saturday, according to data aggregated by Johns Hopkins University, as the case tally climbed above 140 million. The U.S. leads the world in cases and deaths by wide margins, with 31.6 million cases and 566,238 deaths. The U.S. added at least 78,932 new cases and 940 new deaths on Friday, according to a New York Times tracker. The U.S. has averaged 70,117 cases a day in the past week, up 8% from the average two weeks ago. Outside of the U.S., India has replaced Brazil as the country with the second highest number of cases at 14.5 million, and is fourth globally by deaths at 175,649. Brazil is third by cases at 13.8 million and second with a death toll of 368,749. Mexico is third by deaths at 211,693 and 14th highest by cases at 2.3 million. The U.K. has 4.4 million cases and 127,472 deaths, the highest in Europe and fifth highest in the world.
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Sheriffs in Minnesota worried about who would oversee an escrow account, funded by pipeline giant Enbridge, to reimburse the costs of policing protests.
The post Local Cops Said Pipeline Company Had Influence Over Government Appointment appeared first on The Intercept.
Privately held Space Exploration Technologies Corp., or SpaceX, was selected by NASA on Friday to move forward in developing a human landing system to carry the next two U.S. astronauts to the moon "and pave the way for sustainable lunar exploration." That's under NASA's Artemis program, which aims to return humans on the moon, collaborating with commercial and international partners, and eventually send astronauts to Mars. Elon Musk is chief executive on SpaceX as well as Silicon Valley electric-car maker Tesla Inc. SpaceX in February announced plans to send four space tourists to orbit later this year on a mission to raise awareness for a children's hospital. Last month, the company's prototype Mars rocket Starship broke apart while attempting to land.
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The Dow Jones Transportation Average was rising 0.1% in afternoon trading Friday, and looks set to eke out the longest weekly gain since the late-1980s. The Dow transports has edged up 0.2% this week, which would mark the 11th-straight weekly gain. That would be the longest such streak since the 11-week stretch that ended Feb. 3, 1989. The index has run up 23.6% during its weekly win streak. In comparison, its sister index the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 1.2% this week and was headed toward a fourth-straight weekly gain, and ninth gain in the past 11 weeks, and has advanced 14.1% over the past 11 weeks. Both Dow sister indexes are set to close at weekly records, which is a bullish sign for the broader stock market. One of the six basic tenets of the century-old Dow Theory of market analysis, according to the CMT Association, is that no important bull or bear market signal could take place unless both averages gave the same signal. The idea is, the indexes have a symbiotic relationship, since transports take what the industrials make; if the companies in one of the indexes isn't performing, there's a good chance companies in the other won't either.
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Oil futures fell on Friday, pulling back on the heels of four consecutive session gains, but finished the week up by more than 6%. Forecasts for higher oil demand and declines in U.S. crude inventories contributed to the weekly price climb. May West Texas Intermediate crude fell 33 cents, or 0.5%, to settle at $63.13 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Prices for the front-month contract logged a weekly rise of 6.4%, according to FactSet data.
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Baker Hughes on Friday reported that the number of active U.S. rigs drilling for oil was up by 7 at 344 this week. The total active U.S. rig count, which includes those drilling for natural gas, was also up by 7 at 439, according to Baker Hughes. May West Texas Intermediate crude continued to pull back after four consecutive session gains. The contract was down 18 cents, or 0.3%, to $63.28 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
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Biomea Fusion Inc. rallied out of the gate Friday, as shares of the California-based biopharmaceutical company focused on treatment of genetically defined cancers opened 17.6% above the initial public offering price. The company said late Thursday its IPO, which was upsized to 9.0 million shares from 7.5 million shares, priced at $17 a share, at the top of the expected range, as it raised $153 million and was valued at $463.6 million. The stock's first trade was at $20.00 at 11:51 a.m. Eastern for 341,119 shares. The stock has pared some gains since then to trade up 16.2% at $19.75. The company went public on a day that the Renaissance IPO ETF fell 1.4% while the S&P 500 gained 0.2%.
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The homebuilder sector enjoyed a unanimous rally toward a record Friday, after data showing that new-home construction in March surged more than expected. the SPDR S&P Homebuilders ETF rallied 1.6% toward a record close, with all 35 equity components gaining ground. Among the more active homebuilders, shares of Toll Brothers Inc. climbed 1.9% and D.R. Horton Inc. hiked up 2.3%, both into record territory, while Lennar Corp. advanced 1.0%, in range of its April 9 record close of $105.52. Also in the homebuilders ETF, shares of Home Depot Inc. rallied 1.3% and Lowe's Companies jumped 1.5%, both toward record closes. The homebuilders ETF has run up 29.6% year to date, while the S&P 500 has gained 11.2%. Housing starts in March rose 19% from February to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.74 million, topping expectations of 1.62 million.
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A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's advisory committee is scheduled to meet for a second time on Friday, April 23, to discuss rare safety concerns about Johnson & Johnson's COVID-19 vaccine. Of the 6.8 million people in the U.S. who have received the J&J's shot, six women have been hospitalized with severe blood clots after receiving the vaccine. As a result, federal health officials recommended a "pause" in using the vaccine, a decision that was extended when the CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices met earlier this week. The emergency meeting is scheduled for 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Eastern Time on April 23. It will be webcast to the public.
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Shares of Mer Telemanagement Solutions Ltd. shot up 62.4% on very heavy volume in morning trading Friday, to pace all gainers on major U.S. exchanges, after the Israel-based telecom expense management company agreed to be acquired by sports betting company SharpLink Inc. Trading volume spiked to 46.2 million shares, compared with the full-day average over the past 30 days of about 343,900 shares, to make the stock the second-most active on major U.S. exchanges. The stock's rally, which puts it on track for the highest close since August 2015, has pushed Mer's market valuation up to $24.1 million. Following the closing of the merger, SharpLink shareholders will own 86% of the combined company. "Following the merger, our company will be on the leading edge of a potentially massive sports betting market in the U.S. and globally," said Mer Chief Executive Roy Hess. "By providing proprietary advanced conversion and engagement solutions for the sports betting industry, we expect SharpLink's services will be needed by many companies looking to capitalize on this opportunity." Mer's stock has tripled (up 200.7%) year to date, while the S&P 500 has gained 11.2%.
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U.S. stocks shot higher at the open Friday, aiming for fresh records, as economic reports and corporate results remained strong. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 157 points, 0.5%, to open near 34,193, while the S&P 500 added 15 points, 0.4%, starting trading near 4,185. Both indexes clinched record closes Thursday. The Nasdaq Composite index, meanwhile, ticked up 0.1%, about 15 points, to trade near 14,053. The pace of residential construction quickened in March, according to the most recent housing starts report and Morgan Stanley said profit doubled in the first quarter, topping analyst expectations.
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Shares of Affirm Holdings Inc. are up 2% in premarket trading Friday after Seaport Global analyst Chris Brendler upgraded the stock to buy from neutral and set an $80 price target. He sees the stock as more attractive following a 34% selloff since he initiated coverage of the company 10 weeks back, whereas the S&P 500 has gained 7% in that time. "In our view, this underperformance comes despite increasing evidence that BNPL [buy-now-pay-later] is going to be huge in the US and based on a string of encouraging data points, we expect Affirm to materially exceed near-term expectations," Brendler wrote in a note to clients. The company offers financial options that let consumers pay in installments, and this trend seems to be reaching a "hyper growth adoption phase in the U.S.," Brendler continued, which could set Affirm up for success. "We also want to be in front of Affirm's Shopify partnership which has the potential to significantly accelerate Affirm's growth," he wrote. "Recent data suggests the wait is nearly over, and we expect management to provide an update on the upcoming earnings call."
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Shares of Kansas City Southern tacked on 0.1% in premarket trading, after the rail road operator reported a first-quarter profit and revenue miss, with Chief Executive Patrick Ottensmeyer citing "several unique and challenging events," but he said he can "confidently confirm" the full-year outlook. Net income rose to $153.0 million, or $1.68 a share, from $151.7 million, or $1.58 a share, in the year-ago period. Excluding nonrecurring items, such as merger costs and foreign exchange losses, adjusted earnings per share came to $1.91, below the FactSet consensus of $1.95. Revenue fell 3.5% to $706.0 million, missing the FactSet consensus of $714.0 million. Among the "challenging" events mentioned by CEO Ottensmeyer were adverse weather resulting from the Polar Vortex and lingering network congestion. The company said in January that it expects 2021 revenue growth in the double-digit percentage range and EPS of $9.00 or better. The stock has rallied 26.7% year to date through Thursday, while the Dow Jones Transportation Average has advanced 19.4% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average has gained 11.2%.
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Shares of Esports Technologies Inc. soared 36.5% in premarket trading Friday, adding to the 6-fold gain in the previous session, as investors continued to cheer the public debut of the Las Vegas-based online gambling company. The stock's first trade Thursday morning was at $21.00, or 250% above the $6.00 a share initial public offering price, and it continued to climb in volatile trading to close at $36.42. At that closing price, the Esports' market capitalization was about $460.7 million, compared with the market cap of $75.9 million at the IPO pricing. Based on premarket trading Friday, the company is on track to open with a market cap above $600 million. The frenzy for Esports shares occurred on a day that shares of Applovin Corp. , with a valuation of $28.6 billion at the IPO price, closed 18.5% below its IPO price, and TuSimple Holdings Inc. , valued at $8.5 billion at its IPO price, closed right at its IPO price. The Renaissance IPO ETF rose 1.3% on Thursday while the S&P 500 gained 1.1%.
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Investment companies Knighthead Capital Management LLC and Certares Management LLC have sweetened their bid for bankrupt rental-car company Hertz Global Holdings Inc. and are now offering a deal that values the company at $6.2 billion, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter. The investors said their new offer fully covers Hertz's funded debt and has the backing of Apollo Global Management Inc. and existing shareholders. Hertz endorsed a restructuring offer backed by Centerbridge Partners LP, Warburg Pincus LLC and Dundon Capital Partners LLC earlier in April to sponsor its exit from chapter 11. With their new proposal, Knighthead, Certares and their co-investors proposed taking control of Hertz with backing from Apollo, which has agreed to supply up to $2.5 billion in preferred equity financing, people familiar with the matter said. Hertz, which is aiming to exit bankruptcy by end-Juen, did not response to a request for comment.
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Eli Lilly and Co. said Friday it is seeking a revocation of the emergency use authorization granted by U.S. regulators for its bamlanivimab antibody treatment for COVID-19 alone in order to complete the transition to bamlanivimab and etesevimab together. "Lilly made this request due to the evolving variant landscape in the U.S. and the full availability of bamlanivimab and etesevimab together," the company said in a statement. The combination has proved to be more effective in neutralizing the COVID-19 variants that have been detected in the U.S. after first emerging in the U.K., South Africa and Brazil, and that are more infectious than the original virus. The combination is also better at treating the rapidly growing B.1.427/B.1.429 California strain that currently accounts for 50% of virus cases in California and over 10% of cases in other states. "In the U.S., bamlanivimab alone should no longer be administered. However, sites of care should not dispose of bamlanivimab supply; instead, they should order etesevimab to pair with it," said Lilly. Bamlanivimab was the first neutralizing monoclonal antibody to receive an EUA from the FDA as a treatment for mild to moderate COVID-19 and more than 400,000 patients have been given it. Lilly estimates that has prevented more than 20,000 hospitalizations and at least 10,000 deaths during the peak of pandemic cases. Lily expects that in collaboration with Amgen Inc. , it can manufacture sufficient supply of the two antibodies to meet global supply needs. Lilly shares were up 0.6% premarket, and have gained 10% in the year-to-date, matching the S&P 500's gains.
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The global tally for the coronavirus-borne illness rose above 139 million on Friday, according to data aggregated by Johns Hopkins University, as the death toll climbed above 2.98 million. The U.S. leads the world in cases and deaths by wide margins, with 31.5 million cases, or about 23% of the global total, while the 565,289 death toll makes up about 19% of the global toll. The U.S. added at least 74,312 new cases and 909 new deaths on Thursday, according to a New York Times tracker. The U.S. has averaged 70,514 cases a day in the past week, up 8% from the average two weeks ago. Pfizer Inc. Chief Executive Albert Bourla said it is likely that people who receive Covid-19 vaccines will need booster shots within a year afterward, and then annual vaccinations, to maintain protection against the virus as it evolves, the Wall Street Journal reported. "The variants will play a key role. It is extremely important to suppress the pool of people that can be susceptible to the virus," Bourla said during a virtual event hosted by CVS Health Corp. that aired Thursday but was recorded April 1. Outside of the U.S., India has replaced Brazil as the country with the second highest number of cases at 14.3 million, and is fourth globally by deaths at 174,308. Brazil is third by cases at 13.7 million and second with a death toll of 365,444. Mexico is third by deaths at 211,213 and 14th highest by cases at 2.3 million. The U.K. has 4.4 million cases and 127,438 deaths, the highest in Europe and fifth highest in the world.
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Biomea Fusion Inc. was set to go public Friday, as the California-based biopharmaceutical company focused on treatment of genetically defined cancers said its upsized initial public offering priced at $17 a share, at the high end of the expected range of between $15 and $17 a share. The company said late Thursday that it offered 9.0 million shares in the IPO, up from previous expectations of 7.5 million shares, to raise $153 million. At the IPO pricing, Biomea was valued at $463.6 million. The stock is expected to trade on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol "BMEA." J.P. Morgan, Jefferies and Piper Sandler are book-running managers. The company recorded a net loss of $5.3 million on no revenue in 2020 after a loss of $1.2 million on no revenue in 2019. The company is going public at a time of tempered investor demand for IPOs, as the Renaissance IPO ETF has lost 3.6% over the past three months while the S&P 500 has gained 10.7%.
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PTC Inc. PTC shares ticked higher in the extended session Thursday after S&P Dow Jones Indices announced that the product-management software company would be joining the S&P 500 index SPX. PTC shares rose 1.3% after hours, following a 0.7% rise to close the regular session at $147.55. By April 20, PTC is set to replace Varian Medical Systems Inc. on the index following Varian’s acquisition by Siemens Healthineers AG SMMNY.
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Shares of Merck & Co. were up 0.1% in premarket trading on Thursday after the drug company said the oral antiviral COVID-19 treatment it is developing with Ridgeback Biotherapeutics did not help hospitalized patients in a mid-stage clinical trial. The companies now plan to test molnupiravir in non-hospitalized COVID-19 patients in a Phase 3 trial, with plans to file for emergency authorization in the second half of the year. They are also planning to see if the experimental therapy works for post-exposure prophylaxis. In a separate news release, Merck said it is discontinuing MK-7110 as a treatment for patients hospitalized with COVID-19, saying that the Food and Drug Administration's request for additional clinical information would push the launch into 2022. "Merck is now focusing its efforts on advancing molnupiravir, which, as an oral medicine for outpatient use, represents a promising potential new approach, and on accelerating production of Johnson & Johnson's COVID-19 vaccine," Dr. Roy Baynes, chief medical officer for Merck Research Laboratories, said in the release. Merck's stock has gained 6.6% since the start of the year, while the broader S&P 500 is up 9.8%.
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Oil futures climbed Thursday to tally a fourth session gain in a row. A higher forecast for global oil demand from the International Energy Agency and recent data from the Energy Information Administration showing a third straight weekly decline in U.S. crude inventories continued to provide support for prices. Traders also eyed the latest talks on the Iran nuclear deal. May West Texas Intermediate crude rose 31 cents, or 0.5%, to settle at $63.46 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange after climbing 4.9% on Wednesday. Prices for the front-month contract logged another finish at their highest since March 17, FactSet data show.
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Exchange-traded funds tracking the banking sector fell Thursday even as big banks reported quarterly results that blew away analyst expectations. The broad Financial Select Sector SPDR Fund lost 0.5% midday Thursday, while funds more focused on banks were down more sharply: the Invesco KBW Bank ETF slid 1.7% and the First Trust Nasdaq Bank ETF was off 1.2%. Shares of JPMorgan Chase , which reported on Wednesday, were flat, but Citigroup Inc. and Well Fargo & Company both lost 0.7%.
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When a democratic socialist slate won in March, establishment staffers rushed to drain party funds. Now the new staff has raised it back — and then some.
The post Nevada’s New Democratic Party Raises Back Funds Shuttled by Ex-Staff appeared first on The Intercept.
An exhibition at London’s Science Museum shows how far carbon capture research has come
Tackling climate change may bring unexpected benefits, London’s Science Museum will reveal next month. A special exhibition on carbon capture, the fledgling technology of extracting greenhouse gases from the atmosphere and emissions from factories, will display bottles of vodka, tubes of toothpaste, pens and yoga mats made from carbon drawn out of thin air.
In addition, the exhibition – Our Future Planet – will showcase prototypes of the gas-harvesting machines that can provide this carbon. They include the Lackner artificial tree which mirrors the actions of living plants by breathing in carbon dioxide and exhaling oxygen. This Heath Robinson-like device – made up of dangling panels of carbon-absorbing material – was built by Klaus Lackner at Arizona State University and will be the first to be displayed in Britain.
Continue reading...M&S and Aldi are at loggerheads over a cake. What’s at stake and what’s behind Britain’s love affair with the confection?
Colin the Caterpillar first darkened M&S’s shelves in the autumn of 1990, mere weeks before Margaret Thatcher stood down as prime minister. It’s too simple to put the timing down to coincidence. The symbolism was obvious. Here was an anthropomorphic chocolate sponge log ready to hold the nation’s hand through the coming decade. The lady wasn’t for turning; the new guy wasn’t for turning into a butterfly. In a confusing and fast-changing Britain, Colin has been a continuity figure.
The stubbornly larval national icon has been at the centre of a row this week. On Thursday it was reported that M&S had lodged a legal complaint against its discount rival, Aldi, whose “Cuthbert the Caterpillar”, it claims, besmirches Colin’s good name. It’s sad to see Colin dragged through the mud like this, but he has always been a quietly provocative figure.
Continue reading...Observer analysis of those companies condemned by unions also shows that some raised executive pay
Nearly 70% of companies accused of launching fire-and-rehire assaults on workers’ wages and conditions are making a profit and half have claimed government support during the pandemic.
Boris Johnson has called the practice “unacceptable”, but ministers have also insisted that firms in financial difficulty must have the flexibility to offer new terms and conditions.
Continue reading...As a medical school dropout spiralling between grief, rage and revenge, Mulligan takes Emerald Fennell’s stylish if oddly dated Oscar contender to the next level
It’s stingingly timely material. Thematically, Emerald Fennell’s feature debut, Promising Young Woman, could have been distilled from pure pain, an amalgamation of the countless rape culture testimonies on sites such as Everyone’s Invited. But tonally, with its extravagantly arched eyebrow and lacquered manicure of irony, this film feels oddly dated – a couple of decades out of step with current sensibilities. Were it not for Carey Mulligan’s Cassandra, an avenging angel in bubblegum-pink lip gloss, the picture may well have toppled off its stripper heels long before it got to stomp into its divisive shocker of a final act. Mulligan’s withering disdain is a thing of beauty. If anyone wins prizes for this liberally and generously nominated film – it has five Oscar nods, including best picture and best director, and scored six Bafta nominations, winning two – it should be her.
And for a while at least, the writing matches the quality of her performance. The film’s opening is a DayGlo blast of righteous catharsis. We meet Cassie blurry with booze, slumped across a banquette in the kind of bar where the alpha-bro afterwork crew go to toast themselves. She’s a beautiful wreck, the skirt of her business suit bunched up, hair and life unravelling. Three brash guys eye her hungrily, but it’s the most seemingly decent of them (Adam Brody) who approaches, with the offer to see her home safely. But danger comes in all shapes and sizes, and the next thing we know, the “nice guy” is plying her with emetic-pink kumquat liqueur and manhandling her on to his bed.
Continue reading...It is in danger of becoming received wisdom that the Greensill affair is an example of “Tory sleaze” similar to that which polluted the party’s reputation in the late 1990s. They do not compare. I had a ringside seat for the seedy death throes of John Major’s government. The scandals of those years mainly involved hitherto obscure politicians being caught with their peckers out or their snouts in the trough. The tabloids discovered various Conservative MPs in bed with people who were not their wives, often a career-busting transgression then, but now so accepted that Boris Johnson can be prime minister. There were also some notorious cases of Tory backbenchers taking undeclared payments – “cash for questions” – to promote business interests in parliament. This swelled the public’s feeling that the Conservatives had been corrupted by a long stretch in power and contributed to their landslide defeat at the 1997 election, but none of it threw into question the integrity of government itself.
The Greensill affair is several orders of magnitude more serious. A former prime minister is at the heart of this scandal that points to something rotten about how we are governed and is now embroiling not just politicians, but also the civil service.
Continue reading...More directors could be pushed off next week as aerospace firm tries to recover its reputation after 737 Max problems and Covid downturn
Two more top-level directors could be ousted from Boeing’s board of directors next week as family members of the victims of two fatal crashes of its 737 Max jets join shareholders to push for further high-level reforms at the aerospace giant.
Related: Denver plane engine fire consistent with metal fatigue in fan blade, say investigators
Continue reading...The US president has chosen to stand up to Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping with steady diplomacy
In one respect, the punitive measures imposed on Russia last week by the Biden administration are an attempt to clean up the mess left by Donald Trump. On issue after issue, such as Russian meddling in the 2016 and 2020 elections and cyber-attacks and hacks of US government agencies and businesses, the former president failed to take prompt retaliatory action or any action at all.
Trump cast doubt on Russia’s responsibility for these and other hostile acts, contradicting the findings of America’s intelligence agencies. He routinely declined to criticise Vladimir Putin, Russia’s president, for his support for Syria’s murderous regime, the 2018 Salisbury poisonings and the persecution of the opposition activist Alexei Navalny.
Continue reading...Politicians will continue to line their pockets until a ministerial code is strictly enforced and breaches are punished
When David Cameron predicted in 2010 that lobbying was “the next big scandal waiting to happen”, he could not have envisaged that a decade later he would be at the heart of it. But that is exactly where he is: a former prime minister who has traded his time in public office to accept a lucrative role at now-collapsed financial services firm Greensill Capital, lobbying former colleagues for access to government schemes that would have helped protect his financial interests in the company.
Related: Role call: the former ministers who found private sector jobs
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Despite the firm’s test and trace failings, boss Rupert Soames’s £4.9m package is set to be approved by well-rewarded investors
What do you do when your company finds itself at the centre of a controversy? Some companies draw up delicately worded apologies or at least look for convenient scapegoats, but Serco has taken the more traditional approach during the pandemic: stick to your position and insist there’s nothing to see here.
The outsourcing company will be winning no popularity prizes any time soon, not least because of its role in the UK’s expensive test-and-trace programme. The National Audit Office said there was no evidence the £22bn programme had reduced rates of Covid-19 in England.
Continue reading...Prime minister ‘will lose trust of ex-Labour supporters’ over Cameron lobbying scandal, leading Tory Sir Bernard Jenkin says
Boris Johnson will lose the trust of former Labour voters who helped put him in Downing Street unless he tackles the burgeoning sleaze crisis now threatening to engulf his government and the Whitehall machine, a leading Tory says today.
The warning from Sir Bernard Jenkin, chair of the powerful Commons liaison committee, is evidence of mounting concern in Conservative ranks about the potential electoral damage to the Tory party, particularly in so called “red wall” seats, from any further revelations like the David Cameron lobbying scandal.
Continue reading...The Consumer Product Safety Commission said it received reports of children and a pet being pulled, pinned and entrapped under the machine
Safety regulators warned people with kids and pets Saturday to immediately stop using a treadmill made by Peloton after one child died and nearly 40 others were injured.
The US Consumer Product Safety Commission said it received reports of children and a pet being pulled, pinned and entrapped under the rear roller of the Tread+ treadmill, leading to fractures, scrapes and the death of one child.
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Locally beloved buildings, from 1930s classics to brutalist edifices, are facing developers’ wrecking balls
Campaigners are organising themselves to prevent the destruction of historic department store buildings around the country, from fantastical brutalist structures to sleek 1930s edifices.
The Twentieth Century Society is taking action against the destruction or redesign of seven sites, and has concerns about the future of another 23 threatened by the reinvention of town centres following the pandemic and the shift to online shopping.
Continue reading...UK officials are exploring restrictions on product after minister described it as ‘unbearably barbaric’
The head of France’s foie gras producers’ association has said she is “shocked and outraged” that the British government is considering banning imports of the product.
And she has invited MPs to visit French farms producing foie gras to see the force feeding of ducks and geese and judge for themselves whether it is “cruel and torturous”, as animal rights campaigners claim.
Continue reading...China dominates supply of the elusive metals, which are vital to modern technology, but finding new sources is becoming a global priority
There are an estimated 1.4bn cars on the world’s roads today. Around 78m new cars are sold every year. To head off the worst effects of climate change, every single one will need to go electric eventually.
Whether it rolls off a production line in Fremont, California, or comes together in a vast megafactory in Qinghai, China, a colossal amount of human effort must go into building the components and obtaining their base minerals. In each car, for instance, there is roughly a kilogram of magnet providing the motion needed to fire engines and electrify windows. Roughly 30% of this material is made up of rare earth material known as neodymium and praseodymium (NdPr).
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Howard Dean, ex-governador democrata no estado de Vermont, se junta à indústria farmacêutica para lutar contra o compartilhamento de propriedade intelectual para vacinas de baixo custo.
The post Pressão sobre Biden contra vacinas genéricas de covid-19 para outros países vem até de ex-governador democrata appeared first on The Intercept.
We would like to hear from pub owners and workers in England about their first week of reopening
The reopening of pubs in England on 12 April saw people having a drink in outdoor spaces and supporting their local businesses.
We would like to hear from pub owners and workers on how the first week has been. What is your most memorable moment?
Continue reading...The details of the blackout at Iran’s Natanz nuclear facility are scattered — but intriguing.
The post Israel May Have Destroyed Iranian Centrifuges Simply by Cutting Power appeared first on The Intercept.
As the government attacks press freedom, reporters must consider their responsibility to sources — and each other.
The post The Journalist and the Whistleblower appeared first on The Intercept.
Our parents aren’t just ageing, they’re growing more important to us. Financially, that is. They increasingly determine not just our childhoods but how wealthy our adulthoods are. Lots of research shows parents’ income or education affect our earnings and the rich literally buy their children’s education.
New work from the London School of Economics shows that whether your parents were homeowners became more important between 2000 and 2015 in determining whether you managed to get on to the property ladder. Resolution Foundation research found that, in the 1990s, 30-year-olds whose parents had property were twice as likely to be homeowners as those whose parents did not, but from the mid-2000s they were three times as likely.
Continue reading...Hungary has one of the lowest birthrates in Europe, and the prime minister, Viktor Orbán, is spending significant money trying to convince young people to have babies. Leah Green and Ekaterina Ochagavia visit Budapest, where they meet three women of similar age and with very different outlooks on the country’s parenting drive
Continue reading...
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