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33m ago
U.S. stocks decline ahead of big tech earnings week
Bloomberg News
,Strategy wise, always look to upgrade: Senior investment advisor
U.S. stocks declined ahead of a busy week for Big Tech earnings while those in Europe and Asia were also lower as China’s COVID outbreak continued to compound fears sparked by faster Federal Reserve tightening. Bonds rose.
The S&P 500 shed 1.5 per cent while the Nasdaq 100 lost 0.7 per cent. The Stoxx 600 Europe Index fell, with miners and energy firms at the forefront of losses. And West Texas Intermediate futures slid more than 6 per cent to trade below US$96 a barrel amid a rout in other raw materials.
“This week may easily be a fork in the road of equities,” JC O’Hara, chief market technician at MKM Partners, wrote in a note. “We have nearly a third of the S&P 500 and half of the Dow Jones set to report. Bottom-up drivers will either confirm or reject what the challenging macro backdrop has given us over the last three weeks.” Alphabet Inc., Apple Inc., Amazon.com Inc. and Meta Platforms Inc. are all due to report.
Fears of wider curbs in Beijing are also spooking investors already fretting about the risk of a global slowdown as the Fed raises rates to tame inflation. A broad gauge of Chinese stocks dropped to the lowest in almost two years as policy makers put some areas of the capital under lockdown amid the government’s steadfast adherence to its COVID-zero policy.
The S&P 500 is about to drop sharply, Morgan Stanley’s Mike Wilson warned, as investors struggle to find havens amid fears that aggressive Fed action will engineer a recession. Morgan Stanley strategists said a quickly tightening Fed is looking “right into the teeth of a slowdown” in a note Monday, and that crowded defensive stocks no longer pay.
A flight to havens lifted global government bonds, with the yield on the U.S. benchmark note down 13 basis points. The dollar extended an advance, while the euro fell even after Emmanuel Macron’s win in the French election removed a key risk for markets. Gold shed nearly 2 per cent.
Monday’s pullback in the soaring price of commodities since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has done little to assuage concerns about runaway inflation.
Fed chair Jerome Powell had outlined his most bold approach yet to reining in surging prices and the European Central Bank signaled stronger tightening.
China’s central bank is in a different position, however, as it looks to shore up its economy. On Monday it cut the amount of money that banks need to have in reserve for their foreign-currency holdings, prompting the yuan to ease recent declines.
“We continue to believe that U.S./global equities will not bottom until markets stop discounting ever more aggressive Fed rate policy,” wrote Nicholas Colas, co-founder of DataTrek Research. “It’s not that the current news flow is bad. The problem is that the range of potential economic outcomes is too wide to predict future corporate earnings with any certainty.”
Events to watch this week:
- Tech earnings include Alphabet, Meta Platforms, Amazon, Apple
- EIA oil inventory report, Wednesday
- Australia CPI, Wednesday
- Bank of Japan monetary policy decision, Thursday
- U.S. 1Q GDP, weekly jobless claims, Thursday
- ECB publishes its economic bulletin, Thursday
Some of the main moves in markets:
Stocks
- The S&P 500 fell 1.5 per cent as of 11:55 a.m. New York time
- The Nasdaq 100 fell 0.7 per cent
- The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 1.3 per cent
- The Stoxx Europe 600 fell 1.8 per cent
- The MSCI World index fell 1.8 per cent
Currencies
- The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index rose 0.5 per cent
- The euro fell 0.8 per cent to US$1.0705
- The British pound fell 1 per cent to US$1.2706
- The Japanese yen rose 0.7 per cent to 127.64 per dollar
Bonds
- The yield on 10-year Treasuries declined 13 basis points to 2.76 per cent
- Germany’s 10-year yield declined 14 basis points to 0.83 per cent
- Britain’s 10-year yield declined 12 basis points to 1.84 per cent
Commodities
- West Texas Intermediate crude fell 6 per cent to US$95.99 a barrel
- Gold futures fell 2 per cent to US$1,894.70 an ounce | https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/u-s-stocks-decline-ahead-of-big-tech-earnings-week-1.1756265 | 2022-04-25T16:30:49Z | https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/u-s-stocks-decline-ahead-of-big-tech-earnings-week-1.1756265 | true | 2 |
By Jeremy Henderson
AUBURN, Ala., April 25, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Former Auburn basketball player Gary Godfrey just participated in his third Bo Bikes Bama event.
Apparently, he didn't get the memo.
Godfrey, a 1986 industrial engineering graduate who played alongside Charles Barkley as the Tigers reached the Elite 8 before embarking on a highly successful 30-year career in logistics and brand management consulting, was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) in 2019. ALS degrades nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord. It causes loss of muscle control, paralysis. It's supposed to keep you from doing things like completing a 20-mile charity bike ride.
But it didn't, thanks to 13 students in Auburn University's Samuel Ginn College of Engineering who said "yes" to the challenge.
Last week, a senior design team comprised of eight mechanical engineering seniors, an industrial master's student volunteer, three mechanical engineering graduate teaching assistants and an undergraduate teaching assistant completed a custom student-designed adaptive bike that could accommodate Godfrey, and the vehicle's operator, Chuck Smith, an experienced cyclist who has known Godfrey for years. The team was supervised by assistant mechanical engineering professor Kyle Schulze and mechanical engineering lecturer Jordan Roberts, who also serves as the director of the Samuel Ginn College of Engineering's Design and Manufacturing Lab.
For an initial test ride, the team reached out to Auburn senior tight end Luke Deal, who at 6"5 and 260 pounds could nearly replicate Godfrey's 6-feet 8-inch, 290-pound frame. Deal's father, Chris, was diagnosed with ALS in early 2021.
The bike is a modified cargo ebike with a custom-built frame that includes a hot-swappable battery for continuous operation. Godfrey sat securely in the front of the bike between two 20-inch tires pushed by the powered rear wheel and was monitored by three primary sensors — two GoPro cameras and a "twitch switch" — that allowed his support team to monitor his vital signs during the race. The twitch-switch was attached to Godfrey's cheek and connected to a light and siren system allowing him to signal the team via the slight facial mobility he maintains had he been in distress. He was secured to a racing seat with a five-point harness and his head was supported with a HANS device typical of motorsports safety.
"Building the bike for Gary was a great experience because it was an example of a real-world design and build process — we were working on a tight schedule with a big group," said mechanical engineering senior Joshua McCreight, the project's team lead. "I'm really pleased we got it done in time for Gary to participate in Bo Bikes Bama. We were committed to finishing it, not only because it was our senior design project, but because it's such a great way to share the positive impact of Gary's story."
Beginning and ending at Jordan-Hare Stadium, Godfrey and Smith completed the event's 20-mile course in approximately two hours.
Godfrey and his wife, Carol, who also earned an industrial and systems engineering degree from Auburn in 1986, first approached the college about the project late last year.
"We weren't willing to give up on the things that we love just because of a bad break," Carol said. "Gary has ALS, but ALS doesn't have Gary."
Started in 2011, Bo Bikes Bama is an annual charity ride led by two-sport legend Bo Jackson benefiting the Governor's Emergency Relief Fund. This year's ride was the first in person since 2019.
Before the ride, Auburn University President-elect Chris Roberts, former dean of the Samuel Ginn College of Engineering, along with Auburn University Football Head Coach Bryan Harsin and Auburn Mayor Ron Anders, powered Godfrey on a short demonstration of the bike's capabilities.
"This project and this day represents the full circle of the Auburn mission of education, research and outreach," Roberts said. "The bike ran incredibly well. I'm so proud of these students and so happy for Gary. This is what the Auburn Family is all about."
Godfrey agrees.
"Thanks to these Auburn Engineering students," Godfrey said through the speech generating device he controls with his eyes, "I got to feel the wind in my face again."
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SOURCE Auburn University-College of Engineering | https://www.wlbt.com/prnewswire/2022/04/25/auburn-engineering-alum-paralyzed-als-completes-20-mile-charity-bicycle-ride-thanks-senior-design-team/ | 2022-04-25T16:32:38Z | https://www.wlbt.com/prnewswire/2022/04/25/auburn-engineering-alum-paralyzed-als-completes-20-mile-charity-bicycle-ride-thanks-senior-design-team/ | true | 12 |
RJD leader and Lalu Prasad Yadav's son Tej Pratap Yadav on Monday said that he will resign from Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) soon. This decision comes after a party leader accused Tej Pratap of assault and beating him up. The leader said that he has followed in his father's footsteps and will resign after meeting him.
In a tweet in Hindi, the leader said: "I followed in my father's footsteps. Gave respect to all the workers, I will submit my resignation soon after meeting my father."
Ramraj Yadav, RJD's Patna Metropolitan Youth President, had earlier in the day, alleged that he was beaten up in a room at Rabri Devi's residence by Tej Pratap Yadav. “I was taking care of the arrangement of a pandal at the Iftar party.
At around 3 pm, Tej Pratap Yadav, along with four or five others, suddenly came and asked me to go with him. They locked me in a room and started beating me up. One of his associates was filming this," the RJD leader said.
Ramraj also claimed that they were also making derogatory remarks about Jagdanand Singh and Lalu Yadav. He said that he was crying outside the RJD office when he went to submit his resignation, but nobody came to him. Reports also suggest that another RJD leader, apart from Ramraj Yadav, was also assaulted in the same Iftar party.
Read More | RJD leader claims he was beaten up by Tej Pratap after Iftar party at Rabri's house | What happened | https://www.indiatvnews.com/news/india/tej-pratap-yadav-says-will-resign-from-rjd-after-assault-allegations-by-ramraj-yadav-at-iftar-party-rabri-house-latest-updates-2022-04-25-772138 | 2022-04-25T16:32:43Z | https://www.indiatvnews.com/news/india/tej-pratap-yadav-says-will-resign-from-rjd-after-assault-allegations-by-ramraj-yadav-at-iftar-party-rabri-house-latest-updates-2022-04-25-772138 | false | 1 |
(The Hill) — Twitter could as soon as early this week reach a deal with Elon Musk to purchase the company for around $43 billion in cash, according to new reports.
Reuters reported on Monday that Musk, who has expressed interest in buying the social media giant for weeks, has made his “best and final” offer to purchase the tech company.
Twitter could announce the $54.20-per-share deal as soon as Monday, the outlet reported, adding that sources it spoke with noted a deal could still fall apart at the last minute.
Bloomberg also reported on Monday that Twitter was in the “final stretch” of negotiations about a potential sale.
Musk sent the business and technology world into a frenzy earlier this month when he announced he was offering to buy 100 percent of Twitter for $54.20 per share in cash.
Musk’s vision for Twitter, he has said, is to take the company private and expand its subscription service and add an edit feature. He has also said the platform should be more open to all kinds of speech and focus less on content moderation.
Monday’s reports come just a day after the social media company’s 11-person board met to discuss Musk’s bid. | https://fox4kc.com/news/twitter-could-reach-takeover-deal-with-musk-as-soon-as-monday-reports/ | 2022-04-25T16:33:25Z | https://fox4kc.com/news/twitter-could-reach-takeover-deal-with-musk-as-soon-as-monday-reports/ | false | 20 |
Janet Lee Dickman, 88, of Carthage, passed away at 7:08 a.m. Thursday morning, April 21, at The Elms rehabilitation center in Macomb.
Janet was born Feb. 6, 1934, the daughter of Glen and Maxine (Jacoby) Bishop in Macomb. She graduated from Colusa High School in Colusa. On Feb. 5, 1956, she was united in marriage to Charles B. Dickman in Burnside. He preceded her in death in 2015.
Janet attended Burnside Christian Church before moving to Gainesville, TX. When she returned, she attended Elvaston Community Church and more recently the First Baptist Church of Carthage.
Janet is survived by her son, Charles E. “Gene” Dickman of Mission, KS; a brother, Jim (Mary) Bishop of Keokuk, IA; a sister, Gloria Brewster of Carthage; as well as twelve nieces and nephews.
She was preceded in death by her parents; her husband, Charles; a niece, Connie Wollbrink; a brother-in-law, Vern Brewster; and a sister-in-law, Wanda (J.C.) Kirk.
Graveside services were held Monday, April 25, at 2 p.m. at Moss Ridge Cemetery in Carthage.
Printy Funeral Home of Carthage is in charge of the arrangements.
HCJP 4/27/22 | https://www.mississippivalleypublishing.com/journalpilot/janet-lee-dickman/article_26e168f5-1118-5955-9b47-1cbb8de020f5.html | 2022-04-25T16:33:27Z | https://www.mississippivalleypublishing.com/journalpilot/janet-lee-dickman/article_26e168f5-1118-5955-9b47-1cbb8de020f5.html | false | 1 |
The 2022 NFL draft is just three days away, and that means that the suspense is drawing to a close when it comes to where cornerback Derek Stingley Jr. will land.
Stingley is a tricky prospect to evaluate. After a stellar true freshman season in 2019, he looked like a bonafide top-five pick. But the last two seasons haven’t been kind to Stingley, who has appeared in just 10 games after having some injury problems.
That took a toll on his draft stock, and now most projections have him outside the top 10 or even top 15. Most, but not all. In the latest mock from Touchdown Wire’s Mark Schofield, Stingley is the ninth player off the board going to the Seattle Seahawks.
The Seattle Seahawks have a number of positions they could address with this selection. Offensive tackle is certainly chief among them, and according to nflmockdraftdatabase.com, Charles Cross is the consensus pick right now for Seattle in this spot.
But with the top three tackles off the board, the Seahawks go in a different direction. Of course, with John Schneider and Pete Carroll still in the room, one might anticipate that Seattle throws everyone a curveball with this selection. However, with Derek Stingley Jr. staring them in the face, adding him to the secondary would be the move I’d be advocating for in the draft room.
Quarterback is another need, but with Willis off the board, Seattle goes in a different direction.
This is a Seattle team that was once known for its defense, affectionately dubbed the “Legion of Boom,” which was headlined by its strong secondary play. That has been lost under Carroll for some time, but the Seahawks could start to bring it back by adding Stingley.
As things currently stand, Artie Burns and Sidney Jones IV are the top-two corners in Seattle, so this is a defensive backfield that could definitely use an upgrade.
In Stingley, it would get an extraordinarily athletic corner with fantastic ball skills. The only major potential red flags have to do with Stingley’s health, and after he ran a 4.37-second 40-yard dash at LSU’s Pro Day, it seems fair to say those concerns are minimal.
If that’s the case, it wouldn’t be shocking to see Stingley sneak into the top-10 during Round 1 on Thursday night.
Contact/Follow us @LSUTigersWire on Twitter, and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Louisiana State news, notes, and opinions.
Follow Tyler to continue the conversation on Twitter: @TylerNettuno | https://lsutigerswire.usatoday.com/2022/04/25/lsu-football-derek-stingley-jr-2022-nfl-draft-mock-touchdown-wire-top-10/ | 2022-04-25T16:34:21Z | https://lsutigerswire.usatoday.com/2022/04/25/lsu-football-derek-stingley-jr-2022-nfl-draft-mock-touchdown-wire-top-10/ | false | 2 |
Sarah Mooney
Ireland has recorded 84 Covid-19 deaths over the past week, with 20 further deaths and 2,246 new cases logged on Monday.
Of Monday’s cases, 1,058 were confirmed by PCR test while 1,188 people registered a positive antigen test through the HSE portal.
Figures for the weekend were also released today by the Department of Health, with 2,874 cases confirmed on Saturday and 1,721 confirmed on Sunday.
Of the deaths related to Covid-19 recorded over the past week, 20 were notified on Monday, three on Friday of last week, 12 on Thursday, 17 on Wednesday and 32 on Tuesday.
Hospitalisations with the virus fell below the 500-patient mark at the weekend, but returned above that number on Monday with 535 people in the hospital system with the virus.
This number includes 43 people in intensive care, a rise of three on the day before.
The figures come as Professor Philip Nola, the former head of the National Public Health Emergency Team (Nphet)'s modelling group, said on Monday that he did not communicate Covid-19 models “as well as was necessary” to Government ministers, weeks before Ireland had the world’s highest incidence of cases. | https://www.echolive.ie/nationalnews/arid-40858673.html | 2022-04-25T16:36:30Z | https://www.echolive.ie/nationalnews/arid-40858673.html | true | 1 |
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — Florida school shooter's jury selection to start over; judge says she should have questioned dismissed candidates.
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — Florida school shooter's jury selection to start over; judge says she should have questioned dismissed candidates. | https://www.myplainview.com/news/article/Alert-Florida-school-shooter-s-jury-selection-to-17124648.php | 2022-04-25T16:37:58Z | https://www.myplainview.com/news/article/Alert-Florida-school-shooter-s-jury-selection-to-17124648.php | false | null |
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas district court judge on Monday struck down a new Republican-backed congressional map that would likely make it harder for the only Democrat in the state's delegation to win reelection this year.
It was the first time a court has declared that the Kansas Constitution prohibits political gerrymandering. The state is expected to appeal to the Kansas Supreme Court.
The decision from Wyandotte County District Judge Bill Klapper in the Kansas City area came a little more than five weeks before the state's June 1 candidate filing deadline. He ordered legislators to draft a new one.
“How strong are Kansans?” Klepper wrote in his 209-page opinion. “Strong enough to expect nothing more than a level playing field devoid of partisan advantage for one group of Kansans. Strong enough for the merits of the issue to be the deciding factor. Strong enough to make their political decisions based upon the content of a candidate’s character rather than the color of their political party.”
Democrats have criticized the map as political gerrymandering. Lawsuits claimed it violated voting rights and constitutional guarantees of equal rights for all Kansas residents and freedom of speech and assembly. Critics also said the map was unacceptable under the state constitution because it diluted the political power of Black and Hispanic voters in the Kansas City area by splitting them up. The state rejected all of those allegations.
The map moved the northern part of Kansas City, Kansas, out of the 3rd District represented by Democratic Rep. Sharice Davids and into the larger 2nd District of eastern Kansas represented by Republican Rep. Jake LaTurner. Kansas City, Kansas, is among the few Democratic strongholds in GOP-leaning Kansas.
Davids lost territory where she performs well, while the new map added several rural, heavily Republican counties to her district. She has gained national attention for her resume as a lesbian, Native American lawyer who fought mixed-martial arts bouts.
The map also moved the liberal northeast Kansas city of Lawrence — another Democratic stronghold and home to the main University of Kansas campus — out of the 2nd District. The city of 95,000 is now in the already sprawling 1st District of central and western Kansas with small conservative communities, some six hours away by car.
Klapper ruled in three consolidated lawsuits filed by a voting rights group, Loud Light, and 20 voters in the Kansas City and Lawrence areas. Kansas Secretary of State Scott Schwab, the state's top elections official, and local elections officials are the defendants.
The state argued that Davids' district emerged slightly more competitive than it had been. They also said the changes were driven by the need to satisfy past federal court decisions requiring districts to have as equal a number of residents as possible after 10 years of population shifts.
But the state's attorneys also argued that nothing in the Kansas Constitution allows state courts — rather than federal courts — to review congressional maps or to consider political gerrymandering as an issue. Federal judges have decided challenges to congressional redistricting in the past, and the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2019 that complaints about partisan gerrymandering are political issues and not for the federal courts to resolve.
Meanwhile, the Kansas Supreme Court must review a separate law redrawing Kansas House, Kansas Senate and State Board of Education districts. The state constitution requires a decision by June 5.
___
Follow John Hanna on Twitter: https://twitter.com/apjdhanna | https://www.myjournalcourier.com/news/article/Kansas-judge-rejects-congressional-map-appeal-17124821.php | 2022-04-25T16:39:56Z | https://www.myjournalcourier.com/news/article/Kansas-judge-rejects-congressional-map-appeal-17124821.php | false | 11 |
STORM LAKE, Iowa -- A Storm Lake man has pleaded guilty to failing to secure a gun that was found by a child who accidentally shot another child.
Kaurav Randhawa, 32, entered his written plea Friday to a serious misdemeanor charge of allowing unlawful access to a loaded firearm by children. Sentencing was scheduled for May 9 in Buena Vista County District Court.
According to a plea agreement, Randhawa may request a deferred judgment, which will not be opposed by the prosecution. He will be ordered to pay a $2,560 civil penalty and be placed on probation for one year.
In a separate agreement, the state has agreed not to prosecute Randhawa for child endangerment as long as he abides by all laws through January 2023 and completes a gun owner safety class and 50 hours of community service.
Randhawa was arrested Jan. 24, five days after police and emergency personnel were called to the 600 block of East 12th Street, where a 9-year-old child had been shot.
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According to court documents, a 7-year-old child found Randhawa's loaded 9mm handgun on a shelving unit in the living room. The 7-year-old thought the gun was a toy and pulled the trigger, shooting the 9-year-old in the right hip. The 9-year-old was treated at Buena Vista Regional Medical Center for non life-threatening injuries. | https://siouxcityjournal.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/storm-lake-man-enters-plea-in-accidental-shooting-case/article_ad172c0f-724f-59eb-9ed0-50121fbc25a4.html | 2022-04-25T16:41:33Z | https://siouxcityjournal.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/storm-lake-man-enters-plea-in-accidental-shooting-case/article_ad172c0f-724f-59eb-9ed0-50121fbc25a4.html | true | 3 |
NEW YORK, April 25, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- InvestorsObserver issues critical PriceWatch Alerts for CRTX, BRQS, SNDL, NOK, and NAT.
To see how InvestorsObserver's proprietary scoring system rates these stocks, view the InvestorsObserver's PriceWatch Alert by selecting the corresponding link.
- CRTX: https://www.investorsobserver.com/lp/pr-stocks-lp-2/?symbol=CRTX&prnumber=042520226
- BRQS: https://www.investorsobserver.com/lp/pr-stocks-lp-2/?symbol=BRQS&prnumber=042520226
- SNDL: https://www.investorsobserver.com/lp/pr-stocks-lp-2/?symbol=SNDL&prnumber=042520226
- NOK: https://www.investorsobserver.com/lp/pr-stocks-lp-2/?symbol=NOK&prnumber=042520226
- NAT: https://www.investorsobserver.com/lp/pr-stocks-lp-2/?symbol=NAT&prnumber=042520226
(Note: You may have to copy this link into your browser then press the [ENTER] key.)
InvestorsObserver's PriceWatch Alerts are based on our proprietary scoring methodology. Each stock is evaluated based on short-term technical, long-term technical and fundamental factors. Each of those scores is then combined into an overall score that determines a stock's overall suitability for investment.
InvestorsObserver provides patented technology to some of the biggest names on Wall Street and creates world-class investing tools for the self-directed investor on Main Street. We have a wide range of tools to help investors make smarter decisions when investing in stocks or options.
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SOURCE InvestorsObserver | https://www.wrdw.com/prnewswire/2022/04/25/thinking-about-buying-stock-cortexyme-borqs-technologies-sundial-growers-nokia-or-nordic-american-tanker/ | 2022-04-25T16:41:52Z | https://www.wrdw.com/prnewswire/2022/04/25/thinking-about-buying-stock-cortexyme-borqs-technologies-sundial-growers-nokia-or-nordic-american-tanker/ | false | 5776 |
You need to enable JavaScript to run this app. | https://sportspyder.com/mlb/kansas-city-royals/articles/39277141 | 2022-04-25T16:42:01Z | https://sportspyder.com/mlb/kansas-city-royals/articles/39277141 | true | null |
Report: Chelsea Remain Interested in Jules Kounde & Wesley Fofana Amid Antonio Rudiger's Pending Departure
Chelsea are said to remain interested in Jules Kounde and Wesley Fofana amid Antonio Rudiger's pending departure, according to reports.
The Blues will see the German international leave the club at the end of the season when his contract expires after five years in west London.
Thomas Tuchel's side will therefore be looking at the transfer market to recruit his replacement as they prepare for life without the centre-back.
According to the Evening Standard, both Kounde and Fofana are still on the club's list of targets for the upcoming transfer window.
La Liga giants Real Madrid are said to be the favourites to land Rudiger in the summer, and Andreas Christensen is still set to join Barcelona at the end of his contract.
Kounde has been a long term target for the Blues and nearly joined last summer as personal terms were agreed, but a move from Sevilla did not materialise.
Read More
Chelsea's interest in Fofana has been reported as far back as December, with the west London side keen on signing the defender from fellow Premier League outfit Leicester City.
Tuchel revealed after their 1-0 win against West Ham that Rudiger is set to depart from the club at the end of the season, as he said: "Toni, the media is on it. The situation is that he wants to leave the club. He informed me of this is in a private talk.
"We gave everything - me and the club - but we could not fight anymore because of the actions. Without the sanctions we would at least be able to carry on fighting, but out hands are tied. We don't take it personally. It is his decision.
"He is a key figure and will stay that way until the end of the season. But it is disappointing. We will miss him a lot. He gives courage in the dressing room.
"The kind everyone is afraid of, but the kind to play 50-55 games at an outstanding level. He is a top defender in the last one and a half years for me. We then need to find another solution."
Follow Absolute Chelsea on: Twitter | Facebook | Instagram | YouTube | https://www.si.com/soccer/chelsea/transfer-news/report-chelsea-remain-interested-in-jules-kounde-wesley-fofana-amid-antonio-rudigers-pending-departure | 2022-04-25T16:42:26Z | https://www.si.com/soccer/chelsea/transfer-news/report-chelsea-remain-interested-in-jules-kounde-wesley-fofana-amid-antonio-rudigers-pending-departure | false | 1 |
FAIRFAX, Va. (AP) — Jurors in Johnny Depp's libel lawsuit against his ex-wife, actress Amber Heard, hear audio clips of Depp shouting vulgarities at his wife and warning of a "bloodbath" if their arguments escalate.
During the audio recording, Depp could be heard saying that if he didn't walk away, it would be "a bloodbath like it was on the island."
As Depp sat on the witness stand, he winced as the clip played while his ex-wife appeared to fight back tears.
He took the stand for the fourth day of testimony in the trial over his allegations that ex-wife Amber Heard falsely portrayed him as a domestic abuser.
Heard's lawyers continued their onslaught of questions, focusing on Depp's drinking, drug use, and charged interactions with the actress.
Jurors have also been shown the texts Depp sent to friends regarding his drinking, drug use, and interactions with his then-wife.
Depp is suing Heard for libel over a 2018 op-ed piece she wrote in The Washington Post about domestic abuse.
The piece doesn't name Depp, but his attorneys say the implications are defamatory.
Heard's attorneys argue that Depp physically and sexually abused Heard.
Depp, who has denied ever abusing Heard, has said she abused drugs and often attacked him violently.
He also added that although he acknowledged taking many drugs, accusations that he has a drug addiction are “grossly embellished." | https://www.newschannel5.com/entertainment/depp-takes-stand-for-4th-day-in-libel-trial-against-heard | 2022-04-25T16:42:26Z | https://www.newschannel5.com/entertainment/depp-takes-stand-for-4th-day-in-libel-trial-against-heard | true | 13 |
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ANN ARBOR, Mich., April 25, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- A team of public health specialists from the University of Calgary School of Public Policy has developed an interactive, web-based guide to help family doctors better speak to a wide range of patient concerns related to the COVID-19 vaccine.
The researchers – which include Myles Leslie, PhD, Nicole Pinto, MSc, and Raad Fadaak, PhD – document the process their team used to create and disseminate a conversation guide for health care providers in a new publication now available in Annals of Family Medicine. The paper, titled, "Improving Conversations with COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitant Patients: Action Research to Support Family Physicians" can be found on AnnFamMed.org here: https://www.annfammed.org/content/early/2022/04/22/afm.2816
The online guide was created for and with family medicine practitioners, who often serve as the first point of contact for patients seeking COVID-19 treatment or have questions about how to protect themselves and their loved ones. To ensure the guide was relevant to health care providers, Leslie et al conducted qualitative interviews with primary care doctors in multiple Canadian provinces. The data gathered through these interviews was then used to identify commonly held beliefs, attitudes and perceptions that impact a patient's willingness to receive the vaccine. "This attention to clinical experience was central to achieving buy-in from our participants," the team wrote.
The research team found that clinicians were frequently encountering many of the same reasons for hesitancy from their patients including concerns around safety; interactions with comorbidities; conspiracy theories; religious or moral obligations; and past traumas experienced in the medical setting.
Using this information, researchers created several provider resources to better counsel vaccine-hesitant patients, in direct response to each potential concern. These are free to the public and include tips for clinicians, patient-provider conversation scripts, and resources to help navigate conversations about COVID-19 vaccines with hesitant patients.
The guide also outlines four steps to help practitioners have better conversations with vaccine hesitant patients, emphasizing the physician's role as an ally on the patient's health journey. Steps include engaging with patients; affirming patient concerns; asking permission before sharing information; and evoking future risks to motivate patients to reconsider vaccine hesitancy.
The guide is available at www.vhguide.ca.
Myles Leslie, Nicole Pinto and Raad Fadaak
View original content to download multimedia:
SOURCE Annals of Family Medicine | https://www.wbtv.com/prnewswire/2022/04/25/annals-family-medicine-researchers-develop-online-guide-help-family-medicine-doctors-discuss-vaccine-hesitancy-with-patients/ | 2022-04-25T16:44:31Z | https://www.wbtv.com/prnewswire/2022/04/25/annals-family-medicine-researchers-develop-online-guide-help-family-medicine-doctors-discuss-vaccine-hesitancy-with-patients/ | true | 10 |
BEIJING — Beijing will conduct mass testing of most of its 21 million people, authorities announced Monday, as a new COVID-19 outbreak sparked stockpiling of food by residents worried about the possibility of a Shanghai-style lockdown.
The Chinese capital began mass testing people in one of its 16 districts where most of the new cases have been found. The city also imposed lockdowns on individual residential buildings and one section of the city. Late in the day, health officials said the testing would be expanded Tuesday to all but five outlying districts.
While only 70 cases have been found since the outbreak surfaced Friday, authorities have rolled out strict measures under China's "zero-COVID" approach to try to prevent a further spread of the virus.
Some residents worked from home and many stocked up on food as a safeguard against the possibility that they could be confined indoors, as has happened in multiple cities, including the financial hub of Shanghai. The city of Anyang in central China and Dandong on the border with North Korea became the latest to start lockdowns as the omicron variant spreads across the vast country of 1.4 billion people.
Shanghai, which has been locked down for more than two weeks, reported more than 19,000 new infections and 51 deaths in the latest 24-hour period, pushing its announced death toll from the ongoing outbreak to 138.
Beijing residents snapped up rice, noodles, vegetables and other food items as long lines formed in supermarkets and store workers hastily restocked some empty shelves. State media issued reports saying supplies remained plentiful despite the buying surge.
Shoppers appeared concerned but not yet panicked. One woman, carrying two bags of vegetables, eggs and frozen dumplings, said she was buying a little more than usual. A man said he isn't worried but is just being cautious since he has a 2-year-old daughter.
Beijing health officials said 29 new cases had been identified in the 24 hours through 4 p.m. Monday, raising the total to 70 since Friday.
The city has ordered mass testing across sprawling Chaoyang district, where 46 of the cases have been found. The 3.5 million residents of Chaoyang, as well as people who work in the district, need to be tested on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
Testing sites were set up overnight and in the early morning in Chaoyang at residential complexes and office buildings around the district. Residents and workers lined up at the temporary outdoor stations for a quick throat swab by a worker in full protective gear. The testing is free.
"I think Beijing should be fine," said Gao Haiyang as he waited on line for a COVID-19 test. "Based on the previous response made by my community, if there's any emergency, I think supply can be guaranteed. Plus there were lessons we learned from other cities. I think we can make good preparations."
Shanghai has buckled under a strict lockdown that has driven residents to band together to get food delivered through group buying. Goods have backed up at the port of Shanghai, affecting supplies and factory production and putting a crimp on economic growth.
Beijing locked down residents in an area about 2 by 3 kilometers (1 by 2 miles), telling them to work from home and stay in their residential compounds. It wasn't a total lockdown but cinemas, karaoke bars and other entertainment venues were ordered closed.
Elsewhere, the city also shut down some or all buildings in five residential compounds, adding to others that were locked down on Sunday.
___
Associated Press video producer Olivia Zhang and researcher Yu Bing contributed to this report. | https://www.startribune.com/beijing-to-mass-test-most-of-city-as-covid-19-cases-mount/600167705/ | 2022-04-25T16:46:17Z | https://www.startribune.com/beijing-to-mass-test-most-of-city-as-covid-19-cases-mount/600167705/ | false | 34 |
The 9-year-old boy who Scooter Brown and his wife, Vicki, had started the process of adopting was among those hiding in the basement of an orphanage in central Ukraine as three Russian missiles soared overhead and slammed into a Ukrainian military base about 60 miles away.
After that episode, the Browns took matters into their own hands.
Brown, a burly and bearded former Marine who fought on the front lines of Iraq in 2003 and whose namesake band has produced songs with titles such as “Guitars, Guns, and Whiskey” and “Wine Drunk,” convinced a “special forces buddy” to join him overseas. They worked with a small Nashville organization run by another military veteran in an attempt to rescue the Browns’ future adoptee and a handful of other kids; Brown’s wife arrived later to provide additional support.
What followed was an erratic chain of events that started with Brown and his friend setting up a fortress of computer screens and whiteboards in a Polish hotel. From there, they said they fed associates the details they needed to pick up passports from a Kyiv apartment and to make a harrowing rescue of a woman connected with the orphanage who was trapped in a bunker.
“You couldn’t write a movie script about all the things that have happened,” Brown told CNN.
But the mission ended in disaster and confusion. Not only did the Browns return to Tennessee without the children, their rescue attempt led to an international child trafficking investigation that the couple said is baseless.
Ever since
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine — an adoption hotspot for US families — a litany of stories about often well-intentioned Americans seeking to rescue Ukrainian orphans and whisk them to safety have cropped up. But experts on adoption, nonprofit workers and child safety advocates told CNN they worry about how these kinds of stories will end.
A number of such missions have been detailed, even celebrated, in news reports. A pastor and a group of churchgoers
reportedly flew to Poland with the hope of temporarily bringing children back to Missouri. Two Pennsylvania men — a businessman and a Catholic priest —
went to Ukraine where they would shuttle 22 Ukrainian orphans over the border into neighboring Lithuania with the original plan, now on hold, of taking some of them to temporary safe harbor in Pittsburgh. A 55-year-old mom
traveled to Ukraine — at one point hunkering down in a Lviv-area mall during a rocket attack that rattled the building — to be near the teenager she intends to adopt and bring back to Kentucky. And a former Washington state lawmaker with far-right ties who was involved in a dramatic rescue of more than 60 kids from an orphanage in ravaged Mariupol later became the focus of
scrutiny after the children wound up in Poland and he butted heads with a Polish volunteer who questioned his motives. Now a Polish prosecutor may
launch an investigation into the matter.
“It’s what I call the Rambo reaction, which is to go in and get ’em out,” said Nigel Cantwell, a child protection policy consultant in Switzerland who often works with UNICEF. “And that is, to me, an enormous concern in child protection.”
Americans who take extreme measures to get orphans out of harm’s way and into the United States say many of these kids lack parental advocates and are eager to join a family in a stable setting, even if just temporarily.
“We just want the kids to be here with us in a home and a family surrounded by people that they know and love,” said upstate New York resident Melissa Nowicki, who had hosted — and is now trying to adopt — an 11-year-old boy who was among the more than 60 orphans the Washington state lawmaker, Matt Shea, helped evacuate in March. Shea, a pastor who is trying to adopt four of the kids himself, did not return emails or calls from CNN seeking comment, but on a rightwing
Christian podcast, he blasted local newspaper reports about the matter as “fake news” — even though he did not reply to their requests for comment — and accused the reporters of bias.
In any case, independent missions to move orphans out of the country could set a precedent that makes it easier for other kids to become unaccounted for, and ultimately exploited or even trafficked, experts warn. Numbers are in short supply, but reports are already coming in of children going missing after they cross the border, said a spokesperson with Save the Children, a humanitarian organization that assists kids during conflicts and other emergencies.
Some groups heading into the danger zone don’t have proven track records of being able to care for children or operate in combat areas, experts say. What’s more, most kids living in Ukrainian orphanages have parents or family who are still their legal guardians,
according to the US Department of State, so sending anyone abroad in haste during times of turmoil runs the risk of separating kids from their immediate or extended families. The State Department added that the Ukrainian government does not approve of Ukrainian children traveling to the US for temporary travel at this time.
“The dust has got to settle,” said Mark Davis, who runs a nonprofit called
Abundance International that works with many of the orphanages in Ukraine. “You can’t just grab a child and take them home.”
Davis said someone tried to convince him to “just put the orphans on a bus and get them across the border” without a plan of where they would stay or access medical care, while two other men he had never met asked him for $100,000 to take orphans to another part of the country.
Adam Pertman, president of a policy group called the National Center on Adoption and Permanency, said the frenzy to save kids in Ukraine follows a pattern: During almost every conflict or natural disaster abroad, US adoption agencies are flooded with calls by Americans who want to adopt but are uninformed about the procedures in place to protect the kids.
“The best practice is to keep the kid as close to home as possible,” he said. “In the middle of a war like this, you can’t know whether one of the parents is alive — whether there’s a grandparent, an aunt, a cousin. You do a due diligence search for the people who already know the child.”
The notion that attempts are being made during the current conflict to bring Ukrainian kids who still have parents to the United States isn’t a hypothetical, said Teresa Fillmon, executive director of a Ukrainian charity that works with orphans called His Kids Too!.
She said she knows a Ukrainian mother who temporarily dropped off three of her four children at a facility because the mother felt overwhelmed. Fillmon — who splits her time between Ukraine and Florida, where she is currently located — spent several days trying to reach the mother to let her know that a hosting organization had been searching for the three kids to send them to families in the United States. (Fillmon declined to name the organization.) But the mother’s home is just a few miles from the front lines, and cell phone coverage — along with electricity and running water — has been nonexistent for weeks.
Fillmon, whose charity has operated in Ukraine since 1998, said she hasn’t been able to track down the kids or the mother, and added that she plans to travel to Ukraine herself “to see what is going on.”
“She’s illiterate; she doesn’t read,” Fillmon said of the mother. “But that doesn’t make it that your children get taken away from you.”
In mid-March, the beleaguered Ukrainian government — struggling to survive let alone keep track of thousands of displaced orphans —
issued a moratorium on inter-country adoptions, citing a concern that wartime brings with it the threat of exploitation or child trafficking.
100,000 ‘orphans’
For decades, Russia was an adoption hotspot for Americans. But in late 2012, Russian President Vladimir Putin — partially in response to a human-rights law targeting Russians accused of human rights violations signed by then-President Barack Obama — banned Russian adoptions by US citizens.
Since then, although the number of inter-country adoptions by Americans has been steadily
plummeting for nearly 20 years — including from Ukraine — Ukraine has essentially replaced Russia as one of the top countries from which Americans adopt.
Meanwhile, Ukraine is not among the 104 nations that are beholden to the 1993 Hague Adoption Convention established by the Hague Conference on Private International Law. This means there is no guarantee the adoption has been done following the safeguards and procedures established by this international treaty, such as verifying the adoptability of the child and eligibility of the adoptive parents, a Hague official told CNN in an email.
“Thus, there is no guarantee that the intercountry adoption took place in the best interests of the child and with respect for his or her fundamental rights,” the official said.
At first blush, it would appear Ukraine has a large pool of adoptable children. Its population of kids living in orphanages and other childcare facilities — at 100,000 — was the highest in Europe before the war, a UNICEF spokesperson told CNN, adding that it amounts to 1.3 percent of all kids in the country.
But, as experts noted, most are not orphans in the literal sense, in that they have family connections or legal guardians.
Many live in orphanages to receive specialized care for medical disabilities or other needs that couldn’t be met by their families.
“It’s not like, ‘Oh, they just dump them there,'” said Fillmon. “They love their children. They just can’t take care of them at that given moment. And that’s no reason why some American can swoop in here and snag them.”
‘I have no one’
But some adoptive parents say there are Ukrainian orphans who have been abandoned by their family for years and are desperate to be adopted.
Colleen Thompson and her husband, David, of Kentucky, have been jumping through bureaucratic hoops to adopt a teenage girl named Maure for three years. In early March, the adoption was close to being finalized but was put on hold due to the war. Maure and other children had taken refuge in a dingy basement of a Donetsk orphanage to protect themselves from the carnage outside. Thompson, 55, decided to go to Ukraine to wrap up the process so she could bring Maure home to a family with two biological children and six adoptees, all from Ukraine.
One day, Thompson said, she was in a mall near Lviv — where the orphans had been sent — when she and hundreds of shoppers had to hunker down during a rocket attack on a nearby target that literally shook the shopping center. She sat near a teddy-bear kiosk for a few hours, and eventually bolted out a door to her car in the parking lot. She drove to the home of a friend in Ukraine through a city in panic.
“There were so many sirens going off — like police sirens,” Thompson told CNN, speaking from the friend’s home, where she has been staying. “People are driving the wrong way; people are honking. … It was so scary.”
At an adoption hearing in Lviv several weeks ago — Thompson has been able to continue with the process in part because Maure, who was institutionalized at age 4, turned 18 just days before the invasion — the judge asked the teenager if she had family nearby, Thompson recounted.
“I’m holding her hand and she’s standing there talking to the judge, and I’m sitting next to her and he’s asking her, ‘Where’s your mother? Where’s your father? Siblings?’ And she says, ‘I have no one,'” said Thompson, a former marketing executive who is now a stay-at-home mom and volunteers with US-based nonprofits serving Ukrainian orphans. “I just had tears like dripping onto my dress.”
Thompson is hopeful that her request to adopt Maure will soon be approved. But she said the system has been hard on her: A judge postponed making a decision at that hearing in late March, and did so again on Monday, saying he wanted to hear from the Ukrainian government, Thompson said.
“My daughter sobbed as the judge suggested she follow the rest of her Donetsk orphanage to Italy where they will be relocating soon,” she said in an email.
The US Department of State declined to comment on specific attempts to take Ukrainian orphans to the United States, citing privacy reasons. But a spokesperson did indicate in a statement to CNN that the agency disapproves of volunteer rescue missions.
“We understand that some U.S. citizens want to respond by offering to open their homes and adopt, foster, or host these children,” a spokesperson said in a statement. “However, the Ukrainian government has confirmed that it is not approving children to participate in host programs at this time.”
Most families looking to adopt children from Ukraine aren’t embarking on flak-jacket missions to rescue their chosen kids.
Gina and Chris Callahan of the Bay Area, for example, have abided by the rules, and were nearly finished with a two-year process of adopting an 11-year-old girl when the war put their efforts on ice.
“We were just crushed,” Gina Callahan told CNN.
They, the Nowickis and the Thompsons are among 200 American families that had started the process of adopting approximately 300 Ukrainian children before the war broke out. That group has lobbied the State Department to grant special visas for the children to come and stay with their adoptive families in the United States temporarily for the duration of the war.
Although they have the
bipartisan support of more than 70 members of Congress, to date, the State Department hasn’t acted on their behalf.
‘These crazy heroes’
And then there are the Browns, who took it upon themselves to rescue a handful of Ukrainian orphans — including the one they intend to adopt. Scooter and Vicki Brown hosted 9-year-old “Little B,” as they call him, over the Christmas holidays last year, and said they knew within days that they wanted him to be a part of the family.
They said they started the adoption process in January, and hoped to be approved by the Ukrainian government in time to bring him home for Christmas. When they heard the news of the imminent invasion, they capitalized on Scooter’s military background and immediately began plotting an operation to bring him, along with four other children their friends had previously hosted, to the United States, where the Browns figured the kids would be safe until the war subsided.
“My original plan was we were going to be these crazy heroes and get our five kids,” Vicki said. “I said I was going to do it no matter what anyone said.”
Upon his arrival in Poland, Scooter — who made the journey a few days before his wife — sized up the situation. He learned that the children’s passports, which would be necessary to bring the kids to Nashville, were sitting in an empty apartment in Kyiv. It was the end of February, so shelling was already constant and ominous satellite images showed a convoy of Russian military vehicles rumbling toward the capital city. The woman who facilitated the orphanage’s hosting program and was entrusted with the passports had left the passports behind when she evacuated her apartment to take shelter in a bunker. So Scooter and his friends arranged for someone to go to the apartment, snatch the passports and deliver them to the woman in the bunker. Then, he said a taxi driver who was willing to partake in their mission picked her up and drove her through the besieged city, hightailing it to a safe house.
As soon as Scooter knew the passports had been secured, it was time to pick up the five children from the orphanage in central Ukraine.
That’s when the plan unraveled.
The director of the orphanage, Oleksandr Lobanov, recounted what happened next in an interview with CNN. At the same time the rest of the Browns’ mission was unfolding, he said the owner of a Lithuanian resort had offered to let the children stay there and sent a bus to collect them. He wanted everyone to travel together to Lithuania before Vicki collected the five children, so she made the trek as well.
When the bus arrived at the resort, Lobanov said he learned that the owner became suspicious when she caught wind of the plan to take multiple children to the United States. Not long after, he said Lithuanian authorities notified him that he was under investigation for attempting to sell children to Vicki — an allegation he strongly denied. He said the only money he accepted from Vicki was to cover lodging expenses and that there was no plan for the children to be adopted in the United States right now.
The Browns, when asked about the investigation, said “there is absolutely zero evidence of any trafficking nor will any evidence come to light. This is only causing more stress and trauma for children who already come from hard places.” And in interviews about the original plan, they emphasized that the stays would have been temporary and that their efforts began before the Ukrainian and US governments issued moratoriums on hosting stays and adoptions.
Lobanov said there was no reason to launch an investigation and that he’s angry that the Lithuanian government has taken custody of the children. He said he would like to move the group to Germany, but that Lithuanian officials are barring them from leaving. He also said he is worried about the children, saying they have told him they want to leave Lithuania, that they are not eating much and are being continuously questioned by authorities. The Lithuanian government’s State Child Rights Protection and Adoption Service told CNN they are safe and that they will stay in Lithuania until it is safe for them to return to Ukraine.
“There are complaints and allegations about possible violence and human trafficking against the group of 43 children from Ukraine,” a spokeswoman from the government agency said. “We suspected it was planned to take children to the third country with the purpose to adopt them there. We informed law enforcement about this possibility, so they are investigating this case.”
The Lithuanian prosecutor’s office said in a statement that it opened an investigation into the possible trafficking of children last month, but it would not confirm that the probe involved the Browns or that the intention was to take kids to the United States. “According to the information currently available, some of these children were intended to be moved to another state, allegedly for temporary family stays, but there are also indications that they are intended to be adopted there,” the office said.
Lobanov said when missiles began flying directly overhead and Russian troops landed near the orphanage, he was determined to do whatever it took to get them to safety.
“We were only saving the children from possibly getting killed,” Lobanov said.
Looking back, the Browns say, they realize they could have had more patience and waited longer before springing into action. But at the time, they were panicked and didn’t know what else to do or what was going to happen — saying it felt like a “life or death” situation.
“I really did feel like if I didn’t do it, then who’s going to?” Vicki said. “I wanted to be there for him and for him to know that he is safe and that we love him … I wanted him to see, ‘they’re here, they came for me.’ I wanted us to show up for him.” | https://stluciachronicle.com/us-couple-traveled-to-rescue-ukrainian-orphans-it-led-to-a-child-trafficking-investigation/ | 2022-04-25T16:49:43Z | https://stluciachronicle.com/us-couple-traveled-to-rescue-ukrainian-orphans-it-led-to-a-child-trafficking-investigation/ | true | 23 |
How to find the best scuba diving vest
After getting your diving certification, you are probably thinking of buying your own equipment. It’s a substantial investment, so getting the correct gear is essential. A quality scuba diving vest, also known as a buoyancy compensation device, is crucial. Some divers also refer to them as a hydrostatic vest or a stab (stabilizing) jacket. Here are a few tips to help you find the right scuba diving vest for you.
Scuba diving vests vs. wet suit vests
A scuba diving vest isn’t actually a vest at all. Instead, it looks and functions more like a jacket or tactical harness, and it is the main component for neutral buoyancy underwater and keeping your oxygen supply firmly on your back.
Most people incorrectly refer to a wet suit vest as a scuba diving vest, but they’re different things. A wet suit vest is often a sleeveless garment made from neoprene that you would wear for any water activities to maintain your body temperature. It is similar to a rash vest that surfers wear to protect themselves from surfboard wax. Make sure you’re getting the right kind of vest before making a purchase.
Types of scuba diving vests
It can be easy to assume that all diving vests are the same, but typically, there are three types of vests that divers use:
- Jacket BCDs are the most common, especially when renting equipment. It has a single air bladder that sits snugly around your back and sides.
- Wing BCDs are slightly different from jackets and take on a horseshoe shape while all the air is in a cell on your back.
- Hybrid BCDs combine elements from the jackets and wings. They inflate three-quarters at the back and a quarter in the front, giving you better buoyancy control.
Best scuba diving vests
Top jacket-style scuba diving vests
The jacket-style BCD includes three exhaust valves for easy buoyancy adjustment, while the durable harness provides excellent load distribution. It also has two large pockets with a Velcro closure and an octopus holder.
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Based on the same modular Monprene harness as the previous Hydros model, this vest uses an EndurTex high-tenacity fabric bladder. The harness is UV-resistant and doesn’t absorb water, reducing the drying time. It has rotating quick-release shoulder buckles, and the tank is held in place by a Super Cinch buckle system. There are two zippered cargo pockets for accessories, and stainless steel D-rings give you clip-on options.
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Top back-inflating scuba diving vests
SEAC Smart Buoyancy Compensator
This scuba diving vest has a comfortable and supportive two-position adjustable chest strap and safety release weight pockets, so it is perfect for beginners. On the back and shoulder straps, there is lightweight cushioning. It’s a great vest for those who travel to diving spots, as the dry weight is under 7 pounds. Additionally, the vest has metal D-rings to clip accessories onto it and pockets with zippers to store extra gear.
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This vest fits relatively snug, and it has several steel D-rings for accessories and some pockets for added gear. The rubber row webbing’s increased width is to secure the tank better, and there is a durable elastic strap on the bladder to prevent excess bulk. The open-cell foam padding on the shoulders and lumbar area offer better support, and there are knife mounting points on both sides.
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The Rogue is a great option if you have a few dives under your belt and know what sort of vest you prefer. The shoulder and waist straps are easily disconnected and reattached, and the GripLock tank band won’t pinch your fingers. The three-position bladder retraction system prevents that by pulling the sides in to make it more streamlined.
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Riptide Mutineer Lightweight Men’s Back Mount BCD
The Mutineer is one of the lightest scuba diving vests available, weighing under 5 pounds when dry. It has a soft backplate and has minimal padding on the harness shoulder straps and waistband. The integrated trim weight pockets assist with the 38 pounds of lift, and it has a water-activated strobe light. The air cell’s design allows air to move around the waist and shoulders, which helps vertically stabilize you as almost no air will be on your back.
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The Masterlift is an excellent all-around vest that is perfect for scuba diving, spearfishing and free diving. Its fit resembles a preformed backpack with an anodized aluminum backplate, elastic compression cord and a 35-liter air bladder. It is compatible with twin-pack cylinders, and there are 12 aluminum D-ring fasteners for accessories.
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Charlie Fripp writes for BestReviews. BestReviews has helped millions of consumers simplify their purchasing decisions, saving them time and money.
Copyright 2022 BestReviews, a Nexstar company. All rights reserved. | https://www.kget.com/reviews/br/camping-outdoors-br/beach-br/which-scuba-diving-vest-should-i-get/ | 2022-04-25T16:51:33Z | https://www.kget.com/reviews/br/camping-outdoors-br/beach-br/which-scuba-diving-vest-should-i-get/ | false | 20 |
DETROIT - Lizzo will return home in 2022 for her biggest homecoming concert to date. The Detroit native and three-time Grammy winner will perform at Little Caesars Arena on Thursday, October 6.
Tickets (starting at $39.50) go on sale on Friday, April 29 at 10 a.m. ET. and can be purchased via SeatGeek, through StubHub or at Ticketmaster.
Fresh off both hosting and performing on “Saturday Night Live” earlier this month, the RIAA multi-platinum certified artist has also recently released a new single called, “About Damn Time.”
Lizzo can also currently be seen in Amazon Prime Video’s popular reality show, “Lizzo’s Watch Out For The Big Grrrls.”
RELATED: All of Pine Knob’s 2022 scheduled concerts for its 50th anniversary season
“The Special Tour:”
- Sept. 23 – Sunrise, FL
- Sept. 24 – Tampa, FL
- Sept. 27 – Washington, DC
- Sept. 29 – Philadelphia
- Sept. 30 – Boston
- Oct. 2 – New York City
- Oct. 6 – Detroit
- Oct. 7 – Toronto
- Oct. 11 – St. Paul, MN
- Oct. 14 – Kansas City, MO
- Oct. 16 – Chicago
- Oct. 18 – Indianapolis
- Oct. 20 – Charlotte, NC
- Oct. 22 – Atlanta
- Oct. 23 – Nashville
- Oct. 25 – Austin, TX
- Oct. 26 – Houston
- Oct. 28 – Dallas
- Oct. 31 – Denver
- Nov. 2 – Salt Lake City
- Nov. 4 – Portland, OR
- Nov. 7 – Vancouver
- Nov. 9 – Seattle
- Nov. 12 – San Francisco
- Nov. 18 – Los Angeles | https://www.mlive.com/life/2022/04/fresh-off-snl-lizzo-announces-her-biggest-michigan-homecoming-show-ever.html | 2022-04-25T16:51:44Z | https://www.mlive.com/life/2022/04/fresh-off-snl-lizzo-announces-her-biggest-michigan-homecoming-show-ever.html | false | 1 |
Error forces redo of Florida school shooter’s jury selection
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — The judge overseeing jury selection for a man who murdered 17 people at a Florida high school declared that the process will start over Monday, conceding that she should have questioned 11 potential jurors who said they would not follow the law before she dismissed them.
In granting the motion filed by Nikolas Cruz‘s prosecutors over the strong objection of his attorneys, Circuit Judge Elizabeth Scherer nullified two weeks of work by prosecution and defense lawyers, forcing them to begin the entire process anew on Monday. As a result, almost 250 potential jurors who had said they could sit for a four-month trial will not be called back next month for further questioning. More than 1,200 candidates had been screened.
Prosecutor Carolyn McCann made her argument after the 11 jurors who were improperly dismissed by Scherer two weeks ago weren’t told to return to court for more questioning Monday, as had been planned, due to a miscommunication error.
Scherer said they would be brought in next week, but McCann argued that more time would be wasted if it turned out the potential jurors had to be struck anyway. She said the prosecution has just as much right to question potential jurors and to an untainted final panel as the defense.
“This is not harmless error,” McCann said.
Melisa McNeill, Cruz’s lead public defender, strongly disagreed with the decision to strike the potential jurors now. She said Scherer should wait until next week to see if the 11 jurors returned and could be questioned. She then asked the judge to delay her decision until Monday afternoon to give her side more time to do research. Scherer sided with the prosecution, but said she might reconsider if the defense can make a persuasive argument Monday afternoon after it finishes its research.
Cruz, 23, pleaded guilty in October to murdering 17 and wounding 17 at Parkland’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on Feb. 14, 2018. The 12-member jury that will be selected after a two-month, three-step winnowing process will decide if he is sentenced to death or life in prison without parole. The misstep will almost certainly push back opening statements from their scheduled date of mid-June. They had already been delayed from May 31.
Having to start all over again has been a possibility since Scherer made the error on April 5 during questioning of a group of 60 potential jurors, the fifth of 21 panels that have appeared before the judge, prosecutors and the defense.
With the previous four groups and every group since, Scherer only asked potential jurors if they knew Cruz or any of the attorneys and if they had any personal or work hardships that would make it impossible for them to serve from June through September. With the fifth group, however, she also asked if any of the candidates would not follow the law if chosen. A couple people put up their hands, then a couple more until soon there were 11 hands held aloft.
Scherer expressed surprise at the number, but dismissed them without further questioning, drawing an objection from Cruz’s attorneys in a private sidebar after they left. The defense wanted Scherer to question them further to make sure they actually believed and understood what they were saying and not simply trying to avoid jury service. Florida jury candidates who say they can’t serve are almost always questioned, regardless of the reasons they give.
Scherer, realizing her error, tried to have the jurors returned, but all except one had left the courthouse. She said the Broward County Sheriff’s Office would deliver summonses to them, but that was not done for unexplained reasons. Even if all had returned, they still might have been disqualified because they had not been given the order that Scherer gave to other potential jurors to not discuss or read about the case.
“I will never make that mistake again,” Scherer told attorneys the day after her error.
Given Cruz’s notoriety and the hatred many in the community have for him, finding jurors who can be fair promises to be an excruciatingly long process. Jurors who pass the first stage by saying they can serve four months complete questionnaires about their backgrounds and their beliefs on the death penalty. The answers are given to both sides, and then prospects are brought back in several weeks later for further questioning, including whether they can be fair to Cruz.
The jurors who are selected will decide whether aggravating factors — the multiple deaths, the planning Cruz put into the killings and the cruelty with which they were carried out — outweigh mitigating factors such as the defendant’s lifelong mental and emotional problems, possible sexual abuse and the death of his parents.
For Cruz to be executed, the jury must vote unanimously for death. If one or more vote against it, he will be sentenced to life without parole.
Copyright 2022 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. | https://www.kptv.com/2022/04/25/florida-school-shooters-jury-selection-start-over/ | 2022-04-25T16:51:50Z | https://www.kptv.com/2022/04/25/florida-school-shooters-jury-selection-start-over/ | true | 71 |
The Supreme Court has agreed to hear an appeal from Texas death row inmate Rodney Reed, who claims untested crime-scene evidence will help clear him.
Reed was sentenced to death for the 1996 killing of 19-year-old Stacey Stites.
Prosecutors say Reed raped and strangled Stites as she made her way to work at a supermarket in Bastrop, a rural community near Austin.
For years, Reed’s lawyers and other groups have argued that there is not enough evidence proving he is responsible for Stites’ death.
The justices will take up the case in the fall.
Texas law allows people who have been convicted to obtain post-conviction DNA testing, if certain conditions are met.
Reed has been denied twice.
The issue is whether Reed waited too long to ask for DNA testing of items recovered from and near Stiles’ body and elsewhere.
His supporters have included Beyoncé, Kim Kardashian and Oprah Winfrey, as well as lawmakers from both parties. | https://www.wcpo.com/news/national/supreme-court-taking-up-appeal-from-texas-death-row-inmate-rodney-reed | 2022-04-25T16:52:06Z | https://www.wcpo.com/news/national/supreme-court-taking-up-appeal-from-texas-death-row-inmate-rodney-reed | true | 12 |
With two games of the regular season remaining, United are sixth in the table and three points ahead of their nearest challengers Millwall.
A positive result at Queens Park Rangers on Friday evening could further enhance the Blades’ play-off hopes – a remarkable turnaround from the position they were in when Heckingbottom succeeded Slavisa Jokanović back in November, when their season was going nowhere fast.
Given United’s horrid record in the play-offs, a degree of trepidation about the end-of-season shootout will be inevitable on the Bramall Lane terraces. But Heckingbottom, whose side beat Cardiff City 1-0 on Saturday, admitted: “We’re enjoying it.
“I know it can be nervy out there with the fans, but that’s why we’re here. Everyone wants to be in that position, not midtable with nothing to play for.
“You want everything that comes with it and you’ve got to enjoy it. If anyone had said we’d be in this position in November, there’d have been a few laughs I’m sure.
“We’ve got to enjoy where we are and that will help us then achieve what we want, which is hopefully getting into that top six.”
But Heckingbottom’s words should not be interpreted as a sign that anyone at United is taking a play-off place, or promotion bid, for granted.
“You can’t do that,” the former Barnsley and Leeds United chief added.
“We’ve been a Premier League club for the last couple of years and this is our first season down, and my first chat with the staff and players was that there can be no sense of entitlement.
“You’re where you belong and at that moment in time we belonged wherever we were in the league. Hard work, determination and the right mentality gets you out of it and it’s the same with everyone else.
“Don’t take things for granted and make sure you enjoy every minute. And that’ll be the same in these last two games.” | https://www.thestar.co.uk/sport/football/sheffield-united/sheffield-united-bosss-message-to-supporters-ahead-of-pressure-games-in-play-off-bid-3667267 | 2022-04-25T16:52:31Z | https://www.thestar.co.uk/sport/football/sheffield-united/sheffield-united-bosss-message-to-supporters-ahead-of-pressure-games-in-play-off-bid-3667267 | false | 1 |
This week's Innovative Teacher brought to you by Every Kid Counts Oklahoma is KC Williams from Edmond Santa Fe High School.
KC teaches Government and Criminal Justice and encourages his students to challenge their thought processes through interactive engagement including with guest speakers. | https://www.news9.com/story/626697c1766bc2219d4c290e/innovative-teacher:-kc-williams | 2022-04-25T16:55:28Z | https://www.news9.com/story/626697c1766bc2219d4c290e/innovative-teacher:-kc-williams | true | null |
Sierra Bancorp (BSRR) Misses Q1 Earnings and Revenue Estimates
Sierra Bancorp (BSRR) came out with quarterly earnings of $0.49 per share, missing the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $0.59 per share. This compares to earnings of $0.72 per share a year ago. These figures are adjusted for non-recurring items.
This quarterly report represents an earnings surprise of -16.95%. A quarter ago, it was expected that this parent company of Bank of the Sierra would post earnings of $0.66 per share when it actually produced earnings of $0.63, delivering a surprise of -4.55%.
Over the last four quarters, the company has surpassed consensus EPS estimates two times.
Sierra Bancorp
The sustainability of the stock's immediate price movement based on the recently-released numbers and future earnings expectations will mostly depend on management's commentary on the earnings call.
Sierra Bancorp shares have lost about 10.8% since the beginning of the year versus the S&P 500's decline of -10.4%.
What's Next for Sierra Bancorp?
While Sierra Bancorp has underperformed the market so far this year, the question that comes to investors' minds is: what's next for the stock?
There are no easy answers to this key question, but one reliable measure that can help investors address this is the company's earnings outlook. Not only does this include current consensus earnings expectations for the coming quarter(s), but also how these expectations have changed lately.
Empirical research shows a strong correlation between near-term stock movements and trends in earnings estimate revisions. Investors can track such revisions by themselves or rely on a tried-and-tested rating tool like the Zacks Rank, which has an impressive track record of harnessing the power of earnings estimate revisions.
Ahead of this earnings release, the estimate revisions trend for Sierra Bancorp: favorable. While the magnitude and direction of estimate revisions could change following the company's just-released earnings report, the current status translates into a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy) for the stock. So, the shares are expected to outperform the market in the near future. You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
It will be interesting to see how estimates for the coming quarters and current fiscal year change in the days ahead. The current consensus EPS estimate is $0.64 on $34.53 million in revenues for the coming quarter and $2.57 on $139.4 million in revenues for the current fiscal year.
Investors should be mindful of the fact that the outlook for the industry can have a material impact on the performance of the stock as well. In terms of the Zacks Industry Rank, Banks - West is currently in the top 8% of the 250 plus Zacks industries. Our research shows that the top 50% of the Zacks-ranked industries outperform the bottom 50% by a factor of more than 2 to 1.
Heritage Commerce (HTBK), another stock in the same industry, has yet to report results for the quarter ended March 2022.
This holding company for Heritage Bank of Commerce is expected to post quarterly earnings of $0.20 per share in its upcoming report, which represents a year-over-year change of +5.3%. The consensus EPS estimate for the quarter has remained unchanged over the last 30 days.
Heritage Commerce's revenues are expected to be $40.14 million, up 7.7% from the year-ago quarter.
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The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc. | https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/sierra-bancorp-bsrr-misses-q1-earnings-and-revenue-estimates | 2022-04-25T16:59:22Z | https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/sierra-bancorp-bsrr-misses-q1-earnings-and-revenue-estimates | true | 2255 |
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Informa PLC (IFPJF) CEO Stephen Carter on Q4 2019 Results - Earnings Call Transcript
Informa PLC (OTC:IFPJF) Q4 2019 Earnings Conference Call March 10, 2020 5:30 AM ET
Company Participants
Stephen Carter - Group Chief Executive & Executive Director
Gareth Wright - Group Finance Director & Director
Richard Menzies-Gow - Director, IR, Corporate Communications & Brand
Conference Call Participants
William Packer - Exane BNP Paribas
Adrien de Saint Hilaire - Bank of America Merrill Lynch
Patrick Wellington - Morgan Stanley
Katherine Tait - Goldman Sachs Group
Adam Berlin - UBS Investment Bank
Nicholas Dempsey - Barclays Bank
Thomas Singlehurst - Citigroup
Matthew Walker - Crédit Suisse
Sarah Simon - Berenberg
Stephen Carter
All right. Good morning, everybody, and thanks very much for coming. For those of you here and for those of you who are watching on the webcast, thanks very much for giving us your time. This is the disclaimer. Vicky has given you the health and safety warning. And there's endless tea and coffee. So if people want anything during the presentation, feel free to take it.
And as a part of what we're going to be talking about today is the acceleration of our commitment to sustainability. Recycling at the beginning of the presentation is a good idea. And the knowledge and information economy is something we've been talking about for some time. It's a place where we have parked the company. And as you will see in the materials that we've published and will talk about today, it's where we see the future of the business. Driving specialization in markets where we face off against sectors and subsectors with the ability to provide a range of products and services in physical and digital form. This is a market which we believe has a lot of long-term attractive characteristics for a whole variety of reasons, not least, actually, it speaks profoundly to some of the underlying trends that are behind the march and the need for the march towards greater sustainability from economic businesses.
I thought I'd start today, for those of you with long memories, of -- or longer memories at these presentations. This is the -- a sort of shorthand version of what are the 20 questions. These, it seems to me, are the key messages and substance points from today's meeting.
The first, and I think you see this in our 2019 results, the very good news about this company is it is very strongly one company. We've put a lot of time and effort in over the last few years in building and deepening a common culture, set of values and approach, a response. And actually, when you find yourself facing a circumstance like the COVID-19 circumstance, that actually serves you very well because it enables a speed of response and an alignment of response, which often makes the difference between your ability to navigate the turbulence and your ability not to.
We had a very strong operating performance in 2019. If we weren't going to be talking about COVID-19, discussion would have been, in a sense, more enjoyably about what were the fundamental drivers behind what produced that performance in '19. And ultimately, that's what's going to serve us well because that's where the long-term value is in the business. We did well in revenue. We did, well in earnings. We had all 5 of our businesses in growth, and we did very well in cash, which actually topically is not a bad place to be either.
Our twin-track strategy of driving market specialization and improving the operational capabilities inside the business is combining very well in geographies and in markets and continues to do so. Our subscription businesses or our subscription-led businesses in advanced learning in Taylor & Francis, and in Business Intelligence in Informa Intelligence, and the parts of Informa Tech which are subscription-led businesses are performing well. They performed well in 2019. They're performing well in 2020. And that gives us a ballast of about 35% of the group's revenue, which remains robust and in markets and products that we feel good about.
Our January and February schedule in 2020 actually was fortunate in one way in our events business in that we had virtually no events to speak of scheduled in Mainland China in January and February. And so that allowed us, and we'll talk about that, we talked about it in the release, to devise at speed a postponement program, which has enabled us to learn from China, Mainland China, and roll that out in other parts of the world. The events that did trade in other parts of the world, speaking to the value of geographical diversity, traded on or ahead of plan. So in round numbers, it's about £250 million worth of events revenue that's already traded in this year to or ahead of plan.
We launched a postponement program inside our own business effectively, quietly and commercially. And to date, as I speak to you this morning, we've lifted over 110 branded events out of the first half into later in the year, about £450 million worth of revenue. We've used our scale; our reach; in some cases, our relationships; in other cases, our muscle to secure capacity to give us that optionality and we made the decision very early with the support of the Board that the right decision for the long-term health of the business was to put our colleagues, our customers and our brands first.
And if that required us to spend money in order to secure capacity, provide rebate allowances for customers, communicate with our customers, the key objective was to manage the long-term value of the branded franchises that we own because that's where the future value is. We moved 2 or 3 weeks ago to a different management approach. We have a -- we've taken management controls into the center. We're running a weekly COVID executive management review process on costs, on CapEx, on operations and on the key decisions around the way in which we make prioritization on postponement and slot alignment for brands and events that need to be moved.
We've secured -- we have a very secure balance sheet. Gareth will talk about this in some depth. We made some quite significant changes last year, which are looking prescient. We pushed out most of our maturities to 2023. We have an extended RCF. We've secured an addition -- as part of the postponement program, an additional surplus credit facility. And so we find ourselves in this situation in a very secure balance sheet position.
We are proposing to confirm the dividend for 2019, in line with what we discussed at the half year at just over 7%. And on a slightly less cheerful note, the Chairman succession process is underway. And towards the end of 2020, we will see the baton passed from our current Chairman, Derek Mapp, to a successor. And that process is, as I say, fully underway.
Important for those of you who are here and for those of you who are watching to know that the position the leadership team have taken, I think, from really, the end of January, is that our objective here is to focus on the long-term value in the business. So that when the market springs back and some version of normal service returns, the test that we will have passed is the test in the minds of the customers and the communities that we serve, that we were open, we were transparent, we were quick, we had the value of their businesses, their brands and their commercial interests at heart and that, I think, will serve us well when we get to spring back.
Those are the subjects we're going to cover today. But to go back to go forward, as I'm fond of saying, let's go back to 2019, a world before COVID-19. And really, this was a strong year for our company. The numbers were strong on the revenue line, both at a reported level, and more importantly, at an underlying level, we saw a sensible flow through to profit. We had some tailwinds on earnings per share and a particularly strong performance again year-on-year on free cash flow.
We did the work on our balance sheet. We tracked down to 2.5x levered, as we undertook to do. And that allowed us to underpin the dividend. More importantly, what stands behind that was a completion of things that we'd set out to do for ourselves. We saw Informa Markets operate for one full year as an integrated business in all of the geographies of the world. And despite the topical challenges that we faced in 2019 in Hong Kong with the civil unrest, which was significant, and the continuing drag from fashion, fashion portfolio where our GAP program is really beginning to have some traction, we still managed to deliver growth rates in the 4.3% area.
In Informa Connect and Informa Intelligence, both those businesses stepped up to a level of growth that we were pleased with. And within Informa Intelligence, we did some sensible portfolio management to come out of businesses we didn't see as part of our long-term plan and doubled down on businesses where we believe we are well suited for longer-term growth.
We gave birth to Informa Tech, the most evident manifestation of our market specialist strategy, where we are building a business that faces off against that market in events, in media, in conferencing, in training, in data, in information, in research, in consulting. And that surround-sound service offering to a single market is a model that we will seek to expand elsewhere.
And serious credit to our colleagues in Taylor & Francis, which is facing a market, which we've discussed often, where we're seeing significant change in customer preferencing, in access, in pricing, in the way in which commercial contracts are negotiated and in the way in which content is developed and validated. A very strong performance from Taylor & Francis in the full year and particularly in the back end of the year, giving us a real confidence going into 2020.
The cash flow, I think, and the cash conversion, the cash generation is -- has long been a bellwether of the business. It's a feature of the business model in all of our businesses. It's become an operating discipline of all of our businesses, and it's what has allowed us to take our leverage back down to 2.5x and maintain our dividend growth on the rate that we have done over the last few years.
This slide will be familiar to you, but we've changed it slightly because we thought it might be more relevant to the backdrop to today's discussion. On the left-hand side, my left-hand side, we look at our portfolio by -- this is through a revenue lens, by geography, and on the right-hand side, by type. And essentially, what it says is that 1/3 of the business is subscription-related, 2/3 of the business is events-related. Although within events-related, there are revenues other than just space revenues. You've got media revenues. You've got some data revenues. You've got some sponsorship revenues, but they're broadly revenues that are sold off the back of a physical-event product. And then on the right-hand side, you see the strength of the business in North America, the scale of the business in Mainland China and -- combined with Hong Kong, and then the distribution of the business around the rest of the world. And actually, particularly in the case of COVID-19, where it is not the same circumstance in every geography in the world, that geographical diversity is also proving to be short-term helpful.
So how have we responded to the reality of COVID-19? Well, it landed in our commercial lives in the week leading up to the decision by the Chinese government on the 23rd of January. We put in place an action plan as to how we would respond to it. We took as our guiding principle that our primary priority would be the well-being of colleagues, customers and markets because this will pass. And when it passes, we want to come out the other side in a position where our brands and our reputation externally and internally is in good order.
We are following government and health authority advice in the markets in which we trade. We're not writing our own policies. We are being guided by the relevant authorities in the markets in which we trade. From a colleague perspective, we have put in place a management discipline on most of our cost structures, which is giving us clear visibility of where we are in control, where we are spending and where we need to double down in order to secure future capacity and some very proactive controls on cash and on cost. From our customers' point of view, we've made multiple decisions in multiple markets about when to call for postponement, when to shift, how to conduct that, what does that mean for cash and refunds and communication and market value.
As a practical matter, as I stand here today, I think we have only canceled 3 events. So in terms of revenue that we knew about in 2020, when we open the doors on January 1 that we know will not be coming, it's actually a de minimis number. We have lifted and shifted circa £450 million worth of revenue in the postponement program. There is a question, which I'm sure we'll get to, about how much of that £450 million of revenue will recur. Will there be a dilution effect? Will there be a delay effect? Will there be a decay effect? Will people never want to get on an airplane ever again in their life effect? And you've got to make your own judgments about that. But the judgments that we've made is that the reason why these are valuable franchises is because they contribute to our customers' ability to trade. So our objective is to maintain the long-term relationships and the long-term value of the products.
We have in some markets gone to a model whereby we trade the event, but we move it to a highly localized event. So we either screen out international travelers in total or we make it only a local event. We have, in some instances, gone to a virtual event, where you can turn the product into a purely digital event short-term rather than rely on a physical gathering. The net consequence of all of that has put us in the position that we've laid out in today's announcement, which in summary, looks as it laid out -- is laid out on this chart. 100 brands that have run successfully so far already in 2020, mainly in January, February and early March, although there are events running through April, May and June in parts of the world, either because they're highly localized events or because there are no control measures in those localities.
We've got 45 large-scale events, large-scale events for us are brands that are revenues above £2 million, that we have lifted and moved, and then there are about 70 smaller events. And then there is about 13 events that fall broadly into the category of rephased, postponed or canceled. And within those, some of those are biennials where, in a sense, it was easier to make the decision just to lift them out of '20 and move them into '21.
The customer response to where we are today has actually been very reassuring on 2 levels. Firstly, where we have been open and transparent, we've been rewarded by customer feedback that has been very welcoming of that. And secondly, it has consistently underscored the fundamental value of the trade show as a product, particularly for smaller players in markets or innovators in markets. For the larger players, in a sense, it's easier to take a pass for a year. But for the smaller players, which make up most of our business in most of our trade shows, it's the route to market. It's how you sell. It's how you distribute. It's how you get distribution. It's how you see your customers. It's how you work out how to price. It's how you see where your competitors are. And actually, it's been very reassuring for us to see the depth of that validation.
The next two charts, I'll leave you to peruse. It just tries to bring to life what the lift and shift looks like in revenue. And we've broken it out by China, by the rest of the world and by our subscription-related businesses. Our subscription-related businesses, which, if you like, is the underpinning ballast of the group at the moment, is trading on plan, and in some instances, ahead of plan. And for both the first half and the second half, as these two slides make clear, we assume that it trades on normal seasonal patterns, and there's no indication on our forward subscription numbers of any change there.
January and February in our events business has already traded on or ahead of plan. So really, the pinch point is around a judgment about what happens between March and let's pick a month, July or August. And our approach at the moment is we are running this business with the expectation that the world will spring back in the back half of 2020, and we want to be well placed for that when it happens.
So to summarize, where are we? 2019, a very strong year, puts the business in very good shape for 2020. Our strategy of market specialization remains our driving focus. We had a very strong cash performance in 2020, which is serving us well. We've secured a robust position on the balance sheet, and we have got a very tight response program in relation to the COVID-19 circumstance as we see it today, and we are managing that on the assumption that our primary obligation is to secure the long-term value of the brands and the franchises we own and operate, and that's what has driven our approach to large-scale first half to second half postponement and rescheduling. And on that note, I will pass over to Gareth. Gareth?
Gareth Wright
Tackled by my chair. Hold on. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for coming to our 2019 full year results announcement. The headlines are we've produced a set of results in 2019 that demonstrated further year-on-year improvement in terms of the financial performance of the group and have delivered our financial targets for the year. Entering 2020, we're tackling the challenges thrown our way earlier in the year in a proactive and responsible way.
So these are the financial highlights from the 2019 full year results. Reported revenue was up 22%, increasing to almost £2.9 billion. Underlying revenue growth increased to 3.5%, reflecting a full year of growth from the UBM business acquired halfway through 2019. Adjusted operating profit increased 27.5% to £933 million, and this increase in OP drove a 4.3% improvement in the adjusted diluted earnings per share on a reported basis and a 16% increase on a pro forma basis for a full year of UBM ownership.
Free cash flow growth was powerful, increasing over 40% to £722 million. And this cash flow completed the process of bringing our leverage back down to our group target range with year-end leverage at 2.5x. In response to the pro forma earnings growth and the strong free cash flow, the Board is recommending a 7.3% increase in the full year dividend.
So looking at the income statement below operating profit, the interest charge is £112 million, which included a £13 million charge for the effect of IFRS 16. Additionally, the year-on-year increase was driven by higher debt following the UBM combination and the stronger U.S. dollar in 2019. The effective tax rate increased to 19%, primarily reflecting a full year of UBM profits, but also the increase in the average jurisdictional tax rates in the U.S. and China. As we've previously communicated, the medium-term outlook for the enlarged group tax rate was a 19% effective rate, so we were in line with that rate in 2019. And we can confirm that that's where we expect to be in 2020.
So overall, these results produced a 4% increase in reported EPS and a 16% increase on a pro forma basis. And finally, the 51p of earnings covered the full year proposed dividend around 2.2x.
So focusing on the revenue growth. The largest element of the revenue growth was delivered by our successful combination with UBM, which added around about 15% to our reported revenue. The most important element for us, though, was the 3.5% of underlying revenue growth through trading and growth in the divisions, which I'll go through in a minute. The currency benefit of the stronger U.S. dollar added about 3% reported revenue growth. And the affecting -- the effect of biennials in the year was immaterial, which -- increasing the reported revenue by 0.2%. So all of this added up to an increase in reported revenue of 22% for the year.
The shape of the waterfall graph for adjusted OP is consistent with that of our revenue, although the OP growth increased benefits from the crystallization of synergies from the combination, and the benefit of currency is more marked in this -- in the OP chart with the weighting of operating profit towards the U.S. dollar.
Just focus on how the group results break down by division. Informa Markets delivered underlying revenue growth of 4.3%, which is a good result that occurred despite 2 market-specific in-year headwinds in Dubai and in Hong Kong. This performance was driven by a strong performance from the top 30 exhibitions, which in Markets in 2019, made up around about half of the revenue. And that revenue growth and the synergies helped increase operating profit by over 7%.
Informa Connect improved its underlying revenue growth of 2.9%, led by stronger performances from the larger biotech, pharma and finance events. Reported revenue was impacted by the disposal of the Life Sciences business at the start of 2019. Informa Tech achieved its 2% underlying revenue growth target in its full year of existence. And the priority for this team, really, in the year was to establish the team, the business and the brand, and to achieve all that while hitting the underlying revenue growth target was satisfying.
Informa Intelligence continues its trend in recent years of improving underlying revenue growth, delivering 3.3% growth in 2019. This improvement reflects the benefits of the investment in products and platforms and the revenue streams, particularly in pharma, retail banking and maritime. OP increased just over 11% as the revenue dropped through very cleanly and it was assisted by cost savings.
Finally, Taylor & Francis delivered a consistent underlying performance overall, delivering 2.4% revenue growth. The growth is weighted towards journals in the year with a steady year-on-year trading performance in the books business. So looking at the evolution of the operating profit margin, the group finished 2019 delivering an attractive margin north of 32%. The inclusion of a full year of the UBM business trading at a slightly lower margin acted as a circa 1% drag on the overall margin of the business. The increase of the year-on-year margin was driven by 2 specific dynamics. The FX benefit arises principally from the stronger U.S. dollar, which benefits our U.S. operations in Informa Markets and Taylor & Francis, and the growth in synergies delivered have increased the margin year-on-year, slightly offset by some investments in the group to upgrade our technology platforms and our digital capabilities.
Strong free cash flow has been one of the real successes of 2019, increasing over 40% to £722 million of free cash flow in the year. Most significantly, this reflects the growth in EBIT year-on-year, which is driven by the extra 5.5 months of trading of UBM in 2019, but also includes a stronger year-on-year working capital performance driven by a better contribution from the UBM portfolio, which did not benefit from the timing of the completion date in 2018.
The interest line includes one-off fees payable in prepaying certain USPP debt in 2019 and also that extra £13 million payable in relation to IFRS 16. Finally, we paid a bit more tax in 2019, as you'd expect, from the larger business following the UBM combination.
So building off that strong 2019 free cash flow result, I thought it'd be worth outlining some of the characteristics of the business that produced those strong free cash flows. Advanced bookings of subscriptions and events and paid for in advance -- are paid for in advance and leave us with over £500 million of cash held in the balance sheet at any one time.
We have flexibility around our payments. We're able to roll forward bookings for future events based on our terms and conditions, if we reschedule them. And we're able to manage the payments to our suppliers over our payment periods. Our business is not capital hungry, with 2019 running under 2% of revenue for CapEx. Whilst this was an unusually low percentage compared to recent years, it doesn't damage the business operating to a low capital intensity for short periods. Our costs are split evenly between direct costs and indirect costs, leaving us lots to go for operationally should we reduce the volume of operations that the business is trading through and should we want to take a more aggressive stance on costs.
And finally, our cash management and working capital management have been strong for a few years and allow us to keep tight control on these areas and increase control in periods where we need to. So all these characteristics result in robust operating cash conversion, which for 2019 was over 100%, and it drove that strong free cash flow generation. So as Stephen mentioned earlier, when we've moved fast to implement the postpone program to move events from the first half to the second half of 2019. In addition to our base-case planning, we're also running multiple downside scenarios to plan how I think what -- the business is going to respond to emerging situations, should they change. These scenarios are important to us. They're important to me because they help me assess at what stage we need to take actions and decisions on our cost base and also informs how decisively we need to move at any point in time.
As Stephen says, we want to be ready to trade strongly out of the downturn. And to do that, we need to make sure we only remove capacity that we absolutely must and when we absolutely must have to. So this slide talks you through 2 scenarios that we've assessed. In Scenario 1, on the left-hand side, we're assuming that no further events operate in the first half of 2020 after the circa £260 million of revenue that we've already delivered in January and February. In this scenario, we'd look to avoid the direct costs relating to those events that we'd not be operating, and we'd look to take specific targeted action in our indirect cost base. These mitigations would see us finish the first half of the year with material liquidity and the leverage covenant delivered under our control.
In Scenario two, which looks at a scenario whereby you -- after the £270 million worth of revenue in January and February, no further large events operate in the rest of 2020. Now we think this is highly unlikely, given that we're starting to see signs of activity returning in China. But we're modeling it nonetheless, so that we're prepared for this scenario. In this scenario, we would again look to avoid the costs, the direct costs related to operating events and we would take a more proactive pieces of action and action plan in terms of our direct cost base and our indirect cost base. These mitigations would see us finish 2020 with material liquidity. But after 10 months with no large events, it's unsurprising that we may need to manage up, i.e., through our year-end covenant position.
As you'll have seen today in 2020, we've put in place an additional surplus credit facility for £750 million, which provides optionality to help us manage our way through a scenario like Scenario 2. The key thing is that we're constantly tracking developments through the COVID management committee meeting that Stephen mentioned, and that's enabling us to consider, on a real-time basis, further management measures should they be required.
Looking at the maturity of our borrowings. We're now in a position where we have no maturities until 2022 and no material drawn maturities until 2023. Our strong free cash flow has steadily and consistently reduced covenant leverage from 3.1x of the 2018 half year following the UBM completion to 2.5x at the 2019 year end.
Most recently, we've moved proactively and quickly to secure a £750 million committed surplus credit facility with a term of up to 2.5 years. Together with our existing £900 million RCF, which is only around 25% drawn with about £700 million headroom at the moment, this gives us material committed undrawn facilities as we enter a period of potential uncertainty. The headline message on synergies is we remain on track to achieve the targets we set ourselves and that we've outlined to you previously. And that's both on track in terms of the savings we're looking to achieve and also in terms of the costs of achieving those savings.
This includes the delivery of £50 million of OP savings generated in 2019, principally from 2 main areas of duplication, the Informal Markets division and the cost of operating corporate and support functions, which benefit all the divisions through lower cost allocations. The UBM integration costs in 2019 were just over £40 million, which together with the £40 million we incurred in 2019, means we've invested around about 80% of the total budget that we had earmarked for the integration process.
So wrapping up and going into 2020, our subscription businesses are performing well with over 35% of group revenue generated from forward-booked subscriptions. We're planning for a period of short-term volatility in the events-related growth in the business. But we have, through the postponement program, a plan in place to work our way through that in 2020. We're taking proactive cost measures in the business to set ourselves up for future scenarios, and the synergies that we earmarked out of the UBM combination are secure. Finally, our strong cash flow model and our good time lines to maturity, together with the strong liquidity, give us real balance sheet strength going into 2020.
And with that, I'll hand you back to Stephen.
Stephen Carter
Thanks, Gareth. All right. If you can bear with me just for a couple of seconds before we get into questions. Thought I might just step out of the day-to-day and talk a little bit about the business. So where are we as a company going into 2020? If, as I say, if we weren't dealing with the immediate, we'd be focused on the future of the business. And really, this is what we've been seeking to build, business with more international reach. And you'll remember, we used to be really, a very kind of U.K.-, European-focused business. We're now actually almost the complete opposite of that with depth in specialist markets where we see future growth; consistent underlying growth, 3.5%, we set ourselves that kind of target to get into the 4%-plus club; very predictable and growing cash flows.
We wanted to maintain and engage an inclusive culture where people felt a sense of ownership for what they did and how they did it and freedom to be able to do it. We like the business model of our business, where, as Gareth says, you have forward visibilities on your recurring revenues but actually also your exhibition revenues. We believe profoundly in the long-term value of face-to-face. I'm sure someone's going to ask me the existential question, is the whole world going to change and never want to meet anyone ever again? I don't believe that's going to come to pass. I think human beings are fundamentally social animals. Business gets conducted face-to-face. And in the trade show product, you have a perfect vehicle for doing that efficiently and in a highly sustainable manner.
But we needed to become a digital business, and we were a long way from that. And we've put a lot of time, money and effort into building our digital capabilities, whether they be API service delivery for our subscription businesses, Salesforce platform deployment or simple better master data management or accounting operating systems.
The world has gone specialist. It's our theme inside our own company now. Our business is to champion specialists. We are members of multiple industries and multiple communities. And that lack of a single point of weakness serves us well in the upside, and it actually serves us very well in the downside because you very rarely get a universal problem everywhere at the same time. And we have very specialist brands as a consequence. They're not household names, apart from in the households in which they belong. And when they're in those households, they really are household names. That's the company that we've been building and that we are committed to continuing to build for the next 3 to 5 years.
To look at 2019, on any measure, we feel very good about what we did in 2019. We said we would create a single company, what we call the AIP operating model, that we would in this fine building, which was chosen by our predecessors, but thank you very much for it. And we've purposely gone out of our way to say goodbye to UBM as a brand, not because it was a bad brand, but because it wasn't our brand. It wasn't where we were going in the future.
We have pivoted the company around the divisional brands, Informa Markets; Informa Connect; Informa Intelligence; Informa Tech, our newest brand; and invested in the rebirthing of the Taylor & Francis brand, which if Annie were here, she would talk about with more passion. We have built a leadership and talent community, which I believe gives us real bench strength and at times like this, you need it, you feel it, and you're glad you've got it. We delivered and overdelivered on our operating synergies in year 1 and year 2, and we're on track for year 3.
We made the decision that was, frankly at least 3 or 4 years overdue, to invest in the Fashion portfolio. Everyone said the problem with the Fashion business was that the end market was changing. Well, that possibly was true. But end markets change in all of our businesses. The problem with the Fashion business was it wasn't a very well-run business. So we invested to run that business with better brands, better locations, better contracts, better products, better services and a team that had the ability to be able to invest in their customers, and that is producing results.
We made some decisions, at times quite tough decisions, to say goodbye to businesses we liked but we knew we were never going to be long-term owners of, such as our agriculture intelligence business, outstanding business. But that's allowed us to double down in markets where we see long-term growth.
And we've invested a lot in our own culture, our own sense of ourselves and our own brand. And that gives us the Informa Group as you look at it today. The last time I was on this platform, actually, we were launching this brand, Omdia. In our tech business, we've taken all of the research, data and consulting businesses, Ovum, IHS Markit, Light Reading, Heavy Reading, Tractica, and we've rebranded them and we've pulled them together from a product point of view, a pricing point of view and a go-to-market point of view to produce a proposition for the tech community in 6 subsectors in the technology industry to provide a competitive, largely digital product service offer. And the early signs are that, that is going extremely well.
We continue to develop either through relationships and joint ventures, such as in Beauty with BolognaFiere; in Tech, in a joint venture, such as with Founders Forum; or through acquisition in Open Research with F1000, and to strengthen and extend our capabilities in the submarkets where we see future growth. And when we're out of the sharp point of the COVID-19 response, we will return to that as our going-forward strategy.
But before I finish, I wanted to finish with a subject that would have been a larger part of today's discussion and is probably the largest part of tomorrow's discussion, which is our approach to sustainability. Ben, who is here, and his colleagues in the sustainability team, which he has led and we have built over the last 4 or 5 years, have been working for some time on developing a proposition for our colleagues and for our customers and our end markets, where we can set out a target to be fully carbon neutral by 2025 and net carbon zero by 2030 or earlier.
That speaks to what we do with waste. That speaks to what we do with travel. That speaks to what we do with energy. That speaks to what we do with our products and how we deliver sustainability content to the markets that we serve and deliver. This program, FasterForward, we are deploying across all of our businesses. There's been months of work that have gone into turning this into an auditable and documented program and approach to putting us in a place whereby we have a confident position on our economic and environmental footprint as a business. And we'll happily take more questions on this in the Q&A.
I'll finish where I started. Here's the summary. And I'll now throw it open to questions. We'll start in the front.
Question-and-Answer Session
Q - William Packer
It's Will Packer from Exane BNP Paribas. Three questions from me, please. You outlined a postponement scenario in the release, around £400 million of Events revenue postponed to later in the year. If that scenario comes to pass where shows restart in June, what kind of revenue and EBIT hit do you expect to your Events business? That's question one.
Secondly, could you talk us through the cash dynamics on postponement? My understanding is that you hold on to the cash as long as the show takes place. Do you have to pay the venues? Could you just talk us through what happens there?
And then, finally, you talked about China showing evidence of being up and running. Certainly, speaking to top people in the industry, they feel confident that by June, things should start to re-emerge. Could you just talk through the specifics there? Do you think that if the rest of the world is still struggling with the virus, that the Chinese government would be willing for trade shows to restart in June? Is that realistic?
Stephen Carter
Well, thanks, Will. Three very good questions. And I'll cut into maybe all 3 of them. But Gareth, you might want to come in and give a broader picture on how we're approaching the cash dynamic question because I think that's a question that a number of people will have.
Just to be clear, definitely not offering you an opinion on the Chinese government. But to talk about China. The -- what are we seeing in China in our business? Well, we're seeing what I'm sure you're picking up elsewhere. We moved early to close, and we went for an extended close. I think we're in 8 or 9 locations, physical locations in China. We closed all of them for an extended period. That -- and I have to say, and I genuinely want to put on record that our colleagues in China have been absolutely outstanding through this process in speed of response, flexibility, impact and effectiveness of remote working and the way in which they've managed customers. We were blessed, as I said, that we didn't have so many shows in the early part of January. So that gave us some breathing time to work fast and quick.
The good news about the China market, as you know well, is there's quite a lot of capacity coming on. So actually, I wouldn't say it was the work of a moment to secure replacement capacity. But by and large, in Mainland China, we've had no example of not being able to find a replacement capacity slot.
What are we seeing? All of our offices are now open. Everyone is now physically back at work, unless they are remote working for practical reasons. There is no province that I'm aware of, as of pretty much very early this morning, where venues are yet open. But the level of grade -- of security grading is coming down progressively in various locations. And we, like others, are planning on a June return, possibly an end May return in some locations. The big swing vote, as I'm sure you also know, is what happens to the Canton Fair. Sadly, the Canton Fair is not one of our brands, but it is a huge commercial trading event in China. And there's a bit of a debate about when that will come back. Will it be as planned, which is the end of April? Or will it be slightly later in May or early June? But there's confidence it will return.
To your point about what the volume will be, well, that speaks to the question about metaphorically, if you looked at the entirety of our shows, what percentage of the exhibitors are international, what percentage is domestic? That's not just the China question, that's an everywhere question. What percentage of our attendees are international, what percentage of our attendees are domestic or international? And the broad answer is it's a way higher percentage of exhibitors that are domestic. There's a higher percentage of visitors that are international.
On costs, we took a commercial decision early that we would pay to secure venue capacity on a going forward and worry about, not heedlessly, but we would worry about the cost of the venue capacity we've already paid. And that seems to be serving us well because there's evidence certainly in China of sensible, in our view, clearly, we're biased, but sensible venue cost waivers and -- being offered by locations. And so our judgment is actually when this comes out in the wash in China, I don't think that double costing will be anywhere near the earnings impact that we might have modeled in a worst-case scenario.
On the broader cash question, if we run the show, we run the show. In some specific shows, we've offered some targeted rebates, particularly for those communities who feel the cash pinch more and that speaks to my point about maintaining long-term relationship. But generally, actually, we haven't had a significant demand from customers to speak of or who have forward paid if we have secured an alternative venue and date. And that's part of the reason why we moved quite so fast on postponement.
We're not giving guidance on revenue and EBIT. The only revenue we know we're not going to have are the canceled shows. Everyone here can make their own judgment about whether a postponed dollar will appear at 100%. That's a judgment. It's not a fact today. It might appear at $0.80 on the dollar, which is a sort of consensus number I've seen out there. But actually, you might find that it appears at $1.10 because there's pent-up demand because people haven't been able to trade for 6 months, and that's very difficult to predict at this point. But we're not giving any guidance on that. And that's the way we're thinking about those few things. But on the more general cash question, do you want to outline our approach, Gareth?
Gareth Wright
Yes. I think in terms of the headline, as you know, from -- in the last couple of years, the working capital nature of the business is that we received cash in advance of operating the vendor or delivering the services. And therefore, in advance of paying out the money to the suppliers. And therefore, at any point in time, that model works in our favor. And therefore, it's -- the ball is in our court to manage the situation and work our way through it because we are on the right side of the working capital equation and everything is managed by us.
In terms of customers, just looking at that piece, we are -- we're looking to reschedule the events. But when we do that, we reschedule the event then we talk to the customer about the new event, what the format's going to be, what the date's going to be, where it's going to be, et cetera. And we look to see how they want to engage with that new show.
Generally, what we're finding is the engagement is positive. There is demand there. People want the shows to run, they just don't want them to run at exactly at the time it was scheduled to run originally. So generally, we're finding engagements positive and people are looking to reengage with the new shows.
And once we've discussed customer requirements then hopefully, we can get them to come on to the new show. We are looking very carefully at smaller customers or smaller suppliers to some of our industries to make sure we look off to them in appropriate ways. So they remember that when we come out the other side of the process.
And in terms of suppliers, this is where it helps being a large-scale operator and operating events regularly through a lot of these venues and with these contractors because we can have a more, I think, professional and long-term relationship discussion rather than a short-term reaction to any cash flow issues they're facing or dynamics that we're seeing in the business. So headline is, I think it's -- the working capital model is in our favor and therefore, enables us to manage it through the situation.
William Packer
Just to come back quickly on your comment around the drop through. So I think Hive, which is the old IT group, talked about a 7% revenue impact from cancellations flowing through to a 25%-ish profit impact. It would sound from your communication that, that would be too significant a read across your business.
Stephen Carter
I genuinely don't know, which is why we're not giving guidance. We're not giving guidance because we're trying to be unhelpful. We're not giving guidance because this situation is changing literally on a daily basis. I think the revenue to profit drop-through will be higher than one would expect normally. So the revenue cancellation to profit because there is some double costing, and that's a sensible business decision, although it's going to affect 2020 earnings to a degree because I think it's going to secure the long-term value of the franchises and the key value equation, the judgment we've made, is in the long-term value of the cash flows which doesn't mean that we're going to be casual about the cost impacts in 2020. But if you have to make a decision on the margin, we're making a decision in favor the long-term value of the cash flows.
Adrien de Saint Hilaire
Yes. It's Adrien from Bank of America, please. So I get that there's about £1.4 billion of events revenues, which have not been rescheduled yet. Can you talk a bit about the underlying growth rate that you expect for that part of the revenues? Is that the usual 4 to 5, I would probably expect not, but if you can give us a number, that'd be helpful.
Also second question on your presentation. I think you showed which revenues are being rescheduled in what parts of the world. And from that chart, it seems that most of the rescheduling is taking place actually outside of China. Perhaps you want to give us a split of the £400 million, how does that split between China and non-China?
And then, Stephen, you said you would expect things to reemerge maybe in June in China. Do you think that puts us -- or puts you in a position to give us a guidance at the July H1 numbers?
Stephen Carter
Again, good questions. Maybe take them in reverse order. And Gareth you might want to speak to the first one, if you could, on the -- that was a non-event revenue question, the first one, is that correct?
Adrien de Saint Hilaire
No, sorry. I meant the -- out of the -- you said 65% of revenues or events. But you said there is 400, which is rescheduled.
Stephen Carter
It is trade. What's happening to the rest of it? Is that your question?
Adrien de Saint Hilaire
Yes. So what's happening to the events that are not being rescheduled.
Stephen Carter
Okay. Yes. Okay, I'll touch on that, but Gareth, if you can pick that up at the end. On your -- yes, on guidance. Look, we are -- AGM is on June 12. And then the half year is whenever the half year is. I mean, I would suspect we would aim to try and give some more detailed guidance in June 12. I mean, I'm not over-fixating on a specific date. But my own personal view would be that by the end of May, early June, we'll have enough forward visibility as to whether the challenges in H1 are challenges in H2, if you see what I mean. So I think at that point would be sensible to take a view on forward guidance. If the challenges in H1 look like they're on a kind of glide path to manageable, then I think we'll get back to the sort of questions that you and Will and others are asking, which I understand, around, "So what's the in-year impact?" And what, if any, is the sort of traffic jam impact into '21.
If by the time we get to June 12, the circumstances that are facing us now look like they're continuing into Q3 or worse, to the end of H2, then we'll have enough visibility, I think, to be able to speak to that. So people are clear here today, and I think we've been clear to the market. Our planning assumption is that, that is what will happen, that there will be a spring back and that we have planned it to be a spring back from H2.
Slightly to one bit of your question about the events revenue that either hasn't traded, the £250 million or that hasn't been postponed and rescheduled, the 450. So the remainder, some of that we're still planning to trade and indeed is trading as we speak, because there are parts of the world where there are not control measures and actually, much of our product is highly localized.
So last week, we ran the Middle East Energy Show in Dubai. We have 2 shows running in São Paulo in Brazil next week. So it is not the case that there is no event activity everywhere in the world. I wouldn't want you to take that view.
But to your question about where the big chunks of movement have been, there have been some in Mainland China. But fortunately for us, not so many because we didn't have that much in the front half of the year. Really, the bigger chunks have been in specific locations in North America, which the single biggest was Natural Products Expo. And that was a tough one for us to call because Natural Products Expo is a hot -- the reason why it's such a highly valuable franchise is because it's a highly valuable product because it serves up for many thousands of exhibitors. And so that we were kind of caught between half the community who wanted us to run it and half the community who didn't. And so we ended up making a decision in the end, that in the best interest of the community, we would step out put a pop-up show in before summer and then do a fuller show in the east, in Philadelphia, in the autumn, and that's an area, to Gareth's point, where we have stood up a relief and rebate fund for the kind of smaller founder-innovator community in that market, because they're very important to the health of that market. That's what the big guys turn up to meet, and that's what really what drives the health of that show.
GDC, Game Developer, was another big North American share which we lifted and dropped. In Europe, we've had 3 big shows which we've lifted and dropped. So it hasn't just been China. You're right to spot that. But we have made these decisions on a case-by-case basis. We have no shows in Italy. So Italy is not directly an issue for us. It's indirectly an issue. And we self-evidently feel for the circumstances in Italy, not least because we have a very close and constructive partnership with BolognaFiere. Indeed, I was due to be Bologna this weekend for that reason. But it doesn't directly affect our portfolio. On the remainder of the non-event revenues, what's our forward assumption there?
Gareth Wright
Those are non-event revenues, I think.
Stephen Carter
Sorry, event revenues.
Gareth Wright
Yes, yes. So Adrien's question was around event revenues. Non-event revenues, as we said, are proceeding to plan. Journal subscription renewal is good. Professional contracts is good in Informa Intelligence. In terms of the event revenues on the balance, broadly, we think they have some trading to plan as we go through the year. But what we're doing at the moment is we're saying that we're going to reassess that when we get to the half year and give you sort of clearer guidance for the full year on that basis. But we do think some of those smaller outdoor, smaller gathering, private-type shows can continue to operate through Q2.
Stephen Carter
Thank you. I'm going to leave you to judge or just hand the microphone around as you see fit.
Patrick Wellington
Sorry. It's Patrick Wellington at Morgan Stanley. And 3 questions. The top 30 shows are 50% of revenues. So can you tell us how many of the top 30 shows have run? And where the others appear in terms of Q2, Q3, Q4?
Secondly, Stephen, you say you're working on the basis of things normalize at the end of June, but your phasing chart would suggest that in China at least, you've got more shows than you would normally have in June. So you're assuming that China turns around, what, at the end of May? Are you going to run China Beauty in mid-May? I mean, what are your assumptions? Are you going to run Hong Kong Jewelry in June?
And then thirdly, you talked a bit about the traffic jam effect. As this creeping barrage of cancellations and postponements happens, what can you do about rephasing shows in the early part of the second half, the late part of the second half? And what's the impact on '21? If you've held a show in October, which would normally be in March, what we do expect to happen in the following March? Is everybody going to turn up? Are people are going to have the desires sated by having turned up in October. What's the roll forward impact in '21.
Stephen Carter
Those are quite challenging questions. Let me see if I can give you some clarity. On the answer to your first, I'm going to throw that one to Richard. I don't have that data to hand. Of our top 50 shows, how many of those...
Richard Menzies-Gow
….they're roughly spread even across the year. So if you go quarter-by-quarter, they worked pretty even through the year. Year-to-date, I think we've traded 7 of the top 30, which the quarter is 7 -- 7 in the quarter and we're basically on track what you'd expect. So it's the ones in Q2, those ones are the ones that are rescheduling back out into the second half of the year, 1 or 2 of them in the first quarter in China. But generally, we waited fairly steadily through the year, and we've operated the sort of number of them that you'd expect us to operate so far in the calendar.
Stephen Carter
On the specific question on CB, I hope you'll forgive me, Patrick, and others will. I understand the desire for specifics, but there's a limit to how far we will go because a, it's commercially-sensitive and we're trying to manage in real-time in the community. We are making some assumptions but what I would say is rest assured that we've also got backup plans if those assumptions don't come to pass.
But to your specific question around China in June, you're correct. In order for China, as a generic, and it won't be a generic, it will be province by province, location by location, to trade in June for us, it would probably mean by April or early May, we would -- the relevant level of control would have to have come down to a point whereby the venues were officially open and markets were ready to come back. We would have enough advance notice of that, that if we needed to go to our plan B for any of the brands that are currently scheduled for June, we could do that.
Patrick Wellington
Traffic jam effect [indiscernible].
Stephen Carter
I genuinely don't know is the answer to a very legitimate forward modeling question or commercial question. I think based on what we would judge today, because we do know which of the 45 larger brands that we've lifted and moved. If someone flicks a switch tomorrow and this was all over, do I think we would see a significant deleterious effect in 2021 because of the shift in 2020? No, I don't believe we would, actually.
I think if it extends beyond the half year into the second half, then I think that traffic jam effect begins to build up a bit more and then we'd have to make a different judgment about what it means for 2021.
The good news about our calendar is it's either relatively light in the first quarter of 2021. Or actually, they've already run. So it really, for us, would become an issue by the time you get to the Q2 of 2021, if you see what I mean. So I think we have a little bit more flex than the natural calendar would suggest.
Katherine Tait
Katherine Tait from Goldman Sachs. A couple of questions for me. I think at your Investor Day last year, you very helpfully put up a sort of pie chart that showed the exposure within the Informal Markets division to different end markets. Just given what's been happening with the oil price, I wonder if you could kind of give us a fresh number on, particularly exposure to aviation and transport and any other sort of end markets that, I guess, you imagine could be impacted by that?
Secondly, you talked about more space constraint coming on in China and how that's enabled you to sort of fill those postponements. Can you give us a sense for the rest of the world as well, particularly the U.S. and North America is a big market for you, what's the sort of space constraints there?
And then, finally, on the sort of forward bookings for back-end of '20 and into '21. Are you seeing any impact so far to those sort of forward bookings? Or are people sort of generally accepting that this is -- this will pass?
Stephen Carter
Great questions. Let's start with the last one because it's a good answer. Forward pacing is tracking well, right? So actually, the forward indicators -- I mean, pacing is not revenue, but it's an indicator. Forward pacing is tracking well. So the buy side of the market isn't looking at what's happening and thinking, "This isn't a product or a service that I'm interested on a go-forward basis." Which doesn't mean that there aren't specific in spot issues. But to that very specific question, actually good.
To your capacity question, we're relatively well placed. There are pinch points of capacity in some locations. But in most of the locations where there are pinch points of capacity, we are the single-largest commercial buyer. And Gareth, I think, spoke to that earlier, and that has served us well. So being early and being scale is advantageous.
In China in particular, there's quite a lot of capacity. And so that is relatively helpful. And some of this is involving us making some decisions about moving some of our own shows to accommodate other shows. And so the larger portfolio also happens to help you there.
And actually, broadly, on the end market exposure, I'm certainly feeling good about the decision not to get big in energy, and that's not an end market for us. We do have an aviation business. We've got a -- in round numbers, a $100 million aviation business in -- which essentially comes in 3 parts. It's a data business, it's an events business, and it's a media information business.
Actually, the events business is largely focused at the secondary market, and that's holding up actually quite well for maybe the same reasons as the primary market isn't. The media business is feeling a little bit of softness, and the data and kind of the information business actually reasonably steady.
So in the round, we're feeling a bit of a pinch in aviation, but not material or worrisome. And we don't really have any other end markets where we're feeling it. In fact, our single biggest end market as a company in advanced learning, in business information and in events is pharma and health care. And right now, it's tracking well.
Adam Berlin
It's Adam Berlin from UBS. Just two questions for me, please. The first is can you talk a little bit about what's happening in North America in terms of are there any cities where there's bans in place? What are you hearing from the U.S. government about whether things could happen and are events generally running and the majority of events happening because North America, obviously, is your biggest market for events.
And the second question was in your scenario 2, Gareth, where you talked about £275 million of indirect cost savings. Could you explain a little bit about what that would come from? And are you going to do that because you need to meet covenant obligations or just to kind of preserve short-term numbers? Why would you react to a one-off event by cutting costs so dramatically?
Stephen Carter
Don't worry. We'll restrain his worst instincts. I'll leave you to take the second question. On the first one, in the U.S., I mean, the same is true everywhere in the world. We are approaching our approach through the guidance from the relevant authorities in location. And in North America or in the United States of America, that varies. Sometimes, that could be a state government. Sometimes, that can be a city government. And sometimes, that could be the federal government. And it really varies.
And so there are, in some locations -- so let's take -- I think, the first one in the U.S. out of the trups, Orange County. There was a state of emergency declared in Orange County. But there are other locations where there have been a different set of responses. We have made a very conscious decision not to try to put ourselves between what the authority guidance is and our own view of it. And by and large, our customers have welcomed that. We have, as a standard operating measure, put in place a whole range of services at events generally on hygiene, on screening, on deep clean, on briefing and on -- and when we have got attendees and exhibitors from control locations we have put in place, we would rather you didn't attend or don't participate measures, if that has been deemed appropriate. So that's the way we've stepped through it.
To date, that is serving the communities we serve well, and we'll continue to work on that basis. Obviously, the latest example is Italy, where there's been a unitary decision for the entire country. But we will see how that plays out more broadly.
I'll let Gareth speak to the chart he presented. But I think the point that I would leave you with is, at the moment, we are, I think, doing the -- exactly what you are speaking to, which is the decision we're making is to preserve the long-term value of the business, and we're doing that based on an assumption that some version of normal service will return in the second half of the year, and normal service is currently happening in our subscription and information businesses, and normal service is currently happening in many geographies around the world. But the scale of the postponement program is such that if that continued through to June or July, we might have to scenario plan for a different outcome and I think that's what Gareth was talking to.
Gareth Wright
Yes. I think that's what it is. I think we would agree with the sort of tone of your question, which is, "Why would you take strong action and decisive action right now based on what you know now?" Because we want to trade strongly out of this downturn and what we perceive to be a period of time issue rather than something that is sustained and will be long term.
So we are absolutely taking the approach to be ready to move decisively if we need to, but not looking to take the capacity out unless we absolutely have to and only when we have to.
So to get to the essence of scenario 2, what you've got to believe and assume is there going to be no events for the rest of the year, so for effectively 10 months of the year. And I think based on the global view and general view, that appears unlikely as a scenario. But it's not saying it's a scenario we shouldn't plan for. And that's why we're doing the work to make sure we understand how we're going to react in that situation.
And in that situation, what we're looking to do is look at the volume-related indirect costs. So -- and I know indirect sounds like it's fixed but actually, there's quite a lot in there. It is volume-related in terms of the back office in structures and how you actually operate the business. And we look to take short-term cost measures that were appropriate in terms of the length and appropriate in terms of the depth of the downturn as it played out.
But we don't feel we have to make that decision at this point in time, and we feel there are opportunities and actions that we can take as we go through the year should the scenario evolve that -- looks like it's heading down that road. So I think, overall, we feel in control, and we feel comfortable about how we're going to manage that situation, should it evolve that way.
Adam Berlin
Just to clarify, what's the reason in the bad scenario, you have to cut cost by that much? Is that because you want to preserve short-term earnings or because you're worried about covenants and other issues?
Gareth Wright
I think it's a variety, I think, a variety of issues. I think in that sort of situation, as you'd expect, management to take action and to do something around the cost base. But then you'd expect us just to have -- if you take scenario 2 and believe it, I don't think you expect us to go for 10 months without operating an event and not do anything on cost. I think that would just be a slightly strange management action to take. But we want to be appropriate, and we want to take the right decisions at the right time.
Nicholas Dempsey
It's Nick from Barclays. Can you hear me? So first question. Just -- if we do have the more negative scenario and we get towards the end of 2020, and we're worrying about the covenants, to what extent is that conversation with your debt holders shaped by your bookings into 2021? So in the event that you were there in December and saying, "Hey, it looks like we might be just over 3.5x net debt EBITDA, but our bookings into '21 showed good growth." To what extent does that shape the conversation that you then have and the measures you'd have to put in place?
Second question, just on the biennial shows that are being bumped into 2021. Could they run again in 2022? Or are we talking about starting again with them as a biennial, so that we're bumping 2022 revenue into 2023?
Stephen Carter
Just the two?
Nicholas Dempsey
Just the two.
Stephen Carter
Fantastically economical. Possibly on biennial, it's a good question. I mean, as a general rule, with the biennial portfolio, which as you know, has enlarged a lot in our business over the last few years, we tend to take a view and do quite significant market and customer research to see whether or not there is value in that product coming to market more often. That would be -- generally, we would do that anyway at the end of any year. In a year like this, where we've, in effect, moved biennials up, then I think that would be particularly the case. So I think we would just take a judgment based on market appetite and customer interest.
Unless Gareth is going to disagree with me, which he's perfectly free to do so, I don't think we should get into answering your first question, Nick, not to personalize it to you. It's a hypothetical. We've laid it out for transparency's sake because I think it seems wise to do that. But our view at the moment is that we're running the business on the assumption that normal service returns in H2.
If some form of normal service doesn't return, which is a kind of an in extremis scenario, then I think we're a different situation, both as it relates to our cost and as it relates to our broader commercial circumstance, and we'll deal with it then. I'm not sure right now it's useful to play it out as a hypothetical scenario, but we've given you a sense of the levers that we've got to pull, if we need to.
And as it happens, I think you're 100% correct. I think the forward value of the forward bookings would be a key indicator of the long-term value of the business, which is why we're making the decisions right now that what really matters is the long-term value of the assets.
Thomas Singlehurst
Tom here from Citi. Just two questions. Actually, 1 backwards-looking, funny enough. For events, I guess, 4.5 minus ended up being 4.3. But specifically, the impact of Hong Kong in that. Is that -- firstly, can you quantify it?
And secondly, is that just not an issue in the near-term for you guys? Should we expect any hangover from that even on the second half shows, assuming everything is unaffected. And then very briefly on the cash. Obviously, the prepayments mean that the cash flow is secured for this year, presumably, regardless of what happens. Does this mean we'll just end up with a cash echo or cash at sort of into 2021 so that the profit squeeze hits this year and cash next?
Stephen Carter
Okay. I'll let Gareth take the second one. On the first one, we haven't broken out and probably wouldn't choose to. But if you look at our markets business, I think the combination of Hong Kong and the specific issues facing the real estate market in the Middle East, which we really felt acutely in our cityscape portfolio in Dubai. And then the remaining drag of fashion, which was considerably greater in '19 than it will be in '20, all else being equal, was probably worth, I don't know, 1.5% to 2% growth in that division.
I mean, that's a little bit earnings without the bad things, but they were very specific. As to whether or not the civil unrest issues in Hong Kong recur in 2020, well, they've been rather overtaken by events. And so it's very difficult to see that right now. And we'll have to take a judge on that as we step through the year. But we have not planned on that recurring in our normal planning process for 2020. Do you want to talk to the cash flow?
Gareth Wright
Yes. In terms of the cash dynamic, I mean, as you'd expect, sitting here at this stage of the year, it's quite difficult to make a definitive answer to whether the dynamics are going to fall, this side or the other side of the new -- end of the year. In our modeling, we're assuming that it falls, so the downside falls largely in 2020. So the working capital outflows occur in the year this year. But in terms of kind of end of year guidance and I mean being definitive about it, I think it's too early to call at this stage.
Matthew Walker
It's Matthew Walker from Crédit Suisse. First question is on the dividend. I'm guessing that under your basic scenario, the sort of 6%, 7% increase in the dividend for 2020 is held if things do kick off again in June? That's the first question.
Second question is on the famous Scenario 2. Isn't it a case -- I mean, your only covenants are actually in the U.S. private placement debt. That's about £1.2 billion. With your facilities, you could actually repay the U.S. private placement debt if you needed to.
And also, wouldn't you expect the bondholders to give you a waiver, if this is a sort of a one-off event that's not permanently impairing the business? Would you not expect the bondholders to give you a waiver anyway? So there are kind of 2 REITs to deal with that, one is you just repay it and the second thing is you get a waiver.
Stephen Carter
There's nothing I like better, Matthew, than someone who asked the question and then answers it.
Matthew Walker
I'm not the CEO yet, so I'll wait for you to answer it.
Stephen Carter
If things continue the way they are, Matthew, it's only a matter of time. On the dividend, I mean, what have we said about the dividend? We said it's a progressive dividend. So we haven't actually committed to a specific percentage increase. But I mean, our historical pattern, I think, has been consistent. All else being equal, it's obviously a decision for the Board. I can't imagine that a circumstance where we would change that. And you've -- we've laid out, I think, the information on your second question in a way that's allowing you to self-conclude how one might cut into that if you needed to. There's a question at the front here, and I think one at the back there.
Sarah Simon
Yes. Sarah Simon from Berenberg. Two questions. First one was just on Scenario 1. Just to be clear, when you talk about the savings in terms of direct costs, should we assume that all of those returns, the essentially deferred cost rather than absolute savings, whereas, presumably, the indirect costs are largely absolute? Can you just explain that a bit more?
And then if I can be controversial to talk about something other than events. If you look at Tech, tech is obviously a sector that we know of as a high-growth sector. It's actually your slowest growth division. Can you talk us through what the pluses and minuses are within tech? Because it's obviously a sort of microcosm or informer of events and data and so on. If you can just give us a bit of color on that.
Stephen Carter
Sure. Thanks for that second question. On your first, sort of yes is the short answer. I mean, the direct cost, effectively, if we don't run the event, then you just defer the cost to when we do. But I think to an earlier question, it would be safe to assume that we're providing no guidance, that there probably will be -- the margins might be slightly less rich this year than they would be in a normal year because we might have additional marketing costs, additional sales costs and possibly in some instances, not literally duplicate venue cost, I think that's highly unlikely, but there might be some incremental venue cost.
Having said that, we have been reassured already in our early discussions in probably 8 or 9 locations around the world of the degree to which locations have already worked out, that when normal service returns, then there is a material interest for the location in encouraging the world to return there. And one of the most efficient ways of doing that is promoting large-scale trade shows.
So I think we have a high degree of confidence, but do we have cash in the bank on that today? No. But we have a high degree of confidence that there will be funds made available, which we, I think, would have a legitimate call on. But that's the way I think about the direct costs.
The indirect costs, well, they are indirect and therefore, more controllable immediately, and that's an area where we have made some early control measures just to keep pace with current circumstance.
Tech, what a great discussion. Let's talk about Tech. Essentially, our tech business is a thing of beauty, but it's a thing of -- it's a bit like the Taj Mahal, it's made up of lots of individual things that are beautiful, makes an even more beautiful thing in total. We've got an outstanding trade show portfolio in tech, particularly in some key markets where actually we're not facing up against large-scale vendor competitors. Because, as you know, in the trade show market in tech, many of the large-scale vendors run their own trade shows as kind of customer events, whether it's Salesforce's Dreamforce or Google's Zeitgeist or indeed trade associations like Mobile World Congress.
But in our security portfolio, Black Hat, and in our game developer portfolio, GDC, we really are the leading brands in those markets. And what we're doing there is beginning to build additional products and services around those trade show brands from our other capabilities, which we've put together in Tech. Omdia is a big engine for that, which is why we're interested in doing the swap for agribusiness intelligence for IHS Markit's capabilities so that we could build up our research, our data and our product consulting and project consulting capability in -- under the Omdia label.
Probably the toughest area of that business, which slightly speaks to why the overall aggregate growth rate is 2% rather than 4% or 6%, is the kind of complex portfolio, where there are some outstanding brands of scale, probably the showcase brand would be africa.com, which is definitely Africa's leading digital trade show brand, Broadband Wealth Forum, our 5G series, our AI summits, best-in-class. But it's a portfolio of 50, 60 brands, and that probably needs some further work on focus and pruning.
So what you'll see over the next 2 or 3 years is more investment in the research data product, more expansion behind the end markets where we see future growth, security, game development, AI, machine learning, 5G and a little bit of pruning in the historical conference and complex portfolio. That's the way we think about it.
Stephen Carter
Any final questions? Fantastic. Thank you very much for coming. I really do appreciate it, particularly it's a busy time. I hope we've given you some color. I hope we've laid things out clearly in the release, and we're hanging around for a bit, so if people want to have one-on-one conversations, please feel free to do so. And in the meantime, travel well. Thank you very much. | https://seekingalpha.com/article/4330898-informa-plc-ifpjf-ceo-stephen-carter-on-q4-2019-results-earnings-call-transcript | 2022-04-25T17:02:57Z | https://seekingalpha.com/article/4330898-informa-plc-ifpjf-ceo-stephen-carter-on-q4-2019-results-earnings-call-transcript | true | 1 |
Market Mover: Verisign (VRSN) Down at Midday April 22
Equities Staff Follow |Verisign Inc. (NASDAQ: VRSN) has lost $5.07 (2.39%) and sits at $206.95, as of 12:21:13 est on April 22.
176,047 shares exchanged hands.
The Company is down 1.32% over the last 5 days and shares lost 2.54% over the last 30 days.
Verisign expects its next earnings on 2022-04-28.
For technical charts, analysis, and more on Verisign visit the company profile.
About Verisign Inc.
Verisign, a global provider of domain name registry services and internet infrastructure, enables internet navigation for many of the world's most recognized domain names. Verisign enables the security, stability and resiliency of key internet infrastructure and services, including providing root zone maintainer services, operating two of the 13 global internet root servers and providing registration services and authoritative resolution for the .com and .net top-level domains, which support the majority of global e-commerce.
To get more information on Verisign Inc. and to follow the company's latest updates, you can visit the company's profile page here: Verisign Inc.'s Profile. For more news on the financial markets be sure to visit Equities News. Also, don't forget to sign-up for the Daily Fix to receive the best stories to your inbox 5 days a week.
Sources: Symbol info widget is provided by TradingView based on 15-minute-delayed prices. All other article data is provided by IEX Cloud on 15-minute delayed prices or EOD company info.
Stock price data is provided by IEX Cloud on a 15-minute delayed basis. Chart price data is provided by TradingView on a 15-minute delayed basis.
DISCLOSURE: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors, and do not represent the views of equities.com. Readers should not consider statements made by the author as formal recommendations and should consult their financial advisor before making any investment decisions. To read our full disclosure, please go to: http://www.equities.com/disclaimer | https://www.equities.com/news/market-mover-verisign-vrsn-down-at-midday-april-22 | 2022-04-25T17:03:26Z | https://www.equities.com/news/market-mover-verisign-vrsn-down-at-midday-april-22 | true | 22710 |
BENSALEM, Pa., April 25, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Law Offices of Howard G. Smith announces that investors with substantial losses have opportunity to lead the securities fraud class action lawsuit against Embark Technology, Inc. f/k/a Northern Genesis Acquisition Corp. II ("Embark" or the "Company") (NASDAQ: EMBK).
Class Period: January 12, 2021 – January 5, 2022
Lead Plaintiff Deadline: May 31, 2022
Investors suffering losses on their Embark investments are encouraged to contact the Law Offices of Howard G. Smith to discuss their legal rights in this class action at 888-638-4847 or by email to howardsmith@howardsmithlaw.com.
The complaint filed alleges that, throughout the Class Period, Defendants failed to disclose to investors that: (1) the Company had performed inadequate due diligence into Legacy Embark; (2) Legacy Embark and the Company following the Business Combination held no patents and an insignificant amount of test trucks; (3) accordingly, the Company had overstated its operational and technological capabilities; (4) as a result of all the foregoing, the Company had overstated the business and financial prospects of the Company post-Business Combination; and (5) as a result, Defendants' positive statements about the Company's business, operations, and prospects were materially misleading and/or lacked a reasonable basis at all relevant times.
To be a member of the class action you need not take any action at this time; you may retain counsel of your choice or take no action and remain an absent member of the class action. If you wish to learn more about this class action, or if you have any questions concerning this announcement or your rights or interests with respect to the pending class action lawsuit, please contact Howard G. Smith, Esquire, of Law Offices of Howard G. Smith, 3070 Bristol Pike, Suite 112, Bensalem, Pennsylvania 19020, by telephone at (215) 638-4847, toll-free at (888) 638-4847, or by email to howardsmith@howardsmithlaw.com, or visit our website at www.howardsmithlaw.com.
This press release may be considered Attorney Advertising in some jurisdictions under the applicable law and ethical rules.
Contacts
Law Offices of Howard G. Smith
Howard G. Smith, Esquire
215-638-4847
888-638-4847
howardsmith@howardsmithlaw.com
www.howardsmithlaw.com
View original content:
SOURCE Law Offices of Howard G. Smith | https://www.wmbfnews.com/prnewswire/2022/04/25/embk-investors-have-opportunity-lead-embark-technology-inc-fka-northern-genesis-acquisition-corp-ii-securities-fraud-lawsuit/ | 2022-04-25T17:03:42Z | https://www.wmbfnews.com/prnewswire/2022/04/25/embk-investors-have-opportunity-lead-embark-technology-inc-fka-northern-genesis-acquisition-corp-ii-securities-fraud-lawsuit/ | true | 2670 |
Portion of Route 61 Closed in Sunbury Due to Crash
Montoursville, PA – Motorists are advised that a portion of Route 61 is closed between Route 890 and Black Mill Road in Sunbury, Northumberland County, due to a vehicle crash.
A detour using local road is in place.
Motorists should be alert, slow down, expect travel delays, and drive with caution.
Motorists can check conditions on major roadways by visiting www.511PA.com. 511PA, which is free and available 24 hours a day, provides traffic delay warnings, weather forecasts, traffic speed information and access to more than 1,000 traffic cameras.
511PA is also available through a smartphone application for iPhone and Android devices, by calling 5-1-1, or by following regional Twitter alerts accessible on the 511PA website.
Subscribe to PennDOT news and traffic alerts in Tioga, Bradford, Lycoming, Sullivan, Union, Snyder, Northumberland, Montour and Columbia counties at www.penndot.pa.gov/District3.
Information about infrastructure in District 3 including completed work and significant projects, is available at www.penndot.gov/D3Results. Find PennDOT’s planned and active construction projects at www.projects.penndot.gov.
Follow PennDOT on Twitter at www.twitter.com/PennDOTNews and like the department on Facebook at www.facebook.com/PennsylvaniaDepartmentofTransportation and Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/pennsylvaniadot/.
MEDIA CONTACT: Maggie Baker, 570-368-4202 or magbaker@pa.gov.
### | https://www.einpresswire.com/article/569880623/portion-of-route-61-closed-in-sunbury-due-to-crash | 2022-04-25T17:03:51Z | https://www.einpresswire.com/article/569880623/portion-of-route-61-closed-in-sunbury-due-to-crash | true | 27 |
WHEATLAND (CBS13) — Kid Rock is coming to Wheatland, California, to perform at the Toyota Amphitheater on Sept. 30.
According to a press release, Rock’s “Bad Reputation Tour” stop in Wheatland will include special guest Grand Funk Railroad and a special appearance by Trey Lewis.
Tickets go on sale on Apr. 29 at 10 a.m. PT on Ticketmaster. | https://sacramento.cbslocal.com/2022/04/25/kid-rock-announces-show-at-toyota-amphitheater/ | 2022-04-25T17:09:40Z | https://sacramento.cbslocal.com/2022/04/25/kid-rock-announces-show-at-toyota-amphitheater/ | false | null |
According to Swiss consultancy Pexapark, around 400 MW of power purchase agreements were closed in Europe in March. Germany and Spain were the most dynamic PPA markets during the first quarter of the year.Zurich-based renewable energy consultancy Pexapark has reported a sharp decline in European PPA activity for March. The war in Ukraine is having repercussions on PPA prices and Europe could see very complicated electricity price curves in the remainder of the year, the analyst explained. During the month of March, the average price of signed PPAs was €77.37/MWh, 3% higher than the February average ...Den vollständigen Artikel lesen ...
Kostenloser Wertpapierhandel auf Smartbroker.de | https://www.finanznachrichten.de/nachrichten-2022-04/55860177-european-ppa-market-sees-contraction-in-march-451.htm | 2022-04-25T17:14:37Z | https://www.finanznachrichten.de/nachrichten-2022-04/55860177-european-ppa-market-sees-contraction-in-march-451.htm | true | null |
- Addressing everyday challenges in cancer care; apply by June 3, 2022 -
NORTHBROOK, Ill., April 25, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Astellas Pharma US, Inc. ("Astellas") today announced that it is accepting applications for the sixth annual Astellas Oncology C3 Prize (Changing Cancer Care), a global challenge that funds and advances the best non-treatment ideas to improve cancer care for patients, caregivers and the broader oncology community. The C3 Prize awards a total of $100,000 in grants and additional resources to advance ideas that address everyday challenges facing people impacted by cancer.
"The C3 Prize is focused on advancing innovations in cancer care beyond medicine to make every day better for those impacted by cancer," said Anthony Yanni, M.D., Senior Vice President and Global Head of Patient Centricity, Astellas. "Through the C3 Prize, we aim to fuel innovations that address patient and caregiver challenges and foster connections and empowerment throughout the cancer journey. In particular this year, solutions that address some of today's most pressing issues, such as mental health, caregiver support and health disparities and equity, are encouraged."
Sparking Innovation to Make an Impact for the Cancer Community
Innovation through the lens of patients and caregivers fuels the C3 Prize. Many previous C3 Prize innovators have a personal connection to cancer, which aligns with Astellas' philosophy that understanding the patient journey is critical to driving meaningful advancements in cancer care.
"As soon as I learned about the C3 Prize, it was clear to me that the Oncopadi app was exactly the kind of innovation Astellas was seeking to support," said Dr. Omolola Salako, 2020 C3 Prize Grand Prize winner, Founder and CEO, Oncopadi and 2022 C3 Prize Judge. "The funds and resources we received have enabled our team to close the cancer gap, strengthen the cancer care system and create new paths to improving the patient experience. The C3 Prize has fueled my personal mission and cemented the legacy of my sister, whose cancer journey motivated me to become an oncologist and launch Oncopadi."
Astellas Oncology will award one Grand Prize winner $100,000 USD in grants, and name two Innovation Prize winners. All winners will be provided with access to tools and resources to help them develop and advance their idea, including a yearlong complimentary membership to MATTER, a global healthcare startup incubator, community nexus and corporate innovation accelerator. The Grand Prize Winner will also receive hands-on support, expertise and resources from Slalom, a global consulting firm focused on strategy, technology and business transformation.
The C3 Prize finalists will participate in a virtual pitch event with an expert panel of volunteer judges, who are experts in cancer care and advocacy, healthcare innovation, and business strategy and consultation.
Details About the C3 Prize Application Process
The C3 Prize is open to applicants through June 3, 2022. Astellas will select three finalists who will participate in a virtual pitch event with the panel of judges to determine the Grand Prize winner and two Innovation Prize winners. Winners will be publicly announced in July 2022.
All eligible entries will be evaluated on the following criteria: potential to make a positive impact on people affected by cancer, originality/differentiation from existing solutions, scalability and financial viability of idea, and the effect of the C3 Prize to help further the idea. The C3 Prize is not just for complex solutions – ideas can be in the form of support tools, educational efforts, technology solutions and beyond. Past winners include people who have lived with cancer, caregivers, healthcare providers, patient advocates, entrepreneurs and more.
For more information, including the full contest rules, or to apply, visit https://c3prize.agorize.com/en.
About Astellas
Astellas Pharma Inc. is a pharmaceutical company conducting business in more than 70 countries around the world. We are promoting the Focus Area Approach that is designed to identify opportunities for the continuous creation of new drugs to address diseases with high unmet medical needs by focusing on Biology and Modality. Furthermore, we are also looking beyond our foundational Rx focus to create Rx+® healthcare solutions that combine our expertise and knowledge with cutting-edge technology in different fields of external partners. Through these efforts, Astellas stands on the forefront of healthcare change to turn innovative science into value for patients. For more information, please visit our website at https://www.astellas.com/en.
About the Astellas Oncology C3 Prize
The Astellas Oncology C3 Prize, launched in 2016, is a global challenge that aims to address the complexities of the cancer journey by funding the best ideas in cancer care beyond medicine. The C3 Prize sparks innovative developments in cancer care, tackling cancer challenges by awarding the winners with prize money and connecting them with resources and support. The C3 Prize directly reflects the mission of Astellas Oncology: striving to make every day better for those impacted by cancer. Astellas maintains no ownership in the ventures funded by the C3 Prize. For more information, see the challenge rules and apply at https://c3prize.agorize.com/en, visit the website at https://www.C3Prize.com and follow on social media with the hashtag, #C3Prize.
About MATTER
At MATTER, we believe collaboration is the best way to improve healthcare. The MATTER collaborative includes more than 275 cutting-edge startups from around the world, working together with dozens of hospitals and health systems, universities and industry-leading companies to build the future of healthcare. Together we are accelerating innovation, advancing care and improving lives. For more information, visit https://matter.health and follow @MATTERhealth.
About Slalom
Slalom is a global consulting firm focused on strategy, technology, and business transformation. In 42 markets around the world, Slalom's teams have autonomy to move fast and do what's right. They are backed by regional innovation hubs, a global culture of collaboration, and partnerships with the world's top technology providers. Founded in 2001 and headquartered in Seattle, Slalom has organically grown to over 12,500 employees. Slalom has been named one of Fortune's 100 Best Companies to Work For seven years running and is regularly recognized by employees as a best place to work. Learn more at slalom.com.
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SOURCE Astellas Pharma US, Inc. | https://www.dailyrecordnews.com/news/state/astellas-oncology-now-accepting-applications-for-annual-c3-prize-to-cultivate-innovation-in-cancer-care/article_24b0f522-4e03-5071-a00e-c23fb2346fcf.html | 2022-04-25T17:14:51Z | https://www.dailyrecordnews.com/news/state/astellas-oncology-now-accepting-applications-for-annual-c3-prize-to-cultivate-innovation-in-cancer-care/article_24b0f522-4e03-5071-a00e-c23fb2346fcf.html | false | 15 |
PITTSBURGH, April 25, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- "I wanted to provide pickup truck owners with an improved means of loading and retrieving belongings from the truck bed," said an inventor, from Greenfield, Ind., "so I invented the LITE WEIGHT REMOVABLE TRUCK BED PULLOUT. My design offers a strain-free alternative to reaching or climbing up into the bed."
The patent-pending invention provides improved access to loads and supplies carried within a pickup truck bed. In doing so, it eliminates the need to climb, crawl, kneel or stretch to retrieve items. As a result, it increases efficiency and it enhances comfort and safety. The invention features a user-friendly design that is convenient and easy to use so it is ideal for the owners of pickup trucks. Additionally, it is producible in design variations and a prototype is available.
The original design was submitted to the National sales office of InventHelp. It is currently available for licensing or sale to manufacturers or marketers. For more information, write Dept. 20-SGM-132 , InventHelp, 217 Ninth Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15222, or call (412) 288-1300 ext. 1368. Learn more about InventHelp's Invention Submission Services at http://www.InventHelp.com.
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SOURCE InventHelp | https://www.kfyrtv.com/prnewswire/2022/04/25/inventhelp-inventor-develops-convenient-pickup-truck-accessory-sgm-132/ | 2022-04-25T17:15:06Z | https://www.kfyrtv.com/prnewswire/2022/04/25/inventhelp-inventor-develops-convenient-pickup-truck-accessory-sgm-132/ | false | 20 |
PITTSBURGH, April 25, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- "I thought there could be a better way to see when driving a truck or an off-road vehicle at night," said an inventor, from Vacaville, Calif., "so I invented the VERSA LIGHT. My design could also be used as a supplemental light source when working or hanging out around the parked vehicle."
The invention provides a versatile light bar for truck owners. In doing so, it can be used to illuminate a trail, camping area, flat tire, etc. As a result, it increases visibility and safety at night and it eliminates the need to find and use a flashlight. The invention features a portable design that is easy to use so it is ideal for truck owners. Additionally, a prototype is available.
The original design was submitted to the Sacramento sales office of InventHelp. It is currently available for licensing or sale to manufacturers or marketers. For more information, write Dept. 20-SCO-125, InventHelp, 217 Ninth Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15222, or call (412) 288-1300 ext. 1368. Learn more about InventHelp's Invention Submission Services at http://www.InventHelp.com.
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SOURCE InventHelp | https://www.kfyrtv.com/prnewswire/2022/04/25/inventhelp-inventor-develops-lighting-accessory-trucks-sco-125/ | 2022-04-25T17:15:19Z | https://www.kfyrtv.com/prnewswire/2022/04/25/inventhelp-inventor-develops-lighting-accessory-trucks-sco-125/ | false | 1405 |
The last couple of years have seen many of us welcome a new four-legged friend into our homes, as the Kennel Club saw dog ownership rise by nearly eight per cent.
But with 221 different breeds of pedigree dog to choose from, there’s plenty of thinking to do before you select your perfect pup.
Those with active lifestyles might want to consider a larger dog, while somebody with allergies will be looking for a hypoallergenic dog.
There’s even academic guidance to seek out, with Psychologist Stanley Coren’s book ‘The Intelligence of Dogs’ ranking breeds by instincts, obedience, and the ability to adapt.
One dog that often appears at the top of people’s canine wishlists is the Staffordshire Bull Terrier – they were one of the UK’s 10 most popular dog breeds in 2020 and have a range of positive attributes that make them a great family pet.
Here are 10 fun and interesting facts about the breed.
Read more: | https://www.falkirkherald.co.uk/lifestyle/family-and-parenting/staffy-dog-facts-these-are-10-fun-and-interesting-things-you-need-to-know-about-the-loving-staffordshire-bull-terrier-3368333 | 2022-04-25T17:15:32Z | https://www.falkirkherald.co.uk/lifestyle/family-and-parenting/staffy-dog-facts-these-are-10-fun-and-interesting-things-you-need-to-know-about-the-loving-staffordshire-bull-terrier-3368333 | false | 830 |
Rihanna, the woman who has forever changed [maternity style](https://www.glamour.com/story/rihannas-pregnancy-style-photos){: target="_blank"} for the better, just wore another bump-bearing look for the books. On Saturday, April 23, Rihanna attended dinner with her [boyfriend A$AP Rocky](https://www.glamour.com/story/rihanna-asap-rocky-complete-relationship-timeline){: target="_blank"} and some friends at Giorgio Baldi in Santa Monica, California. The outing comes just days after Rocky was arrested at LAX upon returning to L.A. on a private plane from Rhianna's native Barbados, per [*People*](https://people.com/music/asap-rocky-released-from-jail-after-his-arrest-photo/){: target="_blank"}. He was charged with assault with a deadly weapon, in this case, a firearm, which is a felony. According to court records, his bail was $550,000. The alleged assault occurred in November 2021. Despite A$AP Rocky's arrest, the [expecting couple](https://www.glamour.com/story/rihanna-is-pregnant-and-expecting-her-first-child-with-asap-rocky){: target="_blank"} was in good spirits at dinner, according to sources who spoke to *People* about their date night. "It was a happy and relaxed group. Rihanna looked great. She sat next to A$AP and they were affectionate," the source said. "They dined for a couple of hours. The focus was very much on Rihanna and the baby." For the occasion, Rihanna added yet another iconic outfit to her collection of groundbreaking maternity styles. She paired black short shorts featuring shiny silver pinstripes with a black bra, an oversized white button-down, and a black jacket. She finished the look with black heeled sandals with silver accents and continued the silver theme with a silver necklace, silver earrings, and a silver handbag. She wore her [hair](https://www.glamour.com/story/the-rihanna-hair-evolution-through-the-years){: target="_blank"} long and straight and went for a subtle winged liner and a peachy nude lip. See the look below: [#image: /photos/6266b1bbafadbc27aac367bb] Rihanna, who is on the cover of *Vogue's* May issue, [told the magazine](https://www.vogue.com/article/rihanna-cover-may-2022){: target="_blank"} that her pregnancy was [not exactly planned](https://www.glamour.com/story/rihanna-pregnancy-asap-rocky-unplanned){: target="_blank"}. “I wouldn't say planning. But certainly not planning against it," she said. "I don't know when I ovulate or any of that type of shit. And then it was just there on the test. I didn't waste any time. I called him inside and showed him. Then I was in the doctor's office the next morning and our journey began.” *** [#cneembed: script/video/5b031df1841c4b39e000001a.js] | https://www.glamour.com/story/rihanna-date-night-look-after-asap-rocky-arrest | 2022-04-25T17:15:41Z | https://www.glamour.com/story/rihanna-date-night-look-after-asap-rocky-arrest | false | 1 |
You need to enable JavaScript to run this app. | https://sportspyder.com/nba/detroit-pistons/articles/39275669 | 2022-04-25T17:16:41Z | https://sportspyder.com/nba/detroit-pistons/articles/39275669 | true | null |
((SL Advertiser)) To book an appointment at the Ahn Clinic call (480) 515-2000 or visit ahnclinic.org.
The pain of rheumatoid arthritis can be excruciating! Stop suffering and go see Dr. Yang Ahn
Posted at 8:56 AM, Apr 25, 2022
and last updated 2022-04-25 13:00:48-04
Copyright 2022 Scripps Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. | https://www.abc15.com/sonoranliving/the-pain-of-rheumatoid-arthritis-can-be-excruciating-stop-suffering-and-go-see-dr-yang-ahn | 2022-04-25T17:17:18Z | https://www.abc15.com/sonoranliving/the-pain-of-rheumatoid-arthritis-can-be-excruciating-stop-suffering-and-go-see-dr-yang-ahn | false | null |
First News is a 28-page weekly newspaper for young people delivered into homes across the UK every Friday. Find out more at firstnews.co.uk/1free site.
The Queen has been turned into a Barbie doll to celebrate her Platinum Jubilee.
Her Majesty’s doll was revealed by toymaker Mattel on her 96th birthday last week.
It’s a limited edition and forms part of the Barbie Tribute Collection, which celebrates people who have made an incredible and lasting impact on the world.
The royal Barbie wears an elegant ivory dress, along with a blue ribbon featuring decorations of order (medals to honour someone’s service) and a special brooch known as the Garter Star, which is thought to date back to the late 17th century. The doll also features Queen Mary’s Fringe Tiara, famously worn by Queen Elizabeth II on her wedding day to Prince Philip.
The Queen hasn’t commented on her special Barbie lookalike, but we’re sure one would approve, don’t you think?
YOUR NEWS
Young people! Send us your news and photos to [email protected] and have your story published on this page and, perhaps, in First News too.
Game creator
By Jackson Mann
My family and I were in Costa Rica when I came up with the idea for my SOS Save Our Species game.
Costa Rica is a shining example of conservation. In a world of deforestation and climate change, Costa Rica’s forests are growing. I am a big fan of games like Exploding Kittens, Ticket to Ride and Uno, so I decided to create a game that had a real-life message behind it.
The aim of SOS is to collect rare species and match them with habitat cards to live in. The rarer the species, the more species points you get.
As in real life, your habitat can be threatened. Forest fires, oil spills and global warming can destroy your habitat and make your species extinct! Special habitat cards like Corridor Cards and National Parks can connect and protect your species.
This cause is important to me, so I am donating 100% of profits to WWF and other conservation charities.
DIARY DATES
Hedgehog Awareness Week
MAY 1-7
The week aims to highlight the problems hedgehogs face and how you can help them.
Eid al-Fitr
MAY 2-3
A celebration to mark the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
WOW!
Sir David Attenborough has been named a Champion of the Earth by the United Nations Environment Programme. The 95-year-old naturalist and broadcaster was awarded for his dedication to telling stories about nature and climate change.
WEEKLY PUZZLE [
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Last Week's Answer:
[
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See last week's article at: | https://www.falkirkherald.co.uk/read-this/first-news-meet-queen-barbie-3667491 | 2022-04-25T17:17:54Z | https://www.falkirkherald.co.uk/read-this/first-news-meet-queen-barbie-3667491 | true | 20 |
I gave my £15 Ikea highchairs a stylish makeover on a budget – they look so designer now
ANY parent will know that having a child is very expensive - and highchairs alone can cost anything from between £15 to £699.
But one mum, from North East Lincolnshire, has revealed how to turn the most basic Ikea Antilop £15 highchair into a gorgeous designer style chair on a budget.
Mum-of-seven Kim Pate, 37, who is a secondary school kitchen assistant, bought a set of Ikea Antilop highchairs for her five-month-old twin girls Rhonnie and Coco.
Using Frenchic paint and accessories bought from Instagram, she made the basic chairs look like they cost hundreds of pounds.
Kim told money-saving Facebook group DIY On A Budget UK: "I started following a page on Instagram a few months ago called AZEbabydream and I really liked the idea that you can buy the accessories to transform the IKEA Antilop highchair."
"You can pick all the accessories to mix and match to suit you.
"The highchairs are from IKEA and cost £15 each. The accessories were from AZEbabydream and I went for the dotty insert and cover for £22.50. "
She went on to say how the soft peach silicone placemat cost £22.50 and the oak footrest cost £24.
"I also ordered vinyl names to put on the footrests, which were £2.50 each from Heathershomevinyls on Instagram," she continued.
"I had a tin of Blackjack Frenchic paint left over from another project so I painted the legs with that."
Most read in Fabulous
In the past, Kim says she's gone for bigger bulkier highchairs that recline and have height adjustments and so on.
However, this time with two twins, she decided the smaller, more compact highchairs would be a better fit in her home.
"I also like the fact I can change all the accessories when I fancy a change of colour," she noted.
"I’m really happy with how they have turned out and have had lots of comments about them."
FABULOUS BINGO: Get a £20 bonus & 30 free spins when you spend £10 today
Kim has since shared a video on her TikTok page @mummytopatetwins so that other parents can see how to change a plain highchair into something a bit more stylish.
"I personally feel it is a better choice for us cost-wise as I was able to buy the highchairs and accessories separately over time instead of paying out a big amount in one go," she continued.
"We’ve managed to get two for around the same price as other more expensive highchairs which is a bonus with having twins because everything obviously costs double!"
Tom Church, co-founder of LatestDeals.co.uk, commented: “I have recently had a baby myself, and I know how expensive it can be to buy seemingly millions of products that only last a few months.
“Kim has shown you don’t need to compromise on style - she’s bought the cheapest highchair out there, but has made it look even better than some of the most expensive ones on the market, all on a budget!” | https://www.thesun.ie/fabulous/8702032/i-gave-ikea-highchairs-makeover-on-budget/ | 2022-04-25T17:22:36Z | https://www.thesun.ie/fabulous/8702032/i-gave-ikea-highchairs-makeover-on-budget/ | true | 5 |
ELOY, Ariz. (KNXV) — A Red Bull plane spun out of control and crashed after an attempted stunt near Eloy, Arizona Sunday evening.
According to the Red Bull website, the pilots were to take the aircrafts up to 14,000 feet, put them in a vertical dive, jump out of the planes in mid-air and attempt to switch planes.
The stunt appeared to be going well when both men jumped out of their planes. Moments later, however, one of the planes began to nosedive.
The Federal Aviation Administration says one of the pilots was able to get back into one of the aircrafts and safely land. The other pilot was able to land safely using his parachute.
One of the pilots told USA TODAY that he was happy that everyone was safe but disappointed in the outcome.
The event was being streamed live on Hulu.
This story was originally reported by Kasey Brammell on ABC15.com. | https://www.wxyz.com/news/national/red-bull-plane-crashes-after-attempted-stunt-in-arizona | 2022-04-25T17:23:07Z | https://www.wxyz.com/news/national/red-bull-plane-crashes-after-attempted-stunt-in-arizona | true | null |
WEST MICHIGAN - After temperatures in the lower 80s on Saturday and lower 70s today, it sometimes is hard to transition back to a cooler, more normal air mass without seeing a round of showers and storms. As a cold front slides through the state this evening, some strong to severe storms will be possible in the mid/late afternoon into the early evening. A bit more sunshine south/east of Grand Rapids will add more heat/energy to the atmosphere with a little higher threat there. The Storm Prediction Center (SPC) has placed Michigan in a SLIGHT RISK. See image below. | https://www.newsbreak.com/news/2580704852066/overnight-showers-storms-to-make-way-for-nice-saturday-in-midland | 2022-04-25T17:26:05Z | https://www.newsbreak.com/news/2580704852066/overnight-showers-storms-to-make-way-for-nice-saturday-in-midland | true | null |
British Land sells off £694m stake in Paddington Central to Singapore state-fund
British Land has sold off a majority stake in its London Paddington Central assets to Singaporean sovereign wealth fund GIC.
The London-headquartered firm, one of the largest property developers in the UK, will wrap up its majority ownership over the next three months, British Land confirmed in a regulatory filing today.
The state-backed fund will pay out £694m to the FTSE 100 firm, which is around one per cent lower than its book value in September last year.
The sold assets do not include Five Kingdom Street, its final plot of the Paddington Central development in Westminster.
British Land plans to use the proceeds to invest further into logistics spaces in London, and so-called innovation campuses, which are cropping up across the capital following work-from-home measures.
British Land first bought Paddington Central, a cluster of three buildings, retail and leisure sites and two development spaces, in 2013 for £470m. It has since sold 1 Sheldon Square for £210m in 2015 and 4 Kingdom Street in 2017.
It is the second deal between the pair, after GIC invested in the Broadgate development, another central London campus.
“We are pleased to invest in Paddington Central, a high-quality office-led mixed-use campus with retail and leisure uses,” GIC chief investment officer Lee Kok Sun said. “It is very well-located with connectivity to national rail services and key transport links to Heathrow, West London and Oxford.”
Tracy Stroh, Europe’s regional real estate lead at the sovereign fund, pointed to rising demand for new office space in London, as workers flock back to the city after a pandemic-induced hiatus. | https://www.cityam.com/british-land-sells-off-694m-stake-in-paddington-central-to-singapore-state-fund/ | 2022-04-25T17:26:14Z | https://www.cityam.com/british-land-sells-off-694m-stake-in-paddington-central-to-singapore-state-fund/ | true | 1 |
HAMDEN, Conn., April 25, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- SimiTree, a revenue cycle, coding, professional services and talent management resource for post-acute and behavioral health organizations, announced Genny Poole as Vice President of Human Resources. A veteran human resources executive within the automotive and aerospace industries, Poole brings more than 25 years of experience to her role.
"Genny is the right leader to help us continue to build an engaged, inclusive and high-performing culture at SimiTree," said Bill Simione, CEO and Managing Principal, SimiTree. "She understands the unique needs of an organization and leads with her values. We are excited to welcome her to SimiTree."
Most recently, as Vice President of Human Resources for the energy conservation company Cenergistic, Poole was responsible for employee engagement, talent management, compensation and benefits, and HR technology. She began her human resources career in the home health and hospice industry, eventually moving to automotive and aerospace.
"I look forward to supporting SimiTree's ambitious and exciting future by driving an inclusive culture of belonging, attracting best-in-class talent and creating a meaningful and positive work experience for our people," said Poole. "I'm excited to join the team and return to the home health and hospice industry."
About SimiTree
SimiTree, a consulting and outsourcing company serving the home health, hospice, applied behavioral analysis, palliative care, and other post-acute organizations, was created by the merger of Simione Healthcare Consultants and BlackTree Healthcare Consulting in May 2021. SimiTree further expanded its behavioral health footprint in 2022 with a strategic alignment with INFINITY, a SimiTree company.
In addition to clinical, financial, and operational consulting, SimiTree offers a robust suite of outsourced services, including billing, coding, OASIS, Review Choice Demonstration (RCD) and Quality Assessment and Performance Improvement (QAPI), and revenue cycle management; executive placement, interim management, retention consulting and other talent solutions; mergers and acquisitions support; compliance assessments and risk mitigation plans; sales and growth training; and benchmarking and data analytics.
SimiTree also prepares cost reports for Medicare-certified home health agencies and provides hospice cap reporting and hospice cap due diligence services.
For more information, visit www.SimiTreeHC.com.
MEDIA CONTACT:
Lynn Eastep, Vice President, Marketing
[email protected]
SOURCE SimiTree | https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/simitree-announces-genny-poole-as-vice-president-of-human-resources-301532029.html | 2022-04-25T17:27:01Z | https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/simitree-announces-genny-poole-as-vice-president-of-human-resources-301532029.html | true | 16 |
A series of IPOs of major state companies are expected on the Belgrade Stock Exchange (Belex) in the coming years, which should reactivate Serbia’s capital market, the CEO of the exchange, Siniša Krneta, said in an interview with bne IntelliNews in Belgrade.
Serbia is one of the bigger economies in Southeast Europe, with a significant number of large companies, both public and private, yet activity on the stock exchange does not match up. However, that may change in the coming years after two key events in 2021: the government’s adoption of a capital markets development strategy and the Athens stock exchange’s acquisition of a 10.24% equity stake in Belex.
According to Krneta, the problems facing the exchange at present date back to mistakes made during the privatisations of the early post-socialist years. Following mass privatisations, more than 2,000 issuers came to the exchange, but not to raise capital; instead, the majority owners of former state companies brought those companies to the exchange in order to consolidate their control and squeeze out minority shareholders. The final step was the delisting of those companies from the market – where they would no longer need to comply with strict reporting rules – that culminated in a mass exodus in 2008.
Coinciding with the start of the international economic crisis, the consequences for the Belgrade Stock Exchange were devastating. Until 2008 around 60-70% of investors on the buy side were from abroad, but that completely changed once the major companies delisted.
SOEs to become icebreakers
The stock exchange has thus played a minimal role in Serbia’s economic development over the last 14 years. However, that is now changing.
Following the adoption of the capital markets development strategy, Serbia’s parliament adopted a new capital market law in line with the EU’s MIFID 2 directive. Belex expects full implementation by the beginning of 2023, which, Krneta says, will enable “EU investors to recognise the Serbian capital market not as a regulatorily exotic market, but as a MIFID 2 aligned market.”
Even more importantly, “For the first time, the government has stated the intention to privatise some of the companies it holds through the IPOs. Not only will this bring new public companies to the market,” says Krneta, it will “showcase what the capital market is about – first of all to raise capital, thus offering to the local investment community an opportunity to invest.”
Until now, there has been significant political resistance to restructuring or privatisation of state-owned enterprises (SOEs), which are large employers within the country. But with the government – the major shareholder in these companies – behind the strategy the privatisations should actually happen. “History has demonstrated it’s very difficult to get [SOEs] on the exchange,” says Krneta. “What is different right now is that we have a national strategy adopted by the government, and within the strategy is the going public of SOEs. IPOing them is a major pillar of the strategy.”
Krneta is optimistic that the IPOs of major SOEs will act as an “icebreaker” to create a path for private companies to list on the exchange. He refers to data showing there is a "significant hunger” for investment opportunities among Serbian institutions and retail investors. “It’s not the goal per se to have state-owned companies going public. Our idea is to use them as the icebreakers for showcasing what the capital market is about, and our real target in the mid-term is today’s private companies. Serbia is rich with a huge list of candidates among the powerful private companies with businesses spread throughout the region.”
Many of their top managers, points out Krneta, have already publicly stated their aims to go public at some time in the future, usually mentioning Vienna, Warsaw or London. However, he says, “We strongly believe that such an endeavour could be executed with much bigger luck and success locally where they are very well established and recognised by their end-users, consumers of their services or goods.”
A life-long quest
Belex is one of the oldest stock exchanges in Central Europe, having been established in 1894. It continued to operate even in the first years of the Second World War, when Serbia was under attack from Nazi Germany, though it was closed down under the socialist regime in 1945. While it was re-established in 1989, little happened during the last decade of the 20th century due to international sanctions.
Krneta has headed the exchange since mid-2015. He started his career as a futures trader, with experience in Chicago, London, Frankfurt and other international financial centres, then was invited to join the exchange in 2001, a year after the democratic changes in Serbia. Over the last 21 years, Krneta says, he has devoted his professional life to the success of the Belgrade Stock Exchange.
Speaking for his colleagues at the exchange, he tells bne IntelliNews: “We believe it is worth committing our professional lives to the attempt to develop the stock exchange in Serbia. It is difficult, it is long-lasting, it is probably an entire life’s work, but it is worth committing our professional lives to such a monumental goal.”
Next steps
In summer 2021 the Athens stock exchange acquired 10% of the Belgrade stock exchange. Together with the adoption of the national capital market development strategy, says Krneta, “These combined create a kind of beginning and – I hope – a beneficial wind in the back for the Belgrade Stock Exchange, though we will have to wait for a while to see the first effects.
“The Athens stock exchange is a unique partner that can be not only a service provider to us but also an equity partner. Joining forces in this globalised world with such an exchange can be a source for the transfer of tech and know-how,” he added.
The equity deal was followed by an agreement between the exchanges to migrate the Belex trading platform to the Athens stock exchange trading platform. When completed, that will create a common trading platform for the exchanges of Greece, Cyprus and now Serbia.
Also in 2022, a new set of bylaws are expected to be set by the securities commission. Thirdly, Belex is working with clearing financial organisations to offer the market completely new financial instruments (for Serbia), starting with exchange traded funds (ETFs).
Another thing the exchange plans to do is enable initial coin offerings (ICOs) as an option for startups. It has already selected a blockchain-based technology partner, and the two are now working together to explore the possibilities created by Serbia’s digital assets law.
“We are aiming to offer possibility of tokenisation of startups and a secondary market of investment tokens for market participant,” says Krneta. “That will give them the opportunity to raise capital, not through the conventional capital market, but through a newly set up digital environment.” He points out that blockchain is one of the main strengths of the Belgrade-Novi Sad tech cluster.
Sustainable development
Environmental and social governance (ESG) is increasingly important for investors, and while the performance of the Serbian capital market lags in volume terms, Krneta says he is proud of its efforts in joining the UN’s sustainable stock exchange initiative, and of its gender balance. The composition of the board of the stock exchange, for example, is 60% women. In the area of environmental sustainability, Belex has organised trainings for public companies’ climate-related reporting and aims to make this an obligation for all companies aiming to list on the exchange.
“We are small but we are trying to position ourselves as the showcase that every move towards respect for gender equality as well as fighting against climate change is worth doing,” says Krneta. “It’s a question of respecting humanity and respecting this planet.”
There are also hopes that companies will start to come to the exchange with green bonds – a way for companies that are still reluctant to go public with equities to test the water. Krneta notes the large number of private companies investing into the green sector, including those from industries like coal that are “investing a lot in greening their dirty industries”.
Serbia issued its first green Eurobond in September 2021 to finance environmental protection and climate change mitigation projects. | https://www.intellinews.com/expected-ipos-of-major-state-companies-to-revive-belgrade-stock-exchange-242115/ | 2022-04-25T17:27:10Z | https://www.intellinews.com/expected-ipos-of-major-state-companies-to-revive-belgrade-stock-exchange-242115/ | true | 4 |
If you’re a 3D printer user you’re probably familiar with that dreaded feeling of returning to your printer a few hours after submitting a big job, only to find that it threw an error and stopped printing, or worse, turned half a spool of filament into a useless heap of twisted plastic. While some printers come with remote monitoring facilities, [Kutluhan Aktar]’s doesn’t, so he built a device that keeps a watchful eye on his 3D printer and notifies him if anything’s amiss.
The device does this by tracking the movement of the print head using a camera and looking for any significant changes in motion. If, for example, the Y-axis suddenly stops moving and doesn’t resume within a reasonable amount of time, it will generate a warning message and send it to its owner through Telegram. If all three axes stop moving, then either the print is finished or some serious error occurred, both of which require user intervention.
The camera [Kutluhan] used is a HuskyLens AI camera that can detect objects and output a set of 3D coordinates describing their motion. A set of QR-like AprilTags attached to the moving parts of the 3D printer help the camera to identify the relevant components. The software runs on a Raspberry Pi housed in a 3D-printed enclosure with a T-800 Terminator head on top to give it a bit of extra presence.
[Kutluhan]’s description of the project covers lots of detail on how to set up the camera and hook it up to a Telegram bot that enables it to send automated messages, so it’s an interesting read even if you’re not planning to 3D print something to check on your 3D printer. After all, software like Octoprint has many similar features, but having an independent observer can still be a good safety feature to prevent some types of catastrophic failure. | https://hackaday.com/2022/04/25/machine-vision-helps-you-terminate-failing-3d-print-jobs/ | 2022-04-25T17:27:38Z | https://hackaday.com/2022/04/25/machine-vision-helps-you-terminate-failing-3d-print-jobs/ | true | 1 |
Inside paranoid mind of wanted gang boss Daniel Kinahan who believes his associates will turn on him to save themselves
ASSOCIATES of Daniel Kinahan will turn on the wanted mob boss in a desperate bid to save themselves, insiders last night revealed.
The notorious Kinahan Cartel leader has been left reeling after the US government slapped a $5million bounty on his head.
The Dublin drug baron’s global empire is in freefall after his narco terrorist gang was slapped with an asset freeze by the rulers of his Dubai bolthole.
The mobster is now desperately trying to avoid international authorities who have slapped his top henchmen with flight bans and heavy sanctions in a bid to bring his empire down.
A former MTK employee - who first spoke to us in 2018 when they revealed how Kinahan ran the old MGM gym “like a cult” - last night gave an insight into the 44-year-old’s current state of mind.
The ex-member believes that someone close to him will turn him in to authorities to save their own skin, and admitted Kinahan would be enraged at his current plight.
The source told the Irish Sun: “He will have been absolutely furious that the life that he has built up for himself in Dubai is now effectively over.
“Kinahan was convinced that Dubai was a safe haven for him and his associates but this is no longer the case.
“He will also be extremely paranoid as he waits for one of his inner circle to make a deal with the authorities.
“I have no doubt that there will be people attached to MTK who will agree to testify against him just to protect themselves.
Most read in The Irish Sun
“Everyone has now deserted him and he only has his ego to blame for the tsunami of trouble that he finds himself in.”
The insider also told how Kinahan’s attempts to move into the crypto currency market were part of his efforts to “impress” the most powerful people in boxing.
The crisis hit mob boss was one of a number of key figures in the world of boxing who attended a meeting last year to discuss their future involvement in crypto currency.
CRYPTO WORLD
The insider explained: “I have been told that Daniel’s plan was to eventually move everything into the crypto currency world.
“It would have been a further extension of his money laundering networks and he was always looking at new investment opportunities.
“But his arrogance will always outweigh his intelligence and his ambition to be acknowledged as a respectable businessman is dead and buried.
“The other reason that he wanted to invest in the crypto industry is because he was constantly trying to impress people.
“But people can now see that he was just a bully and an idiot for bringing the global spotlight of law enforcement on to his organisation.”
FLEEING TO OMAN
The one-time MTK employee also believes Kinahan will flee to nearby Oman as the net closes in, but believes he’ll be unable to stay there for any substantial period of time.
Instead, he believes the wannabe boxing promoter could then attempt to travel on to Brazil where the Cartel have invested millions of their ill-gotten gains.
The insider told us: “I think he could go to Oman because that has certainly been mentioned in the past.
“Oman is on the UAE border so it would be accessible for him.
“I don’t think they could settle in Oman and could most likely (then) go to Brazil because of all the investments they have there or another south American country.
'HE'S JUST TOXIC'
“It’s no surprise the MTK has folded because Daniel Kinahan’s prints were all over it and he’s just toxic.”
At present, Kinahan, along with his dad Christy and brother Christopher Jnr remain in their Dubai bolthole.
But they remain under huge pressure after last week’s decision to freeze their assets.
According to John O’Driscoll, the assistant garda commissioner in charge of fighting organised crime, the Kinahans’ days are numbered.
He told the Irish Sun: “A combination of the actions already taken brings us further along the road to the total dismantling of the Kinahan Organised Crime Group.
“Since the announcement at City Hall, additional information has been disclosed about other companies and this will now be taken into consideration and thoroughly analysed.” | https://www.thesun.ie/news/8698695/paranoid-mind-gang-boss-daniel-kinahan-associates/ | 2022-04-25T17:27:46Z | https://www.thesun.ie/news/8698695/paranoid-mind-gang-boss-daniel-kinahan-associates/ | true | 1 |
Co-Founder Matt Meitl will present invited papers at the SID/DSCC Business Conference and Technical Symposium
RTP, N.C., April 25, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- X Display Company (XDC), a leader in MicroLED displays, will participate in this year's Society for Information Display (SID) hosted Display Week 2022 symposium and exhibition to be held from May 8-13 at the McEnery Convention Center in San Jose, California.
Dr. Matt Meitl, Co-Founder and EVP at XDC will present at the Business Conference as follows:
Title: "Transfer Transforms: How microLED tech opens an unexpected door to the future of displays"
Abstract: What does microLED technology really mean for the display industry? Very high-end TVs use microLEDs, and many groups developing augmented reality hold great expectations for microLED displays. But will the displays that mass markets know today, like handsets, televisions, and PCs, ever allow microLED to compete alongside LCD and OLED displays? Continued investment in microLED will bring the answer to that question in the next few years, but the technology developed for microLEDs has farther reaching implications than just bringing brighter emitters to display panels. Mass transfer processes bring other kinds of semiconductors to the backplanes of advanced displays with a cost structure that can intercept the trajectory of mainstream consumer displays and, at the same time, set higher expectations for their picture quality, power efficiency, and integrated function. XDC is a group that provides ultraminiature semiconductors for frontplanes and backplanes as well as mass transfer solutions for the display industry. XDC solutions are practiced, refined, and increasingly adopted with a growing number of licensees.
Dr. Meitl will also present an invited paper as follows:
Session 50.1: Micro-LED Displays I: Thursday, May 12, 2022 ;1:30 PM; Room 220C
Title: Design and Manufacturing Processes for MicroLED Displays in Handsets, Smartwatches, and Personal Computers.
Abstract: Industry-wide efforts to develop microLED technology for displays brought focused attention to the importance of mass-transfer micro-assembly. Processes that are compatible with high-volume manufacturing that can rapidly manipulate millions of discrete micron-scale semiconductor objects per product unit are a new technological capability and required for making microLED displays accessible to mainstream consumer applications. As those assembly processes become mature, new attention shifts to the microLED devices themselves and to electronic driving schemes to operate them. Furthermore, mature mass-transfer processes make possible new semiconductor constituents to the backplane, including single-crystal devices with levels of integration density that are not natively available to display panel manufacturing. This confluence of new requirements and new possibilities sets a stage for far-reaching innovation in consumer displays. This paper describes designs for microLED displays that use micron-scale full color emitter packages and micron-scale driver elements (microICs) that control clusters of pixels. A combination of mass transfer and conventional backplane fabrication processes is suitable for making displays of these designs, and the resulting products will support more than 300-400 pixels per inch with advantageous power consumption characteristics.
"XDC is revolutionizing the semiconductor and display industries with its technology," said Randy Chan, CEO of X Display Company. "We look forward to sharing our progress with our industry peers, customers and eco-system partners."
XDC will also demo its products and technology at a private suite during the Display Week conference.
About X Display Company
X Display Company (XDC), a technology developer, licenses intellectual property for manufacturing MicroLED displays, sells MicrolC & PixelEngine™ components and Micro Transfer Printing Equipment that will power next-generation displays. XDC is poised to capture share in the semiconductor and display markets, delivering solutions that will make peoples' lives better. www.xdisplay.com
Media Inquiries: [email protected]
SOURCE X Display | https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/xdc-to-speak-and-exhibit-at-display-week-2022-301532050.html | 2022-04-25T17:28:44Z | https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/xdc-to-speak-and-exhibit-at-display-week-2022-301532050.html | true | 11 |
Price war: Asda and Morrisons slash prices as supermarkets battle to woo shoppers
Supermarkets are vying to win shoppers hunting for cheaper deals, as Asda and Morrisons become the latest to announce price cuts.
Asda, owned by the billionaire Issa brothers, has said it will inject more than £73m into ensuring the prices of more than 100 essential items are low, until the end of the year.
Meanwhile, Morrisons revealed on Monday it had slashed prices on more than 500 products. The retailer said it had also introduced new savings deals.
Prices on certain items at Asda will see an average drop of 12 per cent and at Morrisons price cuts will average 13 per cent.
It follows Marks & Spencer slashing prices on some core grocery items earlier this month, lowering prices within its Remarksable range, with price cuts of up to 20p.
Industry data has shown shoppers flocking to discount retailers such as Aldi and Lidl, with the budget firms gaining market share as customers face rising energy and tax bills. | https://www.cityam.com/price-war-asda-and-morrisons-slash-prices-as-supermarkets-battle-to-woo-shoppers/ | 2022-04-25T17:30:48Z | https://www.cityam.com/price-war-asda-and-morrisons-slash-prices-as-supermarkets-battle-to-woo-shoppers/ | true | 1 |
BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) — Police in the Moldovan separatist region of Transnistria say several explosions believed to be caused by rocket-propelled grenades hit the Ministry of State Security on Monday.
No injuries were immediately reported. The Interior Ministry said in a Facebook post that some of the building's windows were broken and that smoke was coming from the structure.
Transnistria, a strip of land with about 470,000 people between Moldova and Ukraine, has been under the control of separatist authorities since a 1992 war with Moldova.
Russia bases about 1,500 troops there nominally as peacekeepers, but concerns are high that the forces could be used to invade Ukraine.
A senior Russian military official, Rustam Minnekayev, said last week that Russian forces aim to take full control of southern Ukraine, saying such a move would open the way to Transnistria.
___
Follow the AP’s coverage of the war at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine | https://www.middletownpress.com/news/article/Blasts-hit-ministry-in-Transnistria-next-to-17124935.php | 2022-04-25T17:31:30Z | https://www.middletownpress.com/news/article/Blasts-hit-ministry-in-Transnistria-next-to-17124935.php | false | 12 |
The failure of CNN+ could put a damper on big news organizations’ attempts to innovate
The failure of CNN+ could put a damper on big news organizations’ attempts to innovate
CNN reportedly spent hundreds of millions of dollars developing CNN+ — the streaming service that it launched last month and canceled last week.
The cable giant abandoning its new streaming service so quickly after spending so much on it could create a chilling effect, according to Carrie Brown of CUNY’s journalism school.
“The fact that they invested so much into this and then pulled the plug, I think that also has a lot of impacts on the internal culture of CNN itself and even other journalism organizations that want to try something like this in the future,” Brown said.
Brown said news organizations that don’t give new platforms enough time or resources to succeed are less likely to keep trying new things, like developing coverage for new social media platforms.
News organizations need to do some thoughtful experimentation to stay relevant, said Amy Webb of the Future Today Institute.
“You can’t keep taking the same product and porting it to the new technology and expecting that people are going to pay for it,” Webb said. Because people only have so many dollars to spend and only so many minutes to spend watching.
There’s a lot happening in the world. Through it all, Marketplace is here for you.
You rely on Marketplace to break down the world’s events and tell you how it affects you in a fact-based, approachable way. We rely on your financial support to keep making that possible.
Your donation today powers the independent journalism that you rely on. For just $5/month, you can help sustain Marketplace so we can keep reporting on the things that matter to you. | https://www.marketplace.org/2022/04/25/the-failure-of-cnn-could-put-a-damper-on-big-news-organizations-attempts-to-innovate/ | 2022-04-25T17:31:37Z | https://www.marketplace.org/2022/04/25/the-failure-of-cnn-could-put-a-damper-on-big-news-organizations-attempts-to-innovate/ | false | 1 |
LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — Nebraska state employees will get an added job perk starting this summer that will let their dependent children attend in-state community colleges for free.
Gov. Pete Ricketts unveiled the new tuition reimbursement program Monday for the children of state workers. The program could help an estimated 1,000 children in its first year.
State officials have been boosting pay and benefits for employees to try to stay competitive in a tight labor market and record-low unemployment. The program is also intended to steer more students into community college programs that help provide workers for in-demand jobs.
Nebraska Department of Administrative Services Director Jason Jackson said the program will reimburse college tuition expenses that remain for students after scholarships and other financial aid have been applied to their bill. Nebraska's community colleges have agreed to give the state a discount.
Jackson said children of state workers are eligible up to age 25, as long as they finish their studies by age 27. | https://www.thetelegraph.com/news/article/Nebraska-launches-community-college-reimbursement-17124791.php | 2022-04-25T17:32:18Z | https://www.thetelegraph.com/news/article/Nebraska-launches-community-college-reimbursement-17124791.php | false | 12 |
Which side table with a charging station is best?
Settling in for the night usually involves a mad scramble for your charging cable. Or, just as you sit down to watch your favorite TV show, you realize that your phone’s battery is about to die. A side table with a charging station can quickly solve that problem in both cases.
Many of these side tables look just like the regular ones but have concealed or partially obscured USB charging points. The Brightech Madison Desk and Lamp is a great choice because it also has a wireless charging pad on top.
What to know before you buy a side table with a charging station
The table connects to a wall socket
It might seem obvious, but you must place the side table close to a wall socket. This is because there are very few built-in charging stations that can operate on a rechargeable battery, so the side table needs to draw power from the outlet. Additionally, keep in mind that the cable is only a few feet in length, so you can save yourself a lot of hassle by ensuring that it can reach the plug.
There is limited charging space
Designers of side tables with built-in charging stations must find a delicate balance between aesthetics and technological functionality. Usually, the former gets more attention leaving the latter with the bare minimum. So, don’t expect to find a desk or table with more than two USB ports, a few standard outlets or more than one wireless charging pad.
Consider your need for the table
You have a few design choices, so you must consider the primary use of the side table. For use next to your bed or couch, you should look for a slender table that is roughly the same height. There are also side tables with charging stations that fold out to be the same height as a standing desk. With those, you get enough space for your laptop and mouse movements while still charging your devices.
What to look for in a quality side table with a charging station
Wireless charging pad
A side table with a few USB ports for charging your devices is great, but it’s even better with a wireless charging pad. Some side tables have these charging pads built into the table’s surface, so you only need to set your device down to charge it. Additionally, there are no wires to worry about, which makes the table and surrounding area look a lot neater.
Enough storage space
A good-quality charging side table will have a lot of additional storage space for your other gadgets. However, while they are not charging or being used, several drawers or openings keep them within reach — or out of reach of children. You will rarely find a side table with lockable compartments, so you might not want to store valuables or expensive technology in them.
Solid construction materials
Whenever you deal with electrical elements, you must ensure that no wires or cables are exposed. Similarly, the construction of the side table must be durable enough to ensure that it doesn’t come apart quickly or place anyone in danger by leaving the wires and connections out in the open. A good-quality charging side table is made from solid wood with all the cables neatly fastened underneath.
How much you can expect to spend on a side table with a charging station
The price of a side table that has built-in charging options largely depends on the construction material of the table and any additional features. A table with only a few USB ports costs around $90-$120. However, a table with a wireless charging pad can cost $150-$200.
Side table with a charging station FAQ
Which mobile devices are compatible with charging stations?
A. All charging stations use regular USB ports and are compatible with most charging cables. In addition, the wireless charging pads are compatible with all Android and Apple devices with Qi wireless technology.
How long does it take to assemble the side table?
A. Most side tables, whether they have a charging station or not, will ship to you unassembled. So, you must set it up yourself before using it, but it shouldn’t take longer than 30 minutes to do so.
What’s the best side table with a charging station to buy?
Top side table with a charging station
Brightech Madison Desk and Lamp with Wireless Charging Pad
What you need to know: This side table comes with both a built-in lamp and charging facilities.
What you’ll love: It has one USB port, one two-prong outlet on the front and a wireless charging pad in the middle of the desk’s surface. The energy-saving LED light bulb will last for about 20,000 hours, and the power cable is over 6 feet long.
What you should consider: Turning off the light can be a bit awkward because it has a rotary switch near the socket.
Where to buy: Sold by Amazon
Top side table with a charging station for the money
Seventable Nightstand with Wireless Charging and LED Lights
What you need to know: For added ambiance, this side table has built-in LED lights that let you change the color to suit your mood.
What you’ll love: This side table has three pullout drawers and an open storage compartment. The charging station is on the top surface and includes two USB ports, two standard outlet sockets and a wireless charging pad. The power cable that connects to the table is 6.5 feet long.
What you should consider: The side table ships unassembled, and you’ll have to put it together.
Where to buy: Sold by Amazon
Worth checking out
Rolanstar End Table with Charging Station
What you need to know: This two-tier side table has a top drawer that flips open halfway to access the USB ports.
What you’ll love: Made from solid wood and a steel frame, this side table has two USB ports and two standard outlet plugs in the top drawer. The power supply cable is 6.5 feet long.
What you should consider: Some users indicated that it would be great to put roller wheels on the table, but that might compromise the integrity.
Where to buy: Sold by Amazon
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Charlie Fripp writes for BestReviews. BestReviews has helped millions of consumers simplify their purchasing decisions, saving them time and money.
Copyright 2022 BestReviews, a Nexstar company. All rights reserved. | https://www.wtnh.com/reviews/br/electronics-br/charging-power-br/best-side-table-with-charging-station/ | 2022-04-25T17:32:35Z | https://www.wtnh.com/reviews/br/electronics-br/charging-power-br/best-side-table-with-charging-station/ | false | 20 |
XYO (XYO) traded down 2.7% against the U.S. dollar during the twenty-four hour period ending at 11:00 AM ET on April 25th. One XYO coin can currently be purchased for about $0.0171 or 0.00000044 BTC on major cryptocurrency exchanges. XYO has a market cap of $219.77 million and approximately $7.30 million worth of XYO was traded on exchanges in the last 24 hours. During the last week, XYO has traded up 0.1% against the U.S. dollar.
Here is how other cryptocurrencies have performed during the last 24 hours:
- Binance USD (BUSD) traded down 0.1% against the dollar and now trades at $1.00 or 0.00002548 BTC.
- Crypto.com Coin (CRO) traded up 5% against the dollar and now trades at $0.41 or 0.00001075 BTC.
- Polygon (MATIC) traded 3.6% lower against the dollar and now trades at $1.30 or 0.00003327 BTC.
- Dai (DAI) traded up 0.1% against the dollar and now trades at $1.00 or 0.00002550 BTC.
- Parkgene (GENE) traded flat against the dollar and now trades at $25.59 or 0.00045023 BTC.
- DREP (DREP) traded flat against the dollar and now trades at $1.96 or 0.00003398 BTC.
- DREP [old] (DREP) traded flat against the dollar and now trades at $1.96 or 0.00003399 BTC.
- Chainlink (LINK) traded down 2.9% against the dollar and now trades at $13.08 or 0.00033359 BTC.
- FTX Token (FTT) traded 0.7% lower against the dollar and now trades at $40.86 or 0.00104232 BTC.
- THETA (THETA) traded flat against the dollar and now trades at $5.25 or 0.00010640 BTC.
XYO Profile
According to CryptoCompare, “The XYO Network solves the problem of location verification by creating a layered location verification service that is effective across device classes and smart contract protocols. XYO is an ERC20 utility token that powers XYO Network's ecosystem. “
Buying and Selling XYO
It is usually not presently possible to buy alternative cryptocurrencies such as XYO directly using U.S. dollars. Investors seeking to trade XYO should first buy Bitcoin or Ethereum using an exchange that deals in U.S. dollars such as Coinbase, Changelly or Gemini. Investors can then use their newly-acquired Bitcoin or Ethereum to buy XYO using one of the exchanges listed above.
Receive News & Updates for XYO Daily - Enter your email address below to receive a concise daily summary of the latest news and updates for XYO and related cryptocurrencies with MarketBeat.com's FREE CryptoBeat newsletter. | https://www.themarketsdaily.com/2022/04/25/xyo-xyo-price-tops-0-0171-on-top-exchanges.html | 2022-04-25T17:34:07Z | https://www.themarketsdaily.com/2022/04/25/xyo-xyo-price-tops-0-0171-on-top-exchanges.html | true | 83781 |
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — U.S. Rep. G.K. Butterfield endorsed Don Davis on Monday to become his successor, giving the current state senator his seal of approval as next month's Democratic primary for a northeastern North Carolina district approaches.
Butterfield, a former state Supreme Court justice who has held the 1st Congressional District seat since 2004, announced in November that he would not seek reelection.
A dozen people, including four Democrats, have filed candidacy papers for the seat. Davis is a former Snow Hill mayor and ex-Air Force officer who first joined the state Senate in 2009.
“Having served in Congress for 18 years, I know what the people of the 1st District expect from their representative,” Butterfield said in a news release from Davis' campaign. “Don has the legislative experience and is prepared to fight for the Democratic agenda of empowering America’s families and communities.”
The May 17 Democratic primary has largely been a competition between Davis and former state Sen. Erica Smith of Northampton County, who ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate Democratic nomination in 2020. She also ran for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Republican Richard Burr last year until switching to a House campaign in November.
Smith has portrayed herself as aligned with the Democratic Party’s liberal wing — in part by highlighting a recent endorsement by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. Davis’ politics have been considered more moderate, particularly in supporting at times state budgets and other legislation approved by the Republican-controlled state Senate.
Smith put out a news release Monday congratulating Davis on the endorsement but added: “We have elections, not coronations, for a reason.” Smith promoted her other endorsements, including from the Planned Parenthood Action Fund.
Davis “is out of touch with the Democratic Party and has a record that ought to be entirely disqualifying,” Smith campaign manager Morris Katz said in her release.
In an endorsement announcement separate from Davis’ news release, Butterfield cited Davis' other endorsements and his record of service.
”He believes in getting legislation passed to uplift families and communities that have been left behind," Butterfield wrote. "He knows when to fight and when to compromise.”
Jason Spriggs and Julian Bishop Sr. also are seeking the May 17 Democratic nomination.
The district covers most of Pitt County — the most populous county in the district — and all of 18 other counties. It’s considered a Democratic-leaning area, according to results of statewide elections in 2016 and 2020. Butterfield said the 1st District is now essentially a toss-up district. Several counties in the district have Black majority populations. Butterfield and all of the Democratic candidates are Black.
The district was redrawn three times since the fall, twice due to redistricting litigation.
Butterfield, who is also a former trial judge, previously chaired the Congressional Black Caucus while on Capitol Hill. He often won his congressional reelection bids by comfortable margins, although in 2020, he defeated Republican nominee Sandy Smith by less than 9 percentage points. Smith is running in the GOP primary this year, too.
Butterfield said the goal is to “produce the strongest Democratic candidate who can defeat the well-funded, right-wing, Trump aligned Republican nominee.”
Butterfield is one of about 30 House Democrats who are not seeking reelection this year, including North Carolina Rep. David Price. Republicans are aiming to retake control of the chamber for the first time since 2018. | https://www.theheraldreview.com/news/article/Retiring-US-Rep-Butterfield-backs-Davis-as-his-17124926.php | 2022-04-25T17:36:01Z | https://www.theheraldreview.com/news/article/Retiring-US-Rep-Butterfield-backs-Davis-as-his-17124926.php | true | 11 |
KYIV, Ukraine — Russia unleashed a string of attacks against Ukrainian rail and fuel facilities Monday, striking crucial infrastructure far from the front line of its eastern offensive.
Meanwhile, two fires were reported at oil facilities in western Russia, not far from the Ukrainian border. It was not clear what caused the blazes.
As both sides in the 2-month-old war brace for what could be a grinding battle of attrition in the country’s eastern industrial heartland, top U.S. officials pledged more help to ensure Ukraine prevails.
In a bold visit to Kyiv to meet with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Sunday, the American secretaries of state and defense said Washington had approved a $165 million sale of ammunition — non-U.S. ammo, mainly if not entirely to fit Ukraine’s Soviet-era weapons — along with more than $300 million in financing to buy more supplies.
Blinken said Monday after the meeting that the West’s united support for Ukraine and pressure on Moscow are having “real results.”
“When it comes to Russia’s war aims, Russia is failing. Ukraine is succeeding,” he added.
In an interview with The Associated Press, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba welcomed the American support but said that “as long as Russian soldiers put a foot on Ukrainian soil, nothing is enough.”
Kuleba warned that if Western powers want Ukraine to win the war and “stop Putin in Ukraine and not to allow him to go further, deeper into Europe,” then countries to speed up the delivery of the weapons requested by Ukraine.
Russian President Vladimir Putin accused the U.S. and its allies of trying to “split Russian society and to destroy Russia from within.”
When Russia invaded on Feb. 24, its apparent goal was the lightning capture of Kyiv and perhaps the toppling of its government. But the Ukrainians, with the help of Western weapons, bogged Putin’s troops down and thwarted their push to Kyiv.
Moscow now says its goal is the capture of the mostly Russian-speaking Donbas region in the east. While both sides said the campaign in the east is underway, Russia has yet to mount an all-out ground offensive and has not achieved any major breakthroughs.
Ukrainian troops holed up in a steel plant in the strategic city of Mariupol are tying down Russian forces and apparently keeping them from being added to the offensive elsewhere in the Donbas.
Over the weekend, Russian forces launched fresh airstrikes on the plant in a bid to dislodge the estimated 2,000 fighters. Some 1,000 civilians were also sheltering in the steelworks, and the Russian military pledged to open a humanitarian corridor Monday for them to leave.
The Russian offer was met with skepticism by Ukraine. Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said on the Telegram messaging app that Ukraine does not consider the route safe and added that Russia had breached agreements on similar evacuation routes before. She called on the United Nations to oversee an evacuation.
Mariupol has endured fierce fighting since the start of the war because of its strategic location on the Sea of Azov. In addition to freeing up Russian troops, its capture would deprive Ukraine of a vital port and allow Moscow to establish a land corridor to the Crimean Peninsula, which it seized from Ukraine in 2014.
On Monday, Russia focused its firepower elsewhere, with missiles and war planes striking far behind the front lines, in an apparent bid to slow the movement of Ukrainian supplies toward the east and disrupt the flow of fuel needed by the country’s forces.
Oleksandr Kamyshin, the head of the state-run Ukrainian Railways, said five railway facilities in central and western Ukraine were hit early Monday. That included a missile attack near the western city of Lviv.
Ukrainian authorities said that at least five people were killed by Russian strikes in the central Vynnytsia region.
Russia also destroyed an oil refinery in Kremenchuk in central Ukraine, along with fuel depots there, Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov said. In all, Russian warplanes destroyed 56 Ukrainian targets overnight, he said.
Phillips P. O’Brien, professor of strategic studies at the University of St. Andrews, said the war is, for now, settling into a campaign of incremental battlefield losses and gains.
“The two sides are sort of every day weakening each other,” he said. “So it’s a question of what can you bring in that’s new” and “what can you destroy on the other side.”
Meanwhile, a major fire erupted early Monday at an oil depot in a Russian city about 100 kilometers (60 miles) from the Ukrainian border, Russia’s Emergencies Ministry said. No cause was given for the blaze. Photos showed a huge, churning plume of thick smoke.
The oil depot in Bryansk is owned by a subsidiary of the Russian state company Transneft, which operates the Druzhba pipeline that carries crude west to other European countries. The ministry said the blaze damaged a depot containing diesel fuel. It said the region has enough diesel for 15 days.
It wasn’t clear if the depot was part of the pipeline infrastructure, but Polish pipelines operator PERN said deliveries to Poland have not been affected.
A Russian news report said another oil storage facility in Bryansk also caught fire early Monday.
Last month, two Ukrainian helicopter gunships hit an oil depot in Russia’s Belgorod region, close to the Ukrainian border.
Breaking News Alerts
In a video address Monday, Zelenskyy described his meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin as “encouraging and, importantly, effective.”
The Ukrainian leader added that they agreed “on further steps to strengthen the armed forces of Ukraine and meet all the priority needs of our army.”
With Russia’s shift in focus toward the Donbas, Zelenskyy is now focused on more heavy weaponry, such as tanks and artillery.
“We want to see Ukraine remain a sovereign country, a democratic country able to protect its sovereign territory,” Austin said. “We want to see Russia weakened to the point where it can’t do things like invade Ukraine.”
In a boost for Ukraine, French President Emmanuel Macron comfortably won a second term Sunday over far-right challenger Marine Le Pen, who had pledged to loosen France’s ties to the European Union and NATO.
Le Pen had spoken out against EU sanctions on Russian energy and had faced scrutiny during the campaign over her previous friendliness with the Kremlin.
Associated Press journalists Yuras Karmanau and Jon Gambrell in Lviv, Ukraine, and AP staff around the world contributed. | https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/nation-world/ct-aud-nw-russia-ukraine-20220425-mtz6grcxpnbx7dj7vc6yelec54-story.html | 2022-04-25T17:38:31Z | https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/nation-world/ct-aud-nw-russia-ukraine-20220425-mtz6grcxpnbx7dj7vc6yelec54-story.html | false | 26 |
GAP Properties (Yorkshire) Ltd, based in Doncaster, pleaded guilty at Beverley Magistrates Court to two counts of failing to comply with improvement notices served under the Housing Act 2004.
The prosecution was brought to court by East Riding of Yorkshire Council’s private sector housing team who first received complaints from the tenants in Driffield in October 2020.
An inspection found no smoke or heat detectors, a collapsed ceiling, no lighting in the hallway and windows and patio doors that would not open or lock properly.
Legal notices were then served on the company which were also not complied with and court proceedings issued.
GAP Properties (Yorkshire) Ltd was fined a total of £20,000, ordered to pay costs of £3,419.57 and a victim surcharge of £190.
Chris Dunnachie, private sector housing manager at East Riding of Yorkshire Council, said: “Throughout this case, officers have continually advised the landlord of the need to undertake essential repairs to the property.
"The council does, and will continue, to take robust action when the safety of tenants is put at risk due to serious hazards from the properties they are living in. " | https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/crime/property-firm-fined-ps20000-by-courts-for-failing-to-carry-out-fire-and-safety-repairs-at-house-in-driffield-3667987 | 2022-04-25T17:40:20Z | https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/crime/property-firm-fined-ps20000-by-courts-for-failing-to-carry-out-fire-and-safety-repairs-at-house-in-driffield-3667987 | true | 2 |
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A Dallas woman with a warrant out for her arrest who allegedly led deputies on a car chase shortly after midnight on Saturday was eventually apprehended in an apartment complex.
Marlene Choates, 26, was booked into the Suzanne Lee Kays Detention Facility and charged with evading arrest in a vehicle, according to jail records.
She is also facing a charge for the manufacture and intent to deliver of a controlled substance between one and four grams in Rockwall County, which is just east of Dallas.
A deputy tried to pull Choates over after he spotted her vehicle with the rear license plate light out, but she refused to stop, according to the Dallas County Sheriff’s Department.
Choates eventually got out of her car and ran on foot into the Volara Apartments parking lot, where police caught up with her and arrested her, the sheriff’s office said.
Her total bond was set at $110,000. An attorney for Choates was not listed in jail records. | https://www.thehamdenjournal.com/world/dallas-woman-marlene-choates-all-smiles-after-being-arrested-leading-police-on-a-car-chase/159685/ | 2022-04-25T17:43:58Z | https://www.thehamdenjournal.com/world/dallas-woman-marlene-choates-all-smiles-after-being-arrested-leading-police-on-a-car-chase/159685/ | true | 4 |
Otis Worldwide Corporation (OTIS) CEO Judy Marks on Q1 2022 Results - Earnings Call Transcript
Otis Worldwide Corporation (NYSE:OTIS) Q1 2022 Earnings Conference Call April 25, 2022 8:30 AM ET
Company Participants
Michael Rednor - Senior Director, Investor Relations
Judy Marks - Chair, Chief Executive Officer and President
Rahul Ghai - Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer
Conference Call Participants
Nigel Coe - Wolfe Research
Steve Tusa - JPMorgan. Steve
Jeff Sprague - Vertical Research
Nick Housden - RBC Capital Markets
Julian Mitchell - Barclays
Joe O’day - Wells Fargo
Cai von Rumohr - Cowen
John Walsh - Credit Suisse
Joel Spungin - Berenberg
Operator
Good morning and welcome to the Otis First Quarter 2022 Earnings Conference Call. This call is being carried live on the Internet and recorded for replay. Presentation materials are available for download from Otis’ website at www.otis.com. I will now turn it over to Michael Rednor, Senior Director of Investor Relations. You may begin.
Michael Rednor
Thank you, Latonia. Welcome to Otis’ first quarter 2022 earnings conference call. On the call with me today are Judy Marks, Chair, CEO and President; and Rahul Ghai, Executive Vice President and CFO. Please note, except where otherwise noted, the company will speak to results from continuing operations, excluding restructuring and significant non-recurring items. A reconciliation of these measures can be found in the appendix of the webcast. We also remind listeners that the presentation contains forward-looking statements, which are subject to risks and uncertainties. Otis’ SEC filings, including our Form 10-K and quarterly reports on Form 10-Q, provide details on important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially.
With that, I’d like to turn the call over to Judy.
Judy Marks
Thank you, Mike and thank you everyone for joining us. We hope that everyone listening is safe and well. We had a strong start to the year, reflected in our financial results and in the progress made on our balanced capital allocation strategy. We grew organic sales, expanded margins and achieved high single-digit adjusted EPS growth, while driving growth in all regions in new equipment orders and our maintenance portfolio. Our service business experienced favorable pricing and grew revenue, margins and adjusted operating profit. In addition, we generated nearly $0.5 billion in free cash flow while continuing to return the majority of our cash generated to shareholders.
In Q1, we completed $200 million in share repurchases and received Board approval of a $1 billion share repurchase authorization. In April, we announced a 20.8% increase to our quarterly dividend, while acquiring the remaining interest in Zardoya Otis. After settlement of the tender offer in mid-April, we now have over 95% ownership of Zardoya Otis and expect to automatically delist it in early May. Timing was better than our prior expectations and is expected to add another $0.02 of EPS accretion in 2022. This progress sets us up well for the remainder of 2022 and beyond.
New equipment orders were up 8.8% in the quarter with growth in all regions, leading to approximately 1 point of new equipment share gain on top of close to 2 points of share gain since 2020. In Korea, Otis was selected to provide more than 70 Gen 2 units to the [indiscernible] Seacrest apartment complex in Incheon, Korea. Otis Gen 2 elevators equipped with ReGen drive technology that can deliver substantial energy savings will serve more than 2,200 apartment units. This is our latest project in the region with GS Engineering & Construction and further strengthens our 20-year collaboration with them.
In China, we received an order to support the next phase of the Shenzhen Metro project extending more than two decades of collaboration with the installation of nearly 1,000 units to-date. In this phase, we will provide more than 350 IoT-enabled elevators and escalators. This award marks another milestone in our digitalization journey in China and allows us to continue delivering the benefits of Otis ONE’s predictive maintenance to our customers. In addition to executing on our financial priorities, we remain committed to advancing our ESG initiatives and published our inaugural ESG report in Q1. This report reflects the focus we have placed and progress we have made on reducing our carbon footprint, creating a safe, equitable and inclusive work environment, supporting the communities around us and maintaining best-in-class governance practices.
Moving to Slide 4, Q1 results and 2022 outlook. New equipment orders in the first quarter were up 8.8% at constant currency and up 10.9% on a rolling 12-month basis, contributing to backlog growth of 6% versus prior year. Organic sales were up 3.1% due to the strength in our service business, which was up 5.8%. Adjusted operating profit was up $29 million at constant currency and up $9 million at actual currency, with margin expansion of 30 basis points, driven by strong performance in the service business as well as some benefit from segment mix. Free cash flow was robust at $474 million at 152% conversion of GAAP net income.
A few additional updates before I begin our revised 2022 outlook. In April, the agreement between the National Elevator Bargaining Association and the International Union of Elevator Constructors was ratified. This collective bargaining agreement covers the majority of Otis’ U.S. field colleagues and will become effective this July with wage increases taking effect in January of 2023. We believe this 5-year agreement is fair and equitable to both parties with the annual increases generally in line with historical trends. And like in private years, we expect to fully offset this cost through increased productivity as we upscale and continue to develop this essential workforce.
In addition, we are disheartened to see the escalation of the crisis in Ukraine. We have growing concerns about the long-term sustainability of Otis’ operations in Russia, especially with mounting regulations and supply chain disruptions. As a result, we are motivated to find solutions and explore alternatives for our Russia business that are in the best interest of all of our stakeholders. We remain hopeful for return to peace and stability in the region and we will continue to contribute to the ongoing relief and humanitarian efforts necessary for those most impacted by this crisis.
Looking ahead to our 2022 outlook, given the wide range of outcomes and the process that we are undergoing, we have removed Otis’ Russian operations from the current outlook as well as in the prior year compares. This adjustment will largely impact the new equipment business. Rahul will walk through this in more detail and a reconciliation of Otis’ results, excluding Russia for the last five quarters can be found in the appendix of this webcast.
For the year, excluding Russia, we expect organic sales growth of 3% to 4% with net sales in the range of $14.1 billion to $14.3 billion. Adjusted operating profit is expected to be in a range of $2.2 billion to $2.25 billion, up $105 million to $155 million, excluding the impacts from foreign exchange. At actual currency, adjusted operating profit is expected to be in the $40 million to $90 million. Adjusted EPS is expected in the range of $3.22 to $3.27, up 9% to 11% versus the prior year.
Lastly, we still expect free cash flow to be robust at approximately $1.6 billion or approximately 120% conversion of GAAP net income. We remain disciplined in our capital allocation strategy. And in addition to increasing our ownership in Zardoya Otis, we will continue to return cash to shareholders through dividends and share repurchases and advanced our bolt-on M&A strategy where it makes sense and adds to the density of our growing service portfolio.
With that, I will turn it over to Rahul to walk through our Q1 results and 2022 outlook in more detail.
Rahul Ghai
Thank you, Judy and good morning everyone. Starting with first quarter results on Slide 5, net sales were up 0.2% to $3.4 billion. Organic sales grew for the sixth consecutive quarter, up 3.1% driven by service sales, which increased nearly 6%. Adjusted operating profit was up $9 million and up $29 million at constant currency as the drop-through on higher service volume, favorable service pricing, productivity in both segments and lower bad debt expense was partially offset by commodity headwinds and annual labor cost increases.
We also maintained our unrelenting focus on cost containment and adjusted SG&A expense was down $17 million versus the prior year and down 60 basis points as a percentage of sales despite the inflationary trends in the economy. R&D trend and other strategic investments were flat versus the prior year. Given the strong cash flow and progress on repatriation, we completed our deleveraging and repurchased $200 million of shares in the quarter. Overall, growth in operating profit, reduction in share count and continued progress on reducing the tax rate resulted in first quarter adjusted EPS growth of 6.9%.
Moving to Slide 6, new equipment orders were up 8.8% at constant currency, with growth in all regions. Orders momentum remained strong in Asia, up mid single-digits with about 10% growth in Asia, ex-China. China orders were up 3%, the eighth consecutive quarter of orders growth in the country and outgrew the market that was down mid single-digits. Orders in America were up high single-digit and awards, which preceded order bookings, were up nearly 25% in North America, signaling continued strong demand.
EMEA orders were up 17% with growth in both Europe and the Middle East. Strong orders growth contributed to total company backlog increasing 4% and 6% at constant currency, with growth in all regions, including approximately 6% growth in Asia. In addition, global proposal volume was up low teens with more than 25% growth in China, demonstrating robust market activity and the benefits of increased sales coverage. Globally, pricing on new equipment orders was about flat in the quarter on a year-over-year basis. New equipment organic sales were down 0.5% in the quarter. EMEA was up mid single-digits, but this was offset by a low single-digit decline in both Americas and Asia.
Americas declined due to a tough compare from COVID recovery in the prior year. And in Asia, China was impacted by job site closures towards the end of the quarter. Adjusted operating profit was down $12 million, partially from the impact of lower volume. Commodity inflation of $38 million that was in line with prior expectations was largely mitigated by installation and material productivity and lower bad debt expense.
Service segment results on Slide 7, maintenance portfolio units were up more than 3% from broad-based improvements in retention, recapture and conversion rates, with recaptured units more than offsetting cancellations in the quarter. In China, conversion rates continued to improve and contributed to third consecutive quarter of high-teens portfolio growth. Modernization orders were down about 6% in the quarter, but are up close to 6% on a rolling 12-month basis, driving backlog growth of 3% versus the prior year. Service organic sales grew for the fifth consecutive quarter, up 5.8% with growth in all lines of business. Maintenance and repair grew 5.6%, with mid single-digit growth in contractual maintenance sales, above our unit growth due to improved pricing that was up approximately 2.5% adjusted for geographical mix and the benefits of strong repair volumes.
Modernization sales were up 6.9% with strong growth in Americas, EMEA and China. Modernization sales declined in Asia-Pacific on a tough compare after a strong demand in Southeast Asia in the prior year. Service adjusted operating profit was up $17 million, with 30 basis points of margin expansion, the ninth consecutive quarter of margin improvement. Profit at constant FX was up $40 million, driven by benefit of higher volume, favorable pricing and productivity and partially offset by annual labor cost increases.
As we look forward to the balance of the year on Slide 8, we are excluding Russia, both in the current outlook for ‘22 and in prior year comparisons. Overall, organic growth expectations of 3% to 4% are unchanged at the midpoint, with the improvement in service offset by lower new equipment growth expectations. Total company margin expansion of approximately 30 basis points is also consistent with prior expectations. We are raising our outlook for service margin improvement to 70 basis points from 50 basis points previously from better maintenance pricing and drop-through from higher volume. However, this is getting offset by reduced margin expectations in the new equipment segment from increased headwinds on commodities and higher freight costs and the impact from lower volume growth. Overall, adjusted EPS is expected to be in the range of $3.22 to $3.27, up 9% to 11% versus the prior year after adjusting for Russia. This strong growth is driven by an increase in operating profit, accretion from the Zardoya transaction and progress on reducing our tax rate and share count.
Taking a further look at the organic sales outlook on Slide 9, the new equipment business is projected to be flat to up 1.5%. This is a 1 point decrease from the prior outlook at the midpoint driven by adjustment in sales growth expectations for EMEA and Asia. While the backlog in EMEA is up more than 5%, our customers are requesting postponement of deliveries due to a broader slowdown in building construction activity, pushing shipments from 2022 to 2023. As a result, we now expect EMEA sales to be up low to mid single-digits for 2022.
In China, our backlog at the end of Q1 was up 4% from strong orders growth. But the current lockdowns are not only impacting shipments, but are also disrupting the supply chain. While we expect deliveries to pickup starting May, given the supply chain challenges, we are adjusting our 2022 China outlook to be down low single-digits from flat to down 3% previously as some sales moved to the right. Given the lower volume expectations in China, Asia is now expected to be down slightly for the year. Outlook on new equipment organic sales in Americas remains unchanged and is expected to be up low single-digits in 2022.
Turning to service, we now expect organic sales to be up 5% to 6%, an improvement from the prior outlook of 4% to 6%, driven by better than expected maintenance pricing and repair orders in the first quarter and higher confidence to execute our modernization backlog from the steps we have taken to resolve the supply chain challenges.
Switching to adjusted EPS bridge on Slide 10, we now expect adjusted EPS growth of 9% to 11%, with operating profit growth of $105 million to $155 million at constant currency. This increase of $0.17 to $0.26 versus prior year is driven by strong operational execution, higher volume and favorable pricing. This is partially offset by commodity headwinds, which we now expect to be $110 million for the year, $20 million higher than in the prior outlook and incremental freight costs. We are absorbing these higher commodity and freight costs through increases in productivity and better maintenance pricing. And the midpoint of profit growth expectation at constant FX remains unchanged.
Foreign exchange translation is now expected to be an $0.11 headwind versus the prior year and $0.04 worse than the prior outlook, primarily from strengthening of the U.S. dollar against the euro and the yen. The euro is now expected to be $1.10 for the year, implying a $1.09 for the balance of the year. The $0.11 FX headwind is more than offset by $0.12 of in-year accretion expected from the Zardoya transaction. This estimate is $0.02 better than the prior outlook from a faster pace of acquisition of shares. The balance of the EPS growth is driven by progress on reducing the adjusted tax rate, now expected to be approximately 27.7% for the year and a lower share count.
We have completed $200 million in share repurchases for the year and plan on completing an additional $300 million in the balance of the year at the high end of the prior outlook. This guidance clearly reflects the acceleration of both sales and profit trajectory of the service business from the benefits of investments and our sustained focus on driving productivity. And while the new equipment business is challenged this year due to the current macroeconomic environment, our robust backlog, pricing actions and over $100 million of in-year productivity will ensure that the business recovers sharply once the commodity and the freight headwinds abate.
And with that, I will request Latonia to please open the line for questions.
Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
Certainly. [Operator Instructions] And our first question comes from Nigel Coe of Wolfe Research. Your line is open.
Nigel Coe
Good morning, everyone. Thanks for the question. So there is lots of – lots to talk about. Maybe just to start off with China. What we’re seeing right now in China, obviously, lots of headlines about potentially Beijing locking down? So curious what impact you’re seeing and what we might expect for 2Q?
Judy Marks
Yes. Good morning, Nigel, it’s Judy. So listen, we had a really strong start to the year, and I’ve got to just applaud our China team for their tenacity and resilience, really good start. New equipment orders up low single digits, backlog up mid-single digits and their portfolio up high teens for the third straight quarter. Our elevator factories are open in China, including our one in Hangzhou, which is outside of Beijing. I confirm that as well as recent as today, but we do – we’ve seen some challenges with shipments and obviously site access. So what we’ve done is we really expect the second quarter to be lighter due to those COVID lockdowns, and we’ve really adjusted the rest of the year to be down low single digits, mainly from our suppliers needing to restart their operations as well. So this is a kind of full supply chain impact where we manufacture in China, mainly for China. We think it’s a reasonable approach. We’re going to continue to monitor how things come back in China. But again, our elevator our factories are open and the timing of the reopening could push some performance into 2023, and that’s why we think it’s a prudent guide. We revised China new equipment to low single digits down and took our full guide down on new equipment, mainly because of this.
Nigel Coe
Thanks, Judy. That’s great. And then on pricing, we’re seeing strong – obviously, very strong pricing on – in service. I think you said 2.6%, if I’m not mistaken. Equipment orders are still stat on pricing. So – the two questions here is any reason why we shouldn’t expect that kind of cadence on service pricing to continue? And then are we electing to not get price in equipment to maybe gain share – or is there still a lag impact on the pricing recovery?
Judy Marks
Yes. So pricing – let me start with service, Nigel. We’re really pleased. We’re seeing good service pricing increased more than 2 points in Q1, and we expect that to continue. Very strong start on service pricing in the Americas, followed by EMEA. So we still have a mix as China is growing at the high teens in terms of the portfolio, but really pleased that between the volume in the portfolio and the service pricing, that’s why we’re seeing such a nice guide in service, and we raised our outlook 5% to 6% growth there. We expect that to continue as the year goes on, and we see no reason not to. We’re exercising our clauses that give us that ability to up our service pricing because of inflation, and our sales folks are being able to realize that price. So, very pleased with that. In terms of new equipment, overall, we’re flat globally. Good performance in Asia and Asia Pacific and EMEA. Americas is flat. We expect America’s new equipment pricing to improve throughout the year, continuing the second half ‘21 trend they had China is under pressure on pricing and their pricing is down. But overall, we expect to end the year with flat pricing on new equipment.
Nigel Coe
Great. Thank you.
Rahul Ghai
So Nigel, just maybe a point or two to add on China. First thing, what we’ve seen in China, as Judy said, the pricing was a little bit under pressure. But what we are seeing is that the volume business is doing well. That is where we’ve actually gained a little bit of price in flattish to up on the volume side. The larger projects is where we are seeing the pressure. So that is where the pressure is coming through. The flip side on China is that the commodity prices in China, unlike the rest of the world are also coming down. So if you look at the rebar steel, that was down close to 10% in Q1 and the hot-rolled coil, which is another commodity that impacts the steel prices are down close to 5% in the second quarter. So the China commodity market is behaving a little bit differently than the rest of the world. So that is why maybe the China pricing trends are a little bit different. So – but overall, as Judy said, we are kind of flat for the quarter. And for the year, we’re largely expecting that we will mitigate the backlog pricing headwind that we inherited from last year by in-year price increases. So largely, we will be kind of flattish on price for the year.
Nigel Coe
Great. Thank you.
Operator
And our next question comes from Steve Tusa of JPMorgan. Steve, your line is open.
Steve Tusa
Hi, guys. Good morning.
Judy Marks
Good morning, Steve.
Steve Tusa
So on the services business, some of the key stats that you talked about as being pretty positive, the whole attrition recapture. Can you just give a little more detail on those? Just a little bit more like maybe rolling averages on those metrics, those KPIs?
Rahul Ghai
So we typically don’t provide those quarterly, Steve, as you know. But overall, the trends were fairly robust across all 3 – retention, recapture and conversion. I think we saw global improvements in all three metrics, retention continues to be our, as we’ve discussed previously, continues to be our focus and that improved year-over-year in the quarter, kind of in line with the full year improvement that we saw for all of ‘21. So that trend is good. Recaptures are very strong, especially in China. And as I have said in my prepared remarks, recaptured units exceeded the cancellations in the quarter. So that contributed to our portfolio growth and conversion trends look really good. I mean, again, with China, where we see the maximum opportunity driving the way, and that was a big contributor to the portfolio growth here. So overall, listen, we are very, very pleased with the way things progress. We have, as we said previously, a really, really strong focus on that. And there was a subtle change in what we said, but that’s our portfolio grew more than 3%. So it says the continued traction that we said, we grew 3% last year. And in Q1, it’s more than 3%. So that’s – so we feel good about the full year growth on service portfolio growth.
Steve Tusa
I think Schindler said something about a big difference in order volume versus order price in – specifically in North America, like a double-digit difference. Anything going on there with regards to timing of price increases? Did you guys see that a pretty significant between orders to volume and price in kind of developed markets in North America?
Rahul Ghai
Yes. As we said, our pricing in North America was flattish, right? So North America pricing was flattish. I mean the only part in new equipment where we responded to Nigel’s question, Steve, the only place where we saw a little bit of pressure on price was China, right? So that’s where the rest of the world kind of behaved and we expected North America to improve starting Q1 because the cycle time for – from proposal to actually booking the order is really long in North America. So we expected Q4, our pricing was down in the Americas, and we always expected that Q1, we will see the sequential improvement, and we did. So that is good. And hopefully, it continues to gain traction as we go through the rest of the year. But in China, the pricing was under a little bit of pressure as previously discussed, and there was a difference between our units booked and the overall revenue growth in China.
Judy Marks
Yes. Steve, we’re seeing a really strong market in North America. Our orders were up 9.1%. The awards, as Rahul said, were up nearly 25%, which is our leading indicator. Resi, non-resi, but especially multifamily, in North America is just really coming in very strong. 12-month roll in the Americas is 13%. So the market is strong. We’re seeing – we’re not – obviously, we have a lag from the time we book till the time we recognize that revenue, but we think that bodes very well for the rest of ‘22 and ‘23.
Steve Tusa
Okay. Great, thanks, Rahul.
Rahul Ghai
Thanks, Steve.
Operator
And our next question comes from Jeff Sprague of Vertical Research. Your line is open.
Jeff Sprague
Thank you. Good morning, everyone. First, just kind of on housekeeping on Russia, would you had kind of been anticipating something similar to that $0.06 for 2022 in your original guide? And – maybe you could just elaborate on what the plan is there? Are you unwinding the business? You’re trying to find somebody to acquire it? I’m just a little unclear what the plan is there actually.
Rahul Ghai
Yes. So let me answer the first part of your question, Jeff, and then I’ll hand it over to Julie for the second part. So we were expecting a little bit of growth in Russia. The markets were strong getting into the year. So we were expecting a little bit of growth in Russia as we got into the year. But for the sake of ease, we kind of took $0.06 out because we can size the number. But in our original guide, we had a little bit of growth coming from Russia. So Judy, maybe you want to take the second part?
Judy Marks
Yes. Thanks. Good morning, Jeff, so I think everyone is aware that we stopped taking new equipment orders and making new investments. We’ve been very public about that in Russia. And really, we are right now evaluating the best ownership structure for the business, whether that’s with us or somewhere else. And that’s why we removed it from the outlook. We really wanted to be able to have a useful comparison. We’re working through our backlog in Russia to try and meet existing customer commitments. Candidly, it is very challenging due to supply chain issues and sanctions. And really, it’s against that backdrop that we’re evaluating options to provide a more certain future for the business. I can’t comment on potential future transactions, but we will update you in due course.
Jeff Sprague
Great, thanks. And then just coming back to service, it’s nice to see the uptick in the margin outlook, and I’m sure some of it is explained by price. I just wonder if you could unpack a little bit more what you’re seeing as it relates to mix and adoption of the IoT offerings across the geographies. You’ve got this outgrowth in China, which would technically be mix negative, right, and the margins are looking better in spite of that. So I just wonder if you could unpack that a little bit more for us. Thank you.
Judy Marks
Yes. So on Otis ONE, we had a strong start to the year, especially versus last year first quarter and probably ‘20 first quarter. So we’re picking up nice momentum there and we are headed towards our mid-term – our midterm outlook of 60% of the portfolio covered. We also had some really nice progress in EV bookings, really, which give us another connected product. As we exited the quarter, we had significant EV bookings as well. But we’re really starting to see both the volume pickup and the stickiness, as Rahul said. All three categories are doing better conversion, retension as well as really bringing portfolios, bringing items back to our portfolio. Productivity is strong. It is taking care of any labor increases we’re seeing. And even our apps that we don’t talk about as much anymore, Jeff, have really seen sustained uptick. We’re still rolling them out in some of our Southeast Asia countries as recent as last month. And if you look at the apps, we saw a 20% increase in repair sales booked through the Upgrade app year-over-year. The Tune app, which really gives our mechanics just that ability to use their iPhones to do vibration checking is up more than double same period last year. And we had 50,000 parts ordered, which is up mid-single-digit plus over the year before all using technology. So our mechanics are getting more productive. Otis ONE is adding that ability to be predictive. They have got the ability to see what’s happening with transparency with our customers and we’re seeing actually Otis ONE make a difference in our recaptures when customers come to us, put us back on maintenance because of Otis ONE.
So all in all, everything is trending, and that’s why we’ve got confidence in the service, not just in the revenue side, but it will, with volume, it’s going to fall through and the incrementals are going to be strong.
Jeff Sprague
Great. Thanks for the color.
Operator
And our next question comes from Nick Housden of RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.
Nick Housden
Yes. Hi, everyone. Thank you for taking my questions. My first one is on China. And if I heard you correctly, you said that you grew orders 3% against the market that was down mid-single digits, which seems like a pretty significant outperformance there. So I’m just wondering what exactly the components are? Is it partly because when you talk about the market, you’re including the lower tier cities where maybe the declines have been sharper, whereas your focus is more on the higher tier cities, where my understanding is demand has been holding up a bit better? Or just any color you could give would be helpful there.
Judy Marks
Yes. Let me start, Rahul, and then I’ll let you add. But we saw a share gain of about 1 point globally, but we saw a share gain clearly in China. We came into the year and we expected our backlog to cover 60% or so of the revenue and the rest for the in-year revenue and the rest would be kind of book-to-bill. We thought that book-to-bill, Nick, would be down 5% to 10%. But what we saw in the first quarter was it was only down 5%. So that was fairly positive. As you look at the first quarter, though, we did well Tier 1 through 4 cities, so it wasn’t just the big Tier 1s. We really did well in Tier 1 to 4, and we grew share there, and we grew share in every vertical, residential, commercial, high-rise and infrastructure. So it was an across-the-board gain in terms of share from our China team, and I think that’s what really led to the up 3% in new equipment orders and the backlog up mid-single now.
Rahul Ghai
And Nick, not a lot to add. I think Judy has kind of covered it. I think we covered verticals. We had share gain in all verticals. And what we saw in the market was the market was down about 5% in the quarter, where we saw the growth – we saw a growth in industrial and on the infrastructure side. And residential, as you would expect, was down in the quarter just given the policy that we had. So the market – and the minus 5% that we saw in the market was actually a little bit better than what we would have thought going into the year. We still expect the market to be down 5% to 10% for the year. That estimate has not changed even though some of the metrics have moved around. The construction was up kind of 1% in the quarter. Investment was down a couple of points. The new starts were down, maybe 20% plus in the quarter, but that was a tough compare and then obviously, you had the impact from COVID. But the inventory is kind of holding in China, so the inventory is still at a 3.5 months of inventory. So our estimates for the year on China market growth have not changed. So we’re still expecting minus 5% to minus 10% and with Q1 being down about minus 5%.
Judy Marks
Yes, I think it’s just execution of strategy, Nick. Our sales coverage is there. We kept A&D about – our agents and distributors around 2,200. There is been some churn in them as the lower performers are exited and we bring on new for coverage. But our sales coverage actually globally went up about 150 – about 4%, and even though our SG&A went down significantly. So we’re driving everything and it’s all about executing our strategy.
Nick Housden
That’s great. And then just one more on China and looking at working capital. So you’re expecting the market to be down 5% to 10% this year. And I’m just wondering what the potential impact could be on working capital and specifically in terms of the prepayment position. Should we expect this to move downward at all? Or will it just increase at a slower rate?
Rahul Ghai
Yes. Our business in China did really well on cash last year, Nick. I mean we were up more than 20% over 2020 levels in 2021. And for the year, for 2022, we kind of expect similar level of improvement in free cash flow in China. So last year, if you look at 2021, our receivables were up slightly less than 10% on revenue that was up more than 25%. So we did really well on cash management in China. But obviously, the situation is volatile. We are looking at our payable situation. We are extending some advances to our customers to ensure supply. But at the same time, we are also looking at, okay, where we can, we are stretching the payable terms. So we’re kind of going both ways, managing it on a supplier-by-supplier basis. But overall, listen, the situation, cash in China was good last year, and we expect a similar level of performance in ‘22.
Nick Housden
That’s great. Thanks very much.
Operator
And our next question comes from Julian Mitchell of Barclays. Your line is open.
Julian Mitchell
Hi, good morning.
Judy Marks
Hi.
Julian Mitchell
Hi, good morning, Judy. Maybe just switching away from China perhaps to Europe. I thought it was interesting you talked about the kind of pushouts there into 2023. So maybe just a little bit more color, I suppose, on was that a Europe-wide comment? Or are there just particular markets that are being affected and you had very, very strong new equipment orders growth in EMEA in Q1. Just wondered how you’re expecting those European orders to play out over the balance of the year? And when you think about the broader Europe market, the last time they had some kind of GDP downturn, obviously, service price and elevators was under pressure. How you feel the market structure is different today, if at all?
Rahul Ghai
Yes. So as you said, our orders were strong in Europe. And we are seeing – so the backlog goes up, as I said in my prepared remarks, it was up more than 5%, and the ARPU more than that, clearly. But what we are seeing, Julian, is we are seeing delays in construction activity, and that’s pretty much all the major European – or most of major Western European markets. So we are seeing that slowdown, which is extending our delivery times from our factories. So that is what we are seeing. And that is the reason we kind of looked at our revenue expectations for the year in EMEA, and we took them down slightly. We were up kind of mid-single digit levels last time if we took them to mid to high this time or low to mid this time. And part of that was obviously Russia coming out because Russia was a faster growth market. So some of that impact was just Russia getting pulled out and some of that was construction. So now we think it’s low to mid. But as you look at the overall construction activity in EMEA, that is kind of holding. So, if you look at the building permit activity that was up 2% to 3% over last year. I think they are expecting that to continue. And so that is where we expect that our orders growth in Europe should be okay for the year. We are not expecting any big slowdown at this point. So, the business seems to be holding up. And all we are seeing is this delay in revenue recognition and the pricing was good as well. So, we saw – we picked up pricing up low-single digits in EMEA. So overall, the business is doing well, except for the slowdown in construction that’s impacting us.
Judy Marks
Yes, it’s not a demand issue, Julian, it’s just a delay in the delivery and the recognition of revenue.
Julian Mitchell
Understood. Thank you. And then just on the operating profit line. So, I think your adjusted profit at constant currency was up $29 million in Q1 year-on-year. And the year as a whole, you are guiding up around $130 million. So, you are sort of just taking it looks like the Q1 increase and sort of times it by four across the quarters. I wonder if there was any kind of cadence on that profit development to call out or it really is as simple as sort of $30 million, $35 million increase every quarter? And then specifically on that point, you mentioned the cost inflation headwind of $110 million for the year. How – what was that in Q1? How do we think about that in the second half, the $110 million?
Rahul Ghai
Yes. So, let me start with the second part of your question first, Julian, and then I will get to the first part of the question. So, overall commodity headwinds is about 110 for the year, about $38 million in the first quarter, similar levels expected in second quarter. And what has shifted from the last estimate is clearly, we are expecting a little bit of a headwind in the second half of the year, which was not in our prior expectation that that’s driven by the higher energy prices in Europe that are driving aluminum costs and also some of the steel prices in Europe have gone up. And same thing in North America, we have seen commodity pricing moving higher in North America as well, offset to some extent by lower prices in China. So, commodity headwinds $110 million for the year, about $76 million in the first half, the balance in the second half of the year. Now, in terms of cadence, you are right, I mean what we saw – you can think it’s kind of a run rate. But what you are seeing, obviously, the earnings in new equipment were pressured in the first quarter because of the higher commodity headwinds. And we are expecting kind of similar level of pressure on new equipment earnings in the second quarter. So, the margins in new equipment on a year-over-year basis are going to look very similar in the second quarter as they did in the first quarter. So, the margin expectations in new equipment first quarter, second quarter are going to be similar. And if you look at our full year margin guide, that is more or less in line with the first quarter margin guide. So, we are not expecting a huge acceleration in new equipment margins and maybe that’s a little bit conservative as we get into the second half. Maybe there is a little bit of tailwind. But given all the uncertainty, we felt that, okay, holding the margins kind of sequentially flat to Q1 levels was appropriate. Now, as you move to service though, on the other side, we do expect acceleration of margins in the Service segment. And the biggest driver of that, a, obviously, sequential revenue growth in service that comes through a high drop-through. But also, if you go back to Q1 of last year, we still had the impact from COVID. So, in Q1 of this year, we had some of the costs coming back that were not there in Q1 of last year. So, we absorbed that incremental cost and yet grew margins. So, as we get into the second to the fourth quarter, that headwind is not there, and that helps us drive higher service margins. So, that’s the underlying cover. But as you look overall, obviously, a good start to the year. And we expect Q2 is the same, we expect to grow revenue in the second quarter and then EPS on a year-over-year basis and on a sequential basis, should be up as well in the second quarter.
Judy Marks
Julian, the only other thing I would add is what we saw in repair in the first quarter was very positive, which shows even in the regions where people are concerned about office populations, we are seeing elevator usage pick up in the – really in the commercial side of the business as well. And our repair business certainly indicated that in Q1. That’s going to help drive this – again, this margin expansion in service as we go through Q2 through Q4.
Julian Mitchell
That’s very helpful. Thank you.
Rahul Ghai
Thanks Julian.
Operator
And our next question comes from Joe O’day of Wells Fargo. Joe, your line is open.
Joe O’day
Hi. Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. I wanted to go back to a comment, I think last quarter, just talking about the cadence around Americas. And I think Judy, you had mentioned that there were some larger projects in Americas that were – you were kind of scheduled for back half of the year. I just wanted to kind of check in on that, see if those time lines are still kind of going according to plan.
Judy Marks
Yes. Joe, good morning, they are. I mean, we had secured some large projects in ‘21 and that will actually not just be second half of this year, will be more strong in early ‘23. And that’s still consistent. Those projects are all on schedule. So, what we said last quarter still holds.
Joe O’day
Got it. And then it looks like there was a $20 million cut to CapEx guide. How much of that is Russia related? How much of that is other factors?
Rahul Ghai
Yes, some impact from Russia, but we are just looking at calibrating the full year. So, that’s what we did. So, just nothing major things move around all the time. There is not a big cut in any one line, but there is some definitely some impact from lower investments in Russia. But overall, it’s just kind of minor tweaking in different lines.
Joe O’day
And then maybe just a clarification on service price, the pricing you got in the quarter, how much of that was contractual just on kind of escalators? How much of that was maybe a little bit more proactive on activity levels?
Judy Marks
Well, it all takes activity. So, even though we have those clauses in the contract, they don’t automatically happen at a renewal unless we can enforce it and sell the value of what we are doing. So, our sales force had to go out and basically make all of that happen. So, there was nothing that would just happen automatically, mechanically or commercially. So, it was all make happen, and the team did a great job explaining how we had additional costs and how it’s appropriate for those to flow through on price.
Joe O’day
Got it. Thanks very much.
Judy Marks
Yes. Thanks Joe.
Operator
And our next question comes from Cai von Rumohr with Cowen. Your line is open.
Cai von Rumohr
Terrific. Thank you very much and nice results. And so just follow-up on Jeff’s question. I mean we have terrible relations with Russia. The numbers weren’t bad, but presumably going forward, are you concerned that basically, there will be any sort of penalties put on you or operating difficulties as a result of being a U.S. company. And what should we think about the ultimate exit? I mean are you going to be able to get your bat back, or are they basically going to squeeze you, so it ends up being a loss.
Judy Marks
Well, Cai, I think it’s important to reinforce that we are following all sanctions that have been imposed by the U.S., the UK and – so we are following all of those rules. We provide an important life safety service everywhere in the world, especially in our service business. So, we are – obviously, we are evaluating who should be or could be the rightful owner of this asset, and that’s the evaluation we are under. We will share more as we learn more, but we will have to see where that evolves.
Cai von Rumohr
Got it. Thank you. And then turning to your service population, so could – you were up, obviously, I think you said high teens in China, which looks like it suggests the rest of the world was up 1.5%, 1.8%. Could you give us some color on the service population growth in each of the other three areas as well as some comment in terms of the growth versus how much from conversion, what was the retention loss? And what was the recapture in M&A? Thanks.
Rahul Ghai
Yes. No, it was – as we said, overall, Cai, good growth globally, obviously, strong growth in China. And the other emerging markets in Asia did well as well, but we did grow our portfolio in both Europe and the Americas as well. Obviously, they are lower growth economies. And so they contribute a lower amount because the growth is clearly happening in Asia, but it was a global improvement with improvement in all four regions. And then your second question on conversion. I think the conversion rates obviously moved up a lot overall throughout the world, but especially with the improvement in China kind of driving that, and that is where we expect most of the improvement to come. And the cancellation rate is good. I mean we keep making progress and the fact is that we make, especially in the where that is really important is in the more mature markets, in the U.S. and in the Western European economies. And that is where if you look at our improvement this year, that is we saw – that is where we saw the maximum improvement in our retention rates. Both Europe and U.S. did really well, or Europe and Americas did really well on improving the retention rates. And that is what we really need to see because that also drives price because that’s – losing that portfolio hurts us the most. And by improving our retention rate, that drives incremental price and incremental margin. But overall, really pleased with the progress we are making globally.
Judy Marks
Yes. And Cai, we were 1% 2 years ago. Actually, in 2020, we were 2% portfolio growth. 1% in ‘19, 2% in ‘20, 3% last year. We said we would be 3%-plus. That’s what’s driving, again, everything we have said that to drive that portfolio is the key to our service success, and we just had our fifth consecutive quarter of service organic sales growth and our ninth consecutive quarter of adjusted operating profit growth in our Service segment, So, this and growth in every region this quarter on the portfolio. So, that’s what we need to continue to see going forward. That’s what our team is focused on.
Cai von Rumohr
I get that, but you give projections for everything else, obviously, if – you mentioned how well China is doing. If China continues at upper teens, even at mid-teens as it’s getting bigger, that has some leverage on the rest. So, what’s the potential that you could be close to the 3.5% for the full year?
Rahul Ghai
Definitely. Yes. I mean our expectation, I think we said it just post Investor Day, Cai, that we see portfolio growth hedging – continue to improve, and there is a clear line of sight at some point to this portfolio growth, starting with maybe a four and then maybe even going up from there. But we take this in small steps and every quarter is a dot point on the board that – and all these dot points make up a trend. So, I think that’s what Judy kind of alluded to, just kind of the sequential improvement. And I think we are putting another dot point on the board with this quarter. And we are hoping that by the time we end the year, this number starts with a four, but we are not there yet. So, we will keep marching forward.
Cai von Rumohr
Terrific. Thank you.
Operator
And our next question comes from John Walsh of Credit Suisse. Your line is open.
John Walsh
Hi, good morning and I appreciate you taking the questions.
Judy Marks
Thanks John.
John Walsh
Maybe just first on pricing, can you just remind us kind of historical cycles, the ability to hold on to the pricing you have been pushing through? And I guess, the question really focuses around is this all still strategic, or is some portion of this kind of a surcharge that as we get maybe some lack of inflation at some point gets given back to the customer?
Rahul Ghai
So, most of our price increases are structural. There are surcharges kind of built into that number, because as we have discussed previously, we have escalator clauses, which are tied to overall inflation in the economy. So, that gets captured on the maintenance side, so nothing unusual in the quarter. We should be keeping this entire price increase. Obviously, it’s all market-dependent, and a large portion of our portfolio comes up for renewal in the first quarter, but not all of it. So, we will keep kind of guiding to you guys as the year goes on, how this moves forward. So, that’s point number one. And the second part is – and then obviously, on the new equipment side, it is once you kind of sign the contract, it’s there. So, I think on both sides, there is no reason to give any of this price increase back. On repair, where we kind of do more break/fix work, there are some surcharges that we add based on the travel that we need to do. So, that is where we do add a surcharge based on travel. But on maintenance and new equipment, there is nothing unusual about the price increases we are just kind of pushing through, and we should be retaining all of it.
John Walsh
Great. And then maybe as a follow-on to that, just thinking about capital allocation, every once in a while, you get some noise around a larger asset, either in Asia or Europe. Can you just remind us kind of where doing something larger kind of fits within your capital allocation strategy of share repurchase, dividends, smaller bolt-ons?
Judy Marks
Sure. So, we talk about the smaller bolt-ons at about the $50 million-ish kind of level a year. As you can see when something is attractive like Zardoya Otis, we didn’t hesitate. And kudos to our team for just executing that with excellence with the squeeze out occurring. So, we will be the full owner and delist in the next week or two weeks. So, we are always looking for an opportunity. We think we are at a really good leverage point right now. We are still investment grade. We were able to keep that as well as repaying. We repaid $0.5 billion of debt in the first quarter after $350 million in ‘20 and $450 million in debt in ‘21. So, we are keeping the debt kind of where we want it. Our gross debt is at about $6.75 billion right now, and we think that’s a good place. And if a large strategic opportunity comes up, whether it’s in Europe or Asia or in the Americas, we are going to – we are obviously interested and we are going to evaluate it because the large generation type opportunities don’t happen that often in this industry. So, we are making sure we have got the flexibility on the balance sheet to do that. In the interim, the cash we generate in-year, we plan on returning to our shareholders. We raised our dividend late last week, a little over 20%. And now that’s 45% over 2 years, and already bought back $200 million of shares in the first quarter. As Rahul said, we are going to do another $300 million. So, we will be at $500 million for this year. And our Board reauthorized $1 billion cap for us to do that. So, we are going to share with our shareholders until – and keep our ability to do strategic acquisitions when they arise.
John Walsh
Great. Thank you very much.
Judy Marks
Thank you.
Operator
And our last question comes from Joel Spungin of Berenberg. Your line is open.
Joel Spungin
Good. Good morning.
Judy Marks
Hi Joel.
Joel Spungin
Hi. On Russia, if I could start there. Just – I just want – I can’t see the number in the presentation or the release, maybe I have missed it. Have you actually said what your operating assets in Russia is and if there is a level of any outstanding receivables or working capital there?
Rahul Ghai
Yes. Overall, we did not disclose that, Joel. But overall, our asset base in Russia is not huge. We are – we typically do get advances from our customers in everywhere in the world before we get a new equipment order. And Russia is, call it, 80% new equipment. So, our – we are actually in a negative working capital position in Russia. So, as and when something happens, obviously, we will update the accounting, but we don’t expect a big asset write-off. There could be some other charges that we will have to evaluate as time goes on, but we don’t expect a big asset right off to come from anything that Judy mentioned earlier.
Joel Spungin
Great. Okay. Thank you for that. And then can I just ask about just looking at the numbers on Slide 28. But then is this right, the adjusted operating profit margin in Russia on new equipment was 18%, and that seems incredibly high.
Rahul Ghai
So, just keep in mind, Joel, yes, it is high. And the reason for that is twofold. One, obviously, the biggest reason for that is that we don’t do a lot of installation in Russia. We sell the equipment through our factory to people who actually install it. So therefore, that just drives higher margins because what you – if you look at our industry, we made more money on selling the equipment and the installation part is lower profit. So, that is what you see in Russia because we don’t do a lot of installation that comes through. And obviously, there are some other adjustments that go through as well anytime you try and pull a business out. But the biggest driver of that is just the nature of our business in Russia.
Joel Spungin
Got it. That’s helpful. Thank you. And then maybe just one quick question on China. And thank you for the detail on how you are doing there and on the outlook there. I was just wondering to what extent I think you talked about the market being down mid-single sort of now your current thinking. Are you able to say sort of implicitly within that, what your assumptions are about sort of normalization some of the challenges you are seeing in Russia. Are you assuming that things get back together back to something approaching normality by the middle of the year, or do you just assume that they stay roughly as they are?
Rahul Ghai
Joel, your question is on China, whether we see the market getting back to normal in China?
Joel Spungin
Well, actually, more when you see supply chains and some of the disruption that you have seen they are normalizing.
Rahul Ghai
Yes. So, we are – obviously, Q2 is going to be tough, right. I mean we – obviously, we are expecting the lockdowns to kind of end mid-April, but they have now extended. So, we will see how. So Q2, we are still expecting to resume delivery starting May. So, that’s still part of the expectation. But obviously, we will keep monitoring that. We think from our own delivery standpoint, we should be able to catch up as we get into Q3 and Q4 because we saw that just post-COVID, after the lockdowns, we had a really, really strong Q2 in Russia in 2019 – sorry, in China. We saw a really strong bounce back in China in Q2 of 2019. And we expect that as soon as the lockdowns lift, we should be able to recover. But the supply chain part is a little bit more uncertain for us because that we don’t control directly, and that was the reason for taking down our guide, as Judy said earlier. So, we have adjusted our guide, reflecting more of the supply chain issues and potential some conversion challenges with job sites and other places. But from our own factory standpoint, we are pretty confident that as soon as the lockdowns lift, we are ready to go.
Joel Spungin
Understood. Thank you very much.
Rahul Ghai
Thank you.
Operator
I would now like to turn the conference back to Judy Marks for closing remarks.
Judy Marks
Thank you, Latonia. So to summarize, we had a strong first quarter and continue to make progress on our strategic priorities while weathering macroeconomic challenges. We recognize the work left to be done to continue building on our track record of resiliency and strong execution. We are confident we will do just that and deliver 10% adjusted EPS growth in 2022 with continued momentum in 2023 and beyond. Thank you for joining our call, and please stay safe and well.
Operator
This concludes today’s conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect. | https://seekingalpha.com/article/4503366-otis-worldwide-corporation-otis-ceo-judy-marks-on-q1-2022-results-earnings-call-transcript | 2022-04-25T17:44:52Z | https://seekingalpha.com/article/4503366-otis-worldwide-corporation-otis-ceo-judy-marks-on-q1-2022-results-earnings-call-transcript | false | 1 |
If you’re one of those people who’s ordered the same thing from Subway since you were 10 (we’re right there with you) — you may soon be switching things up. The sandwich brand you know and love has refreshed its menu to offer five brand-new subs.
The revamp goes beyond menu additions, however, as the new signature sandwiches bring with them countless upgrades and exciting, new elements. The brand is making changes to some of its ingredients, such as adding new Canadian farm-raised meats, new sauces, breads, and toppings to offer dynamic flavour combinations. Plus, Subway says that its app will also be getting an upgrade and that more crave-worthy updates are soon to be on the horizon.
Without further ado, here are the five showstoppers hitting your favourite deli counter this spring.
Great Canadian Club
Put on your Canadian tuxedo and get ready to indulge in this one. Featuring deli-style turkey, ham, and Maplewood smoked bacon, this sandwich is made from Canadian farm-raised turkey and pork. It’s topped with lettuce and tomato for that added freshness, then is tied together with a Smoky Honey Mustard sauce.
Maplewood Smoked Bacon & Ham
This one’s for the pork people. Also served on the Classic Italian bread, this sub is topped with deli-style ham and bacon made from Canadian farm-raised pork. Additionally, it boasts real Canadian cheddar, and — once toasted — is topped with lettuce, tomatoes, pickles, and red onion for crunch before being drizzled with Smoky Honey Mustard and mayo.
Smashed Avocado & Turkey
Trying to add healthier foods to your diet? Same. Without sacrificing great taste? Same again. This sub might just be the perfect option for you. Served on Subway’s new Classic Italian bread, this one is topped with Canadian farm-raised, deli-style lean turkey and real Canadian cheddar. It’s then toasted and topped with smashed avocado, lettuce, spinach, tomato, cucumber, green pepper, red onion, and drizzled with mayo.
Southwest Steak & Avocado
Maybe we’ll get you with this one if you’re not yet convinced to kick the bucket on your many years-long running Subway order. This sub elevates your lunch game with seasoned steak, smashed avocado, and Subway Canada’s classic chipotle sauce — it also gets an extra kick from the sweet and tangy banana peppers.
Chicken Bacon & Peppercorn Ranch
Name a better duo than chicken and ranch, we’ll wait. Featuring Canadian farm-raised rotisserie-style chicken and Maplewood smoked bacon, this sandwich is topped with crispy veggies and the zesty kick of Subway’s new Peppercorn Ranch sauce. We’re already drooling.
Nothing here have you salivating yet? While we find that hard to believe, you’ll also have more crave-worthy upgrades and menu introductions to discover later this year, when Subway Canada announces even more sandwiches and ingredients.
To try out any of the above sandwiches or menu items for yourself, visit your local Subway location, or download the Subway app here.
Branded Content | https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/new-subway-sandwiches | 2022-04-25T17:45:07Z | https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/new-subway-sandwiches | false | 1 |
Jane McDonald left red-faced after nightmare wardrobe blunder on kayaking trip
JANE McDonald was left red-faced after a nightmare wardrobe blunder on a kayaking trip.
The star continued her explorations in Florida in the latest episode of her Channel 5 series, and visited Disneyland.
As well as the mega-tourist attraction, Jane also wanted to explore the natural side of the US state, and ended up in a kayak.
She told viewers: "Kayaking is very good for solo travellers.
"You don't need to go with someone as there are plenty of people there on their own as well.
"I am going to be kayaking down the Rock Springs River.
"It is said to be one of the most beautiful in Florida, and thankfully I'm not on my todd today, as, on request, you can be paired up with someone!"
Jane was in a two person kayak and introduced her co-paddler, saying: "I have been paired up with Debbie, who thankfully is much better at paddling than I am.
"Debbie moved to Florida 25 years ago after she too worked on the cruise ships, now look at us both cruising again."
The women paddled down the river before Debbie took over so Jane could have a break and take in the leafy surroundings from the boat.
Most read in TV
After almost crashing into other people kayaking, Jane joked: "It's like dodgem cars, this is fabulous, isn't it! The water is just so beautiful, what lush surroundings, I really didn't expect to see this so close to Orlando.
"I didn't expect an upper body workout either, but I have had a blast!"
Eventually it came time to get out of the kayak but as she did so, she revealed she had a wet bum.
Turning to show the camera, she said red-faced: "I haven't done anything it is just the water from the kayak."
Holidaying with Jane McDonald airs Sunday at 9pm on Channel 5.
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Do you have a story for The Sun Showbiz team?
Email digishowbiz@the-sun.co.uk or call us direct on 0207 782 4220 .
We pay for videos too. Click here to upload yours. | https://www.thesun.ie/tv/8702636/jane-mcdonald-wardrobe-blunder-kayaking-trip/ | 2022-04-25T17:45:52Z | https://www.thesun.ie/tv/8702636/jane-mcdonald-wardrobe-blunder-kayaking-trip/ | false | 3 |
TOPEKA, Kan. (KSNW) — Kansas prison and jail inmates are getting new playing cards that could lead to answers about some of the state’s unsolved murders.
The playing cards in each deck feature cold cases from all across Kansas, dating from 1976 to 2020. The hope is that an inmate will recognize something about a case or have heard someone talking about one of the cases and call the card’s hotline.
The Cold Case Playing Cards will replace current decks of standard playing cards available in prisons and county jails. Decks will be placed in dayrooms and other common areas and available through the commissary for purchase by Kansas Department of Corrections (KDOC) residents.
“Not every tip received leads to resolution of a case, but someone usually knows something,” Kansas Secretary of Corrections Jeff Zmuda said. “Within Kansas correctional facilities and jails, we have segments of our population who want to do something good, perhaps atone for past mistakes, and they may have information about unsolved cases. Our hope is that we receive actionable intelligence that leads to solving cases.”
Cold Case Playing Cards – Diamonds
The KDOC and the Kansas Bureau of Investigation (KBI), in partnership with the Kansas Association of Chiefs of Police (KACP), the Kansas Sheriff’s Association (KSA) and the Kansas Peace Officers Association (KPOA), have developed the cards as a way of generating tips.
Cold Case Playing Cards – Clubs
“Our agency and our state’s criminal justice community have a commitment to the victims of crimes,” Zmuda said. “Our staff members see the unresolved pain experienced by the many families we work with. Hearing the responses from surviving family members when notified that their loved one’s case has been selected for the deck has been powerful and humbling. These families have waited a long time for answers, and this brings some hope.”
Cold Case Playing Cards – Hearts
“Every call or tip that is shared with law enforcement will be vetted by investigators assigned to the case,” KBI Director Kirk Thompson said. “No matter how small, each tip has the potential of being the missing piece of information needed to finally provide justice to crime victims and their families.”
Other states have solved multiplee cold case homicides, missing person cases and suspicious deaths by making these cards available.
Cold Case Playing Cards – Spades
The development of the project began in March 2021. Through a submissions process that began in December 2021, local law enforcement from across Kansas provided 81 cases to be highlighted. A selection committee with representatives from KDOC, KBI, the Kansas Attorney General’s Office and local law enforcement prioritized 59 cases to highlight on the first deck of 52 cards.
“For many of these cases, even after years of investigative work has occurred, questions still remain that need answers before a perpetrator can be held accountable,” Thompson said. “It’s our hope that by distributing this deck, more attention is drawn to these cases, and that someone comes forward with details that will move us one step closer to providing justice.” | https://www.ksn.com/news/crime/deck-of-cards-could-help-solve-kansas-cold-cases/ | 2022-04-25T17:49:16Z | https://www.ksn.com/news/crime/deck-of-cards-could-help-solve-kansas-cold-cases/ | true | 4 |
New York City mayor expanding services for homeless people
New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced a $171 million proposal to help homeless people get off the streets amid a crackdown on street encampments.
The proposal would add 1,400 specialized stabilization beds, or private rented rooms that include personalized social services and fewer restrictions than other transitional housing options.
Previous Mayor Bill de Blasio also supported the program, but Adams said his predecessor didn’t put his money where his mouth was.
“The previous administration talked about these beds,” Adams said at a press conference Sunday. “We are funding these beds, which is a big difference. It’s a big difference between articulating the needs of people and then allocating the money to give the items that are needed for people.”
Adams previously announced the addition of 500 beds in his push to remove people from the subways. The program is aimed at people who are more reluctant to go to shelters, especially those with mental health and substance abuse issues.
Adams’s proposal would expand the total number of beds in the city to 4,000. It comes as the city carries out an aggressive plan to clear out encampments on the street and in the subways, a process that Adams has been criticized for.
“There was an encampment where a woman was living and I got out of the car and sat down next to her and engaged in a conversation. It was clear that she needed real mental health support and she did not want to be there, she did not trust the system,” Adams said, defending his attempts to get people into temporary housing.
His proposal would also allocate more funding to drop-in centers, which are designed to increase ease of access to social services, meals and medical care to people on the streets.
“The funding will include expanding outreach efforts and connecting those in need to specialized resources,” Adams said. “We didn’t discover this on our own. We spoke to the advocates.”
Adams will announce his executive budget and discuss his first 100 days in office on Tuesday.
The Hill has removed its comment section, as there are many other forums for readers to participate in the conversation. We invite you to join the discussion on Facebook and Twitter. | https://thehill.com/news/3462331-new-york-city-mayor-expanding-services-for-homeless-people/ | 2022-04-25T17:51:31Z | https://thehill.com/news/3462331-new-york-city-mayor-expanding-services-for-homeless-people/ | true | 1 |
Coal and gas companies could be sued for climate-fuelled flood damage under legislation promised by the Greens.
Greens leader Adam Bandt will join the party's candidate Mandy Nolan for the flood-affected region of Richmond, on the NSW upper north coast, to announce the policy on Tuesday while offering extra support for flood victims.
The party introduced the Liability for Climate Change Damage Bill 2021 in the last parliamentary sitting period.
Watch the Federal Election 2022 on Channel 7 or stream it for free on 7plus >>
The Greens will also push for a $190 million a year fund for local communities in Richmond to build and upgrade critical infrastructure to reduce flood impacts.
The party will move to change the investment restrictions on the Emergency Response Fund to ensure $600 million is spent each year up until 2026/27, and $300 million a year afterwards, on climate resilience.
"Coal and gas are the leading causes of climate change, which is ravaging the Northern Rivers," Mr Bandt said.
"Coal and gas corporations fuelled the floods and they should pay for the damage they have caused."
Richmond is held by Labor's Justine Elliot on a four per cent margin, ahead of the Nationals.
Stream Free on | https://7news.com.au/politics/election/greens-push-to-sue-coal-gas-companies-c-6576338 | 2022-04-25T17:52:21Z | https://7news.com.au/politics/election/greens-push-to-sue-coal-gas-companies-c-6576338 | false | 2 |
Lincoln's electric SUV concept is a serene lounge on wheels with relaxing smells, a wine fridge, and a spot for your slippers
- Lincoln unveiled a concept SUV that signals the design direction for its future electric cars.
- The brand plans to release four battery-powered models by 2026.
- The Lincoln Star is meant to be "the ultimate sanctuary" for passengers.
Like lots of car companies, Lincoln is eyeing an electric future. Ford's luxury brand said on Wednesday that it plans to launch four battery-powered models by 2026.
And as a preview of what's to come, Lincoln unveiled a concept SUV called the Star. The super-futuristic vehicle won't make it to production, but it's packed with interesting features and sure is nice to stare at. Lincoln says it designed the Star to be "the ultimate sanctuary" for customers.
The Star has a sleek, swept-back silhouette and an illuminated Lincoln badge up front that's surrounded by a constellation of little badge shapes. Suicide doors that create a wide-open entry to the SUV's cabin. Overall, the Star looks more like something out of a cutting-edge startup than a century-old car company.
Imagined for a future of autonomous vehicles, the Star is intended to be more of a lounge on wheels than a vehicle you actually have to think about driving. As such, passenger comfort is the SUV's top concern. The front seats swivel around to face backward, and the steering wheel stows away when it isn't needed.
Everybody gets a wide, reclined seat with a leg rest. A refrigerated glass case between the rear seats keeps your sparkling wine cold. And drawers built into the leg rests are meant to hold passengers' slippers. Because why not kick off your shoes if a computer is doing the driving?
Three "rejuvenation moods" use smells, sounds, and lightning to create a relaxing environment catered to the time of day. "Coastal Morning uses gentle, oceanic sounds, a fragrance of sea mist and the soft, warm glow of the sun with dynamic lighting throughout to replicate a stroll on the beach at sunrise," Lincoln says. "Evening Chill mirrors dusk using a calming night soundtrack coordinated with night sky video and an evergreen fragrance."
The Star does some fun things with storage, too. The SUV's front trunk — possible without a bulky engine taking up space — acts like a giant drawer that pulls out. A bench seat folds out from the regular trunk, for when you want to bring your self-driving Lincoln tailgating.
Once the country's best-selling luxury brand, Lincoln's sales have dwindled in recent decades as consumers preferred German and Japanese competitors. As electric vehicles grow in popularity, a solid stable of battery-powered options could help Lincoln recapture some of its former glory. It plans for at least 50% of its sales to be electric by 2025.
Read the original article on Business Insider | https://www.newsbreak.com/news/2580672487824/lincoln-s-electric-suv-concept-is-a-serene-lounge-on-wheels-with-relaxing-smells-a-wine-fridge-and-a-spot-for-your-slippers | 2022-04-25T17:54:06Z | https://www.newsbreak.com/news/2580672487824/lincoln-s-electric-suv-concept-is-a-serene-lounge-on-wheels-with-relaxing-smells-a-wine-fridge-and-a-spot-for-your-slippers | false | 2 |
(CNN) -- CNN has obtained 2,319 text messages that former President Donald Trump's White House chief of staff Mark Meadows sent and received between Election Day 2020 and President Joe Biden's January 20, 2021 inauguration.
The vast trove of texts offers the most revealing picture to date of how Trump's inner circle, supporters and Republican lawmakers worked behind the scenes to try to overturn the election results and then reacted to the violence that effort unleashed at the US Capitol on January 6, 2021.
The logs, which Meadows selectively provided to the House committee investigating the January 6 attack, show how the former chief of staff was at the nexus of sprawling conspiracy theories baselessly claiming the election had been stolen. They also demonstrate how he played a key role in the attempts to stop Biden's certification on January 6.
The never-before-seen texts include messages from Trump's family -- daughter Ivanka Trump, son-in-law Jared Kushner and son Donald Trump Jr. -- as well as White House and campaign officials, Cabinet members, Republican Party leaders, January 6 rally organizers, Rudy Giuliani, My Pillow CEO Mike Lindell, Sean Hannity and other Fox hosts. There are also text exchanges with more than 40 current and former Republican members of Congress, including Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas and Reps. Jim Jordan of Ohio, Mo Brooks of Alabama and Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia.
The texts include everything from plans to fight the election results to surprising and unexpected reactions on January 6 from some of Trump's staunchest allies. At 2:28 p.m., Greene, the conservative firebrand who had helped to plan the congressional objections that day, texted Meadows with an urgent plea for help as the violence was unfolding at the Capitol.
"Mark I was just told there is an active shooter on the first floor of the Capitol Please tell the President to calm people This isn't the way to solve anything," Greene wrote. Meadows does not appear to reply.
More messages flooded in.
"Mark: he needs to stop this, now. Can I do anything to help?" Mick Mulvaney, Trump's former acting White House chief of staff, texted Meadows.
"It's really bad up here on the hill. They have breached the Capitol," Georgia Republican Rep. Barry Loudermilk wrote.
"The president needs to stop this ASAP," texted GOP Rep. William Timmons of South Carolina.
"POTUS is engaging," Meadows sent in response to Loudermilk. "We are doing it," he texted to Timmons.
"Thanks. This doesn't help our cause," Loudermilk replied.
Shortly after, Donald Trump Jr. weighed in: "This his(sic) one you go to the mattresses on. They will try to fuck his entire legacy on this if it gets worse."
"TELL THEM TO GO HOME !!!" texted Trump's first chief of staff, Reince Priebus.
Heated rhetoric and conspiracy theories
The text messages CNN obtained begin on Election Day, November 3, 2020. Even before the election was called, Meadows was inundated with conspiracy theories about election fraud, strategies to challenge the results and pleas for Trump to keep fighting. The messages -- from GOP activists, donors, Republican members of Congress and state party officials -- appear to act as an echo chamber affirming Trump's false claims that the election was stolen. For months leading up to Election Day, Trump had claimed the only way he could lose was if the election was rigged.
Previously disclosed text messages showed that former Trump administration Energy Secretary Rick Perry and Trump's son, Donald Trump Jr., each texted Meadows on November 4 and 5 with ideas for overturning the election.
On November 7, hours before the election was called, Perry texted Meadows again: "We have the data driven program that can clearly show where the fraud was committed. This is the silver bullet."
While Perry has previously denied CNN reporting about his text messages to Meadows, CNN has confirmed it's his cell phone and he signed this text, "Rick Perry," including his number.
Other texts, however, include hints of doubt expressed by members of Trump's team and even Meadows himself about the veracity of conspiracy theories being spread by Trump's "kraken" team -- outside attorneys working for Trump that included Giuliani and Sidney Powell.
Some key congressional allies who worked with Trump's campaign initially in its efforts to overturn the election, such as Sen. Mike Lee of Utah and Rep. Chip Roy of Texas, ultimately soured on the approach as the January 6 congressional certification neared, CNN previously reported.
The texts also show how Trump allies were quick to deflect responsibility for the January 6 attack. Shortly after pro-Trump rioters breached the Capitol, one of his top aides began crafting a counter-narrative.
At 3:45 p.m., Trump campaign spokesman Jason Miller suggested to Meadows and Trump aide Dan Scavino that Trump should tweet: "Call me crazy, but ideas for two tweets from POTUS: 1) Bad apples, likely ANTIFA or other crazed leftists, infiltrated today s peaceful protest over the fraudulent vote count. Violence is never acceptable! MAGA supporters embrace our police and the rule of law and should leave the Capitol now! 2) The fake news media who encouraged this summer s violent and radical riots are now trying to blame peaceful and innocent MAGA supporters for violent actions. This isn't who we are! Our people should head home and let the criminals suffer the consequences!"
Trump's allies in Congress appeared to get the message. At 3:52 p.m., Greene told Meadows: "Mark we don't think these attackers are our people. We think they are Antifa. Dressed like Trump supporters."
Five minutes later, Rep. Louie Gohmert, a Texas Republican, texted Meadows: "Cap Police told me last night they'd been warned that today there'd be a lot of Antifa dressed in red Trump shirts & hats & would likely get violent."
In the 16 months since January 6, hundreds of indictments have shown nearly all of those who breached the Capitol were in fact pro-Trump supporters.
While Greene was alarmed on January 6, by the next day she was apologizing that the efforts to block Biden's certification had failed.
"Yesterday was a terrible day. We tried everything we could in our objection to the 6 states. I'm sorry nothing worked. I don't think that President Trump caused the attack on the Capitol. It's not his fault," she wrote the morning of January 7. "Absolutely no excuse and I fully denounce all of it, but after shut downs all year and a stolen election, people are saying that they have no other choice."
Meadows replied, "Thanks Marjorie."
Greene is currently facing a legal challenge to disqualify her from running for Congress because of her alleged role in January 6. In court testimony Friday, the Georgia Republican repeatedly deflected or said she didn't remember what she had said around the events of January 6. The Meadows text logs offer a new glimpse into what she was telling the White House chief of staff in real time.
On December 31, Greene reached out to Meadows for advice about how to prepare for objections to certifying the election on January 6.
"Good morning Mark, I'm here in DC. We have to get organized for the 6th," Greene wrote. "I would like to meet with Rudy Giuliani again. We didn't get to speak with him long. Also anyone who can help. We are getting a lot of members on board. And we need to lay out the best case for each state."
Meadows does not appear to respond.
By January 17, Greene was suggesting ways to keep Trump in office, telling Meadows there were several Republicans in Congress who still wanted the then-President to declare martial law, which had been raised in a heated Oval Office meeting a month earlier.
Greene texted: "In our private chat with only Members, several are saying the only way to save our Republic is for Trump to call for Marshall (sic) law. I don't know on those things. I just wanted you to tell him. They stole this election. We all know. They will destroy our country next. Please tell him to declassify as much as possible so we can go after Biden and anyone else!"
Again, Meadows does not appear to respond.
What Meadows turned over
Meadows provided the cache of 2,319 messages to the January 6 committee in December 2021. But soon after, he stopped cooperating and refused to appear for a deposition. Ultimately, the House voted to hold the former White House chief of staff in contempt of Congress. The Justice Department has not yet announced whether it will charge Meadows.
Meadows has sued the House committee in an attempt to block the congressional subpoenas. And in a late-night court filing on Friday, the committee responded with new details revealing Meadows was warned ahead of time that January 6 could turn violent, according to testimony from Cassidy Hutchison, one of Meadows' former White House aides.
In addition, the committee released text messages Meadows exchanged with Republican members of Congress, including texts with Rep. Scott Perry of Pennsylvania about a scheme to replace Justice Department leaders who opposed Trump's claims of election fraud.
In late December, Perry reached out to Meadows, connecting him to then-DOJ official Jeffrey Clark, who was pushing unfounded claims of voter fraud inside the Justice Department. Trump was considering firing the acting attorney general and installing Clark instead. Clark invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination more than 100 times when he spoke to the January 6 committee in February.
On December 26, Perry texted Meadows, "Mark, just checking in as time continues to count down. 11 days to 1/6 and 25 days to inauguration. We gotta get going!"
"Mark, you should call Jeff," he continued. "I just got off the phone with him and he explained to me why the principal deputy won't work especially with the FBI. They will view it as as (sic) not having the authority to enforce what needs to be done."
"I got it," Meadows responded. "I think I understand. Let me work on the deputy position."
On December 28, Perry reached out again: "Did you call Jeff Clark?" Meadows does not appear to respond.
Meadows withheld more than 1,000 messages from the committee on claims of privilege, the panel said in Friday's court filing. In his lawsuit, Meadows' attorney argued the former White House chief of staff "has been put in the untenable position of choosing between conflicting privilege claims."
Hannity to Meadows: 'Yes sir'
In addition to the texts the committee has released, CNN and other news organizations have previously published selections of text messages Meadows received from Lee, Roy, Trump Jr., Perry and Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas' wife, Ginni Thomas.
The logs obtained by CNN include numerous messages from official White House cell phone numbers. Some have been identified by CNN, others are unknown.
There are also numerous group texts with Trump's inner circle. The various group chats include Meadows, Ivanka Trump, Trump Jr. and Kushner, as well as top advisers such as Hope Hicks, campaign manager Bill Stepien, Miller and Scavino, among others.
Some texts only include links to news reports and social media. Others appear to contain content that was cut-and-pasted and forwarded. The logs do not contain images or attachments.
Meadows' messages also include dozens of exchanges with Fox hosts, as well as journalists from the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Associated Press, Politico, Bloomberg, NBC, ABC, CBS and CNN.
Among Meadows' most frequent interactions were those with Fox's Sean Hannity, a well-known friend of Trump. Throughout the logs, Hannity both gives advice and asks for direction.
On the afternoon of Election Day, Hannity texted Meadows to ask about turnout in North Carolina.
Meadows responded: "Stress every vote matters. Get out and vote."
"Yes sir," Hannity replied. "On it. Any place in particular we need a push."
"Pennsylvania. NC AZ," Meadows wrote. "Nevada."
"Got it. Everywhere," Hannity said.
For the most part, Meadows' texts are short, and frequently he does not appear to reply at all. Some conversations include non sequiturs. It's unclear whether Meadows did not respond to the messages or if the logs are incomplete, because texts could also have been deleted or withheld for claims of privilege.
CNN reached out for comment to all individuals who sent text messages quoted in this story. Meadows and his attorney did not respond to requests for comment. A spokesman for the January 6 committee declined to comment.
The fight to 'stop the steal'
The text messages provide a timeline showing how Trump's team searched all corners for evidence of election fraud and tried to overturn the election. Beginning on Election Day, Meadows was in the middle of it all, from connecting activists pushing conspiracy theories to strategizing with GOP lawmakers and rally organizers preparing for January 6.
The texts also show Meadows was dealing with everything from mediating a fight over who would be on the speaker's list for the January 6 rally to fielding requests to pay Giuliani's bills.
"Sir, we are airborne on the way to Michigan from Arizona. We're going to need a hotel for the team and two vehicles to pick us up," Bernie Kerik, a Giuliani associate, texted Meadows on December 1.
Reached for comment by CNN, Kerik confirmed the text was his and said that he never received a credit card for those travel expenses, paid for it himself and was later reimbursed.
Other texts show Meadows coordinating with GOP activists in the immediate aftermath of the election.
"Pls get 4 or 5 killers in remaining counts. Need outsiders who will torch the place. Local folks won't do it. Lawyers and operators. Get us in these states," American Conservative Union chairman Matt Schlapp texted Meadows on November 4.
"I may need to get you and mercy (sic) to go to PA," Meadows responded, referring to Schlapp's wife, Mercedes, who is a former Trump White House aide.
On a few occasions, Trump family members weighed in. Ivanka Trump sent a note on November 5 to a group that included Kushner, Hicks, Stepien, Miller and Meadows: "You are all WARRIORS of epic proportions! Keep the faith and the fight."
Dozens of Republicans also offered support and advice to Meadows -- as well as perpetuated conspiracy theories that were gaining traction in right-wing media.
For instance, Rep. Ted Budd, a North Carolina Republican now running for Senate, suggested in a text on November 7 that Dominion Voting Systems could be connected to George Soros' company. Dominion has no corporate ties to Soros, a billionaire and frequent target of baseless conspiracy theories, according to a CNN fact check.
On November 6, Rep. Andy Biggs, an Arizona Republican, appeared to suggest that state legislatures should appoint electors "in the various states where there's been shenanigans," a move he acknowledged would be "highly controversial." In his text, he wrote the legislatures could appoint "a look doors," which is phonetically similar to electors.
On December 1, then-Attorney General William Barr infuriated Trump when he publicly stated that the Justice Department did not find widespread evidence of voter fraud. Nevertheless, Meadows received multiple texts pushing back, including from Schlapp later that day: "Happy to walk ag through our evidence. Its (sic) overwhelming."
The texts also show Meadows reached out to GOP officials in multiple states to lobby for Trump's cause. On two occasions, Meadows attempted to contact Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, who was under attack from Trump for certifying Georgia's election for Biden.
"mr Secretary. Can you call the White House switchboard," Meadows wrote on December 5. "Your voicemail is full."
Raffensperger does not appear to reply to the messages.
Trump's efforts to overturn the election results in Georgia are under investigation by a district attorney in the Atlanta area.
Meadows also received text messages from GOP activists and local officials making outlandish claims, including allegations that "traitors inside our intel agencies" were committing election fraud, as well as baseless charges that voting equipment companies Dominion and Smartmatic had manipulated votes -- the same false claims being pushed by Giuliani and Powell.
Both companies have filed billion-dollar lawsuits over the false election claims, including against Fox News, right-wing media organizations, Giuliani, Powell and Lindell.
Throughout the two months, Meadows received dozens of messages from Arizona GOP Chairwoman Kelli Ward, who offered what she claimed were examples and sources of voter fraud.
On December 9, she sent a text to Meadows letting him know she'd already reached out to Trump's executive assistant: "This guy says he's cracked the whole election fraud and wants to speak to someone. I sent his info to Molly Michael a few days ago, but I'm not sure it went anywhere."
"I will call him," Meadows responded.
Another frequent texter was Lindell, one of the most vocal proponents of baseless election conspiracy theories. Even after courts had dismissed dozens of Trump's legal challenges, the My Pillow CEO was still pressing the White House.
"Everything Sidney has said is true! We have to get the machines and everything we already have proves the President won by millions of votes!" Lindell texted Meadows on December 20. "This is the biggest cover up of one of the worst crimes in history! I have spent over a million$ to help uncover this fraud and used my platform so people can get the word not to give up!"
Meadows replied, "Thanks brother. Pray for a miracle."
Reached for comment by CNN, Lindell confirmed the text was his. He told CNN that he has not spoken to Meadows since before January 20, 2021, and that at the time he was "just trying to get an appointment with the President."
Doubts about election fraud
While Trump and his allies publicly stuck by their claims that the election had been stolen, behind the scenes, Trump's inner circle -- including Meadows -- expressed some doubts. Trump's aides also questioned whether lawyers like Giuliani and Powell were doing more harm than good.
On November 6, Miller, Trump's campaign spokesman, texted a group, which included Ivanka Trump, Kushner, Hicks, Stepien, Scavino and Meadows, suggesting that the numbers in Philadelphia didn't back up claims about alleged election fraud there.
"One other key data point: In 2016, POTUS received 15.5% of the vote in Philadelphia County. Today he is currently at 18.3%. So he increased from his performance in 2016. In 2016, Philadelphia County made up 11.3% of the total vote in the state. As it currently stands, Philadelphia County only makes up 10.2% of the statewide vote tally. So POTUS performed better in a smaller share. Sen. (Rick) Santorum was just making this point on CNN - cuts hard against the urban vote stealing narrative," Miller wrote.
A week later, Miller wrote to Meadows again, this time saying that campaign research did not find any evidence of a conspiracy involving Soros, the Democratic donor. Miller also said he was concerned about sharing the findings with Trump.
"Lots there re: functionality problems, not much there on Dem/Soros conspiracy connections," Miller wrote on November 13. "Will defer to you on whether or not to share full report with POTUS. POTUS is clearly hyped up on them, not just from his tweets, but he also called me and Justin separately last night to complain. JM."
On November 20, Meadows was asked by a Florida contact how confident he was about fraud related to Dominion. Meadows texted back: "Dominion, not that confident. Other fraud. Very confident."
Two days later, Ginni Thomas messaged Meadows with apparent concerns, asking, "Trying to understand the Sidney Powell distancing..."
Meadows responded: "She doesn't have anything or at least she won't share it if she does."
"Wow!" Ginni Thomas wrote back.
In one of the few messages Meadows received from Kushner, Trump's son-in-law shared a fact check on December 4 debunking one of the most prominent election fraud claims from Georgia. The article showed that despite inflammatory claims of poll workers stashing suitcases filled with ballots under a table, that did not, in fact, occur.
'Hoping the VP sticks with us'
After the Electoral College affirmed Biden's win on December 14, Trump's allies turned their attention to January 6: the congressional certification of the electors and the rally that Trump said on Twitter "will be wild!"
On December 21, Brooks, the Alabama congressman, wrote to Meadows and others in a group text asking whether he should engage with the media about the "formulation of our January 6 strategies."
"Does the White House want me to reply or be mum?" Brooks wrote. A staunch Trump ally running for Senate this year, Brooks gave an incendiary speech on January 6 but recently fell out of favor with Trump after suggesting Republicans should move on from 2020.
In response to CNN's request for comment, Brooks said he had "no regrets" about his speech on January 6 and that he was "shocked" by the violence. "I had no inkling," Brooks added.
Cruz, a Texas Republican who pushed a plan inside the Senate that would have delayed certification of the election, exchanged just a few messages with Meadows -- links to his statements posted to social media.
On January 2, the senator sent Meadows his tweet proposing a 10-day audit of the election results.
"Here's the statement," Cruz wrote.
"Perfect," Meadows responded.
The texts also make frequent reference to then-Vice President Mike Pence, who refused to go along with Trump's plan to try to block the certification on January 6. On December 30, Rep. Brian Babin of Texas expressed concern that congressional leaders might try to short circuit their objections -- and that Pence was not on board.
"Dems and some Republicans may well try to shortstop our objection efforts. Hoping the VP sticks with us," Babin wrote.
On New Year's Eve, Miller shared a news article with Meadows that Pence opposed a lawsuit intended to help overturn the election. Miller warned that it could be used "to drive a massive wedge between POTUS and everybody else in the party."
"He's absolutely going to blow his stack on this if he isn't already aware," Miller said of Trump. "Oh boy I don't understand what the VP was thinking here."
On January 5, Jordan, the Ohio congressman and close GOP ally of Meadows, weighed in.
"On January 6, 2021, Vice President Mike Pence, as President of the Senate, should call out all electoral votes that he believes are unconstitutional as no electoral votes at all -- in accordance with guidance from founding father Alexander Hamilton and judicial precedence," Jordan wrote.
Meadows responded the morning of January 6: "I have pushed for this. Not sure it is going to happen."
The January 6 committee included the text exchange in its Friday court filing as evidence of Meadows' alleged involvement in the effort to overturn the election.
The logs also show Meadows was involved with planning the rally on January 6, helping to mediate a fight over the speakers list. Trump adviser Katrina Pierson was alarmed at some of the proposed fringe figures who wanted to speak.
On January 2 and 3, Pierson wrote to Meadows looking for help.
"Good afternoon, would you mind giving me a call re: this Jan 6th event. Things have gotten crazy and I desperately need some direction. Please," she asked on January 2.
The next day, she reached out again: "Scratch that, Caroline Wren has decided to move forward with the original psycho list. Apparently Dan Scavino approved??"
She continued: "So, I'm done. I can't be a part of embarrassing POTUS any further."
Wren was a fundraiser for the Trump campaign and helped organize the January 6 rally. She has been subpoenaed by the January 6 committee.
Less than an hour later, Pierson wrote Meadows that she told Wren she was talking to the White House in order to get her to back down.
"I let her know that I was going to reach out to WH and her tone changed," Pierson wrote. "So, I'll continue to build a proper event."
"Thank you," Meadows responded.
'As bad as this can get'
In the aftermath of the violence at the Capitol on January 6, Trump's inner circle discussed in a group text how to deal with the fallout -- and Trump's suspension from Twitter. At 10:10 p.m. on January 6, Kushner texted the group: "Why don't we post on his Facebook page since he isn't locked out there."
In the final days of Trump's term, as he faced impeachment for a second time, Meadows received words of encouragement from staunch allies, as well as caution from advisers.
"I would like to pass to POTUS that we are still with him, I believe in him and I want to encourage him," Rep. Andrew Clyde, a freshman Georgia Republican, wrote on January 9. "I truly hope he does create a new platform to complete (sic) with Twitter and I hope he calls it 'Trumpet' and then we can send out 'notes' to each other!"
"I will share it with him. Thanks Andrew," Meadows responded.
On January 13, the day the House voted to impeach Trump for inciting the insurrection at the Capitol -- with 10 Republicans joining Democrats -- Miller shared polling data in a group text with Meadows, Scavino and Kushner that showed "2/3 of the MAGA base wants us to move on."
"I tried to walk the President through this earlier but he won't have any of it," Miller said.
As Trump prepared to leave power, he appeared to be a pariah in the Republican Party. House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy had said during the House's January 13 impeachment debate that the outgoing President "bears responsibility" for the riot. Six days later, on January 19, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell denounced Trump from the floor of the Senate, saying the mob that attacked the Capitol was "provoked by the President and other powerful people."
Nevertheless, Trump's standing in the Republican Party quickly recovered, especially after McCarthy's January 28 visit to Mar-a-Lago and the February 2021 acquittal of Trump in the Senate impeachment trial.
But before Trump left office, the Meadows text logs show some of Trump's staunchest allies were dejected. On January 19, in one of the final texts Meadows received as chief of staff, Fox's Sean Hannity shared a video of McConnell's floor speech.
Hannity texted Meadows: "Well this is as bad as this can get." | https://www.wpsdlocal6.com/news/cnn-exclusive-mark-meadows-2-319-text-messages-reveal-trumps-inner-circle-communications-before-and/article_0aa7f7f8-c4b4-11ec-9cf0-cbffa64fffcb.html | 2022-04-25T17:56:44Z | https://www.wpsdlocal6.com/news/cnn-exclusive-mark-meadows-2-319-text-messages-reveal-trumps-inner-circle-communications-before-and/article_0aa7f7f8-c4b4-11ec-9cf0-cbffa64fffcb.html | false | 12 |
ELOY, Ariz. (KNXV) — A Red Bull plane spun out of control and crashed after an attempted stunt near Eloy, Arizona Sunday evening.
According to the Red Bull website, the pilots were to take the aircrafts up to 14,000 feet, put them in a vertical dive, jump out of the planes in mid-air and attempt to switch planes.
The stunt appeared to be going well when both men jumped out of their planes. Moments later, however, one of the planes began to nosedive.
The Federal Aviation Administration says one of the pilots was able to get back into one of the aircrafts and safely land. The other pilot was able to land safely using his parachute.
One of the pilots told USA TODAY that he was happy that everyone was safe but disappointed in the outcome.
The event was being streamed live on Hulu.
This story was originally reported by Kasey Brammell on ABC15.com. | https://www.kgun9.com/news/national/red-bull-plane-crashes-after-attempted-stunt-in-arizona | 2022-04-25T18:01:01Z | https://www.kgun9.com/news/national/red-bull-plane-crashes-after-attempted-stunt-in-arizona | true | null |
Sport
Chelsea vs Liverpool: England ex-star, Peter Crouch reveals why he owes Mikel Obi an apology
Former England striker, Peter Crouch, has admitted that he owes former Chelsea midfielder, John Mikel Obi, an apology for a terrible tackle he made on the former Super Eagles captain.
Crouch said his tackle on Mikel during Chelsea’s Carling Cup (Carabao Cup) tie with Liverpool over fourteen years ago, although difficult to accept at the time, felt like “three red cards” when he saw it again.
Speaking on BBC 5 Live Sports podcast, Crouch assessed the situation and said it’s a good time to say sorry to Mikel.
He said, “The worst tackle I ever did was on Obi Mikel. Liverpool against Chelsea in the Carling Cup.
“The whole game, I have been receiving balls and he’s been basically told to mark in front of me. So the centre-half is behind me, and him and, here.
“And he’s basically standing all over my toes and I am trying to chest things away and he is putting his head in my face and his elbows around me all game.
“I have been telling the ref all game, all game, all game and I’m getting nothing. We are about 70 minutes in now and it’s been going on all game.
“And it’s happened again and the ball has broken off and another one of these elbows and things he’s done to me – the ball’s broken there just posted perfectly and he’s facing the stand and obviously I have switched, lost the plot and tried to take him out basically.
“But I am not proud of this, if he’s listening to this, which I think in no way he will be John Obi Mikel, I will apologise because the red mist was that… It was like an out-of-body experience.
“After the game, I thought he would dive! Afterward I got back, and I thought I would have a look back at that tackle. I had a look and I thought, oh no! (laughs). That’s, in fact, three red cards!
“What on earth was I thinking? It’s just something that I can’t explain. He would be winding up the entire game and now I just completely lost it.” | https://dailypost.ng/2022/04/25/chelsea-vs-liverpool-england-ex-star-peter-crouch-reveals-why-he-owes-mikel-obi-an-apology/ | 2022-04-25T18:02:45Z | https://dailypost.ng/2022/04/25/chelsea-vs-liverpool-england-ex-star-peter-crouch-reveals-why-he-owes-mikel-obi-an-apology/ | true | 1 |
Tanzanian singer Diamond Platnumz has been subjected to a major setback after his YouTube with over 6 million subscribers got deactivated by the YouTube management.
Diamond's channel with over 6 million subscribers deleted, statement issued
Diamond’s YouTube channel has been deleted days after it was hacked by Bitcoin Scammers
The deactivation of Chibu Dangote’s channel comes two days after it was hacked by Bitcoin scammers - it's name changed to Tesla Live, before his IT team restored it back to normalcy.
A statement issued by WCB Wasafi’s head of digital department Kim Kayndo, details that Platnumz’s channel was deactivated after hackers violated YouTube community guidelines when they were in control of the channel.
“Kutokana na channel ya Diamond Platnumz kudukuliwa jumapili iliyopita na wadukuzi kuingia live.
“Leo imezuiliwa na YouTube kutoka na maudhui yale kuvunja sharia za YouTube. Tumeshafanya mawasiliano ya awali kutatua tatizo hili. Tuendelee kuwa wavumilivu kila kitu kitakuwa sawa.
(Following the hacking of Diamond Platnumz channel on Sunday, and the hackers going. live. Today, it has been deactivated by YouTube management after the hackers violated YouTube guidelines. We are already in communication with YouTube to resolve the issue. Let’s be patient everything will be okay),” said Kim Kayndo head of Digital Department at WCB Wasafi.
On Sunday, Kim announced to the public that they had managed to regain access of Chibu Dangote’s channel after it was hacked by bitcoin scammers.
“Usiku wa Kuamkia leo channel za wasanii wetu Diamond Platnumz na Mbosso zilikuwa hacked na Bitcoin scammers. Tumefanikiwa kuzirudisha salama na poleni kwa wote mliokutana na tatizo hili. Tuendeelea kuwasiliana na YouTube creators kwa msaada Zaidi,” Kim said on Sunday.
The wonder hit-maker owns the YouTube channel with the most YouTube subscribers in the whole of Sub-Saharan Africa.
He joined the streaming platform on June 12, 2011 and so far had garnered over 1.6 billion views and counting.
“@diamondplatnumz 🦁 💎 Finally Hits 6 Million Subscribers On YouTube. Thank You Each & Everyone Who Supported Us 🙏🙏🙏🙏 And We Promise You Great Things To Come ❤️❤️❤️💯💯💯💯💯 #WCB4LIFE #SWAHILINATION #SIMBA,” reads a post from WCB Wasafi.
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Email: news@pulselive.co.ke | https://www.pulselive.co.ke/entertainment/celebrities/diamond-platnumzs-youtube-channel-with-over-6-million-subscribers-deleted/vb29jhm | 2022-04-25T18:02:49Z | https://www.pulselive.co.ke/entertainment/celebrities/diamond-platnumzs-youtube-channel-with-over-6-million-subscribers-deleted/vb29jhm | true | 2 |
A new Olympic cycle often means a new era in U.S. swimming. A man from Suriname is at the front of it, now coaching the top three Americans from the Tokyo Games.
Anthony Nesty, the only Olympic medalist from the smallest nation in South America, makes it clear that he’s not the only one coaching Katie Ledecky, Caeleb Dressel and Bobby Finke. Nesty couldn’t lead both the University of Florida men’s and women’s teams and the most accomplished pros in the country without help, a lot of it.
But his story — both to becoming an Olympic champion and becoming a coach of three gold medalists — is remarkable. This week is his first major meet at this helm, the world championships trials in Greensboro, N.C.
Coaching stars carries a sense of obligation, said Gregg Troy, who guided Ryan Lochte and Dressel and, for two decades, had Nesty on his UF coaching staff.
“I was always very good as an athlete performing under pressure, as a coach performing under pressure,” Nesty said. “Do I feel it? Of course, but it’s not something I dwell on.”
U.S. SWIMMING TRIALS: Broadcast Schedule | Races to Watch | Missing Stars
In a span of four months last year, Nesty became a coach of three individual Olympic gold medalists. It began on the morning of July 29.
Bobby Finke, then a rising senior for Nesty’s Gators, went from fourth at 750 meters to win the 800m freestyle, becoming the first U.S. man to win an Olympic distance event since 1984. Finke came from nowhere in the pool and on paper, going into the Games with a personal best five seconds slower than the favorites and ranked ninth in the world for the year.
Finke, finding the energy to walk along the pool deck after the effort, reached Nesty, whom he had known since age 14. Nesty gave him a bear hug and said how proud he was.
Though Nesty has patrolled the deck at UF since 1998, Finke is his first gold medalist as a head coach. Nesty ascended in 2018 after Troy’s retirement.
So it made sense that Finke saw Nesty cry for the first time that morning in Tokyo. Nesty didn’t even shed a tear when he won Olympic gold in 1988 in Seoul.
“The first thing, I wanted to show him the medal,” Finke said of seeing the coach again minutes later after the victory ceremony. “He had my sisters on the phone already.”
Finke, like older sister Autumn, was recruited to UF by Nesty. He remembers hearing that deep voice for the first time, when Finke nervously called Nesty as a high school sophomore or junior looking for a college home. He remembers shaking Nesty’s had for the first time at a dinner before Autumn’s Senior Day in Gainesville.
“He’s part of my family,” Finke said.
Finke won the 1500m free with another late charge on the final day of pool swimming at the Games. A month later, Finke and Kieran Smith, another Nesty Gator who won 400m free bronze in Tokyo, were sitting inside Spurrier’s Gridiron Grill in Gainesville, having dinner with Ledecky.
Ledecky, after two golds and two silvers, was in the market for a new training base, looking to leave her college setup in Stanford for a place closer to her East Coast roots. She asked about Nesty, whom she got to know a little bit at a pre-Olympic training camp in Hawaii.
“I believe I told her he’s pretty much the reason why I came to Florida,” Finke said.
When Ledecky and Nesty spoke, the coach made it clear that he wasn’t going to try and woo her. Soon after, Ledecky announced she was moving to Gainesville. She had incredible success with three different coaches at the last three Olympics. Nesty is her first coach who also swam at an Olympics.
“He kind of knows the mental aspect of swimmers and what they go through,” said Ledecky, who like Nesty noted the group effort of having four or five coaches on staff available to help. “He’s also a really great coach and has proven himself to be a really great coach. So he kind of has this quiet confidence about the program, but he also brings so much energy to the pool deck.”
Then in November, Dressel announced he was staying in Gainesville but switching from Troy’s pro group to Nesty and Steve Jungbluth, the UF men’s associate head coach. Dressel said he was the only member of Troy’s group who was still swimming after Tokyo. Troy said he had a lack pool access in the area. So the move made sense.
In a span of four months, Nesty became a coach of three swimmers who combined to own at least one gold medal in every freestyle event from 50 meters through 1,500 meters. The University of Florida became the University of Freestyle, which is funny because Nesty’s gold medal came in the butterfly.
In 1988, Sports Illustrated did not pick Nesty to win a medal at the Seoul Games, though he was certainly in the mix.
He finished fifth in the 1986 World Championships 100m butterfly at age 18, then went .64 of a second faster to win the 1987 Pan American Games in a time that would have placed second at the more prestigious 1987 Pan Pacific Games and third at the 1987 European Championships.
Nesty, who graduated from The Bolles School in Jacksonville, Florida, in 1987 (Dressel later swam for the Bolles club team), did not swim collegiately as a University of Florida freshman in 1987-88. He didn’t score high enough on his college entrance exams to be eligible under Proposition 48 rules at the time. So he focused on Olympic prep.
“When you’ve spoken Dutch all your life, it’s pretty hard to pass that exam,” Nesty, who moved to the U.S. in 1985, said before the 1988 Games.
The training paid off on Sept. 21, 1988. Nesty overtook American Matt Biondi on his final stroke to win 100m fly gold by one hundredth of a second, ultimately denying Biondi what would have been a sixth gold medal in Seoul. Video is here.
“Can’t believe it,” Nesty, who became the first Black swimmer to win an Olympic gold medal, said on the NBC broadcast.
Twenty years later, Michael Phelps edged Serbian Milorad Cavic by one hundredth in the Olympic 100m fly final in similar fashion: Biondi and Cavic, both Cal bears, both glided into the wall rather than take an extra half-stroke.
Nesty didn’t always gravitate to the fame, which included a national victory ceremony that reportedly drew 60,000 of the nation’s 370,000 people, his own stamp and coin and, 20 years later, the honor of carrying the flag into the Opening Ceremony. Rarely is a retired athlete a flag bearer.
He didn’t always latch onto the sport, either. In 1982, he told his father, Ron, that he didn’t want to swim anymore. His dad made him a deal: enter the annual 10 1/2-mile race in the Suriname River. If you don’t finish top three, you can quit. Nesty resolved and won it.
Later, Ron learned about Troy and Bolles in a swimming publication, wrote the coach a letter, and eventually sent his son to the boarding school. That began a three-decade relationship with Troy. After finishing his swim career and graduating from UF in 1994, Nesty joined Troy’s staff at Bolles, then followed Troy to UF in the late 1990s.
“He’s seen it all levels, everything from a boys club working in an average facility to working with a big club program that had all the ages involved, and so many coaches don’t have that full experience,” Troy said. “He’s seen some different styles and ways to do things, which has allowed him to put those things together to have his own style.”
Like any coach, Nesty has his trademarks. He wears a bracelet with the names Master Sgt. William R. Posch, Capt. Mark Weber and Staff Sgt. Carl Enis, airmen who were killed in 2018 when a helicopter crashed in western Iraq.
Twice, Nesty was part of coaching staffs that took Gators swimmers to Patrick Air Force Base in Central Florida for an abbreviated version of a boot camp. Enis was the pararescue jumper who guided the swimmers at a 2014 visit.
Finke said that Nesty regularly shares quotes before meets from 1600s Japanese swordsman and philosopher Miyamoto Musashi.
For Finke, the most memorable one came before the Tokyo Games: “There is nothing outside of yourself that can ever enable you to get better, stronger, richer, quicker, or smarter. Everything is within. Everything exists.”
Nesty attributes his success, both as a swimmer and as a teacher of swimmers, to the coaches around him.
“Hard work,” he said, “and a little bit of luck.”
NBC Olympic research contributed to this report.
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Follow @nzaccardi | https://olympics.nbcsports.com/2022/04/25/anthony-nesty-swimming-coach/ | 2022-04-25T18:02:57Z | https://olympics.nbcsports.com/2022/04/25/anthony-nesty-swimming-coach/ | true | 1 |
Judge finds Trump in contempt in legal fight with NY AG
By LARRY NEUMEISTER
Associated Press
NEW YORK (AP) — A New York judge has found former President Donald Trump in contempt of court for failing to adequately respond to a subpoena issued by the state’s attorney general as part of a civil investigation into his business dealings. Judge Arthur Engoron on Monday ordered Trump to pay a fine of $10,000 per day. New York Attorney General Letitia James, a Democrat, had asked the court to hold Trump in contempt after he missed a March 31 court-imposed deadline to turn over documents. Trump, a Republican, has been fighting James in court over her investigation, which he has called a politically motivated “witch hunt.” Trump spokespeople did not immediately respond to a request for comment. | https://kion546.com/news/ap-national-news/2022/04/25/judge-finds-trump-in-contempt-in-legal-fight-with-ny-ag/ | 2022-04-25T18:03:59Z | https://kion546.com/news/ap-national-news/2022/04/25/judge-finds-trump-in-contempt-in-legal-fight-with-ny-ag/ | false | null |
Emily Andre says she doesn't 'make a big deal' of being naked when she is around her children so that she can inspire body confidence in them. Emily, who is married to the famous singer Peter, says she aims not to be "critical" about her body shape in front of her two young children, the Mirror reported.
Writing in a column for OK! Magazine, Emily says she doesn't consider it a problem if her children walk in and see her when she is getting dressed. And she added that she moderates her own body self criticism in front of them as she doesn't want Theo, 5, and Amelia, 8, to grow up worrying about how they look.
Emily wrote: "On Loose Women last week, the panellists were discussing when the right time is to stop being naked in front of your children. Frankie Bridge admitted that she and her husband Wayne are “quite a naked family” and said she wouldn’t cover up unless her sons expressed that they were uncomfortable.
Read more: Emily Andre plans nude surprise for husband Peter's upcoming birthday
"I don’t think there is a set age or time and I think it depends on what you’re comfortable with and what they’re comfortable with. I don’t make a show of parading around naked – and it’s not like I do the housework with no clothes on – but if the kids happen to be around when I’m getting changed I don’t make a big deal out of it.
"I also think immediately covering up would draw more attention to it than there needs to be. But we have had conversations with the kids about who can and can’t see each other with no clothes on so they know that it’s only me and Daddy.
"The other thing I have been very conscious of since they were young is not being critical about my shape in front of them as I want them to be body confident as they grow up."
You can read Emily Andre's OK Magazine column here. | https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/celebs-tv/emily-andre-doesnt-make-big-6997467 | 2022-04-25T18:04:47Z | https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/celebs-tv/emily-andre-doesnt-make-big-6997467 | false | 1 |
NEW HAVEN, Conn. (Project Syndicate)—The predictable downward revision cycle for the global economic outlook has officially begun. That’s the message from the semiannual World Economic Outlook just released by the International Monetary Fund, which reinforces earlier revisions from several prominent private forecasting teams.
“ While the Fed is now talking tough, talk is cheap.”
The revision, largely in response to the war in Ukraine, is a big one—a sharp reduction in world economic growth to 3.6% for 2022, fully 1.3 percentage points below the IMF’s global growth forecast of 4.9% made just six months earlier. To its credit, the IMF warned that this was coming, with an interim downward revision of 0.5 percentage point previously released in January. Even so, in looking back over the past 15 years, this is the third-largest cut in the IMF’s regular six-month revision cycle.
News: War in Ukraine will lead to a significant slowdown in global economy, IMF says
In April 2009, as the global financial crisis (GFC) was unfolding, the IMF cut its global growth estimate for the year by 4.3 percentage points (taking its precrisis projection of 3% positive growth down to an outright contraction of -1.3%). And, of course, as the COVID-19 pandemic erupted in early 2020, the IMF slashed its growth estimate for the year by 6.4 percentage points (from a pre-pandemic projection of +3.4% to an outright contraction of -3%). In both of those earlier cases, the outsize forecast reductions foretold sharp global recessions—in fact, the two worst recessions in modern history.
Perfect soft landing
Yet neither the IMF nor most other forecasters believe that the current shortfall in global growth will push the world into outright recession.
The latest World Economic Outlook calls for a perfect soft landing in the $96 trillion global economy. Following the recent downward revision, global growth is now expected to settle comfortably into a 3.6% growth trajectory over 2022-23, which is fractionally above the 3.4% average since 1980. Landings don’t get much smoother than that.
“Global resilience without a more vigorous Chinese economy is highly unlikely. ”
But that could well be wishful thinking, for several reasons.
For starters, forecasters were overly optimistic in extrapolating the sugar high of 2021 into the future. The 6.1% surge of global growth in 2021 was the sharpest rebound on record, according to IMF statistics dating back to 1980. But this followed the steepest plunge on record, a -3.1% collapse in 2020. Just as COVID lockdowns brought the bulk of the global economy to a virtual standstill in early 2020, reopening, in conjunction with aggressive monetary and fiscal stimulus, produced the mother of all snapbacks.
Forecasters, as well as investors
SPX,
What about China?
A second reason to doubt buoyant forecasts is that the China cushion has been deflated. China’s economy is currently growing well below the nearly 8% pace recorded from 2010 to 2019.
The latest IMF outlook puts average Chinese growth in 2022-23 at 4.75%, only a little more than half the post-GFC trend when strong Chinese growth was literally the only thing that prevented the world from relapsing into recession over the 2012-16 period. As was the case back then, global resilience without a more vigorous Chinese economy is highly unlikely.
That’s the risk today. With China currently facing a trifecta of shocks—a new wave of COVID-19 lockdowns, the ongoing pressures of deleveraging (especially in its unstable property sector), and war-related collateral damage resulting from its ill-advised partnership with Russia—the world economy can no longer rely on China as a source of resilience. That, of course, cuts both ways. If China deepens its commitment to Russia, it will share in the isolation of its “unlimited partner.” For a Chinese economy that remains deeply reliant on the rest of the world, that could prove to be President Xi Jinping’s greatest challenge.
Third, the downshift in the global growth cycle is being accompanied by a major upswing in the global inflation and interest-rate cycles. The soft-landing crowd is dismissive of the consequences. As inflation surges to 40-year highs, there is loose talk of “peak inflation”—the fanciful idea that it is so bad now that it can only get better from here.
Inflation is destabilizing
This superficial arithmetic argument misses the point. With the U.S. consumer price index surging by 8.5% year-over-year in March, there is of course an excellent chance that this key barometer of inflation will be considerably lower by year-end. But how much lower? Low enough to rescue the Federal Reserve from its most irresponsible monetary-policy gambit since the mid-1970s and early 1980s?
Don’t count on it. While the Fed is now talking tough, talk is cheap. So far, it has delivered only 25 basis points, or just 10%, of the some 250 basis points of cumulative tightening that financial markets are expecting over the next six months. Even if the Fed moves as expected and boosts the federal-funds rate
FF00,
That means the real (inflation-adjusted) federal-funds rate will remain in negative territory throughout the year, marking a 38-month period of negative real policy rates—far more stimulus than in earlier periods of über-accommodation under Alan Greenspan, Ben Bernanke, and Janet Yellen.
Real interest rates matter in maintaining price stability and driving economic growth. When assessing risks to the global business cycle, the bottom line is that the upswing in real rates has much further to go.
All of this underscores the downside risks that are building in the global economy. As a recovering Wall Street forecaster, I empathize with the mind-set of most forecasting teams, including the IMF’s highly talented professionals, who believe that they have factored in most conceivable risks.
In this case, financial markets concur, convinced that an inflation-prone world, with still jaw-droppingly accommodative central banks, is somehow gliding gloriously toward a soft landing for the ages. But is this already-rosy scenario really supposed to play out without China? Dream on.
Stephen S. Roach, a faculty member at Yale University, is the author of “Unbalanced: The Codependency of America and China” (Yale University Press, 2014) and the forthcoming “Accidental Conflict: America, China, and the Clash of False Narratives” (Yale University Press, November 2022).
This commentary was published with permission of Project Syndicate—Downside Risks to Global Growth | https://www.marketwatch.com/story/a-soft-landing-is-highly-unlikely-for-global-economy-trying-to-fly-without-its-main-engine-of-growth-11650909013?rss=1&siteid=rss | 2022-04-25T18:06:44Z | https://www.marketwatch.com/story/a-soft-landing-is-highly-unlikely-for-global-economy-trying-to-fly-without-its-main-engine-of-growth-11650909013?rss=1&siteid=rss | true | 3 |
Shock and awe tactics may be needed to contain US inflation
The idea of a 75-basis-point Fed rate hike at one go isn’t outlandish
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The idea of a 75-basis-point Fed rate hike at one go isn’t outlandish
Rates markets crossed two significant thresholds this week. One is that traders for the first time see the US Federal Reserve raising its target interest rate by a half-percentage point in each of the next three meetings, in May, June and July, which would mark the biggest such increases since 2000. The other is that, for a brief moment, yields on benchmark Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities climbed back above zero.
Rates markets crossed two significant thresholds this week. One is that traders for the first time see the US Federal Reserve raising its target interest rate by a half-percentage point in each of the next three meetings, in May, June and July, which would mark the biggest such increases since 2000. The other is that, for a brief moment, yields on benchmark Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities climbed back above zero.
The fact that both moves came soon after Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis President James Bullard said he would not rule out the prospect of a 75-basis-point rate hike next month should not be lost on financial markets.
The fact that both moves came soon after Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis President James Bullard said he would not rule out the prospect of a 75-basis-point rate hike next month should not be lost on financial markets.
This is much more than an outlier call by a known hawk. Bullard has succeeded in floating trial balloons that then turn into commonly accepted wisdom. Not long after Bullard ’s comments, a succession of Fed speakers came out in favour of at least one or more half-percentage-point hikes, and on Thursday Chair Jerome Powell also put his weight behind an aggressive pace of tightening, saying that “50 basis points will be on the table for the May meeting."
It may not be enough just to tame inflation. Although policymakers have been successful in guiding markets toward their goal and then delivering, they have been less effective in lowering inflation expectations. Soon after Powell spoke, 10-year break-even rates, a measure of what the market expects the rate of inflation to be over the life of the securities, climbed above 3% to a record while an auction of inflation-protected securities drew strong demand. One gauge of inflation expectations favoured by the Fed rebounded to levels not seen since before the market started pricing in multiple rate increases. For the Fed to bring the inflation rate closer to its average 2% goal from 8.5%, it may need to do more than just guide the market and deliver a surprise.
To get a sense of how daunting a task the Fed faces, look no further than real yields, which strip out the effect of inflation. After being deeply negative for the past two years, yields on inflation-protected Treasuries just turned positive and reached the highest level since March 2020.
Even so, they remain stubbornly close to zero despite nominal yields rising to levels not seen since the Fed’s last rate-hike cycle ended at the end of 2018. As my Bloomberg News colleague Cameron Crise noted, 10-year real yields were at 1.07% back then, more than a percentage point above current levels.
Real yields are a key transmission mechanism for the US Federal Reserve in its bid to tighten financial conditions in the markets for equities and credit.
A move well above zero would help tighten conditions enough to restrain the US economy and, by extension, inflation. That’s what happened in 2018, with stocks dropping that December as the Fed’s rate-hiking cycle wound down.
Crucially though, 10-year Treasury yields peaked slightly above 3% during that period. For real yields to move significantly higher from their current levels, either 10-year yields—already near 3%—would have to rise much further or inflation expectations would have to drop substantially.
Complicating the situation is the American central bank’s bond-purchase programme, which has distorted and skewed the signals coming from the American debt market for the thinly-traded inflation-linked bonds, according to the Bank of International Settlements.
That is likely to continue as the Fed starts pulling out of the market this summer. Perhaps a better way to assess where real yields really are is to merely subtract core inflation from the nominal 10-year yield, as my Bloomberg Opinion colleague John Authers writes. That gets you back well below zero.
It is little wonder right now that traders are still relatively sanguine about the tightening of monetary policy ahead. Consumer sentiment in the US remains in fine shape and the housing market is proving resilient. Conditions in financial markets remain loose and not a serious threat to stocks, which are not far from their record highs, or credit, where a healthy stream of corporate bond deals on tap.
If anything, Bullard’s recent comments mentioned earlier suggest that the US Fed is finally coming around to the idea that if it wants to get inflation back under control, it needs to inflict some shock and awe upon financial markets and, quite possibly, the American economy as well, by tightening monetary policy more than markets expect—and sooner rather than later. In that sense, a 75-basis-point rate hike at one go in the Fed funds rate, which the Fed hasn’t done since 1994, is not as outlandish as it may seem.
Jenny Paris is executive editor at Bloomberg News for global bond, currency and emerging markets. | https://www.livemint.com/opinion/columns/shock-and-awe-tactics-may-be-needed-to-contain-us-inflation/amp-11650903796165.html | 2022-04-25T18:07:39Z | https://www.livemint.com/opinion/columns/shock-and-awe-tactics-may-be-needed-to-contain-us-inflation/amp-11650903796165.html | true | 3 |
Russia continued to bomb Mariupol’s last bastion of resistance at the Azovstal steel plant on Monday despite calling a ceasefire, as new video footage revealed the deep network of tunnels protecting Ukrainian troops and civilians.
Oleksiy Arestovych, a Ukrainian presidential aide, said that Russian troops had defied their leaders’ own orders by attacking the plant in the southern port city.
“The enemy continues to attack our defences in the area of the Azovstal plant, using aircraft, artillery… firing with tanks and trying to advance with assault groups, violating the order of their own supreme commander,” he said.
The assault came despite Moscow’s announcement of a ceasefire, which was supposedly called to allow civilians to leave the besieged plant. Russia has repeatedly been accused of violating ceasefires and forcibly deporting Ukrainian civilians to camps in Russia.
Iryna Vereshchuk, the Ukrainian deputy prime minister, wrote on the Telegram messaging app: “Today, the Russian side once again announced the existence of a corridor for civilians to leave Azovstal. This could be believed if the Russians had not destroyed humanitarian corridors many times before.
“It is important to understand that a humanitarian corridor opens by the agreement of both sides. A corridor announced unilaterally does not provide security, and therefore is not a humanitarian corridor.”
Ms Vereshchuk added that Ukraine had “appealed” to Antonio Guterres, the UN secretary general, “to be the initiator and guarantor of the humanitarian corridor from Azovstal for civilians”.
New video footage posted on social media has revealed how the tunnels beneath Azovstal are deep and meandering, making them an ideal location for defending against Russian invaders.
The clip, posted by the Visegrad 24 news website, was accompanied by eerie piano music as the camera moved around a series of maze-like corridors.
Civilians hiding beneath the plant face dire conditions. Recent videos from the tunnels appeared to show that babies were having to wear improvised nappies made from plastic bags.
Vladimir Putin recently issued a public order for his forces not to storm the plant, which suggests that he knew Russia would face severe military losses if it tried to do so. | https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2022/04/25/ukraine-mariupol-azovstal-steel-plant-tunnels-civilians-russia/ | 2022-04-25T18:07:50Z | https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2022/04/25/ukraine-mariupol-azovstal-steel-plant-tunnels-civilians-russia/ | true | 1 |
Archie Colgan is an undefeated professional mixed martial artist (MMA).
“From the outside, it's this brutal sport where these two grown men or women go into a cage and beat each other up," Colgan said. "But behind the scenes is a lot of discipline and respect and dedication to what you do and true passion.”
MMA is a sport that takes immense stamina and physical agility.
“You have to know how, obviously, to defend yourself. You have to know how to do this and back out to people too.”
He says those skills can carry over to real-life situations though they're rarely needed.
In March, professional UFC fighter Kevin Holland stopped a gunman who opened fire at a sushi restaurant in Houston.
“I realized that the shooter and another guy are fighting and the guy is trying to grab the gun from him but the guns facing in our direction," Holland said in an interview. "So I circle around the bar, I run over, I go to pick up a chair like I'm going to hit the guy. But as I get over there, you can't really tell who's the shooter and who's the guy wrestling for the gun. You need a closer look. So I take a closer look, I then realized who the shooter, no longer really need the chair, grabbed the gun with the guy”
As a trained fighter, Colgan says it makes sense Holland jumped into action.
“The situations that we're faced in with having to be locked in a cage with another person who wants to fight you, your brain is wired to react a little quicker in scary situations," Colgan said. "I do think, like, an MMA fighter would react better than somebody else who has not been in the situation where there's a real threat.”
That reason is why some police officers choose to get involved in mixed martial arts. Like Brett Titus, a 30-year law enforcement veteran.
“I just retired couple of years ago," Titus said. "Twenty-two of those years I spent on Denver's full-time SWAT team.”
Titus says his MMA training came in handy dozens of times while facing extremely dangerous situations on the job.
“If you're going to train in and get to the level of fighting in MMA, you've got to be in shape," Titus said. "And I think that's one of the biggest things that I see in law enforcement today is guys and gals are not keeping themselves in shape.”
He says the techniques you learn not only make it safer for the officer but also the suspect.
“If you're skilled enough and you have that confidence and you've trained it, you may be able to take that adversary, that suspect in custody without having to go to that lethal force level,” Titus said.
Although Holland isn’t a police officer, Titus says he was proud to see him use his MMA skills for good.
“A guy like that is that skilled felt compelled to do it," Titus said. "Of course, if you're going to get to that level where he's at in the mixed martial arts world, you're a warrior and warriors protect.”
However, Titus says that doesn’t mean anybody should do what he did, especially if lives aren’t at risk.
“It may be best just sometimes to just be a witness," Titus said. "But if it gets to that level of actually saving lives and protecting people and you are that skilled, then in my opinion, yeah, you have to do something.” | https://www.wsfltv.com/news/national/mixed-martial-artists-say-training-helps-them-face-dangerous-situations-in-real-life | 2022-04-25T18:08:45Z | https://www.wsfltv.com/news/national/mixed-martial-artists-say-training-helps-them-face-dangerous-situations-in-real-life | false | 13 |
Hours from the California coast, surfers are hoping one of the next spots where they can catch a wave is in the desert, where summer temperatures often soar above 100 degrees.
At least four large surf lagoons are proposed for the region around Palm Springs, which is more commonly known for art festivals, mountain hikes and golf, and has no natural waves in sight.
But some environmentalists and residents say it isn't water-wise to build large resorts in one of the driest spots in California during one of its driest periods in recent memory. They contend water in the massive surf pools will evaporate quickly in the desert heat, wasting a precious resource, while proponents argue the waves will boost tourism, ramp up recreation and use less water than ever-popular golf courses.
“Is that their best use of the limited water resources in these climate-driven drought times, is golf courses and surf spots?” said Conner Everts, executive director of the Southern California Watershed Alliance. “It’s like a fantasy. It’s like Dubai.”
California is going through a relentless drought, worsened by climate change, and its nearly 40 million residents have faced repeated calls in recent years to conserve water. The greater Palm Springs area sits atop a groundwater aquifer but receives remarkably little rainfall and relies on water from the State Water Project, which is running below capacity, and the Colorado River, a critical U.S. water supplier that is overtaxed.
Local water district officials say there’s enough water in a 20-year plan to support the new wave pools and resorts.
The proposals, which range from private, luxury communities to a public wave park, come as surfing soars in popularity in the United States. It became an Olympic sport last year, and industry experts forecast its continued growth as travel recovers following pandemic shutdowns and amid a rise in inland surf parks, according to San Jose-California-based Global Industry Analysts Inc.
Cheyne Magnusson, a pro surfer who is revamping a Palm Springs water park and adding a wave pool, is counting on that. He said the area is ideal because so many die-hard surfers live within driving distance and waves can be unreliable at the beach. It's also a popular vacation spot, he said, and beginners might want to try surfing in a safe environment.
“A lot of people have a day off today, and they really want to go surfing. I can guarantee they are going to get a good wave, and they're going to get a lot of them,” said Magnusson, who helped develop a wave park in landlocked Waco, Texas.
Magnusson's project is under construction, and two others are approved. In nearby La Quinta, a proposed 400-acre (160-hectare) development around a half-mile-long (0.8-kilometer) wave basin faces opposition from homeowners who moved to the area in search of a quiet retirement community.
They say the proposed Coral Mountain development will draw noisy surf festivals and ruin stargazing with its glaring lights. And they're concerned the pool's anticipated annual use of 120 acre-feet of water — in addition to the water used in the development's 600 homes, hotel and retail outlets — will deplete community water supplies.
In 2016, one acre-foot was enough water for between three and four California households for a year, according to the nonprofit Water Education Foundation.
“With the evaporation and the wind and everything, that is going to happen,” said Alena Callimanis, a member of the group La Quinta Residents for Responsible Development. “The optics of this are just crazy.”
But John Gamlin, president of CM Wave Development, noted the wave basin will use eight to 10 times less water than a golf course, and golf course already has been approved for the site. He said many local backyard swimming pools use drinking water, but the basin will use non-potable water treated in an onsite filtration plant.
“At the end of the day we’re confident that the Coral Mountain project will be among the most responsible water users in the Valley,” Gamlin said in an email, adding that residential areas and open spaces, which account for most the project’s outdoor water use, will also use non-potable water.
The Coachella Valley Water District, which serves much of the region, said whether to build projects is up to local officials, but the water is there. While the groundwater basin's storage hit a low in 2009, supplies have since improved through replenishment efforts and conservation, said Lorraine Garcia, a district spokesperson.
Critics, however, note the district has replenished the groundwater with imported water sources, and these are limited. State officials recently said water agencies will receive 5% of what they requested this year beyond what's needed for critical activities such as drinking and bathing in what has been the driest start to a California year in at least a century.
The conditions come amid a tourism boom in greater Palm Springs, which became a travel destination over a century ago when residents sought out the hot, dry climate believing it was good for their health. In the past decade, more younger visitors have come for music and art festivals, said Scott White, president of Visit Greater Palm Springs.
“To me, the surf parks just make natural sense,” White said.
Desert resident and surfer Dave Hilts said he’d like to try out the wave pools for extra practice — though he'd still drive to the beach regularly to surf. He started the Coachella Valley Surf Club to give kids from low-income inland families a chance to surf and is working with a teacher who began a surf club at her desert high school.
“It is going to bring a lot of new people into surfing that could never surf before,” he said.
That growth, however, worries Ruth Langridge, a senior researcher at University of California, Santa Cruz focused on water law and policy. She said she's long been wary of large-scale development in the desert because of the water demand — from pools or otherwise.
“You can fallow an agricultural area, but you can’t fallow a city once you build it,” Langridge said. “There’s a real concern about development in places where there isn’t going to be sufficient water.” | https://www.myplainview.com/news/article/Surge-of-desert-surf-parks-stirs-questions-in-dry-17124903.php | 2022-04-25T18:09:07Z | https://www.myplainview.com/news/article/Surge-of-desert-surf-parks-stirs-questions-in-dry-17124903.php | true | 24 |
This week along with TOVO - Hailey Tuck, Paris Combo and lots more new music
Tone of Voice Orchestra - Barking up the Wrong Tree
Playlist will magically appear at show time
This week along with TOVO - Hailey Tuck, Paris Combo and lots more new music
Playlist will magically appear at show time | https://www.wuwf.org/show/14-59/2022-04-25/apr-29-2022 | 2022-04-25T18:09:47Z | https://www.wuwf.org/show/14-59/2022-04-25/apr-29-2022 | true | null |
The International Award-Winning Creative Rises From Her ECD Role To Lead The Agency Into A New Era
TORONTO, April 25, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Juniper Park\TBWA is proud to announce that the agency's Executive Creative Director, Jenny Glover, is now acting Chief Creative Officer, effective immediately. Jenny is one of the most awarded creatives in the world – her work has won golds across all major international award shows, amassing twenty-eight Cannes Lions, including ten Gold and a Grand Prix, plus fifteen coveted D&AD Pencils, including five Yellows, among numerous others.
Her entry into branding was unique – she graduated from law school in 1996, which honed her skills in the nuances of language and critical thinking. After twenty years in South Africa, Jenny joined Juniper Park\TBWA from its sister agency, TBWA\Hunt\Lascaris, in 2018. This month alone, Jenny was the Co-Chair of one of Canada's preeminent industry shows, the 2022 Marketing Awards, as well as a One Show jury member. She has acted as both jury president and judge on numerous occasions at both local and international festivals, including Cannes Lions.
"I'm excited to continue my creative leadership of this agency," says Jenny Glover, acting CCO, Juniper Park\TBWA. "Of course, the ultimate goal is always to create branding excellence for our clients, but my methodology is also fundamentally human – to stay creatively curious, keep pushing, and to create better work by nurturing and growing talent. For me, the work and the people are intrinsically connected."
Jenny has a long history of generously developing talent. During her time in South Africa, she co-founded Open Chair, the South African advertising industry gender equity initiative aimed at "filling chairs" with talented young women and putting the onus on leaders to offer opportunity to that talent. Always an active mentor, Jenny incorporates teaching into everyday work, running weekly creative training sessions – aptly called "Sucking Eggs" – and presenting thought leadership masterclasses for the global TBWA collective.
"Beyond borders, Jenny is one of the best creatives in the industry and she epitomizes our core agency values of gratitude and growth," says Jill Nykoliation, CEO of Juniper Park\TBWA. "She combines world-class creativity with unwavering humanity, which makes her beloved by both our team and our clients. Jenny leaves an indelible mark on people's careers."
Coming off the back of two Golds at the 2022 Clio Awards, Jenny joins the agency's high-calibre, award-winning executive team, which includes Chief Strategy Officer Des Jones, who recently joined the agency from TBWA\Hunt\Lascaris and was instrumental in the development of TBWA's new strategic methodology, DisruptionX, and CEO Jill Nykoliation, who was recognized as one of Canada's Most Powerful CEOs in 2021 by WXN.
About Juniper Park\TBWA
Juniper Park\TBWA (juniperparktbwa.com) is The Disruption® Company: the cultural engine for 21st century business. A global, award-winning agency located in Toronto, Juniper Park\TBWA uses Disruption® methodologies to develop business-changing ideas for brands. The 130+ team of world-class creators and thinkers serves clients across North America, including CIBC, Nissan, PepsiCo, GoDaddy, among others. It is part of TBWA Worldwide (tbwa.com), named Agency of the Year and Grand Prix winner at the 2021 Effie Awards, one of the World's Most Innovative Companies by Fast Company in 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022, included on Ad Age's Agency A-List in both 2019 and 2020, and named Ad Age's Network of the Year in 2022. Follow us on Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter, or like us on Facebook for the latest updates from the Park.
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SOURCE Juniper ParkTBWA | https://www.wibw.com/prnewswire/2022/04/25/juniper-parktbwa-appoints-jenny-glover-acting-cco/ | 2022-04-25T18:11:40Z | https://www.wibw.com/prnewswire/2022/04/25/juniper-parktbwa-appoints-jenny-glover-acting-cco/ | false | 23 |
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After securing the No. 1 seed in the Western Conference, the Phoenix Suns are headed home in an unexpected situation with the No. 8 seed New Orleans Pelicans in their first-round playoff series: tied 2-2 entering Game 5.
The best-of-seven series has turned into a best-of-three series starting Tuesday night in Phoenix. The Pelicans tied the series with a 118-103 home victory against the Suns on Sunday night.
“We know Game 5 is going to be a dogfight and we’ve got to be ready to play,” guard CJ McCollum said after scoring 18 points and pulling down nine rebounds for New Orleans. “This is a championship-caliber team who’s been there before, but on the bright side, we understand what to expect. This is a great opportunity for us to learn, to grow and to play in a hostile environment.”
Brandon Ingram scored 16 of his 30 points in the pivotal third quarter and became the first Pelicans player to score 30 points in three consecutive playoff games.
“Brandon is playing some of his best basketball of the season, and he’s doing it on the biggest stage, and it’s great to see,” New Orleans coach Willie Green said. “I’m just trying to move out of the way and let him do his thing.”
Center Jonas Valanciunas bounced back from a poor performance in Game 3 to add a career playoff-high 26 points and 15 rebounds.
“It’s fun to play this way, when everyone’s touching the ball, moving, and finding the teammates open, setting loose screens,” Valanciunas said. “That’s such a good feeling to play this way — on top of winning the game.”
New Orleans held star guard Chris Paul to four points on 2-of-8 shooting. He had 11 assists, but didn’t attempt a free throw.
“We just tried to throw different looks at him, be aggressive, try denying him the ball at times,” Green said. “(It was) having more of a mindset and a focus on not allowing Chris in the fourth quarter to dominate the game, which he’s done and is capable of doing.”
Paul was without his backcourt mate, All-Star Devin Booker, who strained his right hamstring in Game 2 and averaged 26.8 points per game on the regular season. He is not expected to return this series.
“We can’t worry about whether Book comes back,” Phoenix coach Monty Williams said. “Obviously, we need Book back, but that’s not why we lost the game. They played much harder than we did.”
Williams also noted the difference in free throws attempted in what was a very physical game. The Pelicans shot 42 free throws (making 32) and the Suns shot 15 (making 10).
“They outplayed us; they deserve to win,” Williams said. “(But) that’s a free throw disparity that you have to look at.”
New Orleans outrebounded Phoenix for the fourth straight game, 48-39. They are averaging 47.8 rebounds per game in the postseason.
“They were the aggressor tonight,” Paul said. “They came out and made all of the big plays. They outrebounded us again.”
The third quarter was again significant for the Pelicans, who outscored the Suns 35-23 behind Ingram. New Orleans has outscored Phoenix by at least nine points in each third quarter for a cumulative advantage of 137-93 in the third quarters.
“They for sure played with more urgency and grit than we did,” Williams said. “The third quarter, for whatever reason, we haven’t been able to be productive in that quarter, whether it’s missing shots or not getting stops, but it’s been a trend in this series.”
–Field Level Media | https://sportsnaut.com/suns-return-home-to-pivotal-game-5-vs-pelicans/ | 2022-04-25T18:14:45Z | https://sportsnaut.com/suns-return-home-to-pivotal-game-5-vs-pelicans/ | false | 10 |
The much-anticipated Initial Public Offering (IPO) of Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) will open on May 4. The government aims to offload 3.5 per cent of its holding in the insurance behemoth, subject to regulator approval.
“Application can be made till May 9,” a source said. For the anchor investor, date of application would be May 2. The government has already filed Revised Draft Herring Prospectus (DRHP) with the market regulator SEBI.
Market valuation
Going by the market valuation of ₹6 lakh crore, the issue size is estimated at ₹ 21,000 crore. There could be green shoe option too, however, sources have not confirmed yet. The market valuation is nearly 1.1 time of embedded value (EV). International actuarial firm Milliman Advisors has estimated EV at about ₹5.4-lakh crore as of September 30, 2021.
Earlier, a senior government official had told BusinessLine that reservations, discounts for various categories of investors, and issue price will be known by Wednesday morning. The Draft Red Herring Prospectus (DRHP) had already mentioned that the employee reservation portion will not exceed 5 per cent of post-Offer Equity Share capital. Also, the policyholder reservation portion will not exceed 10 per cent of the offer size.
Last Saturday, LIC board approved the issue size at 3.5 per cent of government holding which, in terms of absolute numbers, comes to around 22.14 crore shares. Earlier, in the DRHP, filed with SEBI on February 13, the government had proposed offering 31.62 crore shares which was around 5 per cent of total number of equity shares.
Russia-Ukraine crisis
Reason for cutting down the size of LIC IPO include Ukraine-Russia crisis, withdrawal by foreign portfolio investors (FPI) from Indian market and higher inflation and resultant increase in the interest rates globally. It was reportedly a tough decision to conclude whether to go ahead with the retail and domestic investor demand or to wait for geopolitical tension to ease and FIIs to return to market. The government finally settled for going ahead with the issue.
The March-end deadline for bringing the issue had to be postponed because of the Russia-Ukraine conflict. The Government has time till May 12 to launch the IPO without filing fresh papers with markets regulator SEBI. LIC IPO is expected to contribute a major chunk to the budgeted disinvestment proceeds in the current fiscal year. The government has pegged disinvestment receipts at ₹65,000 crore for 2022-23 — up from ₹13,531 crore last fiscal year.
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EDMONTON, Alberta (AP) — Christian Dedonato doesn't see Connor McDavid much in the offseason, at least not until at least mid-afternoon. McDavid is too busy working out in the gym or staying sharp on the ice.
When the longtime friends get together to skate, surf, kick a soccer ball around or throw a baseball, Dedonato still sees an intensity in McDavid, now seven years into a standout if frustrating NHL career.
“I see him do these skill drills and he won’t stop until he gets it perfect,” Dedonato said. “Even going to throw a baseball around or surfing, everything just has to be perfect, and I think that shows on the ice and shows in his personality — his commitment.”
Knowing McDavid for more than a decade before the two entered high school, Dedonato isn't surprised by the success of the Edmonton Oilers captain. What he knows better than most is how much McDavid sacrifices off the ice in his drive to be the best player in the league.
At 25, McDavid is on pace to be the league's top scorer for the fourth time and led the Oilers to a third consecutive playoff appearance.His dazzling play is the culmination of decades of work designed to prepare him to be at peak performance when it matters most.
“He wants to be the best,” said Dedonato, a hockey player at Brock University who lives less than 10 minutes from McDavid during the offseason. “He knows it’s going to take a lot of work to be the best, and he’s been working his entire life to be the best.”
The playoffs are now his proving ground because McDavid has done just about everything during the regular season. He is a two-time Hart Trophy winner as league MVP, a three-time pick by his peers for the Ted Lindsay/Lester B. Pearson Award as most outstanding player and five times has surpassed the 100-point mark.
For all those accolades, he has never reached the Stanley Cup Final and the Oilers have only won one playoff series in his tenure, back in 2017.
“There’s probably a level of frustration, which is natural,” said retired NHL forward Matt Hendricks, who played with McDavid for two seasons from 2015-17. “But then, saying that, he just keeps coming out and performing the way he does every game. It’s incredible.”
Hendricks noticed right after McDavid was picked first in the NHL draft the so-called “Next One” wanted to put the Oilers on his shoulders and “be the focal point and the reason that they came out of those dark days.” That has not changed.
“Obviously I want to play well and contribute to the team as much as I can," McDavid said. “When I’m at my best, I contribute a lot."
McDavid was at his best when Edmonton needed him. Since the Oilers fell out of playoff position March 4, McDavid has averaged more than 21 minutes of ice time and put up 14 goals and 25 assists for 39 points in 24 games. They've won 16 of 24 games to clinch a playoff spot.
“Me at my best would be skating, having the puck, playing aggressive,” McDavid said. "That’s kind of when I’m at my best.”
What's harder to see is how McDavid has grown as an all-around player.
“He’s driven to win. He has put a lot of emphasis in some of the areas that our staff when we’ve come together (recently) has put a lot of emphasis on, which is his work back to our own end,” said coach Jay Woodcroft, who was promoted from the minors when Dave Tippett was fired in February. "For me, we’re asking some of our higher-minute players to do a lot of things and assume a little bit more responsibility.”
McDavid has also spent the past several years shoring up his biggest weakness.
After getting picked first in the 2015 draft, he struggled on faceoffs. McDavid won just 42% of draws his first three seasons and is now over a 54% success rate, which ranks 21st in the league.
Much of that is thanks to the work McDavid does in the offseason with retired forward Gary Roberts, who has become a high performance trainer, and at the annual BioSteel camp. He also does his own training, sometimes passing up a round of golf with buddies to work on his craft.
“For me it’s those characteristics are what separate really, really good hockey players from great hockey players,” Hendricks said. “Connor from Day One, I knew that he had that. He has a game plan. Everything has a purpose.”
During the season, McDavid's leadership combined with fellow MVP Leon Draisaitl reminds defenseman Duncan Keith of his days in Chicago alongside stars Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane.
“Kane, Toews, Draisaitl, McDavid, those guys are where they’re at because they’re competitive and they want to be the best,” Keith said. “Connor and Leon absorb and take a lot of responsibility because they feel the pressure. They want to win here.”
McDavid's desire to win even bleeds into his social life, where he drinks only light or gluten free beer and clear liquor along with wine — when he even drinks at all. His healthy diet is a 24/7/365 effort.
Almost three years into watching the young center up close, general manager Ken Holland has learned a thing or two about McDavid and his ability to carry the Oilers to the playoffs and, one day, the Cup.
“He competes every night, he competes every day, he competes all the offseason,” Holland said. “He trains all season. He’s a focused, motivated athlete. He’s competing both directions. I think that he’s doing everything he can for us to have success.”
___
Follow AP Hockey Writer Stephen Whyno on Twitter at https://twitter.com/SWhyno
___
More AP NHL: https://apnews.com/hub/NHL and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports | https://www.theintelligencer.com/sports/article/McDavid-s-drive-to-be-NHL-s-best-player-starts-17124919.php | 2022-04-25T18:18:10Z | https://www.theintelligencer.com/sports/article/McDavid-s-drive-to-be-NHL-s-best-player-starts-17124919.php | true | 15 |
Bombay HC rejects Ranas’ plea to quash FIR, couple moves for bail
Mumbai: The Bombay High Court on Monday dismissed a plea filed by independent MP-MLA couple Navneet Rana and her husband Ravi Rana, respectively, seeking to quash the second of two FIRs registered against them for resisting arrest on Saturday after a huge row over their plans to recite Hanuman Chalisa outside the private home of Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray.
A division bench of Justice P. B. Varale and Justice S. M. Modak also observed that there was considerable merit in the submissions made by Special Public Prosecutor Pradip Gharat.
The judges upheld his contention on the FIR pertaining to chant religious verses near the personal home of the CM since such an act at the residence of another person or at a public place is a breach of personal liberty of the other person, and the Maharashtra government was justified in its apprehensions that it could lead to a law and order situation in Mumbai.
“Persons in public life are expected to act responsibly. With great power comes great responsibility… that those who are active in public life are expected to act responsibly is not an extra but a basic expectation,” the court said in its strong observations while dismissing the Rana couple’s plea.
The judges said that in case the state government wanted to initiate action against the Ranas under the second FIR, then they would give 72 hours notice to the petitioners (Ranas) before initiating any such measures.
The Ranas’ lawyer Rizwan Merchant said that after they receive the 72-hour notice from the police, they would decide their further course of action, and moved sessions court for bail.
After two days of high political drama, police in suburban Mumbai’s Khar booked and arrested the Rana couple on Saturday under Indian Penal Code Section’s 153 (A) (promoting enmity between groups on grounds of religion race, etc), and the stringent IPC Section 124 (A), pertaining to sedition.
The Mumbai Police also filed a second FIR around 2 a.m. on Sunday, against the Ranas invoking IPC’s Section 353 for alleged assault of a public servant and obstructing public servant from discharging their official duties.
Merchant argued that the second FIR was “an abuse” of the legal process and the subsequent addition of the offence of sedition was unsustainable.
SPP Gharat countered this, saying that the second FIR was registered for a separate offence relating to obstructing police from discharging their duties, for which the court has granted relief to the extent of serving the Ranas a 72-hour notice for any action.
On Saturday, the Ranas were served with a notice under Bombay Police Act’s Section 149, requesting them to refrain from carrying out their plans, but they did not heed, after which they were detained and arrested that evening.
SPP Gharat said that despite the notice, the Ranas continued to give media and online interviews, creating apprehensions in society, and their statements posing a serious threat to the law and order situation after which the action was taken against them.
Later, amid high drama at their Khar home, the Rana couple was arrested on Saturday evening and produced before a Bandra holiday Magistrate Court which remanded them to 14 days’ judicial custody while posting their bail plea for hearing on April 29.
Through her lawyer, Navneet Rana has written to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla about alleged harassment by the police, even as the couple moved a bail plea before the Sessions Court which is likely to be heard on Tuesday.
Later, Leader of Opposition Devendra Fadnavis alleged that in police custody, she was mistreated, abused, subjected to casteist slurs, and even denied water or permission to go to the washroom.
However, Home Minister Dilip Walse-Patil denied the allegations as totally “baseless”. | https://www.mangalorean.com/bombay-hc-rejects-ranas-plea-to-quash-fir-couple-moves-for-bail/ | 2022-04-25T18:19:53Z | https://www.mangalorean.com/bombay-hc-rejects-ranas-plea-to-quash-fir-couple-moves-for-bail/ | true | 2 |
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to hear an appeal from Texas death row inmate Rodney Reed, who claims untested crime-scene evidence will help clear him.
Reed was sentenced to death for the 1996 killing of 19-year-old Stacey Stites. Prosecutors say Reed raped and strangled Stites as she made her way to work at a supermarket in Bastrop, a rural community about 30 miles (50 kilometers) southeast of Austin.
Reed has long maintained that her fiance, former police officer Jimmy Fennell, was the real killer. Reed says Fennell was angry because Stites, who was white, was having an affair with Reed, who is Black. Fennell, who served time for sexual assault and was released from prison in 2018, has denied killing Stites.
The justices will take up the case in the fall. The issue is whether Reed waited too long to ask for DNA testing of items recovered from and near Stiles’ body, clothing and items found in or near Fennell’s truck.
The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against Reed.
His supporters have included Beyoncé, Kim Kardashian and Oprah Winfrey, as well as lawmakers from both parties. | https://www.rochesterfirst.com/news/politics/texas-death-row-inmate-to-get-supreme-court-review/ | 2022-04-25T18:23:31Z | https://www.rochesterfirst.com/news/politics/texas-death-row-inmate-to-get-supreme-court-review/ | false | 30 |
Highway Fatality Warning Signs Are Doing Real Harm
If you’ve done much driving in the United States, you have likely come across a variety of large warning signs placed on the side of our highways. Many times these signs warn of upcoming road closures or the arrival of inclement weather, but there are some places where the messages may...
www.roadandtrack.com | https://www.newsbreak.com/news/2580782937565/highway-fatality-warning-signs-are-doing-real-harm | 2022-04-25T18:25:02Z | https://www.newsbreak.com/news/2580782937565/highway-fatality-warning-signs-are-doing-real-harm | true | null |
The Valheim Mistlands release date has remained a mystery since the game’s launch in Early Access over a year ago, but it seems the launch of the survival game’s first new biome is finally in sight. As part of a press release announcing that Valheim has sold 10 million copies so far, the devs have confirmed that the Mistlands update is scheduled to launch in 2022.
“As the development of the next major content update continues,” the official statement reads, “fans of the survival genre can look forward to more Valheim goodness coming this year, including a brand-new biome to explore, enemies to fight and new weapons to craft.”
The Valheim roadmap has been substantially shuffled since it was first revealed, though the devs at Iron Gate have made clear they’re ramping up work on the Mistlands with the reveals of new creatures and weapons. A patch in 2021 stripped the placeholder Mistlands locations, which you can already visit in-game, of all their trees and other objects.
Valheim’s biggest update so far has been Hearth and Home, but earlier this year, we got an update to the existing Mountain biome. Despite Valheim’s commercial and critical success (we declared it one of the best games of 2021), the one consistent complaint the community has had is the length of time between major content updates.
“Our team has doubled since launch and knowing Valheim is enjoyed by millions of players around the world honours and humbles us at the same time,” Iron Gate CEO Richard Svensson says in the press release. “Our ambitions for the game have never been stronger and the development of Mistlands is well underway – we can’t wait to bring this new mysterious biome to the game.” | https://www.pcgamesn.com/valheim/mistlands-release-date | 2022-04-25T18:27:03Z | https://www.pcgamesn.com/valheim/mistlands-release-date | false | 1 |
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Six tricks to save money by sharing with neighbours – from car pooling to garden tools
NEIGHBOURHOODS are getting together to mark the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee in June.
But you can share costs and resources with your community in other ways, for your mutual benefit . . .
WHAT A GIVEAWAY: Neighbourhood WhatsApp groups are great for giving away items, such as kids’ clothes, toys, old furniture and books.
Also explore apps like Nextdoor and Freecycle which have items being given away locally.
THE BORROWERS: The Fat Llama app is great for hiring or renting out things. But don’t be afraid to ask to borrow from neighbours.
DIG IT: If you have got an apple tree or an abundant rhubarb patch, offer neighbours the chance to take what you don’t use to save it rotting. Chances are you will get a fruit crumble or similar offers back. If not, nothing is lost.
PET PALS: See if animal-loving neighbours will take care of pets while you’re on holiday, to save costs of kennels or a sitter.
CAR SHARE: Popping out for groceries? Get in the habit of asking if anyone needs anything, to save on petrol costs. If you don’t have a motor, check out the Turo app, where you can hire one from people nearby to save on a rental firm.
BABY BUDDIES: Sharing childcare and babysitting with neighbours can be a money-saver. But check the law first.
If you are paying a friend or exchanging childcare with them, they aren’t legally allowed to look after a child under eight for more than two hours a day during normal working hours, unless they are a registered childminder.
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Every Sun Savers code entered equals one Raffle ticket. The more codes you enter, the more tickets you'll earn and the more chance you will have of winning! | https://www.thesun.co.uk/money/18370697/tips-save-money-neighbours-community/ | 2022-04-25T18:28:38Z | https://www.thesun.co.uk/money/18370697/tips-save-money-neighbours-community/ | true | 2 |
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — With violent crime increasing in many parts of the U.S., Republicans see a winning strategy in portraying Democrats as soft on crime ahead of this year’s elections. In ads, campaign appearances and interviews, the GOP has ripped liberal policies and blamed Democratic lawmakers from the White House to city councils for the violence.
But in Oklahoma, where Gov. Kevin Stitt is being targeted for mass commutations and a crime that involved cannibalism, the attacks are different: Stitt is a Republican.
In one ad, a woman’s voice says Stitt commuted the prison sentence of a man who later “brutally murdered his neighbor, then tried to feed her organs to his family.” The ad, paid for by a group called Conservative Voice of America, concludes, “Oklahomans deserve a governor who cracks down on violent criminals, not one who lets them go.”
Democrats have borne the brunt of the political blame for the increase in homicides and other violent crime in recent years. In some cases that’s meant backpedaling on major criminal justice overhauls or insisting they don’t want to defund police departments, as some activists have advocated.
But now the attacks on some fellow Republicans are intensifying a split within the GOP between hard-liners and those conservatives who have shifted to support alternatives to prisons, largely as a way to save money. Groups that advocate various types of criminal justice reform worry the attacks could jeopardize meaningful changes that have occurred, many in heavily Republican states, such as Oklahoma, which has one of the highest incarceration rates, and Texas.
“We had been seeing sort of growing bipartisan consensus on reforms,” said Kevin Ring, president of Families Against Mandatory Minimums. But that’s gotten tougher because of rising crime and politics.
“There’s still some of those old holdouts who just are ‘lock them up, throw away the key’ types,” Ring said. “They’ve always been there, and I think that they have used the increase in crime to argue for a return to that posture by the party.”
Brett Tolman, executive director of the conservative criminal justice advocacy group Right on Crime, said “the accusation of being weak on crime gets thrown around very quickly,” causing “a lot of hesitation” in Congress. The former U.S. attorney said he now has to work with people mostly behind the scenes.
Republicans who support the changes say they can reduce crime as well as costs to taxpayers. When Stitt approved the2019 mass commutation of more than 450 inmates in a single day, he said the release would save Oklahoma an estimated $11.9 million over the cost of keeping them behind bars. The commutations primarily benefited those convicted of drug possession or low-level property crimes.
Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, a Republican, says his state saved billions of dollars by investing in alternative sentencing and closing prisons. He’s now defending Stitt, who’s facing an avalanche of attack ads as he seeks a second term as Oklahoma governor.
“I see the Texas reforms have proven tough on crime but soft on the taxpayer, as any conservative policy should be,” Perry wrote in a newspaper column defending Stitt.
The attack ads targeting Stitt were paid for by dark money groups, which don’t have to make their donors public. They criticize Stitt for signing off on the parole of a man now accused of three killings, including those of a 4-year-old girl and a neighbor whose heart he cut out and tried to feed to relatives, according to authorities.
Donelle Harder, a spokesperson for Stitt’s reelection campaign, said it’s not clear who is funding the groups.
“The undisclosed, special interest groups are not conservatives, and they are not being honest about their intentions,” Harder said. “Gov. Stitt’s commitment to lead as a conservative political outsider is clearly upsetting a small few.”
Trebor Worthen, a GOP political consultant who is running one of the dark money groups, Sooner State Leadership PAC, said it is dedicated to public safety and has raised $10 million. Worthen declined to identify specific donors.
“We are funded by business and community leaders who care deeply about our future and wish to exercise their First Amendment rights to advocate for policy changes that Oklahoma needs and deserves,” Worthen said.
The issue also has surfaced in the GOP primary for governor in Nevada. Former Sen. Dean Heller has criticized Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo, saying he wants to defund the police. Lombardo told The Associated Press and other media outlets that he has no problem with his department losing funding if the money is used in another area that would benefit law enforcement.
“Who goes on NPR and says they want to defund the police?” Heller told a Nevada TV station during an interview, comparing Lombardo with progressive Democrats who often draw conservative ire, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. “AOC, the Squad, and Sheriff Lombardo. They’re the ones that say that.”
In Illinois, Democrats who control state government hurriedly worked this spring to provide more funding to law enforcement after passing a major criminal justice overhaul last year that set strict standards for police behavior and eliminated cash bail beginning next year. Republicans have blasted the criminal justice legislation.
Among the most vocal critics is GOP candidate for governor Richard Irvin, a former prosecutor and defense attorney who is now mayor of Aurora, a Chicago suburb. Irvin, who faces several Republicans in the GOP primary, often touts his prosecutorial background as he blasts Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker.
The Democratic Governors Association and Irvin’s GOP rivals have questioned his tough-on-crime credentials, however. In an ad, the DGA criticized Irvin’s work as a defense attorney, and fellow Republicans have attacked Irvin, who is Black, for expressing support for Black Lives Matter.
A spokesperson for Irvin dismissed the attacks. Eleni Desmertzis said Pritzker is “running scared” and facing “a former criminal prosecutor, tough-on-crime-mayor and strong supporter of law enforcement who has proven he’s not afraid to stand up for all lives in Illinois.”
___
Burnett reported from Chicago. | https://www.yourbasin.com/political/soft-on-crime-attacks-target-republicans-who-favor-changes/ | 2022-04-25T18:31:19Z | https://www.yourbasin.com/political/soft-on-crime-attacks-target-republicans-who-favor-changes/ | true | 24 |
From popular soloist IU, to Got7's Jay B, to Exo's Kai, these bookworms of K-pop have great recommendations!View Entire Post ›.
From popular soloist IU, to Got7's Jay B, to Exo's Kai, these bookworms of K-pop have great recommendations!View Entire Post ›. | https://mirtesen.ru/dispute/43297928473/13-Books-Your-Favorite-K-Pop-Idols-Loved-And-So-Will-You | 2022-04-25T18:32:21Z | https://mirtesen.ru/dispute/43297928473/13-Books-Your-Favorite-K-Pop-Idols-Loved-And-So-Will-You | false | null |
Prototypical Patriots: Best outside linebacker fits in 2022 NFL Draft class
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- New England PatriotsLiveTodayTomorrowvs--|
- Kyle Van NoyLiveTodayTomorrowvs--|
- Matthew JudonLiveTodayTomorrowvs--|
- Chase WinovichLiveTodayTomorrowvs--|
- Bill BelichickAmerican football coach
Perry: Prototypical Patriots outside linebackers in 2022 NFL Draft class originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston
You may not think of it as a need, but you probably should. There's not a whole lot of certainty on the outside linebacker depth chart in New England at the moment.
The Patriots paid big bucks last offseason to land Matthew Judon. But who would you pencil in opposite him as a full-timer?
Would it be Josh Uche, a second-rounder in 2020 who's missed 12 games through his first two seasons? How about Ronnie Perkins, a rookie last year who didn't see a game-day snap? Can Anfernee Jennings -- a third-rounder in 2020 -- be counted on after missing all of last season?
The Patriots will often play Deatrich Wise as one of their sub-package edge defenders. He's more of a 4-3 end playing in a scheme that is rooted in a 3-4 philosophy, but he remains productive and should have a key role once again in 2022.
But after releasing Kyle Van Noy ... After trading Chase Winovich ... With plans for Dont'a Hightower still unknown ... It sure seems as though the Patriots could use another versatile body to man the edge opposite Judon.
Players with top-end talent at that spot tend to be drafted early, but league evaluators will tell you this is a relatively deep edge class. And there are a variety who fit what the Patriots have typically invested in under Bill Belichick: players who check in around 250 pounds or more, with 33-inch arms and almost 10-inch hands, with broad jumps that sniff 10 feet and three-cone times nearing the 7.00-second mark.
Let's take a look at some of the best fits for the Patriots in this year's draft class ...
Jermaine Johnson, Florida State, 6-foot-5, 254 pounds
Let's go ahead and coast past three of the best players in this year's draft class. The Patriots won't have a crack at drafting Michigan's Aidan Hutchinson, Georgia's Travon Walker or Oregon's Kayvon Thibodeaux, in all likelihood. All would be considered fits on the edge for the Patriots based on their size and athletic profiles. All are also pipe dreams for a team drafting at No. 21.
The same could end up being true for Johnson, who could be a top-eight selection, one league source told NBC Sports Boston. But we'll keep Johnson here in case runs on tackles and receivers end up pushing him down the board and within range for Belichick. His 34-inch arms and 10-inch hands are built to control the point of attack on the outside, but he also has enough athleticism to be unleashed on third downs. He posted a 4.58-second 40 time and a 10-foot-5 broad jump at this year's combine.
2022 NFL Draft Highlights: Jermaine Johnson II
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Add in the fact that he was a force against top-flight competition at the Senior Bowl, something the Patriots value highly, and this feels like the kind of pick Belichick wouldn't have to mull long.
"He's tough as [expletive]," one AFC defensive assistant said. "Really physical on tape. Finishes. Powerful. I don't think he's the most fluid, but he has really good power as a rusher. It's not his skill set to dip and run around. He's about length. Nastiness. My guess is that's what [the Patriots would] like as an edge rusher."
George Karlaftis, Purdue, 6-foot-4, 263 pounds
Karlaftis doesn't have the length of some others on this list, but he fits the bill for the Patriots with his 33-inch arms and 10-inch hands. His 38-inch vertical jump and 10-foot-1 broad jump more than meet New England's standards. And then there's his production. He was a three-year starter for the Fightin' Ninkoviches, and he posted 14.5 sacks and 30 tackles for loss in 27 games. Strong. Violent. Polished.
"I think Karlaftis is like Brandon Graham," said one AFC assistant. "Good burst. Really good power and feel and locating the quarterback like Brandon Graham has. I think Karalaftis is more advanced and a better rusher, better film [than Johnson]."
If the Patriots like the idea of adding a pro's pro at a premium position with pick No. 21, Karlaftis could be their guy.
Drake Jackson, USC, 6-foot-3, 275 pounds
"Enigma," said one NFC evaluator of Jackson. "One of the more talented guys in the draft. Better talent in terms of speed and length and flexibility than Jermaine Johnson or George Karlaftis. Higher upside. But you don't really know what you're getting."
That could be a problem, but not so much a problem that he'll slip into Day 3. One of Jackson's issues is that his weight has been all over the map. He weighed in the 220-pound range in 2020. He checked into the combine at 254 pounds. Then he gained 20 pounds for his pro day. Try to figure that out.
2022 NFL Draft Highlights: Drake Jackson
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And yet ... at his pro day he ran a 7.09-second three-cone drill and an impressive 4.28-second shuttle (81st percentile). He's long (34-inch arms, 10.5-inch hands) and he can move. Jackson is considered exceptionally flexible with the ability to bend better than the vast majority of players his size. And though he's athletic enough to play on the edge as a standup outside linebacker, he has enough size and power to kick inside in sub situations and see success.
There are questions about his maturity and his level of dedication to his craft -- tardiness was an issue at times for him on campus -- but he turned 21 earlier this month, and there are enough traits to work with for him to be worthy of a second-round roll of the dice. That's usually where the Patriots take their high-upside swings.
Josh Paschal, Kentucky, 6-foot-3, 268 pounds
Placing Paschal in a group of outside linebackers may be a bit misleading since at Kentucky he really played primarily as a head-up player on opposing tackles. That may make him a bit of a tweener in New England's defense, but he saw plenty of work out on the edge for the Wildcats last season (252 snaps outside the tackle, per Pro Football Focus), and he has interesting traits with which to work.
Next Pats: Why Boston College prospect would be a 'superhero' for Patriots | Download & Subscribe | Watch on YouTube
He's extremely explosive (38-inch vertical, 90th percentile; 10-3 broad, 85th percentile) for a man carrying as much weight as he does, and he understands the importance of leverage.
He may not be the kind of edge player Belichick would want chasing jet-sweep weapons out in space, but as a rusher who can be functional both inside and out on the edge, Paschal would bring some versatility to Foxboro. He's not quite as long as Trey Flowers, but that's the kind of role he could fill for the Patriots.
David Ojabo, Michigan, 6-foot-4, 250 pounds
Can't leave the other Wolverines edge defender off this list. Unfortunately for Ojabo he tore his Achilles during his pro day. But if he starts to slide into range for the Patriots on Day 2, he has plenty of the traits they like.
His arms measured 33.5 inches and his wing span exceeded 80 inches. Hard to find humans with his frame who a 4.55-second 40 (94th percentile). Having started playing football just five years ago, Ojabo's best football is likely ahead of him if all goes well with his recovery. He'll need to fine-tune his technique and his football instincts at the next level, but he'll be a quick study if his Academic All-American recognition last year is any indication of his off-field habits.
Boye Mafe, Minnesota, 6-foot-4, 261 pounds
Mafe has his critics because of some perceived stiffness off the edge, but he's as explosive a Day 2 edge rusher as you'll find. His 42-inch vertical ranks him in the 99th percentile. His 40 (4.53 seconds, 96th percentile) and broad jump (10-5, 91st percentile) were also eye-popping. Though he has good size, he may be more of a sub-rusher early in his career as his work against the run wasn't prolific for the Gophers (87 tackles in 42 games).
Arnold Ebiketie, Penn State, 6-foot-3, 247 pounds
Mel Kiper Jr. told us on "The Next Pats" podcast recently that Ebiketie was one of his favorite fits for the Patriots. Easy to see why. He's considered a professional. His reputation is as someone who's mature beyond his years. He quickly became a leader for the Nittany Lions after transferring from Temple. He was the only "Iron Lion" honoree in the Penn State program for his focus on his strength and conditioning work, per The Athletic.
Here are Perry's Prototypical Patriots fits at inside linebacker
He has the length (34-inch arms) and explosiveness (38-inch vertical, 10-8 broad) that should translate in pass-rushing situations at the next level, but there are some questions about his ability to play the run on the edge and be a three-down option. He may be a bit redundant if he's joining a team with Uche, but there's no question he has tantalizing traits that teams typically pay premiums for.
Nik Bonitto, Oklahoma, 6-foot-3, 248 pounds
A favorite for defensive coaches who are looking for quicks on the edge, Bonitto is a tad undersized for the Patriots. His 32.5-inch arms aren't usually what they're after. But he ran a 4.54-second 40, jumped 35.5 inches in the vertical and 10-feet in the broad. Plus, he's coming from a program the Patriots respect.
His physical gifts are considered better than those of his former teammate Perkins. If Belichick is looking to add speed to his defense, players who can make plays in space and track down the mobile quarterbacks they'll see on a nearly-weekly basis, Bonitto is a fit.
Jesse Luketa, Penn State, 6-foot-3, 253 pounds
Luketa's frame gets him into the conversation here. His athleticism -- though far from hair-raising -- is good enough. But it's everything else that solidifies his place on this list. He was a two-time captain for Penn State and a more-than-willing special-teamer who had extensive experience in the kicking game under coach James Franklin.
Luketa also has experience in a variety of roles, having played both off the line and on during his career. If the Patriots are looking for a "teams" contributor with enough versatility to play multiple roles defensively, Luketa seems like their type.
Christopher Allen, Alabama, 6-foot-3, 241 pounds
If the Patriots were to call Allen's name in this year's draft he'd likely qualify as a buy-low "value" selection. Why? He suffered a foot injury in the 2021 season opener and didn't see the field for the remainder of his final year. But the last time he was on the field for an extended period, he was dynamite, leading the SEC in tackles for loss and being named a Second Team All-SEC honoree.
He'll have to add some weight to hold up on the outside, and there are questions about how his overall athleticism will play at the next level. But if Belichick is a believer in his 2020 performance, and if he tries to project out from there, he could have an under-the-radar contributor in 2022.
Dominique Robinson, Miami (Ohio), 6-foot-3, 253 pounds
Talk about your best football being in front of you. Robinson just made the move to defense in 2020 after arriving to college as a dual-threat quarterback and then transitioning to receiver for three years. Since then he's bulked up and become one of the more intriguing athletic projections at the position in this year's class. He had an excellent 4.19-second shuttle time, as well as a ridiculous 41-inch vertical at the combine in Indy.
He still plays a bit like a receiver, which may give decision-makers reason for pause; he's not a set-the-edge type at the moment. But he has the demeanor for it. And 33-inch arms. And frankly that's not what you'd be drafting him to do, anyway. He has some special athletic gifts to get into opposing backfields and bother quarterbacks.
Amare Barno, Virginia Tech, 6-foot-5, 246 pounds
Would be weird to come across a player with Barno's length and athleticism and leave him off any list of prototypes on the edge. His athleticism is, in a word, freaky. He ran a 4.36-second 40 at this year's combine, setting a new record for defensive ends. Plus, his broad jump (10-foot-11) ranked him in the 99th percentile at the position. Wild.
The pop in his hands leaves plenty to be desired. But if he can improve his strength, perhaps with the right kind of coaching, he'll be able to mold his rare physical tools into serviceable NFL-caliber edge-rush ability. But even now, he has enough juice to be an impact blitzer, quarterback spy and special-teamer.
Jeremiah Moon, Florida, 6-foot-5, 249 pounds
Noticing a trend with this year's draft class at this particular position? There's an abundance of players with raw athletic talent. Take Moon, who will be a Day 3 choice if he's drafted. He recorded a remarkable 40.5-inch vertical and 11-foot-1 broad jump. Just wacky numbers at his size.
Add to that the fact that he has legitimate length (35-inch arms), and you have some physical characteristics that are special. He's also versatile, having played inside and outside linebacker for the Gators. But he had three different season-ending injuries as a collegian. And, as is the case with others on this list, his power is lacking. Still, as Saturday winds down, if the Patriots are looking to bet on some traits, they could take a shot with Moon.
Luiji Vilain, Wake Forest, 6-foot-4, 255 pounds
Vilain began his career under Michigan defensive coordinator Don Brown but was blocked on the edge in Ann Arbor (Hutchinson, Ojabo, Uche, Winovich, Kwity Paye, Rashan Gary) and ended up transferring to Wake Forest for the 2021 season. Not a bad call. He ended up with nine sacks and three forced fumbles in 14 games for the Demon Deacons.
As far as the measurables go, he fits (34-inch arm, 11-inch hand, 7.01 three-cone drill, 35-inch vertical). He may go undrafted but has the tools to be worthy of a spot as a priority free agent. | https://sports.yahoo.com/prototypical-patriots-best-outside-linebacker-170000475.html?src=rss | 2022-04-25T18:36:45Z | https://sports.yahoo.com/prototypical-patriots-best-outside-linebacker-170000475.html?src=rss | true | 2 |
New COVID case rate doubles in Southwest Virginia, still low
RICHMOND, Va. (WJHL) — Southwest Virginia reported 188 new COVID-19 cases last week, double the number it had the previous week, according to Virginia Department of Health (VDH) data.
The case rate remains far lower than it has been since before the Delta variant arrived last summer, but its increase follows a similar one that occurred in more urban areas of Virginia. The statewide rate increased about 60% from April 1-15, while Southwest Virginia’s stayed steady.
PREVIOUS: VDH: Southwest Virginia’s COVID-19 case rate sees slight uptickThe community spread rate for the nine-county area is now 65 per 100,000 population, still below Virginia’s rate of 91. The highest local rates are in Scott County, which reported 52 new cases last week for a rate of 241, and Washington County (including Bristol), with a rate of 88 per 100,000 after reporting 62 new cases.
‘We expect that may see an increase in cases due to Omicron variants, but we do not expect to see an associated increase in hospitalizations or deaths.’
Breanne Forbes Hubbard, Mount Rogers Health District
The jump in Scott County put it into the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) “medium” community level because the rate is above 200 new weekly cases per 100,000 population.
Despite slight bump, NETN’s COVID rate still lower than a month agoBreanne Forbes Hubbard is the population health manager for the Mount Rogers Health District and said the current trends remain encouraging. She said Mount Rogers, which includes Washington and Smyth counties, has a 7.4% test positivity rate compared to 7.7% statewide.
Forbes Hubbard said with people having easy access to at-home tests, health officials may be missing some cases, but she said hospitalization rates currently remain low, “which is fantastic news.”
“We expect that we may see an increase in cases due to omicron variants, but we do not expect to see an associated increase in hospitalizations or deaths,” Forbes Hubbard said.
The region was hard hit by COVID-19 deaths during the Omicron surge, with death rates close to double the state average. Over the past week, an additional eight deaths were reported. Those reports are usually from deaths that occurred up to a month prior as death certificates are finalized.
The newly reported deaths included two each in Lee and Russell counties and one each in Buchanan, Dickenson, Smyth and Tazewell counties. Scott County had one death removed from its COVID-19 total.
Southwest Virginia has now recorded 1,336 total COVID-19 deaths, a rate of 462 per 100,000. That is nearly double Virginia’s overall rate of 235 and 56% higher than the U.S. rate of 297.
The region reported just four new COVID-19 hospitalizations last week, with one each in Dickenson, Smyth, Tazewell and Wise counties.
Forbes Hubbard encouraged people to stay up-to-date on vaccinations. Southwest Virginia has the state’s lowest vaccination rate. Five out of every six Virginians over the age of 18 are now fully vaccinated (83%). The rate is below 60% in Southwest Virginia, with only Washington (62%) and Smyth (61%) above that mark.
Below is a complete breakdown of local COVID-19 cases , hospitalizations and deaths in Southwest Virginia, including numbers of new cases, hospitalizations and deaths from April 14-21.
Note: VDH does not report whether cases are active or recovered. County and community case totals can include active, recovered, confirmed and probable cases.
Bristol, Va. – 4,408 cases / 251 hospitalizations / 79 deaths (16 new cases)
Buchanan County – 4,879 cases / 192 hospitalizations / 118 deaths (1 new case, 1 new death)
Dickenson County – 3,321 cases / 77 hospitalizations / 48 deaths (7 new cases, 1 new hospitalization, 1 new death)
Lee County – 6,211 cases / 172 hospitalizations / 94 deaths (1 new case, 2 new deaths)
Norton – 1,304 cases / 40 hospitalizations / 22 deaths (-1 new cases)
Russell County – 6,852 cases / 199 hospitalizations / 113 deaths (21 new cases, 2 new deaths)
Scott County – 5,778 cases / 211 hospitalizations / 110 deaths (52 new cases, -1 new deaths)
Smyth County – 8,781 cases / 410 hospitalizations / 170 deaths (17 new cases, 1 new hospitalization, 1 new death)
Tazewell County – 10,223 cases / 267 hospitalizations / 171 deaths (14 new cases, 1 new hospitalization, 1 new death)
Washington County, Va. – 13,787 cases / 836 hospitalizations / 214 deaths (46 new cases)
Wise County – 10,262 cases / 311 hospitalizations / 197 deaths (14 new cases, 1 new hospitalization)
For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to WJHL | Tri-Cities News & Weather. | https://www.newsbreak.com/news/2580469407628/new-covid-case-rate-doubles-in-southwest-virginia-still-low | 2022-04-25T18:38:44Z | https://www.newsbreak.com/news/2580469407628/new-covid-case-rate-doubles-in-southwest-virginia-still-low | true | 2 |
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — The judge overseeing jury selection for a man who murdered 17 people at a Florida high school declared that the process will start over Monday, conceding that she should have questioned 11 potential jurors who said they would not follow the law before she dismissed them.
In granting the motion filed by Nikolas Cruz 's prosecutors over the strong objection of his attorneys, Circuit Judge Elizabeth Scherer nullified two weeks of work by prosecution and defense lawyers, forcing them to begin the entire process anew on Monday.
As a result, almost 250 potential jurors who had said they could sit for a four-month trial will not be called back next month for further questioning. More than 1,200 candidates had been screened.
Prosecutor Carolyn McCann made her argument after the 11 jurors who were improperly dismissed by Scherer two weeks ago weren’t told to return to court for more questioning Monday, as had been planned, due to a miscommunication error.
Scherer said they would be brought in next week, but McCann argued that more time would be wasted if it turned out the potential jurors had to be struck anyway. She said the prosecution has just as much right to question potential jurors and to an untainted final panel as the defense.
“Neither side has been able to talk to these jurors. In a capital case, the questioning of jurors is important. It is of the utmost importance," McCann said. "This is not harmless error.”
Melisa McNeill, Cruz’s lead public defender, strongly disagreed with the decision. She said Scherer should wait until next week to see if the 11 jurors returned and could be questioned.
“We have a right to speak to those jurors” before they are dismissed, McNeill said. She asked that her side be given until Monday afternoon to research the issue. Scherer sided with the prosecution, while saying she might reconsider if the defense can make a persuasive argument after it finishes its research.
Cruz, 23, pleaded guilty in October to murdering 17 and wounding 17 at Parkland's Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on Feb. 14, 2018. The 12-member jury that will be selected after a two-month winnowing process will decide if he is sentenced to death or life in prison without parole. The misstep will push back opening statements from June 14 to June 21. They had already been delayed from May 31.
Having to start all over again has been a possibility since Scherer made the error on April 5 during questioning of a group of 60 potential jurors, the fifth of 21 panels that had appeared before the judge, prosecutors and the defense.
With the previous four groups and every group since, Scherer only asked potential jurors if they knew Cruz or any of the attorneys and if they had any personal or work hardships that would make it impossible for them to serve from June through September. With the fifth group, however, she also asked if any of the candidates would not follow the law if chosen. A couple people put up their hands, then a couple more until soon there were 11 hands held aloft.
Scherer expressed surprise at the number, but dismissed them without further questioning, drawing an objection from Cruz’s attorneys in a private sidebar after they left. The defense wanted Scherer to question them further to make sure they actually believed and understood what they were saying and were not simply trying to avoid jury service. Florida jury candidates who say they can’t serve are almost always questioned, regardless of the reasons they give.
Scherer, realizing her error, tried to have the jurors returned, but all except one had left the courthouse. She said the Broward County Sheriff’s Office would deliver summonses to them, but that was not done for unexplained reasons. Even if all had returned, they still might have been disqualified because they had not been given the order that Scherer gave to other potential jurors to not discuss or read about the case.
“I will never make that mistake again,” Scherer told attorneys the day after her error.
David Weinstein, a Miami defense attorney and former prosecutor, said Monday that the prosecutors are correct, to a point. They, the victims and their next of kin “all have a right to a fair trial, but that right can’t trump the rights of a criminal defendant.”
“What the state is seeking to prevent, more than anything else, is a penalty phase that has been tainted at this early stage,” he said. If Cruz receives a death sentence, that could result in it being thrown out on appeal, he said. “From their perspective, the judge can wipe the slate clean and start over."
But the defense, he said, will argue on appeal that by starting again over their objection, Cruz is being subjected to unconstitutional double jeopardy and cannot be sentenced to death. He said the fact that Scherer ruled before fully hearing the defense's arguments makes her decision even more “problematic.”
The jurors who are selected will decide whether aggravating factors — the multiple deaths, the planning Cruz put into the killings and the cruelty with which they were carried out — outweigh mitigating factors such as the defendant’s lifelong mental and emotional problems, possible sexual abuse and the death of his parents.
For Cruz to be executed, the jury must vote unanimously for death. If one or more vote against it, he will be sentenced to life without parole.
Given Cruz’s notoriety and the hatred many in the community have for him, finding jurors who can be fair promises to be an excruciatingly long process. Jurors who pass the first stage by saying they can serve four months complete questionnaires about their backgrounds and their beliefs on the death penalty. The answers are given to both sides, and then prospects are brought back in several weeks later for further questioning, including whether they can be fair to Cruz.
Both sides then get to ask questions and can try to “rehabilitate” jurors who they believe might be favorable for their side. For example, jurors who say they are morally opposed to the death penalty would normally be dismissed as unfair to the prosecution, but the defense can ask questions about whether they could still vote for the death penalty if the law required it. If the judge is convinced that they could, the juror could still be seated.
Credit: Amy Beth Bennett
Credit: Amy Beth Bennett
Credit: Amy Beth Bennett
Credit: Amy Beth Bennett | https://www.journal-news.com/nation-world/error-forces-redo-of-florida-school-shooters-jury-selection/KHIETJPFHFACXJEJFPUNNT4XAU/ | 2022-04-25T18:41:13Z | https://www.journal-news.com/nation-world/error-forces-redo-of-florida-school-shooters-jury-selection/KHIETJPFHFACXJEJFPUNNT4XAU/ | true | 71 |
When actor Michelle Yeoh first read the script for Everything Everywhere All at Once, she gave a big sigh of relief: Finally, here was a film that put a middle-aged mother in the role of action hero.
"When [people] think 'superhero' ... it's always the guys who seem to be first in line for it," Yeoh says. "Why is it that we older women cannot be the superhero?"
Yeoh originally trained as a ballet dancer, but turned to acting after becoming sidelined with an injury. In the 1980s and '90s, she starred in martial arts films in Hong Kong before becoming more internationally known for her performance in the 2000 art-house film, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.
In Everything Everywhere All at Once, she plays Evelyn Wang, a Chinese American immigrant who made a choice decades earlier to leave her parents behind and follow her boyfriend to America. Years later, Eveyln's life is a mess. Her laundromat business is being audited by the IRS, her husband is serving her papers for divorce and she has a tense relationship with her daughter, who is queer. But through the film she is presented with alternate versions of her life — including the glamorous existence of a movie star.
Yeoh describes Everything Everywhere All at Once as five genres wrapped up into a single film. "It's science fiction, it's comedy, it's drama, it's action, it's a little horror. But I think the core of the story, it's about a mother and daughter," she says.
Yeoh credits filmmakers Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert — aka "the Daniels" — with crafting a nuanced story about the type of character Hollywood often overlooks: a "very ordinary housewife ... a woman that you pass by when you go to Chinatown or in the supermarket."
"I felt that it was so important for someone like that to be given a voice and then to be shown that she is actually a super heroine," Yeoh says. "And we allow her to prove herself, her self-worth and to shine."
Interview highlights
On Everything Everywhere All At Once originally being written for Jackie Chan as the lead and Michelle Yeoh as his wife – but the Daniels rewrote it
They realized, I think, we're telling the same old story if it was really Jackie Chan and myself as playing the husband and wife, and he is the one who goes on the multiverse thing. But I think the good news was ... the Daniels are surrounded by very, very strong women. ... I think it's an homage to all the strong women who are around them. ... So I think that cemented the mother and daughter story a lot more. I think it's much more relatable. It's much more emotional on many levels.
On the intensity of shooting the film
One thing that bonded us always together was the fact that the Daniels would have a 15-minute warm up for everyone. And that means everyone from behind the scenes, anyone who's working on sets in other departments who are normally not seen when we are working, would come together and know and feel that we are in this together. I think that really helped all of us really be a family. So we basically just linked hands, looked at each other and say, "We're diving into the everything bagel with commitment and passion." We just trusted in each other and there was no other way to do it, because if any one of us let go, it would have been chaotic and it would have been a chaos that would have been very difficult to pull back from.
On mourning for the end of her dance career after a back injury
When I was first told that I should consider something else, I just saw in front of my eyes the mirror shatter in front of me. But I was very fortunate, possibly because I'm a foreign student, that the principal felt that it was much more of a responsibility. And she just took me aside and said, "Now don't be a silly young lady. There are many aspects of dance, and if you truly love dance, we will find another place where you don't have to do so much physical dancing but still be very much involved and over time you will heal your back. There will be exercises and it will take a little bit of time. It will become better and hopefully it will be stronger." And so she took me under her wing. She enrolled me and got me to audition for another college where it was more academic rather than physical. So I went from there to be given another chance, another door opened where I was still very much in the world that I wanted to be. So I was very blessed. I must say I've been very blessed all through my life. There's always been someone who's watched out for me.
On her severe stage fright
I have stage fright. If I have to go on stage and say something, I won't be able to sleep the night before or the nights before that, thinking of all the things that could go wrong. I am so bad. It's OK when I dance. It's perfect when I'm just using body language. But once I have to start saying something or give a speech ... it is quite the nightmare for me. So I think if you ever said to my lecturers when I was in college and say, "One day you're going to have Michelle Yeoh on the screen," they'll bet their last dollar that it would not happen.
On breaking into the boys' club of martial arts and stunts
I went into training, like with the stunt boys and all that, and I think they were very curious to see this young girl who wanted to play in the sandbox. And I was very fortunate, they were very agreeable to it. I had some of the best instructors who taught me how to protect myself. [I] did learn that they took the blows. ... All the top action stars, they did not get it handed to them on a silver platter. And so I remember thinking, if I want to join this boy's club, you better be able to take the blows as well. I had to persuade them. I had to demonstrate to them that I deserved to be there. I think that's the most important thing is that we fight for gender equality, we fight for all these kind of things. And when we are given the opportunity to be able to do it, we must be able to prove our worth. I think that's the simple message.
On her first stunt
I remember the very first stunt that I did in my first action film, and I will never forget that one, because even Quentin Tarantino can, frame for frame, tell you how it was done. I was on the second floor sitting on a railing and two guys like, swipe my head with their swords. So, hanging on the balcony on the railing, I bend backwards, go through a pane of glass and drag these two guys down onto the first floor in one take. And at that point, I didn't know how to think of the danger, the repercussions if things did not go right, because I only knew how to focus on how to get the stunt done properly. I was probably too fearless for my own good. Plus, the fact that physically and mentally, I was so fit, so that egged me on, because I did feel that I had a lot of things to prove to stay in what was the boys' club, and to constantly demonstrate that I deserve to be there.
On proving herself among Jet Li and Jackie Chan and taking risks she wouldn't take now
All of us would be injured in some way or the other. But today, with the help of CG, with the help of rehearsal time and things being done in a safer environment, we are much better protected. But would I take risks like that again? No, definitely not. I'm glad I paid my dues.
If I agree to do something, it must be to the best of my ability. But I do assess —whether it's as a script, whether it's a character, and especially if it's a stunt — the reason for it and should I be doing that. In the old days, there was not so much the thought for safety as much as there is now. It was much more: How do we make a much more dynamic, a bigger stunt that the audience will be satisfied with? That was much more the intention of the stunt coordinators. ... And constantly, all of us would be injured in some way or the other. But today, with the help of CG, with the help of rehearsal time and things being done in a safer environment, we are much better protected. But would I take risks like that again? No, definitely not. I'm glad I paid my dues. That's all I can say.
Ann Marie Baldonado and Thea Chaloner produced and edited the audio of this interview. Bridget Bentz, Molly Seavy-Nesper and Natalie Escobar adapted it for the web.
Copyright 2022 Fresh Air. To see more, visit Fresh Air. | https://www.wesa.fm/2022-04-25/actor-michelle-yeoh-wants-to-change-the-way-we-think-of-superheroes | 2022-04-25T18:42:15Z | https://www.wesa.fm/2022-04-25/actor-michelle-yeoh-wants-to-change-the-way-we-think-of-superheroes | true | 23 |
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SOUTHFIELD, Mich., April 25, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The IEOM Society, an international organization of industrial engineers and operation management professionals, has expanded its offices in Southfield, Michigan. IEOM Society has experienced significant growth in the past 10 years. This has necessitated the need for additional office space to serve our growing corporate, academic, and student international membership. The expanded office facilities will provide space for professional training and development for our members.
The IEOM Society hired an Associate Operations Manager – Ahmad Mahir Faysal. He will be responsible for the coordination and management of international conference activities. Mr. Faysal earned a BS in Civil Engineering from University of Asia Pacific, Dhaka, Bangladesh. He will also work closely with our Operations Manager, Dr. Taufqui Islam, and Professor Don Reimer, Director, of Membership and Student Chapter Development. Mr. Faysal said, “He welcomed the opportunity to be part of an international professional organization. IEOM Society is growing around the globe and I look forward to growing with it.” IEOM Society Operations Manager Dr. Islam said, “Bringing an Associate Operations Manager into the team was a much-needed step at this time.” The new office includes working space for several student interns. IEOM Society also employs part-time students to assist with various conference-related activities.
As part of the IEOM Society's expanded global activities, our 4th African conference was held in Nsukka, Nigeria. The event was held virtually with Dr. Paul Ozor of the University of Nigeria serving as the conference chair. More than 33 countries were participating in the conference. Attendees from industry and academia participated in keynote presentations, and technical parallel sessions.
The IEOM Society is a premier organization of professionals who are committed to enhancing the use and implementation of industrial engineering to increase operational effectiveness and productivity around the world. It operates in more than 100 countries of which many are considered underdeveloped. As a student-centered organization, we have nearly 170 chapters in 55 countries. As a result of our intense commitment to student learning and development, this activity provides an opportunity to build leadership skills and interact with industry and other students globally.
Director of Communications
IEOM Society International
Southfield, Michigan, USA
313/300-4950 | https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2022/04/25/2428481/0/en/IEOM-Society-Expands-Operations-in-Southfield-Michigan-and-Held-3rd-African-Nigeria-Conference.html | 2022-04-25T18:44:13Z | https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2022/04/25/2428481/0/en/IEOM-Society-Expands-Operations-in-Southfield-Michigan-and-Held-3rd-African-Nigeria-Conference.html | false | 1 |
North Dakota lawmaker resigns after report he texted child porn suspect
BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — North Dakota’s longest-serving state senator announced Monday that he would resign following a report that he had traded scores of text messages with a man jailed on child pornography charges.
Republican Ray Holmberg, who rose to become one of the state’s most powerful lawmakers in a career that spanned 46 years, said he would resign effective June 1. His term was scheduled to end on Nov. 30 and he already had announced in March that it would be his last.
“Recent news stories have become a distraction for the important work of the legislative assembly during its interim meetings,” Holmberg, 79, said in a statement announcing his resignation. “I want to do what I can, within my power, to lessen such distractions.”
He did not immediately return messages from The Associated Press.
GOP Gov. Doug Burgum said in a statement he “supports Sen. Holmberg’s decision to resign.” He did not elaborate.
Senate Majority Leader Rich Wardner said he spoke with Holmberg earlier about his future in the Legislature.
“No charges have been brought against Sen. Holmberg at this time ... he felt it was in the best interest to resign at this time,” Wardner said.
Days after the published report about his text messages, Holmberg had announced that he would step down as head of a powerful panel that oversees the Legislature’s business between sessions.
The Forum of Fargo reported April 15 that Holmberg exchanged 72 text messages in August with Nicholas James Morgan-Derosier. Prosecutors allege Morgan-Derosier possessed several thousand images and videos depicting sexually abused children. He also is accused of taking two children under the age of 10 from Minnesota to his Grand Forks home, with the intent of sexually abusing them.
Holmberg first told the Forum that he had read a newspaper story about the charges, then in a later interview said he had not, the Forum reported.
He told the Forum that his text messages with Morgan-Derosier were related to “a variety of things,” including patio work Morgan-Derosier did for him. He also told the newspaper that he no longer has the text messages.
“They’re just gone,” he said.
When Holmberg announced on April 20 that he was quitting his leadership post on the Management Committee, he had referred questions from the AP to his attorneys.
Holmberg has been one of the Legislature’s most powerful lawmakers for decades, serving as chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee. He chaired the Legislative Management committee, which decides committee assignments and chooses study topics that often inspire legislation, four times.
He also sat on the state’s Emergency Commission, which allocates funding and resources in times of an emergency, and served on or chaired several GOP-led redistricting committees.
When he announced in March that this would be his last term, he said the stress of a session and a campaign would “only exacerbate a weakened ability to concentrate on the matters at hand and effectively recall events.”
Many North Dakota Republicans, including Burgum, showered Holmberg with accolades at the time.
Holmberg will remain on the Legislature’s payroll through May and on its state-funded health insurance plan through July, a benefit that is worth about $1,425 monthly.
Copyright 2022 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. | https://www.fox5vegas.com/2022/04/25/north-dakota-lawmaker-resigns-after-report-he-texted-child-porn-suspect/ | 2022-04-25T18:46:47Z | https://www.fox5vegas.com/2022/04/25/north-dakota-lawmaker-resigns-after-report-he-texted-child-porn-suspect/ | true | 33 |
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