Trump considers a taxpayer takeover of Spirit Airlines and would aim to resell carrier
NEW YORK — President Donald Trump said Thursday that he was weighing a taxpayer-funded takeover of Spirit Airlines with the intent of reselling the struggling budget carrier after oil prices drop. The president confirmed his continued interest in offering Spirit a financial lifeline after a lawyer told a U.S. Bankruptcy...
Meta slashes 8,000 jobs, or 10% of its workforce, as Microsoft offers buyoutsVideo
Meta is laying off about 8,000 workers, or about 10% of its workforce, the company said Thursday as it continues to ramp up spending on artificial intelligence infrastructure and highly paid AI-expert hires. The company said it was making the cuts for the sake of efficiency and to allow new...
Warner Bros. shareholders approve Paramount’s $81 billion takeover of the Hollywood giant
NEW YORK — An $81 billion Warner-Paramount mega merger has received shareholders’ stamp of approval, propelling a deal that could vastly reshape Hollywood and the wider media landscape closer to the finish line. Per a preliminary vote count on Thursday, the overwhelming majority of Warner Bros. Discovery shareholders voted in...
U.S. jobless claim filings rise modestly to 214,000 last week, remain at historically healthy levels
WASHINGTON — The number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits inched up last week but remains within the historically healthy range of recent years. U.S. jobless aid applications for the week ending April 18 rose by 6,000 to 214,000, up from the previous week’s 208,000, the Labor Department reported Thursday....
Authorities seize counterfeit NFL merchandise in Strip District
Law enforcement agents on Tuesday night seized an array of counterfeit NFL merchandise from at least one business in Pittsburgh’s Strip District two days before the 2026 NFL Draft kicks off in the city. The operation, carried out by agents with the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s office and Pennsylvania State Police,...
Cutting-edge Astrobotic rocket engine could fuel more efficient moon missions
Pittsburgh-based aerospace company Astrobotic has made strides in developing an ultra-efficient rocket engine that could allow more cargo to reach the moon. In a test last month at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama, Astrobotic’s 5,000-pound rotating detonation engine prototype fired for five minutes straight. Several other companies have...
Stocks rally to records, but Brent oil also tops $100 on worries about the Iran war
NEW YORK — The U.S. stock market rallied to more records Wednesday after GE Vernova, Boston Scientific and other big companies joined the parade reporting fatter profits for the start of the year than analysts expected. But caution still hung over Wall Street, and oil prices rose on uncertainty about...
Former Steeler Jerome Bettis, NFL commissioner view CMU’s inventions to power sports
The intersection of sports, physical fitness and technology can be found in Pittsburgh’s Hazelwood Green. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, former Steelers running back Jerome Bettis and local officials toured Carnegie Mellon University’s Robotics Innovation Center for the university’s “Powering the Future of Sport” showcase. More than 16 CMU-related startups —...
Trump raises prospect of federal support or merger as Spirit Airlines struggles with costs and debt
President Donald Trump on Tuesday suggested that the federal government could help keep a struggling Spirit Airlines afloat, while also encouraging a buyer to step in and rescue the budget carrier. “Spirit’s in trouble and I’d love somebody to buy Spirit. It’s 14,000 jobs,” Trump said in a CNBC interview....
Trump media company replaces ex-congressman Nunes as CEO after stock plunge that wiped out billions
NEW YORK — The Trump business behind Truth Social is replacing a former congressman and big supporter of the U.S. president as the leader of the social media platform after a stock collapse that wiped out billions in investor wealth. Devin Nunes, a former California congressmen in Donald Trump’s first...
Pittsburgh restaurants prepare for NFL Draft surge as closures raise concerns
With hundreds of thousands of football fans expected in town, restaurants near the NFL Draft footprint in Pittsburgh say they’re anticipating large crowds — but worry that widespread road closures could make it difficult for employees to get to work. “We are used to volume, whether it’s football or opening...
Local experts say consumers and small businesses might not benefit from new tariff refund portal
The federal government is giving companies the opportunity to file claims for tariff refunds, following the Supreme Court’s Feb. 20 ruling that President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs were unconstitutional. On Monday, the government launched the Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries’ (CAPE) new tariff refund portal. But local trade and...
Kevin Warsh says he got no pressure from Trump to cut rates even as president publicly pushes for themVideo
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s nominee to chair the Federal Reserve said Tuesday that he never promised the White House that he would cut interest rates, even as the president renewed his calls for the central bank to do so. “The president never once asked me to commit to any...
Apple’s new CEO John Ternus steps into the spotlight after flying under the radar for years
LONDON — Apple’s next CEO John Ternus is a company veteran who rose through the iPhone maker’s hardware engineering ranks but until now has maintained a low profile. Ternus will take over as chief executive in September for Tim Cook, who turned Apple into a $4 trillion tech colossus during...
Retail sales up 1.7% in March from February driven by a spike in gas prices due to the Iran war
NEW YORK — Shoppers accelerated their spending in March from February, but they spent most of their money at the gas pump. A spike in gas prices due to the Iran war, now in its eighth week, resulted in a hefty 1.7% gain in retail sales in March after a...
A criminal sentence for OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma clears the way for completing its settlement
A judge is expected to sentence OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma to forfeit $225 million to the Justice Department on Tuesday, clearing the way for the company to finalize a settlement of thousands of lawsuits it faces over its role in the opioid crisis. The penalty was agreed to in a...
Consumers are lost at sea as seafood sustainability grows more complex
BOSTON — Don’t overfish. Don’t trawl the seabed. Keep aquaculture healthy for the fish as well as the ocean. Some aspects of sustainable seafood are obvious and well-trod, even if the how-to intricacies likely are lost on most consumers. But sustainability today is complicated terrain, as much about business as...
Oil prices rise and stocks give back a bit of their record-breaking rally
NEW YORK — Oil prices climbed Monday following the latest rise of tensions between the United States and Iran, but the moves were more modest than they were earlier in the war. U.S. stocks, meanwhile, gave back a bit of their record-breaking rally. The S&P 500 slipped 0.2% from its...
Tim Cook will step down as Apple CEO and hand reins over to the iPhone maker’s hardware leader
Apple CEO Tim Cook is stepping down from the job that he inherited from the late Steve Jobs, ending a 15-year reign that saw the company’s market value soar by more than $3.6 trillion during an iPhone-fueled era of prosperity. Cook, 65, will turn the CEO duties over to Apple’s...
Businesses begin claiming refunds for Trump tariffs struck down by Supreme Court
NEW YORK — A refund system for businesses that paid tariffs which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled President Donald Trump imposed without the constitutional authority to do so launched Monday. Importers and their brokers could begin claiming refunds through an online portal beginning at 8 a.m., according to U.S. Customs...
Ligonier Country Market vendors face uncertain season after zoning, lease setbacksVideo
Lori Lentz of North Huntingdon sells pure homemade baking extracts from her Irwin store, Vnlla Cncpt. But she really benefits from the booth she has operated in the spring, summer and fall at the Ligonier Country Market. Yet the popular market — where vendors sell produce, flowers, beef, poultry, eggs...
Oil prices rise anew after a U.S.-Iran standoff in the Strait of Hormuz strands tankersVideo
NEW YORK — Oil prices rose in early trading Sunday as a standoff between Iran and the U.S. prevented tankers from using the Strait of Hormuz, the Persian Gulf waterway that is crucial to global energy supplies. The price of U.S. crude oil increased 6.4% to $87.90 per barrel an...
Traffic and trepidation in the Persian Gulf could keep gasoline prices from dropping quickly
NEW YORK — After U.S. President Donald Trump and Iran’s foreign minister said the Strait of Hormuz was fully open to commercial vessels after almost seven weeks of war, oil prices plunged 10% and the stock market rallied Friday. Motorists, hoping for relief at the pump, wondered how quickly gasoline...
$1.3B UPMC Presbyterian Hospital tower construction enters home stretch
Sunlight streams in from almost every angle of UPMC’s new glass-paneled hospital tower in Pittsburgh’s Oakland neighborhood. Each of the 636 patient rooms has floor-to-ceiling windows, incorporating research showing the therapeutic effects of a connection with nature. The respite areas for workers to collect their thoughts during tough days follow...
Moss & Rain Boutique to open in downtown Greensburg
Greensburg resident Amy Fiaschetti is living out her dream of owning a boutique. Fiaschetti and her two daughters, Rachel Mormack and Madison Swan, will open Moss & Rain Boutique on Saturday in downtown Greensburg. “I love clothes, and then having two girls, I passed that on (to them),” said Fiaschetti,...
