Wire stories category, Page 61
Omicron unravels travel industry’s plans for a comeback
Tourism businesses that were just finding their footing after nearly two years of devastation wrought by the covid-19 pandemic are being rattled again as countries throw up new barriers to travel in an effort to contain the omicron variant. From shopping districts in Japan and tour guides in the Holy...
Wall Street steadies following omicron slide; stocks rise
NEW YORK — Wall Street steadied itself Monday after last week’s stock market slide caused by the newest coronavirus variant, with investors now waiting for more clues about just how much damage it may do to the economy. The S&P 500 rose 1.3% to recover more than half of its...
Activists block Amazon warehouses in Europe on Black Friday
Climate activists blockaded Amazon warehouses in three European countries on Friday, part of a global effort to pressure the ecommerce giant on one of its busiest days of the year to improve working conditions and end business practices that hurt the environment. Members of Extinction Rebellion targeted 13 Amazon fulfilment...
Stores kick off Black Friday but pandemic woes linger
Retailers are expected to usher in the unofficial start to the holiday shopping season Friday with bigger crowds than last year in a closer step toward normalcy. But the fallout from the pandemic continues to weigh on businesses and shoppers’ minds. Buoyed by solid hiring, healthy pay gains and substantial...
Stocks sink on new covid variant; Dow loses 905 points
Stocks sank Friday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average briefly falling more than 1,000 points, as a new coronavirus variant first detected in South Africa appeared to be spreading across the globe. Investors were uncertain whether the variant could potentially reverse months of progress at getting the covid-19 pandemic under...
Dollar Tree makes it official: Items will now cost $1.25
NEW YORK — Faced with the rising cost of goods and freight, discount retail chain Dollar Tree said Tuesday it will be raising its prices to $1.25 for the majority of its products. Dollar Tree said the reason for raising its prices to $1.25 was not due to “short-term or...
U.S. to release 50 million barrels of oil to ease energy costs
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden on Tuesday ordered 50 million barrels of oil released from the nation’s strategic reserve to help bring down energy costs, in coordination with other major energy consuming nations, including China, India and the United Kingdom. The move is aimed at global energy markets, but also...
Hedge fund Alden in hunt for another big newspaper chain
Hedge fund Alden Global Capital, one of the country’s largest newspaper owners with a reputation for intense cost cuts and layoffs, has offered to buy the local newspaper chain Lee Enterprises for about $141 million. In a news release Monday, Alden said it sent Lee’s board a letter with the...
A late afternoon slump leaves major indexes mostly lower
A choppy day of trading on Wall Street ended with stocks mostly lower Monday, as a late-afternoon burst of selling derailed the market from another all-time high. The S&P 500 fell 0.3% after having been up as much as 1% earlier in the day and on pace to eclipse the...
Stocks wobble as Wall Street heads for a mixed weekly finish
Stocks wobbled in morning trading on Wall Street Friday and major indexes were on track for a mixed finish to a choppy week. The S&P 500 fell less than 0.1% as of 10:16 a.m. Eastern. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 247 points, or 0.7%, to 35,630 and the Nasdaq...
AAA predicts more than 53 million people will travel for Thanksgiving
AAA Travel is predicting that 53.4 million Americans will travel for the Thanksgiving holiday, an increase of 13% from 2020. According to AAA Travel’s latest data, the combination of 6.4 million more people traveling for the holiday this year and the reopening of the U.S. borders to fully vaccinated international...
Stock indexes end mixed as traders weigh retail earnings
A wobbly day on Wall Street ended with a mixed finish for stock indexes Thursday, nudging the S&P 500 and Nasdaq to new highs. The S&P 500 rose 0.3% and the Nasdaq gained 0.5%, enough for the indexes to set new highs after a modest pullback a day earlier. After...
With supply short, Ford dips toe into computer chip business
Ford Motor Co. is in talks with a computer chip maker to shore up its semiconductor supplies and avoid a repeat of this year’s auto factory shutdowns caused by semiconductor shortages. Few details of the nonbinding agreement with GlobalFoundaries Inc. were released, but the deal aims to boost supplies with...
Deere workers approve 3rd contract offer, will end monthlong strike
DETROIT — Deere & Co. workers approved a new contract Wednesday that will deliver 10% raises immediately and end a monthlong strike for more than 10,000 employees. The United Auto Workers union says 61% of the members approved the deal with the tractor maker on their third vote, even though...
U.S. stocks shuffle lower, pulling indexes further from highs
NEW YORK — Stock indexes shuffled lower Wednesday on Wall Street, pulling a bit further off their record heights. The S&P 500 fell 12.23 points, or 0.3%, to 4,688.67 after earlier drifting between a tiny gain and a 0.4% decline. It’s sitting just 13.03 points below its all-time high set...
Ohio retirement fund sues Facebook over investment lossVideo
COLUMBUS, Ohio — Ohio’s largest public employee pension fund has sued Facebook — now known as Meta — alleging that it broke federal securities law by purposely misleading the public about the negative effects of its social platforms and the algorithms that run them. The lawsuit by the Ohio Public...
Stocks rise on Wall Street as retail sales remain healthy
Stocks closed higher Tuesday on Wall Street as investors reviewed solid earnings reports from big retailers and a surprisingly strong report on consumer spending. The government reported that Americans largely shrugged off higher prices last month and stepped up their spending at retail stores and online. The Commerce Department said...
Stock indexes end wobbly day mostly lower on Wall Street
Stocks closed mostly lower after wobbling most of Monday on Wall Street as the market comes off its first weekly loss in six weeks and investors move past the recent round of mostly solid corporate earnings. The S&P 500 fell less than 1 point, or less than 0.1% to 4,682.80....
Washington seeks over $38 billion from opioid distributors
SEATTLE — After rejecting a half-billion-dollar settlement, Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson on Monday took the state’s case against the nation’s three biggest drug distributors to trial, saying they must be held accountable for their role in the nation’s opioid epidemic. The Democrat delivered part of the opening statement in...
Key reason for supply shortages: Americans keep spending
Take a step back from the picked-over store shelves, the stalled container ships and the empty auto showrooms, and you’ll find a root cause of the shortages of just about everything. Even as the pandemic has dragged on, U.S. households flush with cash from stimulus checks, booming stock markets and...
Stocks wobble on Wall Street ahead of retailer earnings
Stocks wobbled in midday trading on Wall Street Monday as the market comes off its first weekly loss in six weeks. The S&P 500 fell 0.1% as of 11:56 a.m. Eastern. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 9 points, or less than 0.1%, to 36,109 and the Nasdaq fell 0.3%....
Alzheimer’s drug cited as Medicare premium jumps by $21.60
Medicare’s “Part B” outpatient premium will jump by $21.60 a month in 2022, one of the largest increases ever. Officials said Friday a new Alzheimer’s drug is responsible for about half of that. The increase guarantees that health care will gobble up a big chunk of the recently announced Social...
Amazon workers in New York withdraw petition to unionize
The National Labor Relations Board has confirmed that a group of Amazon workers in Staten Island, New York has withdrawn its petition to hold a vote to unionize. The move comes less than two weeks before the labor board was expected to hold a hearing to determine whether there was...
Stocks close higher, but indexes still end week in the red
Stocks closed higher on Wall Street on Friday, but the market still ended the week lower as inflation worries weighed on investors’ moods earlier in the week. The S&P 500 index added 33.58 points, or 0.7%, to end at 4,682.85. While it closed higher, the benchmark index still ended the...
Spotify to buy Ohio audiobooks firm, expanding audio ambitions
Spotify on Thursday said it will buy Ohio-based audiobooks distribution company Findaway as the Swedish streaming service continues to expand its audio offerings beyond music and podcasts. “It is Spotify’s ambition to be the destination for all things audio both for listeners and creators,” Gustav Söderström, Spotify’s chief research &...
