Archives for June 2021

Stocks manage modest gains overall; AMC nearly doubles

Wall Street wrapped up another wobbly day of trading Wednesday with modest gains for the major stock indexes, as energy and technology companies kept losses elsewhere in the market in check.

The benchmark S&P 500 rose 0.1% after wobbling between a gain of 0.4% and a loss of 0.1%. Strength in technology, energy and real estate stocks offset a pullback in retailers and other companies that rely on consumer spending. Communication, industrial and materials stocks also fell. Treasury yields mostly eased after rising a day earlier.

Movie theater operator AMC Entertainment nearly doubled in another bout of heavy trading as the company embraced its status as a “meme” stock being driven higher by hordes of individual investors. Other stocks like GameStop that have been championed on online message boards and social media also rose.

The market’s modest moves for the second straight day come as investors look ahead to Friday’s U.S. jobs report, which the market hopes will lead to fresh clues about the Federal Reserve’s next interest rate policy moves later this month, when the central bank holds its next meeting of policymakers.

“Payrolls will hopefully help to clarify where the Fed stands,” said Sameer Samana, senior global market strategist at Wells Fargo Investment Institute. “Until then, it’s going to be hard for the market to find a real direction, with the exception of the small-cap meme stocks.”

The S&P 500 rose 6.08 points to 4,208.12. The index is coming off its fourth straight monthly increase. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 25.07 points, or 0.1%, to 34,600.38. The Nasdaq recovered from an early slide, adding 19.85 points, or 0.1%, to 13,756.33.

Small-company stocks also notched modest gains. The Russell 2000 index rose 3.09 points, or 0.1%, to 2,297.83.

Economists are projecting that Friday’s Labor Department report will show employers added more than 650,000 jobs last month. Expectations of a strong increase in hiring have stoked worries about inflation and how the Fed may respond to it. The concern is that the global recovery could be hampered if governments and central banks have to withdraw stimulus to combat rising prices.

Bond yields edged lower. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note slipped to 1.59% from 1.61% late Tuesday.

Technology companies did much of the heavy lifting for the S&P 500. Chipmaker Nvidia rose 3.2%. Payments processor Visa gained 1.3% after giving investors an encouraging financial update.

Energy companies also made broad gains as oil prices ticked more than 1% higher. Occidental Petroleum rose 2.7% and Schlumberger led all S&P 500 stocks with a 7.7% gain.

Etsy jumped 7.1% for one of the biggest gains in the S&P 500 after the online crafts marketplace said it will buy Depop, an app that’s popular among young people looking to buy and sell used clothing and vintage fashions from the early 2000s.

US seizes 2 domain names used in cyberespionage campaign

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department said Tuesday that it has seized two domain names used in a cyberespionage campaign that targeted U.S. and foreign government agencies, think tanks and humanitarian groups.

The campaign was disclosed last week by Microsoft, which linked it to the same group of Russian intelligence operatives responsible for the massive SolarWinds intrusion that breached federal agencies and private corporations.

The company said over the weekend that it was “still not seeing evidence of any significant number of compromised organizations at this time.” The White House on Friday similarly downplayed the cyber assault as “basic phishing,” in which hackers use malware-laden emails to access networks, and said U.S. agencies had largely fended it off.

Still, officials say the U.S. government’s action on Friday was aimed at preventing any further exploitation of victims, though the Justice Department also warned that the hackers may have used additional backdoor accesses to get into networks between when the hacking first began and the time that the domains were seized.

“Last week’s action is a continued demonstration of the department’s commitment to proactively disrupt hacking activity prior to the conclusion of a criminal investigation,” Assistant Attorney General John Demers, the Justice Department’s top national security official, said in a statement.

He said the department would “continue to evaluate all possible opportunities to use our unique authorities to act against such threats.”

In the case disclosed last week, hackers gained access to an email marketing account of the U.S. Agency for International Development, and masquerading as the government body, targeted about 3,000 email accounts at more than 150 different organizations.

The company did not say what portion of the attempts may have led to successful intrusions but said that most were blocked by automated systems that marked them as spam.

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Follow Eric Tucker on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/etuckerAP

Biden, GOP senator to talk again on infrastructure deadline

WASHINGTON (AP) — For nearly an hour, President Joe Biden and the top Senate Republican negotiating infrastructure met Wednesday behind closed doors — two seasoned legislators engaged in another round of ongoing conversations, but emerging with few outward signs of tangible progress ahead of a deadline next week..

The private meeting was billed as more of a conversation with West Virginia GOP Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, rather than a formal negotiation, the White House said. No new offers were expected to be presented. More than anything, the session in the Oval Office was seen through the political lens of the president and Republicans trying to show the public what Americans say they want — a willingness to work together, even if no deal is within reach.

Biden and Capito had a “constructive and frank conversation,” and agreed to reconnect again Friday, according to a White House official granted anonymity to discuss the private talks.

Talks over the Biden’s top legislative priority have been slow-going, a daunting undertaking over the massive infrastructure investment as time is running out toward a deal. The administration has set a June 7 deadline to see clear direction and signs of progress.

“The fact that the president is having Sen. Capito here today and has been having ongoing discussions with Republicans in the Senate and that he’s eager to find a path forward on bipartisanship work certainly tells you I think what you need to know about what he thinks about working with people even when there’s disagreement,” said White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki ahead of the afternoon session.

Privately, the president has sized up the GOP’s latest $928 billion offer as unworkable, in large part because it taps unused COVID-19 funds to pay for it. Instead, Biden wants to hike the corporate tax rate to generate revenue for his $1.7 trillion package, a nonstarter for Senate Republicans.

The ongoing talks may take on new importance after Democrats suffered a setback Wednesday in their efforts to attempt to pass this and other Biden priorities on a party-line votes. The Senate parliamentarian signaled new procedural limits on how many times Democrats can use the budget reconciliation process that allows a 51-vote threshold, rather than the 60 votes typically needed to advance legislation. In a four-page ruling, the parliamentarian said only one package would be available this calendar year.

Friday’s next round of talks would overlap with the release of the May jobs report, as private economists estimate a meaningful increase the disappointing April figures. May’s jobs figures could provide evidence as to whether Biden’s earlier $1.9 trillion COVID relief package has helped put the country on track to recover the jobs lost to the pandemic by 2022.

Heading into the meeting, Capito was expected to reup the GOP’s push to repurpose the coronavirus relief fund to pay for infrastructure investments, said Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, who has tasked her to lead the discussions.

“That’s the key to getting a bipartisan agreement,” McConnell said at a press conference in Kentucky. He said he particularly wants to halt unemployment assistance that he says is preventing Americans from returning to work.

“The coronavirus is behind us. We need to get back to work,” McConnell said.

Together, the president and the Republicans both have political incentives to negotiate a bipartisan accord over his sweeping investment package, even if no deal is within sight. For Biden, reaching across the aisle and cutting deals in Congress is central to his brand of politics. Republicans can also score political gains by trying to work with a popular president.

Yet an initial Memorial Day deadline came and went without results and in the latest round of talks, Biden and a core group of GOP senators appear to have pulled farther apart. Democrats, who hold slim majorities in the House and Senate, are watching warily as the White House and Republicans try to narrow the gap between the president’s initial ideas for a massive investment in not just roads and bridges but the “human” infrastructure of hospitals and child and senior care facilities, and a GOP approach that is more focused approach on traditional infrastructure projects.

The White House has pared back the president’s initial $2.3 trillion bid, now tallied at $1.7 trillion, with Biden proposing to fund the investment by raising the corporate tax rate, from 21% to 28%.

Without a bipartisan agreement with Republicans, Biden will be faced with trying to muscle support from Democrats alone. That approach also poses political challenges in the narrowly divided Congress where the administration has few votes to spare if the president tries to push the package to passage under the budget rules that allow for a majority vote.

Psaki downplayed the comments Biden had made Tuesday that were seen as critical of two Democrats, presumably Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Sen. Krysten Sinema of Arizona. In remarks at a Tulsa, Okla., he noted those Democrats who don’t always vote with the party, blaming them for stalling his agenda.

Psaki said the president considers both Manchin and Sinema “good working partners” and pointed to the Capito meeting as an example of his willingness to broach the divide to hash out issues.

Biden’s own thinking is that the Republican proposal, while improved from an earlier $568 billion opening bid, is unworkable because the Republicans want to tap unspent COVID-19 funds to pay for the spending.

The president, in meetings with his team, has zeroed in on the questions the GOP proposal raises — namely, which coronavirus relief funds to possibly shelve. Biden’s view is that tapping the COVID funds would unduly burden the middle class, including small business owners, who are receiving the virus aid during the pandemic crisis.

For Republicans, the corporate tax hikes are a red line they will not cross, and instead want to pay for the infrastructure investment with virus aid money as well as typical gas taxes and other fees on consumers.

“I think we can get to real compromise, absolutely,” Capito said over the weekend.

Congress is away for a weeklong Memorial Day break, but faces a deadline when lawmakers return next week.

The White House said the president is also eyeing action in the House that week when the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee is set to begin debating a big highway reauthorization bill that is being closely watched as a potential building block toward the broader package.

White House deputy press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre had noted the panel’s June 9 hearing as “a relevant date in terms of the overall time frame.”

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Associated Press writers Alan Fram, Darlene Superville and Josh Boak contributed to this report.

Donor’s concerns voiced before Hannah-Jones’ tenure stalled

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. (AP) — A major University of North Carolina donor whose name is on its journalism school voiced concerns about the school’s hiring of investigative journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones in the weeks before her application for tenure was halted.

Walter Hussman Jr., publisher of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, said in emails to university leaders that he was concerned about whether Hannah-Jones’ presence at the journalism school would distract from its core values, according to an article in The Assembly. In 2019, Hussman pledged $25 million to what’s now known as the Hussman School of Journalism and Media.

In an interview with WRAL-TV Monday, Hussman said he didn’t pressure school leaders to change any decisions about hiring Hannah-Jones, whose work on The 1619 Project for the New York Times Magazine won a Pulitzer Prize. The project caused an uproar among conservatives who have complained about its focus on the country’s history of slavery.

“It’s not my decision, but I think I’d be kind of derelict in my duties if I thought they were making a mistake without at least telling them what I thought about it,” Hussman told WRAL.

Hussman, who didn’t immediately respond to a request by The Associated Press for comment on Tuesday, majored in journalism and graduated from UNC-Chapel Hill in 1968.

Hannah-Jones was offered a five-year contract to serve as the Knight Chair in Race and Investigative Journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill, even though her predecessors in the role were given tenure when appointed. A trustee who vets submissions for tenure postponed consideration of Hannah-Jones’ application in January because of questions about her non-academic background, the head of the board of trustees said last month. The submission never came before the full board of trustees for a vote.

School leaders have said little about why tenure wasn’t offered, despite the dean of the journalism school and faculty supporting the distinction. The newly revealed emails from Hussman to school leaders shed light on conversations about Hannah-Jones’ hiring in the weeks before her tenure application was halted.

The Assembly obtained emails sent by Hussman to David Routh, vice chancellor for university development; Susan King, dean of the Hussman School of Journalism and Media; and UNC-Chapel Hill Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz.

“I worry about the controversy of tying the UNC journalism school to the 1619 project,” Hussman wrote in a December email.

“Based on her own words, many will conclude she is trying to push an agenda, and they will assume she is manipulating historical facts to support it,” Hussman added in the email.

The 1619 Project launched in August 2019 around the 400th anniversary of the beginning of American slavery. The New York Times Magazine describes the project as one which is designed to reframe the country’s history by placing the consequences of slavery and the contributions of Black Americans “at the very center of our national narrative.”

In a September email to Routh, Guskiewicz and King, Hussman argued that Hannah-Jones overlooked the contributions of white Freedom Riders, journalists and others when she wrote in a 1619 Project essay that Blacks fought for civil rights alone “for the most part.”

“Long before Nikole Hannah Jones won her Pulitzer Prize,” Hussman said in the email, “courageous white southerners risking their lives standing up for the rights of blacks were winning Pulitzer prizes, too.”

In response to that quote, Hannah-Jones tweeted “Just wow,” adding: “I’ve long credited Black and white race beat reporters with inspiring my own journalism.”

Dozens of faculty members from the journalism school have signed statements decrying the failure to offer Hannah-Jones tenure and demanded an explanation for the move. The foundation that endows the Knight chair also encouraged the trustees to reconsider. A group of tenured faculty also resubmitted an application late last month for Hannah-Jones to receive a tenured position, but it’s not clear when or if the trustees will consider it.

Also last week, Hannah-Jones issued a statement saying she had retained attorneys from the NAACP legal defense fund as she considers legal action against the school. Her lawyers argue that the failure to offer her tenure is part of a conservative backlash against scholars telling the truth about the history of racism in the U.S.

NFL pledges to halt ‘race-norming,’ review Black claims

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The NFL on Wednesday pledged to halt the use of “race-norming” — which assumed Black players started out with lower cognitive function — in the $1 billion settlement of brain injury claims and review past scores for any potential race bias.

The practice made it harder for Black retirees to show a deficit and qualify for an award. The standards were created in the 1990s in hopes of offering more appropriate treatment to dementia patients, but critics faulted the way they were used to determine payouts in the NFL concussion case.

Wednesday’s announcement comes after a pair of Black players filed a civil rights lawsuit over the practice, medical experts raised concerns and a group of NFL families last month dropped 50,000 petitions at the federal courthouse in Philadelphia — where the lawsuit had been thrown out by the judge overseeing the settlement.

Senior U.S. District Judge Anita B. Brody later took the unusual step of asking for a report on the issue. Black retirees hope it will include a breakdown of the nearly $800 million in payouts so far by race. They fear the data will never come to light.

“Words are cheap. Let’s see what they do,” said former Washington running back Ken Jenkins, whose wife Amy Lewis led the petition drive on behalf of NFL friends struggling with cognitive problems. Jenkins, an insurance executive, has so far been spared.

According to the NFL, a panel of neuropsychologists formed recently to propose a new testing regime to the court includes two female and three Black doctors.

“The replacement norms will be applied prospectively and retrospectively for those players who otherwise would have qualified for an award but for the application of race-based norms,” the NFL said in a statement issued Wednesday by spokesman Brian McCarthy.

Lead players lawyer Christopher Seeger, who negotiated the 2013 settlement with the NFL, said earlier this year that he had not seen any evidence of racial bias in the administration of the settlement fund. He amended those remarks Wednesday, apologizing for any pain the program has caused.

“I am sorry for the pain this episode has caused Black former players and their families. Ultimately, this settlement only works if former players believe in it, and my goal is to regain their trust and ensure the NFL is fully held to account,” Seeger said in a statement.

The NFL noted that the norms were developed in medicine “to stop bias in testing, not perpetrate it.” And both Seeger and the league said the practice was never mandatory, but left to the discretion of doctors taking part in the settlement program.

However, the NFL appealed some claims filed by Black players if their scores were not adjusted for race.

“If it wasn’t for the wives, who were infuriated by all the red tape involved, it never would have come to be,” Jenkins said of the attention being paid to the issue, three years after lawyers for former Pittsburgh Steelers Kevin Henry and Najeh Davenport say they first raised it.

The binary race norms, when they are used in the testing, assumes that Black patients start with worse cognitive function than whites and other non-Blacks. That makes it harder for them to show a deficit and qualify for an award. Henry and Davenport, for instance, were denied awards but would have qualified had they been white, according to their lawsuit, which Brody dismissed in March, calling it an improper “collateral attack” on the settlement. They have appealed the ruling.

More than 2,000 NFL retirees have filed dementia claims, but fewer than 600 have received awards, according to the most recent report. More than half of all NFL retirees are Black, according to lawyers involved in the litigation.

The awards so far have averaged $516,000 for the 379 players with early-stage dementia and $715,000 for the 207 players with moderate dementia. Retirees can also seek payouts for Alzheimer’s disease and a few other diagnoses. The settlement ended thousands of lawsuits that accused the NFL of long hiding what it knew about the link between concussions and traumatic brain injury.

___ Follow Maryclaire Dale on Twitter at https://twitter.com/Maryclairedale

Archives for June 2021

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