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MPs launch inquiry into prosecution of Norton Motorcycles pension fraud 2023-07-24 - Financial regulators are to be summoned to parliament to explain how they prosecuted the case of a multimillion-pound pensions fraud whose victims have yet to receive compensation and which has not led to anyone serving prison time. Sir Stephen Timms MP, chair of the work and pensions committee, said he was launching an inquiry into how watchdogs and prosecutors handled the case, in which £10m of pension savings disappeared after being invested in the heritage brand Norton Motorcycles. Timms said: “I very much sympathise with the frustration of the victims of this case that justice does not appear to have been done.” The parliamentary inquiry follows years of reporting on the scandal by the Guardian, which exposed how senior government ministers feted a businessman called Stuart Garner, who acquired Norton with £1m borrowed directly from a pension fraud, received a further £10m that was raised via a pension liberation scam a decade ago and then illegally invested that money into his own business. During that period Garner received a series of publicly funded grants along with gushing tributes from the likes of the then chancellor George Osborne. He also managed to use Norton’s brand to secure himself a cameo role in the 2015 Bond film Spectre and travelled with a government trade mission to China on Theresa May’s jet when she was prime minister. Garner received an eight-month suspended prison sentence last year, with the judge saying the former gamekeeper would probably have been locked up if the Pensions Regulator, which was prosecuting the case, had alleged dishonesty. In sentencing, Judge Shant QC said: “Had this offence been put on the basis of dishonesty, or one where it was said that you had gained personally significant amounts of money, the court would have no choice but to send you to immediate custody.” Garner has always claimed he was also a victim of fraudsters. Timms’ intervention comes as a special investigation by the Guardian’s Today in Focus podcast reveals a string of events in Garner’s career that raise questions over if he was really as clueless as he has claimed. The new findings include allegations he: forged the signatures of business partners in order to allow him to more easily raise Norton funds; tapped sources of public money after making seemingly inaccurate claims to government bodies; oversaw a business where motorbikes returned to Norton for servicing were stripped of parts – which were then used to build bikes needed for new orders; and owned a fireworks business where about £1m of assets appear to have been transferred just prior to the company being placed into administration. The new allegations come on top of Norton pension holders complaining for years that the businessman had repeatedly ignored their requests to return their retirement savings. It also follows a 2020 Guardian and ITV News investigation that showed how more than 200 “ordinary working people” had had their entire pension pots invested into Norton shares. The Norton pension holders – hardly any of whom actually worked for the company – had been persuaded to switch from established pension schemes holding retirement savings built up over their working lives. Their money was then transferred to the new Norton scheme, so that it could be invested for “the long term” in the motorcycle company. In total, savers transferred about £10m during 2012 and 2013. However, new evidence seen by the Guardian suggests that much of that money was immediately spent by the company simply to keep Norton running. Between August 2012 and May 2013 – the period when pension money began coming into Norton – company bank statements show about £5m in pension cash going straight into the motorcycle firm, accounting for 66% of all the cash that went into the business at that time. Of those cash receipts, the bank statements appear to show £2.3m went to the company behind the original pensions liberation scam that raised the £10m investment for Norton. More than £300,000 was transferred to a business called “alfa cash”, which appears to be a cryptocurrency-trading website. skip past newsletter promotion Sign up to Business Today Free daily newsletter Get set for the working day – we'll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morning Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy . We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. after newsletter promotion A further £12,000 in cash was withdrawn from ATMs during this period while there were payments to Manchester United’s ticket office. In that same financial year, Garner also took a £40,000 loan out of Norton. The motorcycle company slumped into administration in January 2020, leaving the pension fund holders – who had initially invested the £10m – owed about £14m at that point. In June 2020, Garner was ordered to pay the money back after the Pensions Ombudsman – which is separate from the Pensions Regulator – ruled he acted “dishonestly”. The investments into Norton were later found to have breached technical pensions laws preventing more than 5% of an occupational scheme’s value from being invested into assets connected to the employer’s company. Three counts of that offence resulted in Garner’s suspended prison sentence last year. The Fraud Compensation Fund has now said that victims will be eligible to apply to it. However, the fund will only compensate what was put into the Norton pension schemes at the time – so well short of what Garner had promised they would be worth now. It is estimated that victims will receive roughly half what they thought they were owed. Secondly, the scheme cannot pay out until all avenues to claw back funds for the creditors have been exhausted. Timms said his committee would also be examining if payments to victims of this “appalling saga” could be speeded up, saying compensation via the fund was “taking an extraordinarily long time. It is very striking that scheme members feel they are the last people to be taken account of as this process unfolds.” He added: “Our inquiry will look at the lessons that can be learned from this experience to ensure the right regulatory arrangements are in place both to protect pension rights better and ensure compensation is paid promptly when things go wrong.” The Pensions Regulator said: “We successfully prosecuted Stuart Garner for three serious pension-related criminal offences. Garner received an eight-month suspended jail sentence, was banned from being a company director for three years and ordered to pay costs.” A spokesperson said the regulator’s focus would now be offering the independent pension trustee Dalriada “support necessary in pursuing compensation for Garner’s victims” including via the compensation fund. The regulator did not respond to questions about the way in which it prosecuted Garner. Leicestershire police said: “The conviction and sentence of Mr Stuart Garner and comments made by the sentencing judge were significant and, taken together with the amount of compensation he was ordered to pay, would undermine any further prosecution for what are extensively the same matters.” Garner, Osborne and May did not respond to invitations to comment.
Welsh whisky to gain UK’s special protected origin label 2023-07-24 - Welsh whisky is to join its Scottish and Irish counterparts in being officially awarded protected origin status under the UK’s post-Brexit regime. Single malt from four distilleries in south and west Wales – Coles, Da Mhile, In the Welsh Wind and Penderyn – has been awarded protected geographical indication (UK GI) status, the scheme brought in to replace the EU’s protected designation of origin label. After Brexit, the EU’s scheme no longer applied to the UK market prompting the British government to introduce the alternative designation, amid fears that foodstuffs such as Cornish pasties would be left without legal protection from imitations. In 2021, south Wales led the way, with Gower lamb becoming the first British product to gain recognition under the new UK PGI scheme. Later that year it was joined by lamb from the Cambrian mountains, which cover most of Wales. However, UK GI only protects registered product names when they are sold in Great Britain and not in the EU and Northern Ireland. The Welsh government agency Business Wales said it hoped the UK GI scheme would act as a “stepping stone for those wanting to go on to apply for EU” protected status. Such protection arrangements have long been a feature of agricultural law, driven by the intention to trademark and safeguard the authenticity of produce affiliated with a particular region. Gorgonzola enjoys special protection of origin status under EU law. Photograph: DeRepente/Getty Images/iStockphoto Gorgonzola cheese, Kalamata olives and Lautrec pink garlic all enjoy protection under EU legislation, deterring lesser-quality copycat products from flooding domestic markets. The announcement on single malt Welsh whisky comes amid a backdrop of a rapid expansion in production over recent years. The chief executive of Penderyn distillery, Stephen Davies, said: “The achievement of UKGI status for single malt Welsh whisky is a significant milestone for Penderyn as a producer, and also for the wider Welsh whisky industry.” Labelling the newly announced status as “an exciting step forward”, Davies also added that it “assists in safeguarding both the quality of the product and also its source of origin”. skip past newsletter promotion Sign up to Business Today Free daily newsletter Get set for the working day – we'll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morning Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy . We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. after newsletter promotion Alongside the local tourism sector, Wales’ food and drink industry is undergoing a form of revival with exports at a record high of £640m in 2021. Earlier this month, the Welsh government announced a new fund to encourage food and drink festivals by way of small grants “to improve visitor access to and awareness of Welsh food and drink”. The market for whisky, which includes exports to more than 45 countries, is seen as a growing contributor to the sector, with forecasts predicting a revenue of £23m from total sales in this financial year. Lesley Griffiths MS, the Welsh government minister for rural affairs, said: “It is brilliant news single malt whisky has joined the Welsh GI family with its name now protected. The Welsh whisky industry continues to go from strength to strength, playing an important role in the food and drink sector here in Wales.”
Our generation was told liberal economics would make us free. Look at us now. We were misled | Nesrine Malik 2023-07-24 - Jane is a junior doctor working several extra locum shifts to make ends meet. Burnt out after the pandemic, and struggling with her physical and mental health, she would really like to take unpaid leave, but she cannot afford to do so. Last month, her landlord hiked up her rent, then served her with an eviction notice when she said she couldn’t afford it. She now has to move for the fourth time in three years, and is back in a flat-hunting market where rents are higher everywhere. She feels trapped, she tells me. Trapped in her job, with her accommodation options diminishing and her time permanently constrained by balancing long work hours with the demands of looking for a home. There is no space for socialising or relaxation, only for a fleeting sleep, from which she wakes up to go back to work, to look at places to live that are almost certainly out of her reach, and to run her numbers again, hoping that an overlooked saving will magically appear. Behind the strikes, inflation numbers and talk of all the difficult decisions politicians have to make are a multitude of trapped people, their choices shrinking. People in bad relationships who cannot leave because rents and mortgages have gone up so being single is no longer viable. People who would like to have a child, or another child, but cannot afford its care, or who would like to return to work after having a child but the sums just don’t work. People in bad jobs with no security or benefits who cannot quit and look for alternatives because they have no savings to buffer rising costs. The end result is a crisis not just of the economy, but of freedom. With that crisis, an entire liberal ambition becomes thwarted. We talk of liberalism in grand abstract terms, as the noble heart of an ideal political order that promotes human rights, the rule of law, civil liberties and freedom from religious dogma and prejudice. We hope for it for others, sometimes taking it upon ourselves to bring it to them at gunpoint, evangelical about this finely calibrated system that manages the relationship between citizens and power, so that it never becomes coercive or abusive. But when economic arrangements themselves become coercive and abusive, then political liberalism can coexist with, and indeed mask, a state of illiberalism and bondage. In the throes of personal challenges, lofty political ideals feel remote and irrelevant. All that people like Jane and others have the time or energy to register is a set of invisible oppressive economic forces that simply must be weathered because they are facts of nature. The result is a sort of ambient autocracy, where personal choices are increasingly dictated by forces that you had no say in creating and have no means of overthrowing. You can hear the language and logic of this economic dictatorship everywhere. Tony Blair tells us that with an ageing population, a climate crisis, higher debt interest and an economic workforce increasingly constrained in its ability to seek services such as housing and healthcare outside the public sector, we should be ready to not wait for the NHS and use private health providers for minor health matters, and that we should ultimately be “taxing less and spending less”. Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves fixate on “growth” and “enterprise”, reneging on plans to put up income tax on higher incomes and refusing to impose a capital gains tax, so those whose income comes from that pot of earnings pay less tax than those whose money is earned from labour. “Tough decisions” has become Starmer’s mantra, as if the point is the toughness of the decisions, rather than what those tough decisions will achieve. But, in fairness, it’s an accurate mantra for the state many are in. If things are difficult, tough. Because among those for whom things won’t be tough, enough political, media and economic capital has been generated to sponsor politicians’ austerity, and enable it to be branded as realistic truth telling. This, it strikes me, is not only a political choice, but a reneging on a historical deal, forged in the colossal upheavals of the Enlightenment, the Industrial Revolution, and revolution in England, the US and Europe. The trade-off was that we would lose the traditional supports and solaces of rural values and extended families, but become free from their prejudices and patriarchies, and the associated economic and political exploitations of a hierarchical system that was skewed to landowners, rent seekers and those imbued with authority because of where they were born in that hierarchy. Yes, we would be more prosperous, but more crucially we would also be free to choose how to live our lives. “The only freedom which deserves the name,” wrote John Stuart Mill, “is that of pursuing our own good, in our own way, so long as we do not attempt to deprive others of theirs, or impede their efforts to obtain it.” That good is now increasingly limited to those who can afford it – who can purchase the liberty to love, leave and leisure, and the right to indulge in creative work and expression. The rest are caught in a halfway house between the old and new worlds. Bereft of the support and proximity of family and community, people are deprived of the social safety net that was supposed to replace it, increasingly having to fork out funds for childcare, subsidising boomeranging single children and elderly parents while paying tax, or fretting about their fates in a cutthroat housing market and a scandalously underfunded care system. Anything that disturbs this tenuous balance cannot be contemplated, so the shackles to partners, employers and imperfect domestic arrangements grow ever tighter. I grew up in the old world and saw only its limitations, chafing against it and impatient for some individual autonomy. My mother had four children, working throughout her childbearing years as a school teacher, only able to go back to work because, with each child, a new family member would move in, or move back in, to help. They joined others who lived with us on and off over the years when they needed housing. My parents were distant but seemed to be broadly content figures, either at work or obscured by a blur of relatives they were constantly entertaining, feeding or cleaning up after in a gaggle of chat, laughter and gossip. The price for that mutual communal facilitation was paid in other ways – a violating lack of privacy and personal space, and a sense that everyone’s lives, in their most private and intimate detail, were the subject of others’ opinions and policing. It was a “gilded cage”, as it is called in Orientalist literature. In hindsight now, and in adulthood and parenthood, having experienced both in the new world, I can see that gilded cages come in many forms. Political freedoms are precious metal, but when they come with economic restraints, they are a shiny enclosure.
Is equity release the best way to buy a house in Sweden a year before we sell in the UK? 2023-07-24 - Q My husband and I are going to move to Sweden when he retires as he wants to be nearer to his family. We own our home outright. We are thinking of taking out equity release for £150,000 to buy and decorate a property about a year before we move out of and sell our current home. Is this a good idea? Is there a better option of releasing money from the property? Our house is worth approximately £650,000. PS A I’m not sure that it is a good idea. But that’s because I can’t imagine being able to manage the renovation of a property at long distance, not to mention the cost of insuring an empty property that is miles away. But if you are made of sterner stuff than I am, you may be pleased to hear that, according to Andy Vickery, an equity release expert and mortgage adviser at the independent brokers Money Release, “lifetime mortgage interest rates are at an all-time low, so now might be the best time for you to look at equity release”. But it is worth noting that if you want to release just under 24% of the value of your home (which is what £150,000 represents) the younger of you has to be over 60. If you are under 60 the most you will be able to release is £97,500 (which is 15% of £650,000). Another factor is the interest rate that you’ll be charged. Vickery says the lowest interest rate is currently 6.2% fixed for life, while the highest is 9.39%. On the plus side, you don’t actually have to pay out the interest as it is added to the amount you initially borrowed. On the minus side, because of the interest added to the original loan, there will be less left over when you come to sell the house. It would be cheaper and simpler to wait until you have sold your UK property to buy your Swedish home. You should also investigate whether you need to get a residency visa now that the UK is no longer part of the EU. As a third-country national (unlike EU, EEA or Swiss citizens) you won’t be able to live, work and own property in Sweden without the necessary visa. It would be helpful to read through the UK government’s advice on living in Sweden, which was last updated in March 2022, and also the advice on the Swedish website Migrationsverket.
How to start a pension if you’re self-employed in the UK 2023-07-24 - Make a start If you are self-employed, it’s up to you to save for retirement, as you won’t be enrolled into a company pension. But sorting out your own pension provision can be daunting, particularly when you are managing a fluctuating income and running your own business. Almost half – 45% – of freelance and other self-employed workers are not currently saving into a pension, according to the latest research from the Association of Independent Professionals and the Self-Employed. But you can typically save from about £50 a month into a personal pension, and it is important to start somewhere. After all, you will need additional income on top of the full new flat-rate state pension, currently £203.85 a week, or £10,600 a year, which you get if you have made enough national insurance contributions. If you are self-employed, pensions are still worth it PensionBee’s Becky O’Connor Becky O’Connor, the director of public affairs at the firm PensionBee, says: “If you are self-employed, pensions are still worth it. You might not get contributions from your employer but you will still get tax relief on contributions. This is an instant uplift on what you put in.” As a basic-rate taxpayer, tax relief means that it costs £80 to pay £100 into your pension, while it will cost higher-rate taxpayers £60 to pay £100 into their pension. Pick your pension type You have several choices. You could choose a personal pension that offers a range of ready-made plans to suit different types of savers. If you pay into a stakeholder pension, your contributions will usually be paid into a default fund. A self-invested personal pension (Sipp) typically gives you greater investment choice, including individual shares and investment trusts, for example. It is up to you to choose the investments you want to hold, and this type of pension is usually more suitable for people who are comfortable making their own investment decisions. Research suggests 45% of freelance and other self-employed workers are not currently saving into a pension. Photograph: Fredrick Kippe/Alamy Helen Morrissey, the head of retirement analysis at the investment platform Hargreaves Lansdown, says: “If you have strong investment views, check to see what level of investment choice different providers can offer. If you would prefer to be invested in a ready-made solution, you may want to look at standard personal pensions.” Choose your provider There are plenty of simple personal pensions on offer from a growing number of digital providers. The online pension providers PensionBee and Penfold, for example, are designed for the self-employed, and let you consolidate your old pensions into a single plan if you wish. Other investment providers offering personal pensions include Nutmeg and Wealthify. If you are looking for greater investment choice through a Sipp, the investment platforms AJ Bell, Hargreaves Lansdown and interactive investor enable you to choose from thousands of funds and other investment options. Bear in mind that moving old pensions into your current plan may not be the right move, though, and if you are unsure, seek professional financial advice. Assess your risk Before choosing your personal pension plan, decide on your risk profile. Generally, the sooner you plan to draw an income from your pension, the less risk you should take. For example, Penfold offers four different risk levels for its standard plan, as well as sustainable and Sharia-compliant portfolio options. If you are decades away from retirement, you can afford to take more risk to hopefully generate greater investment growth over time. If you are closer to retirement, you may want to choose a lower-risk pension plan, so that your returns are less affected by stock market movements. Check charges and flexibility Look closely at the charges you will have to pay, as these can eat into your retirement pot over the years. You will usually either pay a percentage charge or a fixed fee. Nutmeg’s charges, for example, range from 0.45% to 0.75% on pots of up to £100,000, while PensionBee’s range from 0.5% to 0.95%, depending on the plan you choose. There may be other costs, too – for example, with Nutmeg, there are fund costs (perhaps about 0.2%-0.3%) on top. Also, consider flexibility. O’Connor says: “Find a personal pension provider that allows flexible payments, if this makes more sense for you than regular monthly contributions. This way, if you get paid unpredictably and sometimes in large chunks, you can simply add a proportion of your payments in, as and when you get them.” Consider other options You don’t have to focus solely on pensions when you are saving for retirement. Stocks and shares individual savings accounts (Isas) are another option. You do not receive tax relief on your contributions but there is less red tape around how you access your money. You can invest up to £20,000 in an Isa this tax year. Almost half, or 45%, of freelance and other self-employed workers are not currently saving into a pension Hargreaves Lansdown’s Helen Morrissey Morrissey says: “Many self-employed people are put off pensions because they cannot access the money within them until at least age 55 (going up to 57 in 2028).” However, she adds that lifetime Isas (Lisas) are another valuable option, as you get a 25% bonus that works in a similar way to basic-rate tax relief on a pension. You can use a lifetime Isa to save for later life (you can withdraw money at age 60) or buy your first home. You must be 18 or over but under 40 to open one, and you can put in up to £4,000 a year until you are 50. The government will add a 25% bonus to your savings, up to a maximum of £1,000 a year. “If times are tough and you need to access the money you have saved in a Lisa, you can do so subject to a 25% penalty,” Morrissey says. Carry on contributing It can be tough to make ends meet as living costs soar, and difficult to find the spare cash for pension contributions. But pay in however much you can afford, when you can. Stopping contributions completely could have a big impact on your retirement income in years to come, particularly if you don’t restart your payments. Also, don’t be deterred by stock market downturns. Remember that it’s during these times that your money buys more investments, so contributing to your pot during a rocky period may boost your returns in the long run. Don’t let stock market downturns deter you. Photograph: James Thew/Alamy Ultimately, the amount you end up with in your pension will depend on how much you have paid in over the years, and how your investments have performed, after charges. You can use the MoneyHelper pension calculator to see what income you could end up with based on your monthly pension contributions.
My disabled son’s solo holiday plan was derailed by Eurostar 2023-07-24 - My 18-year-old son AS is a full-time wheelchair user. He is trying to go abroad without us for the first time this summer, after finishing his A-levels. But we have hit a brick wall with Eurostar over some medical equipment he needs to take with him. We booked and paid for the train journeys and hotel stays in Amsterdam for him and his carers. They use a hoist and sling to help him on to the toilet and into bed and, as his hotel doesn’t have ceiling track hoists, we have been trying to hire a mobile setup. This has proved extremely difficult. The companies we have dealt with have been inadequate. Also, the sling system they use there is different from the UK’s, which is very risky as AS sits in one for long periods, so it’s vital it is comfortable. None of this, however, would be a problem if Eurostar would permit him to take his own mobile hoist. It is about the size of a large rucksack, weighs 26kg and is on wheels. If we can’t send him with his hoist, he simply can’t go. MS, Stonesfield Initially, Eurostar said no to transporting what it described as “oversized medical equipment” because of health and safety requirements on board and within the stations. However, after some to-ing and fro-ing, it has had a change of heart, and AS is now on his travels. Eurostar says: “The safety and wellbeing of customers is always our number one priority. This case presented some particular logistical considerations, and we have worked closely with AS’s family and our assistance teams in London and Amsterdam to ensure his journey is as comfortable and smooth as possible.” With the future of AS’s trip hanging in the balance, you ended up hiring a hoist for £548 and, by the time he was given the OK to take his own, it was too late to cancel. Eurostar has also agreed to refund this, and you are delighted. We welcome letters but cannot answer individually. Email us at consumer.champions@theguardian.com or write to Consumer Champions, Money, the Guardian, 90 York Way, London N1 9GU. Please include a daytime phone number. Submission and publication of all letters is subject to our terms and conditions
Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba says it will not sell shares in Ant’s buyback program 2023-07-24 - HONG KONG (AP) — Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba says it does not plan to sell any shares in its one-third shareholding in financial technology company Ant Group because it wants to retain its stake in an “important strategic partner.” Alibaba Group Holdings said in a filing Sunday that it will not participate in Ant’s share buyback program. It allows shareholders to sell back up to 7.6% of their holdings at an unspecified price that values the company at 567.1 billion yuan ($78.8 billion). Ant, which operates one of China’s leading mobile payments services Alipay, has seen its valuation fall nearly 70% from about $280 billion ($38.9 billion) at the time it was planning an IPO in 2020. That was derailed by regulators who conducted an investigation into the firm and then fined it nearly $100 billion for violating laws and regulations in the payments sector. Given the plunge in Ant’s valuation, investors who sell their shares to Ant will likely get far less than they would have gotten in 2020. “Given that Ant Group continues to be an important strategic partner to Alibaba Group’s various businesses, Alibaba Group has decided that it will not sell any shares to Ant Group under the proposed share repurchase, so as to maintain its shareholding in Ant Group,” Alibaba said in the filing. Alibaba had said earlier that it might sell shares during the program. Singapore state-owned investment firm Temasek Holdings also said it was considering selling some of its shares. Founded by Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma, Ant Group’s Alipay is the primary payment method on Alibaba’s Taobao and Tmall e-commerce platforms. It serves over a billion users. Alibaba earlier this year split its businesses into six business groups to try to increase shareholder value. It plans to spin off those businesses into companies that could eventually go public and raise funding. In May, Alibaba said that its cloud unit, headed by Alibaba’s former CEO Daniel Zhang, is expected to list within a year.
Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba says it will not sell shares in Ant's buyback program 2023-07-24 - Visitors tour the Ant Group booth during the China International Fair for Trade in Services (CIFTIS) at the Shougang venue in Beijing on Sept. 1, 2022. Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba says it does not plan to sell any shares in its one-third shareholding in financial technology company Ant Group because it wants to retain its stake in an "important strategic partner." (AP Photo/Andy Wong) Visitors tour the Ant Group booth during the China International Fair for Trade in Services (CIFTIS) at the Shougang venue in Beijing on Sept. 1, 2022. Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba says it does not plan to sell any shares in its one-third shareholding in financial technology company Ant Group because it wants to retain its stake in an "important strategic partner." (AP Photo/Andy Wong) Visitors tour the Ant Group booth during the China International Fair for Trade in Services (CIFTIS) at the Shougang venue in Beijing on Sept. 1, 2022. Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba says it does not plan to sell any shares in its one-third shareholding in financial technology company Ant Group because it wants to retain its stake in an "important strategic partner." (AP Photo/Andy Wong) Visitors tour the Ant Group booth during the China International Fair for Trade in Services (CIFTIS) at the Shougang venue in Beijing on Sept. 1, 2022. Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba says it does not plan to sell any shares in its one-third shareholding in financial technology company Ant Group because it wants to retain its stake in an "important strategic partner." (AP Photo/Andy Wong) Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba has said it will not sell any shares in its one-third shareholding in financial technology company Ant Group Co_ because it wants to retain its stake in an “important strategic partner.” HONG KONG -- Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba says it does not plan to sell any shares in its one-third shareholding in financial technology company Ant Group because it wants to retain its stake in an “important strategic partner.” Alibaba Group Holdings said in a filing Sunday that it will not participate in Ant’s share buyback program. It allows shareholders to sell back up to 7.6% of their holdings at an unspecified price that values the company at 567.1 billion yuan ($78.8 billion). Ant, which operates one of China’s leading mobile payments services Alipay, has seen its valuation fall nearly 70% from about $280 billion ($38.9 billion) at the time it was planning an IPO in 2020. That was derailed by regulators who conducted an investigation into the firm and then fined it nearly $100 billion for violating laws and regulations in the payments sector. Given the plunge in Ant's valuation, investors who sell their shares to Ant will likely get far less than they would have gotten in 2020. “Given that Ant Group continues to be an important strategic partner to Alibaba Group’s various businesses, Alibaba Group has decided that it will not sell any shares to Ant Group under the proposed share repurchase, so as to maintain its shareholding in Ant Group,” Alibaba said in the filing. Alibaba had said earlier that it might sell shares during the program. Singapore state-owned investment firm Temasek Holdings also said it was considering selling some of its shares. Founded by Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma, Ant Group's Alipay is the primary payment method on Alibaba’s Taobao and Tmall e-commerce platforms. It serves over a billion users. Alibaba earlier this year split its businesses into six business groups to try to increase shareholder value. It plans to spin off those businesses into companies that could eventually go public and raise funding. In May, Alibaba said that its cloud unit, headed by Alibaba’s former CEO Daniel Zhang, is expected to list within a year.
Interest rate rises to hit UK growth next year, but recession unlikely; Twitter rebranding as X – business live 2023-07-24 - 07.39 BST Introduction: Interest rate rises to hit UK growth next year Good morning, and welcome to our rolling coverage of business, the financial markets and the world economy. Rising interest rates are set to slow the UK economy next year, casting a pall over the country in a likely election year. The EY Item Club, the economic forecasting group, has halved its forecast for UK economic growth in 2024 to 0.8%, down from the 1.9% projected in April. The 2025 GDP growth forecast has also been downgraded, from 2.3% to 1.7%. These growth downgrades are due to the increase in UK interest rate over the last 20 months, from 0.1% in December 2021 to 5% today. EY ITEM Club predict two further interest rate rises from the Bank of England, in August and September, meaning Bank Rate peaks at 5.5%. That will further slow growth, and put more pressure on mortgage holders, with over one million households across Britain are expected to lose at least 20% of their disposable incomes to surging mortgage costs. Martin Beck, chief economic advisor to the EY ITEM Club, says: “The inflation and interest rate outlook is a key risk for the forecast. Should inflation prove more stubborn than expected, the prospect of even more rate rises than we expect will come very much into play. On the other hand, the potential is there for inflation to fall faster than expected, as June’s outturn demonstrated. But the good news is that the economy remains on course to avoid recession, with the UK economy is expected to grow 0.4% in 2023, up from the 0.2% growth seen three months ago. Beck explains: “At the moment, the boost from less expensive energy in particular means the EY ITEM Club doesn’t believe recent interest rate rises will push the consumer sector or wider economy into recession. And although the current rate rising cycle doesn’t appear to be over yet, current market expectations for Bank Rate to climb to around 6% seem unlikely to come to pass. That said, how the Bank of England perceives things will be key and, should it opt for a more hawkish stance, there is a real risk that interest rates could continue to ratchet up to a level where even the protection afforded by healthy household and business balance sheets isn’t enough to prevent a recession. On that count, the next few months – and what they tell us about just how sticky inflation and strong pay growth are – will be crucial.” The path for economic growth could influence Rishi Sunak’s decision on when to call the next election, with senior Conservatives urging him to go to the polls in the spring. Also coming up today City minister Andrew Griffith is expected to write to the chief executives of 19 banks, building societies and digital challengers today, to warn them that regulations around politically exposed persons are “being applied in a disproportionate manner by some financial institutions”. Griffith will summon bank chiefs for a meeting to discuss how customers can be protected from “being de-banked”, following the row after Coutts cut ties with Nigel Farage. Travel firms and airlines are being urged to reimburse passengers who decide against flying to Rhodes as the Greek island is ravaged by wildfires. One leading consumer group arguing it would be “unconscionable” to withhold refunds. A string of travel companies have cancelled package holidays to Rhodes, and are now scrambling to repatriate thousands of tourists. Greek authorities have issued an evacuation order for parts of Corfu, after wildfires broke out on there too. The agenda 9am BST: Flash estimate of eurozone manufacturing and services sectors in July 9.30am BST: Flash estimate of UK manufacturing and services sectors in July 1.30pm BST: Chicago Fed National Activity Index of the US economy 2.45pm BST: Flash estimate of US manufacturing and services sectors in July
Santa Barbara’s paper, one of California’s oldest, stops publishing after owner declares bankruptcy 2023-07-24 - SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The Pulitzer Prize-winning Santa Barbara News-Press, one of California’s oldest newspapers, has ceased publishing after its owner declared the 150-year-old publication bankrupt. The newspaper became an online-only publication in April. But its last digital edition was posted Friday when owner Wendy McCaw filed for bankruptcy. Managing editor Dave Mason broke the news to staff in an email Friday, according to NoozHawk, a digital publication whose executive editor, Tom Bolton, used to lead the News-Press. Other news Jury returns $63M verdict after finding Chevron covered up toxic pit on California land A California jury has returned a $63 million verdict against Chevron after finding the oil giant covered up a toxic chemical pit on land purchased by a man who built a house on it and was later diagnosed with a blood cancer. “They ran out of money to pay us. They will issue final paychecks when the bankruptcy is approved in court,” Mason wrote to staff. On Monday, the News-Press’ website was still online, with the most recent stories published Friday. There was no mention that it would cease publishing or that it has declared bankruptcy. A voicemail message left Monday by The Associated Press in the newsroom’s phone number was not immediately returned. The Chapter 7 bankruptcy filing by Ampersand Publishing, the parent company of the Santa Barbara News-Press, said it has assets of less than $50,000 and debts and estimated liabilities of between $1 million and $10 million, according to federal court records. A meeting of creditors, which number between 200 and 999, is scheduled for Sept. 7. Anthony Friedman, the lawyer listed for Ampersand Publishing in the bankruptcy filing, did not immediately return a phone call or email seeking comment. McCaw could not be reached. At its height, the newspaper founded in 1855, had a daily circulation of 45,000 and was published seven days a week, serving Santa Barbara, an upscale city of 90,000 people. Editorial writer Thomas M. Storke won a Pulitzer Prize in 1962 for a series of editorials about the John Birch Society. McCaw, then a billionaire local philanthropist active on environmental and animal rights issues, bought the daily from The New York Times Co. in October 2000 and a few months later appointed herself and her fiancé, Arthur von Weisenberger, as acting co-publishers. Six years later, Santa Barbara News-Press Editor Jerry Roberts quit the newspaper along with four other top editors and a columnist to protest moves by McCaw that they said undermined the paper’s credibility. The editors who quit cited the publishers’ meddling in stories, which they said compromised the paper’s ethics. In one example, the editors alleged McCaw was against publishing a story about one editor’s drunken driving arrest and later intervened to stop a second story. The editors who quit were also upset that McCaw had appointed the paper’s editorial page editor as the acting publisher. “On one hand you have someone writing editorials and on the other hand editing news stories. There is an inherent conflict,” Don Murphy, who quit as the paper’s managing editor, told the AP at the time. The paper’s closure “is not a big surprise,” Roberts said Monday. “The paper’s been on a downhill slide for a while.” “But the fact that the community has lost its only paper is unspeakably sad,” he added. Santa Barbara, which sits along the coast about 100 miles northwest of Los Angeles, is known for its stunning geography and wineries, attracting tourists and celebrities alike for its mild climate and beautiful views. The nearby town of Montecito was the site of deadly 2018 mudslides that killed 23 people. About half of registered voters in Santa Barbara County are Democrats while roughly a quarter are Republicans, statistics that mirror the rest of the state. Under McCaw’s leadership, the paper in 2016 was among the few to endorse Republican Donald Trump for president. Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton won nearly twice as many votes in the county. McCaw personally wrote an editorial endorsing Trump again in 2020. The community still has a weekly newspaper, The Independent, as well as the digital site Noozhawk. The closest major daily newspaper is now in Ventura County. San Luis Obispo and Los Angeles, each more than 90 miles (145 kilometers) away, also have daily papers. The Press-News’ closure is the latest example of a struggling news media, said Tim Franklin, an expert in local news at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism. “We are losing on average two newspapers a week in the U.S.,” Franklin said. “We’re on pace to have lost about a third of all newspapers by 2025.” Media companies are having to compete with Google, Facebook and Amazon, which are soaking up much of the ad market, and have yet to figure out a profitable business model for local news, he said. “The local news crisis is happening in every corner of the country, including in affluent cities and suburbs,” he added. The Los Angeles Times recently announced layoffs and earlier this month sold The San Diego Union-Tribune to MediaNews Group, which owns hundreds of papers around the country. The Union-Tribune, which covers the second-largest city in California, is now owned by the same chain that owns a slew of Southern California newspapers. The parent company is Alden Global Capital, which has bought up newspapers across the country and faced criticism for slashing budgets and cutting jobs. In January, the Mail Tribune, one of Oregon’s oldest operating newspapers, shut down, saying declines in advertising spending and difficulty hiring staff precipitated the closure. The paper-based in Medford, Oregon, stopped producing a print edition in September but continued operating in a digital format until closing.
In ‘Barbie,’ ‘Oppenheimer’ smash success, audiences send message to Hollywood: Give us something new 2023-07-24 - NEW YORK (AP) — In the massive movie weekend of “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer,” there were many winners. Greta Gerwig, who made history for female directors. Christopher Nolan, who set a non-Batman career high. Movie theaters, more crowded than anytime post-pandemic. Lovers of unlikely double features. The color pink. Matchbox Twenty. But one of the most important triumphs in the moviegoing monsoon of “Barbenheimer” was originality. Here are two movies that are neither sequels nor reboots pushing the box office to highs not seen in years. “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” became a meme because of their worlds-apart differences but they’re each indelibly the work of those filmmakers. “Barbie,” based on the Mattel doll, had some extremely well-known intellectual property going for it. And the story of J. Robert Oppenheimer and the atomic bomb comes from no small moment in history. Nolan is himself a brand, too. But Hollywood’s biggest zeitgeist in years was propelled by a pair of movies without a roman numeral, a Jedi or a superhero in sight. At the same time, some of the most dependable franchises in movies, from Marvel to “Fast and the Furious,” are no longer leading the pack. The movie business may be shifting. Audiences are showing a renewed taste for something fresh. “Barbenheimer” could, just maybe, be a turning point. “I’ve always joked that if there’s a tornado movie that works that the next year there will be three tornado movies. There’s an internal prejudice to doing what works,” says Richard Gelfond, IMAX chief executive. “I’m hopeful that these movies were original by noted filmmakers will convince studios to lean into that direction rather than doing what’s safe. “The numbers don’t lie,” added Gelfond. “Barbenheimer,” the social media-fueled fusion of Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie” and Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer” brought moviegoers back to theaters in record numbers over the weekend. Los Angeles’ Alamo Drafthouse Cinema added one more element to the summer blockbuster battle: Life Size: A Barbie Tribute Drag Show. (July 24) And the numbers are eyepopping. The total box office in U.S. and Canadian theaters on the weekend was more than $300 million, the fourth highest ever. Warner Bros.’ “Barbie” grossed $162 million domestically, the best opening of the year. Universal’s “Oppenheimer” took in $82.4 million. Those results, riding critical acclaim and months of a viral double-feature drum beat, nearly doubled expectations and astonished Hollywood. In the wake of “Barbenheimer,” many are hoping Hollywood will draw a lesson other than greenlighting more toy adaptations and the inevitable “Barbie” sequel. “Everyone came out this weekend for two ORIGINAL, smart, quality movies,” wrote Clare Binns, managing director of indie distributor Picturehouse, on Twitter. “It’s what audiences want. Reboots, superheroes and films with bloated budgets that often cover a lack of ideas -- time to take stock. No algorithms this weekend.” Lately, some of the movies’ biggest franchises have shown signs of wear and tear. “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny,” coming 42 years after “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” has failed to ignite in theaters. It’s made $335 million worldwide with a budget more than double that of “Barbie,” which cost $145 million. The 10th “Fast and the Furious” movie, “Fast X,” was a dud domestically, though international sales have been robust. In three days, “Barbie” already surpassed its total North American haul of $145.9 million. The seventh “Mission: Impossible” film, “Dead Reckoning Part One,” fell shy of expectations before getting blown away by “Barbenheimer.” It declined 64% in its second weekend. Meanwhile, recent Marvel films and DC movies haven’t approached the kinds of grosses once assured of comic-book adaptations. Marvel’s “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3,” with $843 million worldwide, has been a big seller but movies like “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” and “The Flash” have fallen well shy of expectations. The nostalgia business isn’t going anywhere, nor is Hollywood’s dependence on remakes and sequels. In last year’s top 10 films at the box office, one movie was a reboot (“The Batman”) and the rest were sequels. But such overdependence on more-of-the-same was sure to run out of steam one day — and this year’s best performers are coming from some new places. “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” ($1.3 billion worldwide) isn’t anyone’s idea of cutting-edge cinema but it reflects Hollywood’s new embrace of the giant gaming industry. The year’s second-biggest hit, “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” ($375.2 million domestically) is yet one more “Spider-Man” movie. But it and its predecessor, “Into the Spider-Verse,” are hellbent on upending comic-book convention and expanding the notion of who can be a superhero. Originality can be riskier for studios, but the payoff can be immense — just ask James Cameron. His reigning franchise goliath, “Avatar,” reached $2.3 billion with “Avatar: The Way of Water,” a futuristic, sci-fi epic that essentially created its own IP. What else is working? Movies that appeal to audiences that have historically been underserved. “Creed III,” starring Michael B. Jordan, blew past expectations in March and ended up with more than $275 million globally on a $75 million budget. “Sound of Freedom,” from the faith-based distributor Angel Studios, has made $124 million in three weeks — though its distributor is using an unusual “Pay it Forward” purchasing program. And of course, horror remains the easiest money. “Insidious: The Red Door” is just the latest in long, bloody line of low-budget, high-performance Blumhouse titles. It’s made $156 million worldwide on a $16 million budget. “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” are widely expected to play strongly for weeks. They’ve reminded everyone of the limitless cultural potency of the movies. When stars, marketing muscle and filmmaking vision collide, anything can happen. And, sure, it doesn’t hurt when their names make a funny smushed-together nickname. Whether that momentum will dissipate in the waning weeks of the summer will be left up to a series of releases — “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem,” “Haunted Mansion,” “Gran Turismo,” “Strays,” “Blue Beetle” — that may struggle to keep the spark alive. Meanwhile, the ongoing strike by actors and screenwriters has begun to play havoc with the fall movie schedul e. Hollywood remains locked in battle over its future. Since the pandemic, studios and theater owners have tried various ways to bring back moviegoers to cinemas after the rush to streaming platforms — everything from Tom Cruise jumping off a cliff to $3 tickets for a day. But it could be that what moviegoers are most craving is the chance to see something new. Mark Harris, author of the Hollywood history “Pictures at a Revolution: Five Movies and the Birth of the New Hollywood,” believes a developing shift has “become undeniable.” “In ‘Pictures at a Revolution’ I wrote that an unexpected big hit is much more disruptive to the Hollywood system than a big flop is,” Harris wrote on Twitter. “That’s where we are: TWO surprise smashes that suggest you get people back to the movies by giving them what they haven’t seen, not what they have.” ___ Follow AP Film Writer Jake Coyle on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/jakecoyleAP
How major US stock indexes fared Monday, 7/24/2023 2023-07-24 - Wall Street ticked higher to start a week full of updates on where interest rates and profits for the stock market’s most influential companies are heading. The S&P 500 rose 0.4% Monday, coming off its eighth winning week in the last 10. The Dow added 183 points, or 0.5%, and the Nasdaq composite climbed 0.2%. Becton Dickinson led the S&P 500 after getting FDA clearance for one of its products. Treasury yields were relatively steady after a report suggested economic growth is slowing. Traders expect the Federal Reserve on Wednesday to raise interest rates for perhaps the final time this cycle. On Monday: The S&P 500 rose 18.30 points, or 0.4%, to 4,554.64. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 183.55 points, or 0.5%, to 35,411.24. The Nasdaq composite rose 26.06 points, or 0.2%, to 14,058.87. The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies rose 5.42 points, or 0.3%, to 1,965.68. For the year: The S&P 500 is up 715.14 points, or 18.6%. The Dow is up 2,263.99 points, or 6.8%. The Nasdaq is up 3,592.38 points, or 34.3%. The Russell 2000 is up 204.43 points, or 11.6%.
UBS fined nearly $400 million related to Credit Suisse’s relationship with failed fund Archegos 2023-07-24 - NEW YORK (AP) — Swiss banking giant UBS will pay nearly $400 million in fines to U.S., Swiss and U.K. banking authorities for the management failures of Credit Suisse, which UBS bought in June, related to how Credit Suisse handled its relationship with collapsed hedge fund Archegos Capital Management. Archegos failed in 2021, costing Wall Street banks billions of dollars in losses, and Credit Suisse took the brunt of the losses. The Swiss bank took more than $5 billion in losses from Archegos’ failure, which over a period of two years, ultimately led to the fire sale of Credit Suisse to UBS in June. Credit Suisse management was found to give Archegos special treatment through its prime brokerage division, which caused the bank to take on undue risk when Archegos purchased a highly concentrated position in ViacomCBS. The firm’s manager, Bill Hwang, is scheduled to face fraud charges for the collapse of Archegos in October. Credit Suisse failed to “adequately manage the risk posed by Archegos despite repeated warnings,” the Federal Reserve said in a statement on Monday. The announcement was made by the Fed alongside the Bank of England and the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority.
China vows to 'adjust and optimize' property policy in 'tortuous' economic recovery 2023-07-24 - China's top leaders vowed to "adjust and optimize policies in a timely manner" for its beleaguered property sector, while elevating stable employment to a strategic goal, along with other pledges to boost domestic consumption demand and resolve local debt risks. Ullstein Bild | Ullstein Bild | Getty Images China's top leaders pledged to "adjust and optimize policies in a timely manner" for its beleaguered property sector, while elevating stable employment to a strategic goal, along with other pledges to boost domestic consumption demand and resolve local debt risks. Chaired by President Xi Jinping, the Communist Party's top decision-making body said it would implement a "counter cyclical" policy and stick largely to a prudent monetary policy and pro-active fiscal policy, according to a readout published late Monday of a quarterly meeting of the Politburo. related investing news China's earnings season is just getting started. Here are some winners to watch The July Politburo meeting typically sets the tone for China’s economic policies for the second half of the year, with market watchers eagerly awaiting firmer guidance on policy support for faltering growth in the world’s second-largest economy. "Currently, the economy is facing new difficulties and challenges, mainly due to insufficient domestic demand, difficulties in the operation of some enterprises, many risks and hidden dangers in key areas, and a grim and complex external environment," Xinhua quoted the Politburo as saying. The post-pandemic economic recovery will proceed in a "wave-like" fashion in a "tortuous" process, it added. The Chinese phrase for risk appeared at least seven times in the readout, underscoring the government's focus on its containment. A raft of disappointing economic data last week prompted renewed calls for policy support to bolster growth, though Premier Li Qiang had previously said China is on track to reach its annual growth target of about 5% this year. Official data last week showed that China's second-quarter gross domestic product grew 6.3% from a year ago, marking a 0.8% growth compared with the first quarter — dramatically slower than the 2.2% quarter-on-quarter pace recorded in the January to March period. watch now "While it signaled more support for the economy, the Politburo meeting generally fell short of offering large-scale stimulus," said economists at Barclays in a note late Monday. "We view this as a signal that the government would stabilize growth around its target but refrain from an outsized policy response, given the top leaders' intended shift in focus to 'quality' growth," they added. On Tuesday, Hong Kong and mainland China stock markets cheered the Politburo's policy pledges, outperforming broader Asia-Pacific benchmarks. The Hang Seng Index jumped more than 3%, while the CSI 300 index of the largest A-share listings climbed more than 2%. The Chinese property sector saw some of the strongest percentage gains in Hong Kong, with developer Country Garden rebounding more than 14% from a nine-month low. Longfor Group surged more than 21% from a seven-week low, while China Overseas Land climbed more than 11% and China Vanke gained nearly 9%. Real estate in focus Observers noted that the Politburo dropped the phrase "housing is for living in, not speculation" from its wording on the country's real estate sector. In its place, the Politburo now talks about adapting to "major changes" in the demand-supply dynamics in the property market, with city-specific measures to better meet residents' essential housing demand and their needs for better housing. It also pledged to "revitalize all types of idling properties." The country's property sector is struggling to emerge from a credit crisis after the government cracked down on its debt levels in Aug. 2020. watch now Years of exuberant growth led to the construction of ghost towns where supply outstripped demand, as developers looked to capitalize on the desire for home ownership and property investment. By some calculations, the country's property sector still accounts for up to a quarter of China's annual economic activity. The Politburo on Monday said it is necessary to effectively prevent and resolve the risks of local debts, and formulate and implement a package of debt reduction plans. It also deems "necessary" the strengthening of financial supervision and the steady reform of high-risk small and medium-sized financial institutions. "We view the July Politburo meeting statement as slightly more dovish than expected, mainly reflected in the neutral statement of the current economic situation, the deletion of 'housing is for living in, not for speculation' and the acknowledgment of new developments in the property market," Goldman Sachs economists wrote in a note late Monday. "As the July Politburo meeting would set the tone for policy stance in 2H of this year, we think the new assessment of the economic situation, property market and local government debt would imply further policy easing measures in the next few months," they added. Supporting asset prices China's top leaders also indicated they plan to "activate capital markets and boost investor confidence," while "maintaining the basic stability of the renminbi exchange rate at a reasonable and balanced level." This likely underscores Beijing's discomfort with the recent weakness in the Chinese yuan against the dollar, Citi economists said in a note late Monday. That culminated in stronger fixes that strengthened the yuan. The People's Bank of China's daily mid-point for the onshore yuan is closely watched for cues relating to its official position on the yuan's movements. The central bank allows the currency to trade within a narrow band of 2% from each day's midpoint. watch now China's leaders also pledged to step up government investment, without offering further details. China also aims to accelerate the issuance and use of local government special bonds. On encouraging private enterprises, the Politburo echoed an earlier announcement on Monday by China's top economic planning agency that introduced a series of measures to promote private investment. Among them, China's National Development and Reform Commission is encouraging private investment projects to issue real estate investment trusts in the infrastructure sector to promote asset diversification and further broaden investment and financing channels for private investment. Expanding domestic demand Late Monday, China's top leaders pledged to "actively expand domestic demand" and to "expand consumption by raising income levels." This is broadly in line with an earlier NDRC statement pledging to "restore and expand" consumption in a wide-ranging plan to bolster growth that includes boosting household income, improving business environment for private firms and stabilizing youth employment. The Politburo also echoed earlier plans to boost consumption in automobiles, electronic products and household consumer goods and services. watch now "Those hoping for a new approach to stimulus involving greater transfers to households are likely to be disappointed," Julian Evans-Pritchard, head of China economics at Capital Economics, said Monday in a note. "The readout talks about boosting consumption but only indirectly, via supporting household incomes," he added. "We understand this to mean that rather than give households handouts, policy efforts should primarily focus on supporting employment, a goal that has now been elevated to a 'strategically high level.'"
Russia Strikes Danube Port, Escalating Attacks on Ukraine Grain Routes 2023-07-24 - Russia for the first time on Monday attacked a port on the Danube River in Ukraine, close to the Romanian border, Ukrainian and Romanian officials said, destroying a grain hangar in an escalation of its efforts to cripple Kyiv’s agriculture and risking a more direct confrontation with the United States and its European allies. The assault on the port in the town of Reni, across the river from Romania, a NATO member, targeted Kyiv’s alternative export routes for grain to reach world markets, days after Russia terminated a deal that had enabled Ukraine to ship its grain across the Black Sea. The attack is the closest Moscow has come to hitting the military alliance’s territory since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine last year. The port strike came amid two drone attacks in central Moscow on Monday morning that Russian officials blamed on Ukrainian forces. At least two nonresidential buildings were hit about 4 a.m. local time, Mayor Sergei Sobyanin of Moscow said on the Telegram messaging app. He added that there had been no “serious damage or casualties.” Ukrainian and Romanian officials denounced the port strike, with President Klaus Iohannis of Romania condemning the attack on Ukrainian infrastructure close to his country’s borders. He said on Twitter that the “recent escalation poses serious risks to the security in the Black Sea,” as well as affecting Ukrainian grain shipments and global food security.
‘Barbenheimer’ Weekend Was a Real Team Effort 2023-07-24 - The incongruous duo of “Barbie,” a hot-pink comedic romp, and “Oppenheimer,” a brooding period drama, combined to sell far more movie tickets than expected over the weekend, pushing the overall domestic box office to $311 million, according to Box Office Mojo, an online database. It was the biggest weekend haul in North America since 2019, and the fourth-largest ever, before adjusting for inflation. It is a sign that Hollywood has, maybe, finally bounced back from the pandemic. (Whether the film business, which is dealing with dual writers’ and actors’ strikes, can keep the momentum going is another question.) The weekend was also noteworthy for its variety, with “Barbie” collecting $162 million, “Oppenheimer” $82.4 million and the rest of the features, including “Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One” and “Sound of Freedom,” adding more than $66 million. Typically, the biggest weekends for domestic ticket sales have been dominated by a single blockbuster. During the highest grossing weekend, in April 2019, “Avengers: Endgame” accounted for nearly 90 percent of the box office. “Barbie,” by comparison, accounted for just over half of the box office over the weekend.
Jason Aldean, Decrying ‘Cancel Culture,’ Has a No. 2 Hit 2023-07-24 - In May, the country star Jason Aldean released a single, “Try That in a Small Town,” with lyrics that paint contemporary urban life as a hellscape of crime and anarchy: “Sucker punch somebody on a sidewalk/Carjack an old lady at a red light.” “You think you’re tough,” Aldean sings. “Well, try that in a small town.” Initially, the track got relatively little notice, landing at No. 35 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart. That changed last week, after the song’s music video became a culture-war battlefield, with some accusing Aldean — one of country’s biggest hitmakers for nearly two decades — of employing racist dog-whistle tactics and the singer defending himself as the latest victim of an out-of-control “cancel culture.” The controversy led to a rush on Aldean’s song, with both streams and downloads exploding over the course of last week. “Try That in a Small Town” makes its debut at No. 2 on the Hot 100, Aldean’s best showing ever on Billboard’s all-genre pop chart, beating current hits by Olivia Rodrigo and Morgan Wallen. Aldean was surpassed this week only by Jung Kook of the South Korean supergroup BTS, whose debut solo single, “Seven,” opens at No. 1. The video for “Try That,” released on July 14, opens with Aldean performing before a stately building draped with an American flag; the structure was quickly identified as Maury County Courthouse in Columbia, Tenn., where in 1927 a young Black man named Henry Choate was lynched by a vigilante mob after being accused — falsely, historians believe — of raping a white girl.
Twitter successor ‘X’ marks Musk’s war for the public’s attention 2023-07-24 - The internet is astir over Twitter’s name change — from “Twitter” to “X” — which was officially announced Monday. The specifics of what, exactly, this means for the social platform are a bit hazy, but owner Elon Musk’s goals as it pertains to the move are hardly mysterious. What will X be? Last October, Musk tweeted: “Buying Twitter is an accelerant to creating X, the everything app.” That phrase — an “everything app” — is widely viewed as a descriptor for popular apps that are essentially multiuse apps, allowing users to use a single app to peruse social media, pay bills, conduct calls, make purchases and do virtually anything they’d do elsewhere on the internet. Musk talked up one such app, the China-backed WeChat, during his town hall with Twitter employees in June. But as TechCrunch noted back in October: “The exact WeChat features that impress Musk are also the source of criticisms of the app.” The writer of the piece, Rita Liao, explained concerns that critics have expressed about WeChat and its parent company, Tencent: The all-in-one messenger has in effect erected a walled garden, critics say, where e-commerce transactions only take place over its payments app and information consumed by users is either published within WeChat’s infrastructure or third-party services backed by Tencent. Links from Tencent’s nemeses, like Alibaba and Douyin (TikTok’s sister in China), were inaccessible on WeChat until Beijing’s recent anti-monopoly movement began to tear down the thick walls. Liao went on to explain: “A super app might bring convenience to users as they hardly need to leave the platform — which in turn helps drive revenues for the company — but the model can stifle competition and rule out user choices.” Musk’s quest for an everything app begins to make a bit more sense when you consider he’s starved — or, at least, hungry — for attention. By which I mean, he enjoys being the focus of people’s interest — and his businesses, from Tesla to what was formerly known as Twitter, rely on acquiring massive amounts of data from consumers. To be clear, essentially every social media platform relies on a business model that involves parlaying user data into money made from advertisers hoping to target ads at particular users. Musk seems to think X is his shot at world domination in the tech space. This is why I’ve written previously about platforms like Facebook and Twitter being involved in an “ugly war for our time and attention.” Meta’s weapons of choice are well-known platforms like Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and the newly launched Threads. Musk seems to think X is his shot at world domination in the tech space. Ultimately, this competition shows that our time — especially time spent on social media apps — amounts to real money. And some of the wealthiest people in the world are plotting ways to claim it for themselves. I’d be cautious about giving it over to them so freely.
Barbenheimer bonanza: how two films saved the summer box office 2023-07-24 - The past weekend wasn’t the first time that two major films had been released simultaneously but the big screen blitz of Barbie and Oppenheimer saw the first time audiences saw it less as a competition and more of a collaboration. Months ago, Barbie v Oppenheimer had been widely discarded for the cosier, Bennifer-adjacent Barbenheimer, the bomb-maker and the bombshell hand-in-hand, fans planning to watch them both rather than just one, an unprecedented event that had exhibitors and studios both geared up for a much-needed win. But even the most ambitious box office analysts couldn’t have predicted just what a win that was going to be, the higher end of estimates now looking positively conservative, the two films combining to shatter records and create a genuine, online-to-offline pop culture phenomenon. Greta Gerwig’s gently satirical Mattel comedy was the inevitable No 1 but with a weekend haul of $162m in the US, it also became the year’s biggest opener to date as well as the highest-ever opening for a female director. Just as surprisingly, Christopher Nolan’s dark period drama managed an $82m second place win, a staggering amount for something of that ilk, a talky, 3-hour awards movie treated by audiences like a superhero epic. Globally, the picture was similarly rosy, the two films combining to bring in over $500m between them, a much-needed boost to what had been a mostly troubling summer at the box office. While audiences had turned out en masse for superhero sequels Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse and Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 3 (although neither film has reached the magic $1bn global mark), they’d mostly stayed away from other tentpole offerings. DC’s beleaguered comic book mash-up The Flash sputtered out as the biggest superhero bomb of all time, set to lose $200m. Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny looked unlikely to prove profitable thanks to an exorbitant $300m budget and a worldwide gross not that much higher. Tom Cruise’s ultra-expensive Mission: Impossible sequel opened beneath projections and thanks to Barbenheimer, suffered a catastrophic second week drop. Animated adventures Elemental and Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken, came in way below expectations. Comedies such as Book Club: The Next Chapter, Joy Ride, The Blackening, The Machine and About My Father tanked in wide release. Before this weekend, ticket sales had been down 20% in comparison to the same point in 2019. Advertisements for Oppenheimer and Barbie in Los Angeles Photograph: Chris Pizzello/AP The industry has still been in recovery from the darkest days of the pandemic when cinemas were shuttered or re-opened with caveats or shuttered again, forcing confused or concerned audiences to stay at home and the studios to reconfigure release strategies. The shortening of the window from theatrical to home viewing, at times reduced to nothing with day-and-date releases available on both big and small screen, has for many made the cinema seem like an unnecessary and overpriced relic of the past, helped by streamers such as Netflix and Amazon releasing blockbuster-sized movies with stars to match straight-to-smartphone. The great disruptors as they were once known have became the great destructors, the subscription model unable to ever prove quite as profitable as the model it was aiming to replace. But even in a year when the box office might be down, there were signs that it wasn’t out. Oscar films such as The Fabelmans, Tar and Women Talking might have stumbled during the dying months of 2022 but 2023 kicked off with B-movie hits like M3gan and Cocaine Bear, luring audiences out with the promise of freakish sights unseen, like a carnival coming into town. There was more good news with acclaimed sequels to Creed, Scream and John Wick all bringing in franchise bests before The Super Mario Bros Movie became the first, and only, film to push past $1bn at the global box office. The audience was there, it just needed a reason to show up. So what did Barbenheimer do to achieve such a record turnout? When both films were announced to be sharing the same date, many saw it as a petty swipe from Warner Bros, positioning Barbie up against Nolan, their long-time director who had moved across to Universal for his latest (the Dark Knight film-maker, like many others had been displeased by the studio’s Covid-era plan to release theatrical films simultaneously on streaming). Barbie had taken an almost 15-year long journey through various developments, with names such as Anne Hathaway and Amy Schumer previously attached. It took Margot Robbie and her production company LuckyChap fresh off the success of Promising Young Woman to really get the wheels turning, approaching Gerwig post-Little Women who agreed on the proviso that her husband and collaborator Noah Baumbach could co-write. Margot Robbie and Greta Gerwig Photograph: Anthony Harvey/Shutterstock The two were seen as unconventional choices, their previous work closer to the arthouse than the multiplex, character rather than plot-led, not the most obvious fit for something set to become the first official Mattel Studios movie (future Mattel movies promise partnerships with JJ Abrams, Lena Dunham and Daniel Kaluuya). But their involvement, along with Robbie and a cast that eventually grew to include Ryan Gosling, Will Ferrell and surprisingly diverse support from Issa Rae, Simu Liu, America Ferrera and Hari Nef, became early proof that this was not going to be your eldest sister’s Barbie and those who might have otherwise turned their noses up at a toy-based tentpole were suddenly intrigued. Even without them, the Barbie brand continues to be big business. While it might have seen a slight drop from the year before, 2022 still saw Mattel make $1.49bn from Barbie products. That’s staggering in-built IP, not just for new consumers but for those who have some attachment to the brand all the way back to its original release in 1959. While Gerwig and Baumbach might have taken a satirical look at Barbie, approaching topics such as patriarchy, capitalism and body image, the film was still launched with a poppy marketing campaign of bright pink everything, a soundtrack featuring Dua Lipa, Billie Eilish and Charli XCX and brand partnerships totaling around 100, from Chevy to AirbnB. Its budget of $145m is believed to be doubled when marketing costs are added, a summer event movie with bite, but a summer event movie nonetheless. Barbie has been inescapable for the past few months but so has the excitement, leveled up by every new soundtrack release, every new clip, every new teasing piece of press from those involved (“This movie is crazy,” Gerwig told the Observer earlier this month) and the meme-ification of its same-day release with a film that couldn’t be any more opposed. While Gerwig’s Barbie had the brand awareness of one of the biggest toys ever created to support her offbeat vision, Nolan had a rockier road ahead. Selling the story of J Robert Oppenheimer, the father of the atomic bomb, with a $100m budget at stake and a 3-hour, talk-heavy runtime at the height of summer felt like an unprecedented gamble, a heavy serving of vegetables in the middle of an all-you-can-eat fast food buffet. But Nolan, one of the few working directors who can draw a substantial audience by name alone, turned what could have been a dry history lesson into an IMAX spectacle thanks to a stacked starry cast (Cillian Murphy, Emily Blunt, Robert Downey Jr, Matt Damon, Rami Malek and Florence Pugh) and an extravagant marketing campaign that kicked off a year before release with a ticking clock and a brooding trailer. Christopher Nolan and Cillian Murphy Photograph: Neil P Mockford/Getty Images for Universal Pictures The campaign continued with class during a season often devoid of it with stars out at every available opportunity and Nolan taking on the Tom Cruise role of cinema savior, highlighting the importance of the theatrical experience. While audiences wouldn’t know this upon buying a ticket, in order to secure the film with Universal, the director made them agree to a number of key terms, including a theatrical window of at least 100 days before any form of digital release and a three-week period before the studio releases another film. Universal had been one of the most open studios to a theatrical window reduction with some films available to watch digitally just 17 days after release. This decision should theoretically give the film better legs than most, allowing it to pull in audiences who might otherwise have waited for a home viewing. Last summer’s biggest hit Top Gun: Maverick was similarly kept in cinemas for longer than what had become standard (it took three months for a rental release), as a result of Cruise’s insistence, and topped out at just under $1.5bn (Barbie similarly has no planned digital release as of yet). One of the most interesting analytic tidbits over the weekend shows that, despite skewing older on paper, Oppenheimer’s audience was surprisingly young, with 18- to 34-year-olds making up 66% of tickets sold. While older audiences are historically less likely to rush out on opening weekend in the same way, this still makes for a revealing result, its over-performing domestic debut (bigger than more commercially viable summer tentpoles like Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning: Part One, Transformers: Rise of the Beasts and Fast X) an important sign to studios that mass audiences will come out to watch films that prioritize words over action. Its success speaks to the rise of the world’s biggest film-based social network Letterboxd and the cineaste culture that comes along with it, amplified by the pandemic where many were left at home to watch classics with nothing new coming out (Oppenheimer is already the 52nd highest-rated film ever on the platform). Barbie shares a vital similarity in that it also aimed to snag an audience often ignored during the warmer months: women. When studios have bothered to eventise films aimed at a female audience in the summer, it has tended to pay off. Just weeks after Iron Man kickstarted the Marvel Cinematic Universe in 2008, the first Sex and the City movie reached over $400m worldwide before Mamma Mia! made over $600m (both films beat out the same summer’s more-hyped tentpoles The Incredible Hulk and Wanted). Since then, Bridesmaids ($306m), Sex and the City 2 ($294m) and Girls Trip ($140m) have shown the power of an underserved audience, but Hollywood has been reluctant to listen. The cultural moment shown in cinemas across the globe at the weekend – parties, costumes, sold out screenings, women making up a massive 71% of audiences – should hopefully be a reminder to pay better attention. Barbie fans in Glasgow Photograph: Katherine Anne Rose/The Observer Leading up to its release, the right had tried to engineer a culture war, enraged by its diversity and its perceived anti-man stance with the usual suspects trotting out tired rants about the evils of wokeness. But the same crowd, who love nothing more than to bask in the failure of a film with a diverse lead, such as Bros or The Little Mermaid, were noticeably quiet over the weekend as the numbers proved that yet again, audiences are more than willing to accept the things a small portion of loud voices are railing against. The unlikely combination of the two films, the creation of Barbenheimer, was a Twitter joke without studio backing that had a striking real world impact. In the US, at least 40,000 double-bill tickets had been sold by AMC while in the UK, Vue reported that a fifth of its visitors were also going to both. Celebrities, such as Quentin Tarantino, were even seen going from one to the other. What’s telling about both films leading to such a craze is that both were given high marks by critics – Barbie at 91% and Oppenheimer at 94% – an ongoing trend of audiences willing to fork out for films that are worth the effort (both films were also handed an A CinemaScore from cinemagoers). With the rise of ticket prices making a trip to the multiplex that much harder to justify and the rise of online spaces where people can share opinions, studios have relied heavily on promoting a film’s critical impact, including Rotten Tomatoes ratings in trailers and on streaming platforms. Sometimes the simplest answer is also the most relevant: both films did well because people like them. Barbenheimer has arrived not only at a worrying time for box office but at an even more worrying time for the industry at large. The ongoing writers’ and actors’ strikes have paused major productions and added a question mark to those already in the can. The actors’ strike prevents guild members from promoting studio work, its official start arriving just after the majority of Barbie and Oppenheimer press had taken place. But it carries a cloud over the rest of the year, obscuring the sunshine from the past weekend. This week’s release of The Haunted Mansion, based on the Disney ride, has been hampered from a lack of star access with actors such as Lakeith Stanfield, Owen Wilson, Rosario Dawson and Jamie Lee Curtis unable to walk a red carpet or feature on a morning TV show to sell the film. Some later releases have already been yanked off the schedule such as A24 comedy Problemista and Zendaya-led love triangle drama Challengers, also pulled from a splashy premiere at the Venice film festival. With rumours that major films such as Dune 2, Aquaman 2 and The Color Purple may also move, it adds a bittersweet tang to the Barbenheimer success. It’s proved that engaged and enthused audiences are out there, but with studios seemingly unwilling to compromise with unions, whether they’ll have much to go see over the coming months is less sure.
X marks ... what? Elon Musk proves once again he’s incredibly bad at naming things | Andrew Lawrence 2023-07-24 - On Sunday, in a series of posts that surely won’t be called tweets for much longer, Elon Musk reasoned that his company’s new logo, a badly rendered letter X, embodies “the imperfections in us all that make us unique”. What does he mean by that? He, of course, has no idea. This is a man with a terrible, terrible history for naming things. At Tesla, Musk would insist on a model lineup that spelled out the word “sexy”, even after there was no chance of Ford relinquishing their copyright on the Model E (so he ended up with Model S, Model 3, Model X, Model Y). At SpaceX, an uninventive moniker in itself, he named his rockets like an improv audience member shouting out random words to inspire a comedy scene: Grasshopper! Merlin! Starship! Musk’s failure of a tunneling concern, the Boring Company, shows he also flair for lame puns that don’t quite land. Bad names run in his family, too. X is how Musk referred to the son he had with the musician Grimes after the child’s original name – X Æ A-12 – was rejected for flouting a California law that limits birth certificates to “the 26 alphabetical letters of the English language”. Grimes said the X took inspiration from algebra’s “unknown variable”, while Æ (a diphthong that echoes the long I in most English dialects) referred to the “elven spelling of Ai (love &/or Artificial intelligence)”. Musk tacked on the A-12, the label for Lockheed’s mold-breaking spy plane (“the coolest plane ever,” he gushed to Joe Rogan). Musk’s love of the letter X is particularly uninspired. In the days of Descartes, X was the preferred letter to symbolize the ineffable – a kiss, a signature, the place on a map where treasure is buried or the eyes of the dead in drawings. But in the tech world, X has become a nothing letter, used to name everything from operating systems (Mac OS X) to gaming consoles (Xbox) to the telecom company Comcast, which changed names to Xfinity in hopes of escaping its overwhelmingly negative consumer reputation. (Time magazine called it one of the worst corporate rebrands of all time.) So it fits that the first letter companies turn to when they want to sound “with it” is Musk’s absolute favorite. Musk named his first company X.com, an online bank. In 2000, it merged with a competing software company co-founded by Peter Thiel – who promptly replaced Musk as the CEO of X.com and renamed the new conglomerate PayPal. (The rest is IPO history.) In 2017, Musk bought the X.com domain back from PayPal, hinting at bigger plans. Three months before purchasing Twitter, a user asked Musk if he had considered creating his own platform. “X.com,” was his reply. At a Tesla shareholder meeting that same month, he revealed “a pretty grand vision” for X that “would be very useful to the world”, a one-stop shop to rival WeChat – China’s all-in-one messaging, social media and mobile payment service. X was the name used in the three Delaware-registered holding companies Musk used to buy Twitter for $44bn. Today, the company is worth less than a third of that, proof that Musk isn’t much better with numbers, either. Musk has had a considerable hand in immolating much of that equity – doing away with character limits, hate speech protections and other features that made Twitter special and safe. Reports say the conference rooms at Twitter HQ were changed on Monday to include the letter X. New names include “eXposure”, “eXult” and – once again – “s3Xy”. This latest change figures to have even more longtime Twitter users pulling up stakes for Threads, Spill and other new replacements. Musk may think himself clever by consolidating all his companies into one nice, neat “Brand X”. But the name reads more like the residue of too much time spent watching product comparison TV adverts than it does proof of genuine creativity. (Also: wasn’t Brand X always the crappier option?) Still, credit where due: Musk picked the right letter to mark the death of a cartoon bird, Xs rolling in its eyes. He might not appreciate that irony until his app is itself dead and buried.