Albi and Harlow have become close since coming into care after being abandoned by their mothers. Source: Koalas of Raymond Island
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission said on Monday it has ordered five e-cigarette companies including JUUL Labs and NJOY to turn over sales and advertising data. The regulatory agency said it sent orders to JUUL Labs, Inc; R.J. Reynolds Vapor Company; Fontem US, LLC; Logic Technology Development LLC; and NJOY, LLC seeking information from 2019 and 2020 including annual data on sales and giveaways of e-cigarettes and characteristics of their e-cigarette products such as flavors. The consumer protection agency is trying better understand the rapidly growing market, similar to studies it has done in the on cigarettes and smokeless tobacco products.
An American father and son accused of helping former Nissan Motor Co Ltd Chairman Carlos Ghosn flee Japan were handed over on Monday to Japanese authorities for extradition from the United States, their lawyer told the Associated Press. The U.S. Supreme Court last month cleared the way for the extradition of U.S. Army Special Forces veteran Michael Taylor and his son, Peter Taylor, who are accused of helping Ghosn flee Japan while he was awaiting trial on financial charges.
A U.N. human rights investigator said on Monday that it was "extremely dangerous" for the United States to have named Saudi Arabia's de facto ruler as having approved an operation to capture or kill journalist Jamal Khashoggi but not to have taken action against him. Agnes Callamard, special rapporteur on summary executions who led a U.N. investigation into Khashoggi's 2018 murder, reiterated her call for sanctions targeting Mohammed bin Salman's assets and his international engagements.
Hyliion's founder Thomas Healy offers Yahoo Finance a timeline on when his hypertruck will come to market.
Interactive Brokers Group, Inc. (Nasdaq: IBKR), an automated global electronic broker, today reported its Electronic Brokerage monthly performance metrics for February.
(Bloomberg) -- President Joe Biden’s plans for a new era of tough Wall Street oversight will take center stage this week when two of his top regulator picks face questions from Senate Banking Committee members at a Tuesday hearing.Gary Gensler, whom the White House has tapped to head the Securities and Exchange Commission, and Rohit Chopra, the administration’s choice to lead the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, are likely to win confirmation, lawmakers and financial executives say. Yet their strong support from progressive Democrats means they’re certain to get pointed questions from Republican senators about their plans to crack down on businesses.The wild rally in GameStop Corp., the explosion of blank-check companies and apps -- like Robinhood Markets’ platform -- that have prompted millions of novice investors to start trading are sure to be focuses. The biggest banks, hedge funds and private equity firms are also likely to be spotlighted, particularly after four years of rule cutting under former President Donald Trump.Gensler, 63, is well known on Wall Street after leading the Commodity Futures Trading Commission during the Obama administration and making a fortune decades earlier at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Chopra, a 39-year-old Federal Trade Commission member who helped Senator Elizabeth Warren set up the CFPB, would run an agency that Democrats want reinvigorated to protect consumers from abuses involving credit cards, mortgages and high-interest loans. Republicans would prefer it remain in the slumber that defined the bureau in the Trump era.“There remains a sharp divide between Republicans and Democrats on the role of the CFPB in financial regulation,” said Andrew Olmem, National Economic Council deputy director in the Trump administration who is now a partner at the Mayer Brown law firm. “This is a very important nomination because a new director can significantly shift the direction of the CFPB.”Gensler, who has been been teaching at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, indicated in his prepared testimony that he planned to examine whether SEC rules have kept pace with advancements in technology. “I believe financial technology can be a powerful force for good -- but only if we continue to harness the core values of the SEC in service of investors, issuers, and the public,” he said.Chopra signaled he would focus on the economic impact of coronavirus, which he said has left millions of Americans’ finances “in ruin.” “Experts expect distress across a number of consumer credit markets, including an avalanche of loan defaults and auto repossessions,” he said.What follows is a breakdown of policy topics that Gensler and Chopra will confront at the hearing -- and, if confirmed, in their jobs:Retail InvestorsThe popularity of commission-free trading -- spearheaded by Robinhood -- has forced regulators to grapple with new questions. Top among them is “gamification” and the proliferation of apps that make investing fun but that critics claim inappropriately hook consumers with nudges and prompts to keep them trading. Determining whether and how to respond is something Gensler will have to grapple with. The issue could also fall under the purview of Chopra and the CFPB.The GameStop frenzy has prompted additional regulatory concerns, including whether unsophisticated investors should be able to so freely engage in risky trading involving options. Bubbles, too, will be on senators’ minds. A number think the SEC should do something about the eye-popping rise of unregulated Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. Another potential target is special purpose acquisition companies, or SPACS, which are essentially corporate shells that issue shares before investors even know what their money is being used for.Market StructureThe GameStop saga has made lawmakers wake up to the inner-workings of the stock market. Practices like off-exchange trading and Robinhood and other brokers selling their customers’ orders to so-called market makers like Citadel Securities are getting unprecedented attention on Capitol Hill.Short-selling has also come under fire after it emerged that hedge funds making bearish bets had borrowed more than 100% of GameStop’s outstanding shares. In the face of all that complexity, lawmakers will want to know how Gensler plans to ensure that markets are fair for average Americans.Private EquityAmong the Banking Committee Democrats who have most relished going after private equity are Chairman Sherrod Brown of Ohio and Warren of Massachusetts.Warren introduced the “Stop Wall Street Looting Act” in 2019 calling for new rules for buyout firms, and she made the industry’s treatment of workers a centerpiece of her unsuccessful 2020 presidential campaign. She and Brown have said they will continue to press the issue and have ideas for how Gensler can use the SEC to add new oversight. Giving impetus to their plans is a successful push by private-equity firms during the Trump administration to be included as an investment option in corporate retirement saving plans.EnforcementWall Street could soon find itself subject to lots more investigations launched by the CFPB, which was created to crack down on industry abuses that Democrats argue spurred the 2008 financial crisis. Beyond big banks, the agency under Chopra may also focus on payday lenders, student loan providers and on issues tied to the retail trading boom.At the SEC, wielding the agency’s powers to probe and sanction companies is where Gensler can make his biggest impact. A high-profile case against a major bank or hedge fund can ripple through the finance industry, deterring other firms from engaging in similar conduct. During the Trump era, busting Wall Street titans was rarely a priority, something progressives expect Gensler to change quickly.CryptoBitcoin has skyrocketed more than 400% in the past year and Coinbase, a trading platform used by millions American, is on the cusp of one of the biggest initial public offerings in years. Yet, despite all the buzz, cryptocurrencies are still a big question mark for Wall Street. Industry backers say that an impediment to broad adoption is a clear legal framework and a lack of regulatory clarity from the SEC.It’ll probably fall largely on Gensler to determine how to regulate the industry. Thorny topics he will likely have to deal with include whether to approve a crypto based exchange-traded fund, and how aggressively to pursue a high-profile lawsuit the SEC filed last year against Ripple Labs Inc. for allegedly misleading investors by selling more than $1 billion of virtual tokens without registering them with the regulator.Climate ChangeProgressives want Biden’s financial regulators to play a crucial role in addressing climate change, including by pressing companies to reveal more about how global warming affects their bottom lines. Democrats also want industry watchdogs to combat inequality by implementing policies that narrow social and economic gaps.At Tuesday’s hearing, such objectives are expected to get lots of attention from Republicans, who argue that securities laws and corporate disclosures should not be used to push what they consider to be political agendas.(Updates with prepared testimony in sixth and seventh paragraphs.)For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2021 Bloomberg L.P.
Otterbourg P.C. announced today that Michael O’Brien has joined the firm as a member in the corporate department. He comes to Otterbourg from the New York office of Akerman LLP, where he served as a partner.
SAN DIEGO, Calif., March 01, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Sorrento Therapeutics (NASDAQ: SRNE, “Sorrento”) and Scilex Holdings Company (“Scilex”), a majority owned subsidiary of Sorrento, have entered into an exclusive licensing term sheet with Aardvark Therapeutics (“Aardvark”) to acquire Aardvark’s proprietary formulation, Delayed Burst Release Low Dose Naltrexone (DBR-LDN), or ARD-301, for the treatment of chronic pain, fibromyalgia, and chronic post-COVID syndrome (“long haul COVID” or “long COVID”) in multiple Phase 2 programs planned to be initiated this year. Following execution of the definitive agreement between the parties, Scilex plans to work with Aardvark to initiate a new Phase 2 trial this year for fibromyalgia, which Scilex believes will be an important milestone for treating physicians, and most importantly for the estimated 10 million U.S. adults suffering from this chronic, frequently debilitating central pain condition with limited treatment options.1 Approximately one-third of those diagnosed with fibromyalgia in the U.S. are reported to receive chronic prescription opioids, which is part of the opioid crisis, since opioids are not believed to be an effective solution for chronic central pain.2 ARD-301 is comprised of a non-opioid, non-addictive therapy option that has been shown to have activity for improving a broad array of fibromyalgia symptoms in prior clinical studies with LDN. Currently, there are only three FDA approved pharmacologic treatments for fibromyalgia, but they have demonstrated limited efficacy and burdensome side effects in many patients. COVID-19 is a global public health crisis with severe and potentially long-lasting effects. COVID-19 patients around the world have reported persistent suffering, including serious complications that can last for months after the acute infection resolves, and – even with vaccines – there is great a need for treatment options for Long Haul COVID. According to a research letter published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), more than 40 percent of COVID-19 survivors assessed in an Italian study still reported shortness of breath an average of 60 days following symptom onset.3 These data suggest that a significant percentage of COVID-19 survivors may be at risk for respiratory complications and other sequelae, which is a condition that is now colloquially referred to as “Long COVID.” “I look forward to working with Sorrento, Scilex Holding, and Aardvark Therapeutics to initiate a Phase 2 trial to explore potential benefit of ARD-301 for patients suffering from the sequelae of chronic post-COVID syndrome,” said Stephen Faraone, Ph.D., Distinguished Professor and Vice Chair for Research, Department of Psychiatry, SUNY Upstate Medical University, Syracuse, New York. “We at Scilex are very excited to license from Aardvark a meaningful non-opioid therapeutic option that is desperately needed for millions of people in the US and around the world who will develop fibromyalgia or the critical complications of COVID-19 disease where very few treatments exist,” said Jaisim Shah, President and CEO of Scilex. “As increasing numbers of patients suffer from uncontrolled chronic pain resulting from dysregulation of pain signaling, we look forward to helping advance both clinical programs with Scilex’s team to address these high unmet needs,” commented Tien Lee, MD, Chief Executive Officer of Aardvark Therapeutics. Dr. Brian Johnson, professor of psychiatry and anesthesia at SUNY Upstate Medical University, states, “it is very encouraging to see development of an innovative low-dose naltrexone formulation to address fibromyalgia, a condition for which there is a need for better pharmacotherapies.” About Sorrento Therapeutics Sorrento is a clinical stage, antibody-centric, biopharmaceutical company developing new therapies to treat cancers and COVID-19. Sorrento's multimodal, multipronged approach to fighting cancer is made possible by its extensive immuno-oncology platforms, including key assets such as fully human antibodies ("G-MAB™ library"), clinical stage immuno-cellular therapies ("CAR-T", "DAR-T"), antibody-drug conjugates ("ADCs"), and clinical stage oncolytic virus ("Seprehvir®", “Seprehvec™”). Sorrento is also developing potential antiviral therapies and vaccines against coronaviruses, including COVIDTRAP™, ACE-MAB™, COVI-MAB™, COVI-GUARD™, COVI-SHIELD™, COVI-AMG™ and T-VIVA-19™; and diagnostic test solutions, including COVI-TRACK™, COVI-STIX™ and COVI-TRACE™. Sorrento's commitment to life-enhancing therapies for patients is also demonstrated by our effort to advance a first-in-class (TRPV1 agonist) non-opioid pain management small molecule, resiniferatoxin ("RTX"), and ZTlido® (lidocaine topical system) 1.8% for the treatment of post-herpetic neuralgia. RTX has completed a phase 1B trial for intractable pain associated with cancer and a phase 1B trial in osteoarthritis patients. ZTlido® was approved by the FDA on February 28, 2018. SP-102 is undergoing a Phase 3 pivotal trial for the treatment of lumbosacral radicular pain/sciatica. For more information visit www.sorrentotherapeutics.com. About Scilex Holding Company Scilex Holding Company, a majority-owned subsidiary of Sorrento, is a commercial-stage, non-opioid pain management company focused on the development and commercialization of topical and injectable therapies. Scilex targets indications with high unmet needs and large market opportunities with non-opioid therapies for the treatment of patients with moderate to severe chronic pain. Scilex launched its first commercial product in October 2018 and is developing its late-stage pipeline, which includes a pivotal Phase 3 candidate and a Phase 2 candidate. Its commercial product, ZTlido® (lidocaine topical system) 1.8%, or ZTlido®, is a prescription lidocaine topical product approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for the relief of pain associated with postherpetic neuralgia, which is a form of post-shingles nerve pain. Scilex’s two product candidates are SP-102 (10 mg, dexamethasone sodium phosphate viscous gel), or SEMDEXA™, a Phase 3, novel, viscous gel formulation of a widely used corticosteroid for epidural injections to treat lumbosacral radicular pain, or sciatica with FDA Fast Track status, and SP-103 (lidocaine topical system) 5.4%, or SP-103, a Phase 2, next-generation, triple-strength formulation of ZTlido®, for the treatment of low back pain. For more information visit www.scilexpharma.com. About Aardvark Therapeutics Aardvark Therapeutics is a clinical stage biotechnology company focused on the development of novel small molecule therapeutics to activate innate homeostatic pathways for the treatment of metabolic diseases, inflammation, and other indications. For more information visit www.aardvarktherapeutics.com. About Fibromyalgia Fibromyalgia is a chronic condition associated with widespread pain and tenderness, as well as general fatigue. Fibromyalgia is considered by many to be a condition that is largely mediated in the central nervous system, given that fibromyalgia sufferers often present without a direct peripheral insult or injury. People suffering from fibromyalgia also often experience sleep disruption, depressed mood, and cognitive impairment. It is estimated that, in the United States, fibromyalgia affects more than 10 million people. Currently, there are only three FDA-approved pharmacologic treatments for fibromyalgia, but they have limited efficacy and burdensome side effects in many patients. Forward-Looking Statements This press release and any statements made for and during any presentation or meeting concerning the matters discussed in this press release contain forward-looking statements related to Sorrento Therapeutics, Inc. and its subsidiaries, including but not limited to Scilex, under the safe harbor provisions of Section 21E of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected. Forward-looking statements include statements regarding the proposed agreement between Sorrento, Scilex and Aardvark regarding the proposed license and acquisition ARD-301 for the treatment of chronic pain, fibromyalgia, and chronic post-COVID syndrome, the prospects for ARD-301 and Scilex’s plans to initiate [a] new Phase 2 trial[s] this year for fibromyalgia. Risks and uncertainties that could cause our actual results to differ materially and adversely from those expressed in our forward-looking statements, include, but are not limited to the risk that the parties do not enter into a definitive agreement or close the proposed transaction, the risk that ARD-301 does not meet the parties’ objectives and the risk that Scilex does not commence [a] Phase 2 trial[s] for fibromyalgia in 2021 or at all. Investors are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this release and we undertake no obligation to update any forward-looking statement in this press release except as may be required by law. Media and Investor Relations Contact: Alexis Nahama, DVM Telephone: 1.858.203.4120 Email: mediarelations@sorrentotherapeutics.com Website: www.sorrentotherapeutics.com Sorrento® and the Sorrento logo are registered trademarks of Sorrento Therapeutics, Inc. ZTlido® and G-MAB™ are trademarks owned by Scilex Pharmaceuticals Inc. and Sorrento, respectively. SEMDEXA™ (SP-102) is a trademark owned by Scilex Holding. A proprietary name review by the FDA is planned. Seprehvir® is a registered trademark of Virttu Biologics Limited, a wholly-owned subsidiary of TNK Therapeutics, Inc. and part of the group of companies owned by Sorrento Therapeutics, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. © 2021 Sorrento Therapeutics, Inc. All Rights Reserved. References National Fibromyalgia Association (https://fmaware.net/fibromyalgia-prevalence/)Mary-Ann Fitzcharles, Neda Faregh, Peter A. Ste-Marie, Yoram Shir, "Opioid Use in Fibromyalgia Is Associated with Negative Health Related Measures in a Prospective Cohort Study", Pain Research and Treatment, vol. 2013, Article ID 898493, 7 pages, 2013.Carfì, A., Bernabei, R., & Landi, F. (2020). Persistent Symptoms in Patients After Acute COVID-19. Jama, 324(6), 603. doi:10.1001/jama.2020.12603
The "Navigating through Maze of In-vitro Diagnostics (IVD) Regulations: A systematic approach from Regulatory Strategy to Regulatory Approvals in U.S./Europe/Canada" conference has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.
Tilson thinks Buffett "left a lot of money on the table" by not putting more capital to work last year.
The "Content Disarm and Reconstruction Market - Growth, Trends, COVID-19 Impact, and Forecasts (2021 - 2026)" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.
Global energy leaders and other luminaries like Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates bored in on the tough road to transforming world economies to a lower-carbon future at the kickoff of the all-virtual CERAWeek conference on Monday. Within that, there was a notable bit of tension as some oil and gas executives still asserted their primacy, noting the need for fossil fuels to drive economic activity. CERAWeek, the world's largest oil-and-gas conference, returns this week after a hiatus in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic, and at a time when oil demand is still struggling to recover from the demand destruction wrought.
The "Peptide Therapeutics Market - Growth, Trends, COVID-19 Impact, and Forecasts (2021 - 2026)" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.
DANONE French Société anonyme with a capital of €171,657,400. Registered Office: 17, boulevard Haussmann, 75009 Paris. Registered with the Paris Commerce and Company Registry under number 552 032 534 Information on the total number of voting rights and shares in compliance with Article L. 233-8 II of the French Commercial Code and with Article 223-16 of the General Regulation of the Financial Markets Authority (AMF- Autorité des Marchés Financiers) DateTotal number of sharesTotal number of voting rights28/02/2021686,629,600Total number of theoretical voting rights(1) : 712,723,956 Total number of exercisable voting rights(2) : 675,890,266 (1) The total number of theoretical voting rights (or “gross” voting rights) is used as the basis for calculating the crossing of shareholding thresholds. In accordance with Article 223-11 of the AMF General Regulation, this number is calculated on the basis of all shares to which voting rights are attached, including shares whose voting rights have been suspended. (2) The total number of exercisable voting rights (or ”net” voting rights) is calculated without taking into account the shares with suspended voting rights. It is published to ensure that the public is properly informed in accordance with the recommendation made by the AMF on July 17, 2007. Attachment Déclaration Droit de Vote VA 28022021
The Czech Republic, battling the world's worst surge in COVID-19 infections, deployed more police officers and soldiers on Monday to help enforce new lockdown measures that seek to confine people mostly to their home districts. Prime Minister Andrej Babis has said the healthcare system faces collapse without the new restrictions due to a record number of patients in a serious condition. Exactly a year from when the first COVID-19 case was reported, authorities deployed around 26,000 police officers and 3,800 soldiers to enforce the three-week order limiting free movement, though there were exemptions for work-related travel.
BATON ROUGE, La., March 01, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- In March 2020, LSU Civil and Environmental Engineering Professor Brian Wolshon and a group of fellow researchers compared roadway travel statistics throughout the state of Florida for that month versus March 2019. This was done as states began to take their respective preventative measures against the coronavirus pandemic. The goal then, as it is now, was to understand the early impacts of government restrictions on social interaction with the expectation that it would be possible to determine their effectiveness in limiting the timing and extent of infections. What they found was that overall traffic volume decreased by 47.5 percent during the study period; there was a lag in response time between urban and rural areas; and that the greatest decline occurred later in the study period, suggesting multiple factors contributed in an additive way to increase the change in travel behavior. A follow-up study has since been conducted, focusing on the period of March 1, 2020-June 1, 2020, and 10 states that represent a cross-section of populations, governmental responses, numbers of COVID-19 cases, and political leanings. The list includes Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Montana, New Hampshire, New York, Ohio and Vermont. The data from this study shows that: At the height of the lockdown during this period, traffic was down 60-65 percent across the 10 states and remained that way for about a month. That amount and its sustained duration is without equal in the last century.The level of traffic-volume “recovery” was slower than the decline, but by the end of the study, most states were in the range of 25-30 percent below their 2019 levels. New Hampshire was on the lower end at 16 percent while Ohio was the highest at 44 percent. Researchers believe that this is a reflection of the levels of restrictions in place.The need for governmental responses should be appropriate to the threat faced and the specific characteristics of the location. For instance, the threat and outcomes faced by Montana were different than those of New York. “The biggest a-ha moment was how consistent the amount of the drops were,” Wolshon said. “Whether you had the state of New York, or Vermont, or Ohio, or Michigan, or Montana, the percentage drops were all really similar…everyone followed similar patterns and timings. And then how long they stayed at the bottom, except for Florida at three weeks, everyone stayed at the bottom. And then by the third week of April, everyone started coming back. “You could make an argument with the data that we show that government actions lowered traffic, and that the decreased traffic led to a decrease in spread of the virus,” Wolshon said. “When you’re shutting down schools, businesses, etc., you’re going to see traffic go down. You can’t deny that human interaction spreads the virus.” Wolshon further stated that the group’s work shows a consistency with growing scientific evidence that the spread of the virus appears to be primarily through human interaction at a “close interpersonal contact level,” like the sort one would experience within a household and not like that of being in a shopping mall or outdoor stadium with reasonable social distancing. There is more work to come on this project, as its focus will extend beyond the United States and examine the global response to the pandemic. Another area that will be examined is crash-related fatalities, which went up while traffic declined. “The next logical step is were these patterns similar across the world?” Wolshon said. “Is human behavior more consistent than we think? Nobody likes to stay home; everybody wants to travel, etc. When governments have the ability to really lockdown an area, you can have beneficial outcomes, but at what cost? We want to try and look at the bookends of hardcore enforcement versus suggested guidelines versus [somewhere in the middle].” Wolshon is joined on the project by Scott Parr, Embry Riddle Aeronautical University Department of Civil Engineering; Pamela Murray-Tuite, Clemson University Department of Civil Engineering; and Tim Lomax, Texas A&M University Transportation Institute. Read the full paper in the Journal of Transportation Engineering by clicking here. Like us on Facebook (@lsuengineering) or follow us on Twitter and Instagram (@lsuengineering). CONTACT: Josh Duplechain LSU College of Engineering 225-578-5706 josh@lsu.edu
An American father and son accused of helping former Nissan Motor Co Ltd Chairman Carlos Ghosn flee Japan were handed over on Monday to Japanese authorities for extradition from the United States, their lawyer told the Associated Press. The U.S. Supreme Court last month cleared the way for the extradition of U.S. Army Special Forces veteran Michael Taylor and his son, Peter Taylor, who are accused of helping Ghosn flee Japan while he was awaiting trial on financial charges.
Flame Acquisition Corp. announced today the closing of its initial public offering of 28,750,000 units.
(Bloomberg) -- Stocks climbed as confidence returned to markets, with investors shaking off concern about the impacts of higher Treasury yields.Companies tied to economic reopenings and faster growth led the gains on Monday amid a broad-based rally. The S&P 500 was on track for its biggest advance in almost nine months, while the Russell 2000 of small caps jumped 3%. GameStop Corp. soared, adding to last week’s surge of over 150%, with retail investors promoting the stock on social-media platforms such as Reddit and StockTwits. Zoom Video Communications Inc. rose ahead of its quarterly results.Read: Stock Bulls Have Stopped Pretending to Care About Balance SheetsLonger-dated Treasuries resumed their selloff even as intermediate maturities found support, with traders priming themselves for how Federal Reserve officials slated to speak this week might respond to the recent tumult. Investors piled back into risk assets as stocks rebounded following a rout that was triggered by concern that massive stimulus as well as progress in battling the coronavirus have left some areas of the economy at risk of possibly overheating. The S&P 500 extended a rally from its March 2020 lows to almost 75%.“Equity investors are still looking at the rise in rates mostly as ‘a good thing’ and not yet as a threat, notwithstanding some shaking of the tree in high multiple stocks and other parts of the market last week,” wrote Peter Boockvar, chief investment officer at Bleakley Advisory Group. “The benefits of the vaccines versus the challenge of higher rates will be the theme this year.”Read: Investors Poured Record $86 Billion Into Equity ETFs in FebruaryBitcoin rallied after a volatile weekend session, riding a broad resurgence in risk assets and a bullish report from Citigroup Inc. The bank’s strategists laid out a case for the digital asset to play a bigger role in the global financial system, saying the cryptocurrency could become “the currency of choice for international trade” in the years ahead.There are some key events to watch this week:U.S. Federal Reserve Beige Book is due Wednesday.OPEC+ meeting on output Thursday.U.S. factory orders, initial jobless claims and durable goods orders are due Thursday.The February U.S. employment report on Friday will provide an update on the speed and direction of the nation’s labor market recovery.These are some of the main moves in markets:StocksThe S&P 500 Index surged 2.4% as of 12:10 p.m. New York time.The Stoxx Europe 600 Index added 1.8%.The MSCI Asia Pacific Index climbed 1.8%.The MSCI Emerging Market Index rose 1.8%.CurrenciesThe Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index dipped 0.3%.The euro fell 0.1% to $1.2059.The Japanese yen depreciated 0.1% to 106.65 per dollar.BondsThe yield on 10-year Treasuries jumped three basis points to 1.44%.Germany’s 10-year yield sank seven basis points to -0.33%.Britain’s 10-year yield decreased six basis points to 0.759%.CommoditiesWest Texas Intermediate crude declined 0.2% to $61.40 a barrel.Gold was little changed at $1,733.40 an ounce.Silver strengthened 0.7% to $26.84 per ounce.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2021 Bloomberg L.P.
Officials in Nigeria's Zamfara state are in touch with the gunmen who abducted 317 schoolgirls last week and are negotiating their release, two state officials told Reuters on Monday. The armed men took the girls from a boarding school in the increasingly lawless northwestern part of Nigeria early on Feb. 26, the region's second school kidnapping in a week. Zamfara Information Commissioner Sulaiman Tanau Anka told Reuters via phone that officials knew where the girls were being held and who had them, but would not send in armed security forces for fear of harming the girls.
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