It’s been five months since Elon Musk took over Twitter after a long-drawn out, tumultuous negotiating period. There has been a lot of controversy since he positioned himself at the helm of the social media platform, including massive layoffs, allowing too-long tweets, and altering the algorithm to make his Super Bowl tweets rank higher. He closed the deal to acquire Twitter on Oct. 28, after paying his original officer price of $54.20 a share for a grand total of approximately $44 billion. He fired some of the company’s top executives almost immediately, including CEO Parag Agrawal, chief financial officer Ned Segal, and chief legal officer Vijay Gadde. Soon after, he began to lay off staff members to remove around half of the 7,500-strong workforce. Twitter value drops to half of Musk’s acquisition price. Now, it appears that Twitter is facing financial challenges. Changes since Musk’s takeover have resulted in more hate speech, issues in acquiring blue check verification, and problems with the app’s features. According to Zoe Schiffer, managing editor of Platformer, a tech news website, the billionaire sent an email to Twitter employees admitting that the company has been through radical changes which were necessary. Musk also reportedly acknowledged that the platform was previously about four months from running out of money. Per Schiffer, the value of Twitter is now half of what Musk paid for it. “Current grants are based on a $20b valuation,” she tweeted, although Musk says he is hopeful of eventually getting a valuation of $250 billion. Advertisers concerned about their brand have left the platform, leading to plummeting revenues for the company in recent months.

Linda Yaccarino was hired as Twitter's new CEO on Friday

Musk proposed a plan to charge verified users $20 a month for verification.

Elon Musk has completed his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter, the company confirmed in a securities filing Friday, putting the world’s richest man in charge of one of the world’s most influential social media platforms.\n\nThe company said the deal “became effective” on Thursday, as part of a filing notifying its intention to de-list from the New York Stock Exchange, a move that happened later on Friday. The confirmation comes after a source familiar with the deal told CNN the deal had closed Thursday night.\n\nMusk also appeared to acknowledge the takeover in a tweet Thursday night saying, “the bird is freed.”. The deal’s closing removes a cloud of uncertainty that has hung over Twitter’s business, employees and shareholders for much of the year. It also averts a court battle that was set to take place if the acquisition did not close by 5 p.m. ET Friday. But Musk’s takeover now raises a host of new questions for the future of the social media platform, and the many corners of society impacted by it. Musk on Thursday fired CEO Parag Agrawal, CFO Neg Segal and policy head Vijaya Gadde, according to two sources familiar with the situation. He also fired Sean Edgett, Twitter’s general counsel, a source told CNN.\nDespite multiple news outlets confirming the changes Thursday night, Twitter staff had still not formally been informed of the changes as of Friday morning, two Twitter employees told CNN.

Twitter de-lists from the New York Stock Exchange.

Twitter's value is half of Musk’s acquisition price.

A poll tweeted by Jason Calacanis showed that 82% of Twitter users wouldn’t pay for verification.


\n\nHollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein has been found guilty of rape and sexual assault by courts in New York and Los Angeles.\n\nHere is a summary of the key events that led him to court:\n\n- Weinstein issues an apology acknowledging he "has caused a lot of pain" - but disputes allegations he harassed female employees over nearly three decades.\n\n- It is announced that Harvey Weinstein has been sacked by the board of his company, with immediate effect. \n\n- The organisation behind the Oscars votes to expel Weinstein. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences says: "What\'s at issue here is a deeply troubling problem that has no place in our society."\n\n- Weinstein\'s former company files for bankruptcy, months after the Oscar-winning producer was accused of multiple sexual assaults.\n\n- Weinstein faces fresh sexual assault charges in New York from a third woman, in a case dating back to 2006.\n\n- After five days of deliberation, the jury finds Weinstein guilty of a criminal sexual act in the first degree and third-degree rape.\n\n- Weinstein goes on trial in LA, facing 11 charges involving five alleged victims.\n\n- Weinstein is found guilty by a Los Angeles jury of raping a woman.\n

Weinstein was sentenced after a criminal conviction in New York in 2020.

\n\nWhen #MeToo exploded in the fall of 2017, its most optimistic promise was that it would become more than a hashtag, more than a brief interruption in America\'s regularly scheduled sexism, more than a reckoning for famous men who had abused wealthy, white women.\n\nThere were front-page headlines, explosions of long-stifled rage and examinations of collective complicity. There was hope those two small words signaled the beginning of meaningful change and, eventually, healing –  a belief the silence was finally broken. \n\nHas #MeToo delivered? \n\n"People are paying more attention, but I\'m not convinced that we\'re able or ready to behave differently about it as a nation," said Kristen Houser, chief public affairs officer at the National Sexual Violence Resource Center.\n\nBrett Kavanaugh, who was accused of sexual assault by Christine Blasey Ford, ascended to the Supreme Court. President Donald Trump, who has been accused by 19 women of sexual misconduct, was recently accused of rape by prominent writer E. Jean Carroll, and public reaction was muted. While Congress has overhauled the process for handling sexual harassment claims on Capitol Hill, it has not passed any legislation in the past two years to address sexual harassment in America\'s workplaces. Thousands of migrant children who crossed the southern border into the U.S. have reported they were sexually assaulted while in government custody. \n\n

President Donald Trump was accused of sexual misconduct and rape by 19 women and E. Jean Carroll, respectively.

\n\nPresident Donald Trump mocked the #MeToo movement again at his rally in Pennsylvania on Wednesday night, citing the “rules of MeToo” as the reason he wasn’t “allowed” to use an expression.\n\nWhen talking about winning the state in the 2016 presidential election Trump said, “Pennsylvania hasn’t been won for many years by Republicans, but every Republican thinks they’re going to win Pennsylvania. … I used an expression – you know, there’s an expression but under the rules of MeToo I’m not allowed to use that expression anymore. I can’t do it.”\n\n“It’s the person that got away,” Trump continued. “See, in the old days, it was a little different,” the President added, laughing as a rally attendee told him from the crowd to “do it anyway.”\n\n“I would do it, except for these people up there,” Trump said, pointing at the cameras and press at the rally. “They would say, did you hear what President Trump said?”\n\nHe continued, “So there is an expression, but we’ll change the expression: Pennsylvania was always the person who got away, that’s pretty good, right, the person that got away?”\n\nIt’s another shot at the movement that began following the publication of sexual harassment and assault allegations against Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein in October 2017.

President Donald Trump mocked the #MeToo movement at a rally in Pennsylvania on Wednesday night.

\n\nA new attorney for Harvey Weinstein says the movie mogul was "railroaded" by the #MeToo movement.\n\nWeinstein appeared in a New York court Thursday morning for a judge to approve newly retained lawyers Donna Rotunno and Damon Cheronis.\n\nThe long-time film producer faces five sexual misconduct charges involving the accusations of two women, but Rotunno insisted the relationships Weinstein had with his accusers were consensual.\n\nRotunno said the facts revealed to date do not represent the whole story.\n\n“Emotion of this case has taken over,” Rotunno told reporters outside the courthouse. “There is a truth you have not reported on.”\n\nClaiming that Weinstein has been “railroaded” by #MeToo, Rotunno said that “movements allow emotion to take over.”\n\nRotunno also said that, as a woman, she would be able to more effectively cross examine a female witness.\n\nShe added that she and Cheronis are “honored to represent Mr Weinstein.”\n\nWeinstein is on his third set of criminal defense attorneys. Earlier this year he let go celebrity attorney Benjamin Brafman and turned to Jose Baez, known for representing high-profile clients including Casey Anthony.\n\nBaez, however, said that he and Weinstein developed "fundamental disagreements" about his representation, and at Thursday\'s court appearance Baez asked the judge for permission to leave the case.\n\nWeinstein\'s new team of Rotunno and Cheronis are well-known criminal defense lawyers in Chicago, but have never tried a case in New York.\n\nWeinstein has been free on $1 million bail pending trial.

Weinstein's lawyer insisted the relationships Weinstein had with his accusers were consensual.

Brett Kavanaugh was accused of sexual assault and ascended to the Supreme Court.


The trial over a 2016 ski accident involving actor and businesswoman Gwyneth Paltrow wrapped up Thursday, with the jury ruling that she was not responsible for the collision at a Utah ski resort.\n\nAfter a short deliberation, the jury concluded that plaintiff Terry Sanderson was entirely at fault for the collision, with the decision ultimately hinging on which party jurors believed was higher on the slopes when the crash occurred. \n\nSanderson, 76, sued Paltrow for $3.1 million after alleging that she crashed into him at the tony Deer Valley resort in Park City, Utah. After a judge dismissed his initial suit, he later refiled his complaint seeking more than $300,000. Paltrow, 50, countersued for a symbolic $1 and attorney fees.\n\nIn each taking the stand last week, Paltrow and Sanderson presented starkly different accounts of the collision and called a succession of medical experts and witnesses to buttress their claims. Paltrow\'s ski instructor at the time of the incident, Deer Valley veteran Eric Christiansen, blamed Sanderson for the crash, which occurred on a beginner ski run. \n\n\n"Gwyneth was making her turns very rhythmically," he said under oath, while alleging that Sanderson "was making wide radius turns and taking up a large swath of the ski slope."\n\nFor his part, Sanderson has accused Paltrow of barreling into him, breaking four of his ribs and causing a severe concussion whose symptoms lingered for years.

Paltrow's attorney asked Sanderson about the possibility of the lawsuit being a result of Paltrow's fame.

The Utah civil trial involving actress Gwyneth Paltrow and a man who is accusing her of wrongdoing in relation to a 2016 ski collision resumed Monday for its second week of proceedings.\n\nTerry Sanderson, the retired optometrist who is suing Paltrow, testified on Monday that he “was skiing easy” and “paying attention” prior to the collision with Paltrow, which happened at Deer Valley Resort in Park City, Utah.\n\n“I just remember everything was great and then I heard something I’ve never heard at a ski resort and that was a blood-curdling scream … and then boom,” he said. “It was like somebody was out of control and going to hit a tree and was going to die. And that’s what I had until I was hit.”\n\nHe went on to describe the impact.\n\n“I got hit in my back so hard and right at my shoulder blades and it felt like it was perfectly centered and the fists and the poles were right at the bottom of my shoulder blades, serious, serious smack and I’ve never been hit that hard,” Sanderson continued. “All I saw was a whole lot of snow.”\n\nSanderson disputed suggestions he sued Paltrow to exploit her fame and wealth.\n\n\n\n“I thought, ‘I’m not into celebrity worship,’” Sanderson told the jury about learning she was the other skier involved in their collision.\n\nCraig Ramon, a witness who testified previously, was recalled to the stand to discuss newly obtained evidence related to a message board earlier on Monday.

The witness Craig Ramon was recalled to testify about newly obtained evidence related to a message board earlier on Monday.

Attorneys are presenting their closing arguments Thursday before handing an eight-member Utah jury the case from the closely watched Gwyneth Paltrow ski collision trial, in which a retired optometrist is suing her for the injuries he says he sustained.\n\nPaltrow testified Friday in Utah after being sued in a 2016 ski crash that\'s been referred to as a "hit and run."\n\nIn 2019, the "Iron Man" star was sued by Terry Sanderson, who claimed she seriously injured him during a crash on the slopes at a Park City ski resort. The alleged incident occurred Feb. 26, 2016, on a beginner run at Deer Valley Resort.\n\nSanderson testified Monday. He is seeking $300,000 in damages, following a $3.1 million lawsuit that was previously dropped. Paltrow has denied the allegations and in a counterclaim said it was Sanderson who crashed into her.\n\nPaltrow is seeking "symbolic damages in the amount of $1, plus her costs and attorney’s fees to defend this meritless claim," her lawsuit said. The actress vowed to donate any additional funds potentially awarded by the jury to a charitable organization.

Paltrow testified in court in Utah on Friday after being sued in ski crash

Gwyneth's ski instructor testified on her behalf that Sanderson was taking up a large swath of the ski slope.

Public opinion of actress Gwyneth Paltrow seems to have changed following her big win in a ski collision lawsuit.\n\nPaltrow was sued by retired optometrist Terry Sanderson in 2019 over a ski crash that he claimed left him severely injured. However, a jury ruled that the Goop founder was not at fault for the accident and awarded her $1 in damages Thursday. Sanderson himself was found to be 100% at fault for the collision.\n\nPrior to the ski collision trial, which lasted for eight days in Utah state court, Paltrow had received an interesting reaction from the public. The Oscar-winning actress has faced tremendous backlash over the years for her beliefs and comments, including the recent drama over her "starvation diet." \n\nPaltrow also came under fire when she announced she and ex-husband Chris Martin planned to "consciously uncouple" rather than divorce after 10 years of marriage. \n\nThe lawsuit, brought against Paltrow by Sanderson, was seen by some – including PR expert Dave Quast – to be "extremely opportunistic."\n\nCelebrity branding expert and founder of Achilles PR Doug Eldridge explained that Paltrow chose to be "authentic" and as an actress chose to play herself throughout this trial. "She took a positive PR bump post trial for four reasons: 1) she won, 2) she countersued for $1 dollar (along with what is likely mid-six figures in legal fees), 3) her answers were ridiculous, and 4) her courtroom wardrobe was strategic and effective."

Paltrow was criticized by the public for promoting starvation diets and her ideas on conscious uncoupling


Gwyneth Paltrow was called to the witness stand Friday in a civil suit filed against her, where she emphatically denied that she caused an accident at Utah’s Deer Valley Resort in 2016 that left a man seriously injured.\n\nTerry Sanderson, 76, who is seeking $300,000 from Paltrow, says she slammed into him from behind in a ski collision that left him with a concussion, brain injury and four broken ribs. But Paltrow alleges that it was actually Sanderson at fault and that he is exploiting her wealth.\n\n"Mr. Sanderson categorically hit me on the ski slope and that is the truth," Paltrow said from the stand Friday.\n\nThe actor and Sanderson both dispute who hit whom and who was farther up the hill at the time of the crash. Deer Valley’s website says the person ahead or downhill has the right of way. \n\nPaltrow was called to the stand Friday by Sanderson’s attorneys, after the jury heard from Sanderson\'s daughters, an eyewitness and medical experts.\n\nPaltrow said she was “gently” skiing down the slope when she felt a body press into her back and saw two skis slide between hers. She and Sanderson fell to the ground, Paltrow said, adding that she momentarily froze before becoming upset and yelling an expletive at Sanderson.\n\nPaltrow apologized for the outburst, saying she felt violated and initially believed the crash might have been a sexual assault.\n\n“There was a body pressing against me and a very strange grunting noise,” she said.

Public opinion of actress Gwyneth Paltrow has become more positive.

Gwyneth Paltrow will not recoup the attorneys\' fees she paid to successfully defend herself against a lawsuit from a 76-year-old retired optometrist who claimed she was at fault for crashing into him at a posh Utah ski resort in 2016.\n In a ruling published on Saturday, a Utah judge said attorneys for Paltrow and Terry Sanderson had agreed to drop the matter of Paltrow\'s attorneys\' fees. District Court Judge Kent Holmberg\'s final judgement did not detail why the matter of attorneys\' fees that Paltrow sought in her 2019 countersuit was dropped.\n\nThe judgement affirmed the jury\'s unanimous verdict finding Terry Sanderson — the man who collided with Paltrow — to be “100% at fault," awarding Paltrow the $1 she sought in a countersuit. It also said Sanderson would not appeal the verdict, effectively ending a protracted legal battle seven years after the two crashed on a beginner run near the base of Deer Valley Resort in Utah.\n\nRepresentatives for both Paltrow were not immediately available to answer questions about the final judgment or the money at stake. Neither side has publicly disclosed how much it cost to sustain a yearslong legal battle with a team of attorneys, expert witnesses from around the United States and, for Paltrow\'s side, high-resolution animated recreations of her recollections of the crash.\n\nThe “Shakespeare in Love” and “Ironman” star\'s eight-day court battle last month emerged as the most closely watched American celebrity trial since actors Johnny Depp and Amber Heard faced off last year.

Sanderson did not appeal the verdict, ending the protracted legal battle

The trial over a 2016 ski accident involving actor and businesswoman Gwyneth Paltrow wrapped up Thursday, with the jury ruling that she was not responsible for the collision at a Utah ski resort.\n\nAfter a short deliberation, the jury concluded that plaintiff Terry Sanderson was entirely at fault for the collision, with the decision ultimately hinging on which party jurors believed was higher on the slopes when the crash occurred. \n\nSanderson, 76, sued Paltrow for $3.1 million after alleging that she crashed into him at the tony Deer Valley resort in Park City, Utah. After a judge dismissed his initial suit, he later refiled his complaint seeking more than $300,000. Paltrow, 50, countersued for a symbolic $1 and attorney fees.\n\nIn each taking the stand last week, Paltrow and Sanderson presented starkly different accounts of the collision and called a succession of medical experts and witnesses to buttress their claims. Paltrow\'s ski instructor at the time of the incident, Deer Valley veteran Eric Christiansen, blamed Sanderson for the crash, which occurred on a beginner ski run. \n\n\n"Gwyneth was making her turns very rhythmically," he said under oath, while alleging that Sanderson "was making wide radius turns and taking up a large swath of the ski slope."\n\nFor his part, Sanderson has accused Paltrow of barreling into him, breaking four of his ribs and causing a severe concussion whose symptoms lingered for years.

Gwyneth's ski instructor testified on her behalf that Sanderson was taking up a large swath of the ski slope.

Paltrow apologizes for her outburst, saying she felt violated and initially believed the crash might have been a sexual assault.

Last month, Gwyneth Paltrow stood trial in Utah where a man named Terry Sanderson accused her of causing him severe injury when she allegedly crashed into him while they were both skiing at the luxurious Deer Valley ski resort.\n\nShe ultimately won the trial after Sanderson was determined to be "100 percent at fault" for the 2016 ski crash. The proceedings garnered lots of attention, and now, weeks later, Paltrow has taken to Instagram to comment on what happened.\n\nHer post featured a video of falling show, a photo of an extravagant living room, another photo of snow, and one of a whiskey bottle, all apparently taken during the time she spent in Utah for the trial.\n\nHer post featured a video of falling show, a photo of an extravagant living room, another photo of snow, and one of a whiskey bottle, all apparently taken during the time she spent in Utah for the trial.\n\nHer captioned seemed to confirm this – she wrote "Last weeks of March; storms of varying kinds, a beautiful place to lay my head, cold therapy of the most natural kind, and a whisky discovery."\n\nThe last weeks of March were when the trial took place. "Storms of various kinds" could refer to both the snowstorms in the area and the media storm the trial caused.\n\nMany of her followers also understood her post to be a reference to her days in court.

Accuser Terry Sanderson was determined to be "100% at fault"


\n\nThe US, and the technology sector which were among its biggest customers, face another Lehman Brothers moment with the failure of SVB.\n\nUS regulators rushed to seize the assets of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) on Friday after a run on the bank, the largest failure of a financial institution since the height of the financial crisis more than a decade ago.\n\nSilicon Valley, the country\'s 16th largest bank, failed after depositors - mostly technology workers and venture capital-backed companies - hurried to withdraw their money this week as anxiety over the bank’s situation spread.\n\nThe bank could no longer cope with the massive withdrawals of its customers and its last attempts to raise new money did not succeed.\n\nUS authorities therefore officially took possession of the bank and entrusted its management to the U.S. agency responsible for guaranteeing deposits, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC).\n\nLittle known to the general public, SVB had specialised in financing start-ups and had become one of the largest banks in the US by asset size: at the end of 2022, it had $209 billion (€196 billion) in assets and about $175.4 billion (€164.5 billion) in deposits.\n\n\nIts demise represents not only the largest bank failure since that of Washington Mutual in 2008, but also the second-largest failure of a retail bank in the United States.\n\nUS Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen called several financial sector regulators together on Friday to discuss the situation, reminding them that she had "full confidence" in their ability to take appropriate action and that the banking sector remained "resilient".

\n\nA global rout sparked by investors’ pessimism about the US economy has pulled down Indian technology companies, too.\n\nThe Nifty IT, a key Indian stock market index for the information-technology space, is ending 2022 down 24% from the previous year, its worst fall since the 2008 global financial crisis. This decline comes after five straight years of annual gains.\n\nTech majors such as Wipro, Tech Mahindra, and Mphasis have lost more than 40% of their market value in 2022. Hundreds of employees of both startups and bellwether companies have been laid off. Venture capitalist funding has dwindled.\n\nWhile the Indian economy itself has been resilient in a shaky global environment, its tech industry’s weak stretch may continue into 2023.\n\nFears of a recession, stoked by rising interest rates in developed markets, have hit the revenues, sales, and growth prospects of many global tech firms. A major share of Indian tech firms’ earnings comes from global clients.\n\nThis sell-off only intensified after Goldman Sachs, in September, downgraded Mumbai-based Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) and Bengaluru’s Infosys to “sell” from “buy,” citing a potential slowdown in revenue growth.\n\nMeanwhile, HCL Technologies, India’s third-largest IT company by revenue, has also lowered its revenue growth projection for 2023.\n\n

\n\n\nFor the second time in two days, the Bank of England has been forced to offer extra support to UK markets still reeling from the government’s announcement last month that it would slash taxes and increase borrowing.\n\nThe central bank warned Tuesday that there was still a “material risk to UK financial stability” from a sharp-sell off in government bonds that has sent yields soaring, pushing up borrowing costs across the economy and forcing some pension funds to dump assets to raise cash.\n\nA slump in UK government bonds that promise to protect investors from inflation — known as index-linked gilts — was the latest source of risk, it said.\n\n“Dysfunction in this market, and the prospect of self-reinforcing ‘fire sale’ dynamics pose a material risk to UK financial stability,” it said in a statement.\n\nThe extent of the bond market strain was underscored Tuesday when the UK government sold £900 million ($994 million) of index-linked gilts due in 2051 at the highest yield since October 2008, according to Reuters.\n\nStarting Tuesday, the Bank of England will include index-linked gilts in its emergency £65 billion ($71.7 billion) bond-buying program announced on Sept. 28. “These additional operations will act as a further backstop to restore orderly market conditions,” it added.\nThe bank said the program would end as planned on Friday, despite calls for it to continue for another three weeks.\n\nOn Monday, it doubled the daily limit on its bond-buying to £10 billion through the end of the week.

UK government announces to slash taxes and increase borrowing.

SVB had specialised in financing start-ups.

Nifty IT index ends 2022 down 24%, its worst fall since 2008 global financial crisis


Gwyneth Paltrow\'s ski crash trial came to an end Thursday when a jury sided with the actor, saying she was not at fault for a 2016 collision at Utah’s Deer Valley Resort that injured a retired optometrist.\n\nTerry Sanderson sued Paltrow for $300,000, alleging that reckless skiing caused her to run into him from behind on Feb. 26, 2016. Sanderson said he suffered four broken ribs, a concussion and lasting brain damage that affected his daily life and personal relationships.\n\nPaltrow, who has repeatedly denied running into Sanderson, countersued for $1 and her legal fees.\n\nThe trial went on for more than a week. The jury deliberated for just a few hours before deciding that Sanderson, not Paltrow, was at fault.\n\nHere’s a timeline of the events that led up to the court case, and memorable moments from trial.\n\nSanderson filed a lawsuit on Jan. 29, 2019, saying that Paltrow was skiing "out of control" when she hit him from behind, knocked him down, and then landed on top of him. He said after the collision, the actor got up and skied away and did not offer any help.\n\nHe was initially seeking more than $3.1 million but amended it to $300,000.\n\nSanderson said it took him three years to file the suit because his legal team could not come to a resolution after meeting with Paltrow and her attorney.

Sanderson did not appeal the verdict, ending the protracted legal battle

Gwyneth Paltrow was called to the witness stand Friday in a civil suit filed against her, where she emphatically denied that she caused an accident at Utah’s Deer Valley Resort in 2016 that left a man seriously injured.\n\nTerry Sanderson, 76, who is seeking $300,000 from Paltrow, says she slammed into him from behind in a ski collision that left him with a concussion, brain injury and four broken ribs. But Paltrow alleges that it was actually Sanderson at fault and that he is exploiting her wealth.\n\n"Mr. Sanderson categorically hit me on the ski slope and that is the truth," Paltrow said from the stand Friday.\n\nThe actor and Sanderson both dispute who hit whom and who was farther up the hill at the time of the crash. Deer Valley’s website says the person ahead or downhill has the right of way. \n\nPaltrow was called to the stand Friday by Sanderson’s attorneys, after the jury heard from Sanderson\'s daughters, an eyewitness and medical experts.\n\nPaltrow said she was “gently” skiing down the slope when she felt a body press into her back and saw two skis slide between hers. She and Sanderson fell to the ground, Paltrow said, adding that she momentarily froze before becoming upset and yelling an expletive at Sanderson.\n\nPaltrow apologized for the outburst, saying she felt violated and initially believed the crash might have been a sexual assault.\n\n“There was a body pressing against me and a very strange grunting noise,” she said.

Paltrow apologizes for her outburst, saying she felt violated and initially believed the crash might have been a sexual assault.

Gwyneth Paltrow\'s attorneys asked the daughter of a man suing the actor-turned-lifestyle influencer over a 2016 ski collision about missing GoPro camera footage that they called "the most important piece of evidence" at trial Thursday.\n\nSteve Owens, Paltrow\'s attorney, asked one of the man\'s daughters, Polly Grasham, about emails exchanged with her father about the mysterious footage and the possibility that the lawsuit was filed against Paltrow because she was famous.\n\nThe GoPro footage has not been found or included as evidence for the trial.\n\n"I\'m famous ... At what cost?" Terry Sanderson, the 76-year-old retired optometrist suing Paltrow, wrote in the subject line of an email to his family after the crash.\n\nSanderson is suing Paltrow for more than $300,000 in damages, claiming that she skied recklessly into him on a beginner run at Deer Valley Resort seven years ago, breaking his ribs and leaving him with a concussion. Paltrow has claimed Sanderson caused the crash and countersued for $1 and attorney fees.\n\nThe trial took on an increasingly personal note on the third day of proceedings when Sanderson\'s daughter and a neuropsychologist testified about his declining health.\n\nSanderson\'s attorneys tried to persuade jurors that the collision had changed the course of their client\'s life, leaving him brain-impaired and damaging his relationships with loved ones.\n\nPaltrow\'s attorneys questioned whether Grasham and neuropsychologist Dr. Alina Fong could say with certainty that Sanderson\'s downturn wasn\'t a result of aging or documented, pre-crash conditions.

Paltrow's attorney asked Sanderson about the possibility of the lawsuit being a result of Paltrow's fame.

Public opinion of actress Gwyneth Paltrow seems to have changed following her big win in a ski collision lawsuit.\n\nPaltrow was sued by retired optometrist Terry Sanderson in 2019 over a ski crash that he claimed left him severely injured. However, a jury ruled that the Goop founder was not at fault for the accident and awarded her $1 in damages Thursday. Sanderson himself was found to be 100% at fault for the collision.\n\nPrior to the ski collision trial, which lasted for eight days in Utah state court, Paltrow had received an interesting reaction from the public. The Oscar-winning actress has faced tremendous backlash over the years for her beliefs and comments, including the recent drama over her "starvation diet." \n\nPaltrow also came under fire when she announced she and ex-husband Chris Martin planned to "consciously uncouple" rather than divorce after 10 years of marriage. \n\nThe lawsuit, brought against Paltrow by Sanderson, was seen by some – including PR expert Dave Quast – to be "extremely opportunistic."\n\nCelebrity branding expert and founder of Achilles PR Doug Eldridge explained that Paltrow chose to be "authentic" and as an actress chose to play herself throughout this trial. "She took a positive PR bump post trial for four reasons: 1) she won, 2) she countersued for $1 dollar (along with what is likely mid-six figures in legal fees), 3) her answers were ridiculous, and 4) her courtroom wardrobe was strategic and effective."

Paltrow was criticized by the public for promoting starvation diets and her ideas on conscious uncoupling

While highlighting Latino underrepresentation in Hollywood, John Leguizamo joked that he might take a role from a white actor by playing Gwyneth Paltrow in a movie about her ongoing ski-accident trial.\n\nThe actor, who stars in Prime Video\'s "The Power," is guest hosting "The Daily Show" after the departure of its host Trevor Noah. On Monday\'s episode, Leguizamo spoke about the phenomenon of white actors like James Franco, who was cast as Fidel Castro in the film "Alina of Cuba," being cast in Latino roles.\n\n"Well, guess what? If white people can take our roles, I\'m going to take theirs," Leguizamo said.\n\n"When they do the TV series based on Gwyneth Paltrow\'s ski-accident trial, I\'m going to be Gwyneth Paltrow," he continued, before launching into an impression of the actor and Goop founder.\n\n\nPaltrow is in court after a retired optometrist, Terry Sanderson, sued her in 2019 claiming that she was at fault when she crashed into him on a ski slope in 2016. Paltrow, who has disputed parts of Sanderson\'s story, countersued, saying that Sanderson ran into her.\n\nLeguizamo has been outspoken about the dearth of Latino representation in Hollywood, writing an open letter to the industry in the Los Angeles Times in 2022 about the long-standing issue.\n\n"You may think Lin-Manuel Miranda, Bad Bunny, J Lo, Benicio del Toro and I are the only ones, but you are wrong," he wrote. "There are millions of Latinos, and we were just among the few to be allowed through."

John Leguizamo joked that he might take a role from a white actor by playing Gwyneth Paltrow in a movie about her ongoing ski accident trial.


\n\nEquifax says a giant cybersecurity breach compromised the personal information of as many as 143 million Americans — almost half the country.\nCyber criminals have accessed sensitive information -- including names, social security numbers, birth dates, addresses, and the numbers of some driver\'s licenses.\n\nAdditionally, Equifax said that credit card numbers for about 209,000 U.S. customers were exposed, as was "personal identifying information" on roughly 182,000 U.S. customers involved in credit report disputes. Residents in the U.K. and Canada were also impacted.\n\nThe breach occurred between mid-May and July, Equifax said. The company said it discovered the hack on July 29.\n\nThe data breach is one of the worst ever, by its reach and by the kind of information exposed to the public.\n\n"This is clearly a disappointing event for our company, and one that strikes at the heart of who we are and what we do," said Equifax chairman and CEO Richard F. Smith.\n\nEquifax is one of three nationwide credit-reporting companies that track and rates the financial history of U.S. consumers. The companies are supplied with data about loans, loan payments and credit cards, as well as information on everything from child support payments, credit limits, missed rent and utilities payments, addresses and employer history, which all factor into credit scores.\n\nUnlike other data breaches, not all of the people affected by the Equifax breach may be aware that they\'re customers of the company.

Shares of Equifax shed more than 13% of their value in trading.

\n\nThe Equifax data breach that leaked information on the now-145 million people was caused by a vulnerability in Apache's Struts system. Trouble is, the software provider supplied a patch back in March that should have eliminated that vulnerability. But Equifax's former CEO (who suddenly retired last week) told the House Energy and Commerce Committee that a single IT technician was at fault for the whole thing after they failed to install the patch.\n\nWhile speaking to the committee (video below), former CEO Richard Smith outlined the company's normal procedure for new patches: Have a technician install it and then scan the system for any remaining vulnerabilities. Apparently, both the human and computer steps failed.\n\nAs Smith outlines in his written testimony (PDF), the Department of Homeland Security's Computer Emergency Readiness Team (CERT) sent Equifax (alongside many other companies) a notice on March 8th, 2017 about the vulnerability in certain versions of Apache Struts. Equifax sent out an internal mass-email, which should have required its internal IT team to fix the vulnerability within 48 hours, but that didn't happen. An automatic scan for vulnerabilities on March 15th also failed to indicate that Equifax was using a Struts version that had the vulnerability.\n\nBased on Equifax's postmortem investigations, the hacker that exploited this exact weakness likely first used it to pry into Equifax on May 13th, and then continued until July 30th, and Equifax's security tools were none the wiser.

DHS CERT sent Equifax notice about vulnerability on March 8th.

Automatic scan on March 15th failed to detect vulnerability.

\n\nIf you\'re an American with a credit history -- and at least 143 million are -- you probably already know your Equifax data, including at least your name, social security number, birthdate, and home address, may have been stolen.\n\nWho\'s to blame?\n\nAccording to an unsubstantiated report by equity research firm Baird, citing no evidence, the blame falls on the open-source server framework, Apache Struts. The firm\'s source, per one report, is believed to be Equifax.\n\nApache Struts is a popular open-source software programming Model-View-Controller (MVC) framework for Java. It is not, as some headlines have had it, a vendor software program.\n\nIt\'s also not proven that Struts was the source of the hole the hackers drove through.\n\nIn fact, several headlines -- some of which have since been retracted -- all source a single quote by a non-technical analyst from an Equifax source.\n\nNot only is that troubling journalistically, it\'s problematic from a technical point of view. In case you haven\'t noticed, Equifax appears to be utterly and completely clueless about their own technology. Equifax\'s own data breach detector isn\'t just useless: it\'s untrustworthy.\n\nAdding insult to injury, the credit agency\'s advice and support site looks, at first glance, to be a bogus, phishing-type site: "equifaxsecurity2017.com." That domain name screams fake. And what does it ask for if you go there? The last six figures of your social security number and last name. In other words, exactly the kind of information a hacker might ask for.\n\nEquifax\'s technical expertise, it has been shown, is less than acceptable.\n\n

Equifax's advice and support site looks to be a bogus, phishing-type site.

Equifax was using the open-source server framework, Apache Struts.


Elon Musk says that Twitter is close to becoming cash-flow positive after making sharp layoffs and working to lure advertisers back to the platform.\n\n“I’d say we’re roughly breakeven at this point,” Musk said Wednesday, during a live interview with the BBC recorded on Twitter Spaces.\n\nMusk has pushed to make more money at Twitter to recoup his multibillion-dollar investment in the company. As part of this income-generation drive, Twitter has sought to make more money from subscriptions, charging users $8 a month to get access to Twitter verification marks and for the ability to edit tweets, among other features.\n\nMusk said that Twitter will start removing blue checks from accounts without a subscription to the company’s paid Twitter Blue service next week.\n\nDuring the interview, Musk said that “almost all” advertisers have resumed buying ads on the platform, after several hit pause on Twitter advertising following Musk’s acquisition of the app.\n\nMusk purchased Twitter for $44 billion in late October after a drawn-out legal battle with the company. He has since sought to radically overhaul the platform, including its content moderation policies.\nThis has spooked many product placers, with half of Twitter’s top 100 advertisers now estimated to have left the platform since Musk took over.\n\n“Depending on how things go, if current trends continue, I think we could be ... cashflow-positive this quarter, if things keep going well,” Musk said.\n\nBrands were concerned about the app failing to tackle hateful posts in the wake of the $44 billion deal, which was completed in October 2022.

Half of Twitter’s top 100 advertisers have left the platform

Less than a week after Elon Musk finally gave in and paid full price for Twitter, his attempts to remake the platform are already descending into an entirely predictable clown show. Watching him begin to reshape content moderation and launch a poorly considered monetization scheme would be entertaining if their potential effects weren’t so dire, with consequences for Twitter’s employees and users, and potentially the broader society. \n\nOriginally reported Sunday by The Verge, a plan to charge verified users to get or keep their blue checks was expected to cost $20 a month. But after widespread backlash on the platform and a poll tweeted by Musk ally Jason Calacanis, in which nearly 82% of users responded that they wouldn’t pay anything for verification, those plans appear to have changed.\n\nBy Tuesday afternoon, Musk had posted a thread on the platform outlining his plan to charge $8 a month instead — part of an overhaul of Twitter’s existing Blue service.\n\nAlong with the coveted blue check, Twitter Blue subscribers will be able to post longer video and audio clips. They will also have half as many ads in their feeds and be able to get around paywalls from news publishers “willing to work” with the platform, and their tweets will get priority in replies, mentions and search results.\n\nIt should come as no surprise that such a plan could have a number of drawbacks.

A poll tweeted by Jason Calacanis showed that 82% of Twitter users wouldn’t pay for verification.

Twitter has begun laying off sizable chunks of the company, the first major move by Elon Musk since his acquisition of the company was completed last week.\n\nTwitter told employees in an email sent Thursday evening and seen by NBC News that the company would notify staffers by email about their employment.\n\n“We recognize that this will impact a number of individuals who have made valuable contributions to Twitter, but this action is unfortunately necessary to ensure the company’s success moving forward,” the email said.\n\nThe firings immediately prompted a class action lawsuit against Twitter for allegedly failing to give a 60-day warning of mass layoffs.\n\nIt had been widely reported that Musk planned to slash the company\'s 7,500-person payroll after he finalized his $44 billion acquisition late last week. He immediately dismissed CEO Parag Agrawal, as well as Twitter’s chief financial officer and its head of legal, public policy and trust and safety upon taking over the company.\n\nA Twitter employee said Thursday\'s email was the first communication staff members had received from Twitter since the acquisition Oct. 27.\n\n"It\'s total chaos, house melting down, everyone looking towards this email," the employee said.\n\nAccording to the email from Twitter, staff members will get notices either through their company email accounts — if they still have jobs — or their personal email accounts if their "employment is impacted."\n\nWorries about layoffs began to emerge before the buyout transaction was complete, but Twitter\'s general counsel urged employees not to dwell on rumors before Musk took ownership.

Twitter sends email to employees notifying them of layoffs.


Less than a week after Elon Musk finally gave in and paid full price for Twitter, his attempts to remake the platform are already descending into an entirely predictable clown show. Watching him begin to reshape content moderation and launch a poorly considered monetization scheme would be entertaining if their potential effects weren’t so dire, with consequences for Twitter’s employees and users, and potentially the broader society. \n\nOriginally reported Sunday by The Verge, a plan to charge verified users to get or keep their blue checks was expected to cost $20 a month. But after widespread backlash on the platform and a poll tweeted by Musk ally Jason Calacanis, in which nearly 82% of users responded that they wouldn’t pay anything for verification, those plans appear to have changed.\n\nBy Tuesday afternoon, Musk had posted a thread on the platform outlining his plan to charge $8 a month instead — part of an overhaul of Twitter’s existing Blue service.\n\nAlong with the coveted blue check, Twitter Blue subscribers will be able to post longer video and audio clips. They will also have half as many ads in their feeds and be able to get around paywalls from news publishers “willing to work” with the platform, and their tweets will get priority in replies, mentions and search results.\n\nIt should come as no surprise that such a plan could have a number of drawbacks.

A poll tweeted by Jason Calacanis showed that 82% of Twitter users wouldn’t pay for verification.

Musk changed the plan to charge users $8 a month for verification.

Elon Musk, the CEO of Twitter, has reportedly issued stock grants to the company\'s staff at a valuation of close to $20 billion.\n\nThe price is only half of what he paid for Twitter in October 2022, when he shelled out $44 billion to buy the microblogging platform, according to multiple media sources on Saturday.\n\n"Musk sent Twitter employees an email about the state of Twitter 2.0. He acknowledged the company has been through a period of radical change, but said the changes were necessary… Because Twitter was previously about 4 months away from running out of money." Zoe Schiffer, a tech journalist, tweeted on Saturday. \n\n"Comp increases will be based on X Corp stock. Current grants are based on a $20 billion valuation. Musk says he sees a \'clear but difficult path\' to $250 billion valuation, which would mean current grants could 10x. Musk says Twitter is on the path of an inverse startup." she wrote in the thread of comments.\n\nTwitter\'s value has dropped significantly since the acquisition, but it is still far higher than Twitter\'s competitors\' public market valuation levels, according to a report by The information.\n\nThe site has lost advertisers as a result of the Musk-mandated reinstatement of some previously banned users, an increase in antisemitic and other hate speech, broken functionality, and a botched blue check rollout that cost Eli Lilly millions of dollars.\n\nDespite the fact that ad revenue surprisingly increased during the fourth quarter of 2022, the site has lost many users permanently, reported The Wrap.

Twitter was 4 months away from running out of money.

It’s been five months since Elon Musk took over Twitter after a long-drawn out, tumultuous negotiating period. There has been a lot of controversy since he positioned himself at the helm of the social media platform, including massive layoffs, allowing too-long tweets, and altering the algorithm to make his Super Bowl tweets rank higher. He closed the deal to acquire Twitter on Oct. 28, after paying his original officer price of $54.20 a share for a grand total of approximately $44 billion. He fired some of the company’s top executives almost immediately, including CEO Parag Agrawal, chief financial officer Ned Segal, and chief legal officer Vijay Gadde. Soon after, he began to lay off staff members to remove around half of the 7,500-strong workforce. Twitter value drops to half of Musk’s acquisition price. Now, it appears that Twitter is facing financial challenges. Changes since Musk’s takeover have resulted in more hate speech, issues in acquiring blue check verification, and problems with the app’s features. According to Zoe Schiffer, managing editor of Platformer, a tech news website, the billionaire sent an email to Twitter employees admitting that the company has been through radical changes which were necessary. Musk also reportedly acknowledged that the platform was previously about four months from running out of money. Per Schiffer, the value of Twitter is now half of what Musk paid for it. “Current grants are based on a $20b valuation,” she tweeted, although Musk says he is hopeful of eventually getting a valuation of $250 billion. Advertisers concerned about their brand have left the platform, leading to plummeting revenues for the company in recent months.


\n\nFor the first time, global demand for each of the fossil fuels shows a peak or plateau across all WEO scenarios, with Russian exports in particular falling significantly as the world energy order is reshaped\n\nThe global energy crisis triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is causing profound and long-lasting changes that have the potential to hasten the transition to a more sustainable and secure energy system, according to the latest edition of the IEA’s World Energy Outlook.\n\nToday’s energy crisis is delivering a shock of unprecedented breadth and complexity. The biggest tremors have been felt in the markets for natural gas, coal and electricity – with significant turmoil in oil markets as well, necessitating two oil stock releases of unparalleled scale by IEA member countries to avoid even more severe disruptions. With unrelenting geopolitical and economic concerns, energy markets remain extremely vulnerable, and the crisis is a reminder of the fragility and unsustainability of the current global energy system, the World Energy Outlook 2022 (WEO) warns.\n\nThe WEO’s analysis finds scant evidence to support claims from some quarters that climate policies and net zero commitments contributed to the run-up in energy prices. In the most affected regions, higher shares of renewables were correlated with lower electricity prices – and more efficient homes and electrified heat have provided an important buffer for some consumers, albeit far from enough. The heaviest burden is falling on poorer households where a larger share of income is spent on energy.\n\n

Jennifer Jones is struggling to pay her energy bills.

\n\nEurope could solve its energy crisis by scrapping sanctions against Russia and launching the mothballed Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, the speaker of Russia\'s lower house of parliament said on Friday.\n\nGermany halted the Nord Stream 2 Baltic Sea gas pipeline project on Feb. 22, just two days before Russia sent its troops into Ukraine in what it calls a "special military operation", and after the Kremlin formally recognised two breakaway regions in eastern Ukraine.\n\nSome Europeans have been voluntarily cutting their energy consumption, including limiting their use of electrical appliances and showering at work to save money, while companies are bracing for possible rationing. read more\n\nDuma speaker Vyacheslav Volodin, an ally of President Vladimir Putin, said energy security is impossible without Russia.\n\n"The moment of truth has come for European leaders. They have two ways out of the situation they have created for themselves," he wrote on Telegram.\n\n"The first one. Lift illegal sanctions against our country and launch Nord Stream 2. The second one. To leave everything as it is, which will lead to problems in the economy and make life even more difficult for citizens."\n\nEurope\'s most divisive energy project, costing $11 billion, was finished in September 2021, but has stood idle pending certification by Germany and the European Union.\n\nMoscow\'s military actions in Ukraine have triggered sweeping sanctions from the West, led to a cut in energy supplies from Russia and stoked inflation across the globe to multi-year highs.\n\n

Some Europeans have been voluntarily cutting their energy consumption.

IEA member countries have released two oil stock releases of unprecedented scale.

\n\nEurope’s energy crisis is deepening as Russia further limits exports of natural gas, forcing governments to spend billions to protect businesses and consumers from soaring bills as the region slides towards recession.\n\nEuropean benchmark natural gas prices spiked 28% on Monday morning to hit €274 ($272) per megawatt hour — the first day of trading after Russian energy giant Gazprom halted flows through the vital Nord Stream 1 pipeline indefinitely, claiming it had found an oil leak in a turbine.\n\nLast year, the pipeline delivered about 35% of Europe’s total Russian gas imports. But since June, Gazprom had slashed flows along Nord Stream 1 to just 20% of its capacity, citing maintenance issues and a dispute over a missing turbine caught up in Western export sanctions.\n\nMoscow’s decision not to reopen the pipeline on Saturday stoked concerns that the European Union could run short of gas this winter, despite a successful effort to fill storage tanks. Similar fears in the United Kingdom sent wholesale natural gas futures up by more than a third on Monday.\n\nNews of the pipeline’s indefinite closure on Friday caused the euro to sink below $0.99 on Monday — its lowest level in 20 years. The pound hit $1.14, its lowest since 1985, as traders worried about the toll a potentially drastic energy shortage could have on regional economic activity and government budgets.\n\nSome countries are preparing to spend big to try to limit the pain.\n\nOn Sunday, the German government announced a €65 billion ($64 billion) relief package to help households and companies cope as inflation soars.\n\n

German government announces €65 billion ($64 billion) relief package to help households and companies cope with inflation.


\n\nIn a historic and far-reaching decision, the U.S. Supreme Court officially reversed Roe v. Wade on Friday, declaring that the constitutional right to abortion, upheld for nearly a half century, no longer exists.\n\nWriting for the court majority, Justice Samuel Alito said that the 1973 Roe ruling and repeated subsequent high court decisions reaffirming Roe "must be overruled" because they were "egregiously wrong," the arguments "exceptionally weak" and so "damaging" that they amounted to "an abuse of judicial authority."\n\nThe decision, most of which was leaked in early May, means that abortion rights will be rolled back in nearly half of the states immediately, with more restrictions likely to follow. For all practical purposes, abortion will not be available in large swaths of the country. The decision may well mean too that the court itself, as well as the abortion question, will become a focal point in the upcoming fall elections and in the fall and thereafter.\n\nJoining the Alito opinion were Justice Clarence Thomas, appointed by the first President Bush, and the three Trump appointees — Justices Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett. Chief Justice John Roberts, appointed by President George W. Bush, concurred in the judgment only, and would have limited the decision to upholding the Mississippi law at issue in the case, which banned abortions after 15 weeks. Calling the decision "a serious jolt to the legal system," he said that both the majority and dissent displayed "a relentless freedom from doubt on the legal issue that I cannot share."

10-year-old victim of rape was forced to cross state lines to receive an abortion.

\n\nWithin days of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s memorial service in late September 2020, boxes of her files and other office possessions were moved down to a dark, windowless theater on the\u202fSupreme Court’s\u202fground floor, where\u202f–\u202fbefore the ongoing pandemic\u202f–\u202ftourists could watch a film about court operations.\nGrieving aides to the justice who’d served 27 years and become a cultural icon known as the “Notorious RBG” sorted through the chambers’ contents there.\nThe abrupt mandate from Chief Justice John Roberts’ administrative team to clear out Ginsburg’s office and\u202fmake way for the next justice broke from the common practice of allowing staff sufficient time to move and providing a new justice with temporary quarters if needed while permanent chambers were readied.\nIt upset employees throughout the building. They were aware that in the weeks before Ginsburg died, her staff had labored to ensure she had case documents at hand, whether in the hospital or at home. They were exhausted from all the memorial arrangements, which had attracted thousands of people to Washington.\u202f\nBut the confirmation of then-President Donald Trump’s chosen successor, Indiana-based US appeals court\u202fJudge Amy Coney Barrett, was as much a fait accompli at the court as in the political sphere.\n

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died in September 2020.

\n\nThe Supreme Court ruled to overturn Roe v. Wade on Friday. This decision will mean laws further restricting abortion care and services will go into effect in many states. Following May's leak of the draft Supreme Court opinion in which the justices appear ready to overturn Roe, we asked you what questions you had for our experts about abortion care and access in the U.S.\n\nMany of you wrote in wanting to know more about the impact this decision could have on hospitals, in vitro fertilization, and care for miscarriages. To answer those questions, we reached out to Kristyn Brandi, an OB-GYN and family planning doctor, who is also the board chair for Physicians for Reproductive Health, and NPR health policy correspondent Selena Simmons-Duffin.\n\nMiscarriage care is definitely going to be impacted — it's already happening in Texas.\n\nA lot of times people think about miscarriage as something that's spontaneous, that somebody has no control over. That can be true, but it can also be something that people have to make decisions about. The standard of care for treating a miscarriage is the same as the standard of care for providing an abortion.\n\nThe way that can play out is if somebody has a miscarriage and they need to take medication to empty the uterus so they're not at risk of infection, that same medication is what's used for medication abortion. There have already been a lot of reports of pharmacists in Texas not filling those prescriptions for people who are suffering miscarriages.\n\n

Miscarriage care already being impacted in Texas.

\n\nThe number of abortions per month in Oregon went up by 18% in August, after the Supreme Court’s June decision overturning Roe v. Wade.\n\nAbortion remains legal without restrictions in Oregon, and providers have been anecdotally reporting an increase in travelers.\n\nNow there’s data documenting that change, from a national effort called, #WeCount. Led by the Society of Family Planning, it is gathering data from clinicians and tracking changes to abortion nationwide.\n\nThe data compares the number of abortions performed in April, before the high court’s decision, to July and August, just after it.\n\nIn the Pacific Northwest, the greatest changes occurred between April and August, when a near total ban on abortion went into effect in Idaho. That month, there was a 48% decrease in abortions in Idaho, amounting to 70 fewer abortions. In Oregon over that time period there was an 18% increase in abortions, or 150 more. In Washington, there was a 5% increase in abortions, or 90 more.\n\nAlyssa Colwill, the director of family planning clinical services at Oregon Health & Sciences University, says anecdotally, the majority of patients traveling for abortion are coming from Idaho, but she’s also seen patients from Texas, Wisconsin and other states.\n\nColwill says women who need to leave their home state for an abortion face steep obstacles. Appointments can be hard to schedule, and many patients are struggling with the cost of travel on top of the cost of an abortion.\n\n

Abortion remains legal without restrictions in Oregon.


\n\nHundreds more people were evacuated from their homes as wildfires blistered land in France, Spain and Portugal on Friday, while officials in Europe issued health warnings for the heatwave in the coming days.\n\nMore than 1,000 firefighters, supported by water-bomber aircraft, have battled since Tuesday to control two blazes in southwestern France that have been fanned by scorching heat, tinder-box conditions and strong winds.\n\nWhile temperatures dipped a little in Portugal, they were still expected to top 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) in some places, with five districts on red alert and more than 1,000 firefighters tackling 17 wildfires, authorities said.\n\nIn Spain, a new wildfire broke out in the south of the country after blazes in the west in the past week.\n\nMore than 400 people were evacuated from the hills of Mijas, a town popular with northern European tourists in the province of Malaga. Beachgoers in Torremolinos, some 20 km away, could see plumes of smoke rising above the hotels lining the coast.\n\nMeanwhile, the worst drought in over 70 years reduced Italy's longest river, the Po, to little more than a trickle in places, with temperatures expected to rise next week.\n\nOfficials are worried about the effects on people's health and on healthcare systems already challenged by the COVID-19 pandemic as the searing heat sweeps the continent, with warnings issued for worse to come in Britain in particular.\n\nThe World Meteorological Organization said the heatwave would worsen air quality, especially in towns and cities.\n\n

Italy's longest river, the Po, reduced to little more than a trickle in places.

\n\nJapan is asking some 37 million people living in and around Tokyo to use less electricity and ration air conditioning even amid a record heat wave that has seen temperatures in some parts of the country pass 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit).\n\nThe government urged citizens in the capital to turn off lights and power switches for three hours in the afternoon and to use air conditioning “appropriately,” as the country struggles with growing power shortages.\n\nThe request comes despite experts warning that record-setting temperatures could continue for weeks.\n\n“Please save as much power as possible, such as by turning off lights that are not in use,” the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry said Monday. It said appropriate uses of air conditioning included to “prevent heatstroke.”\n\nJapan’s power supply has been tight since March, when an earthquake in the northeast forced some nuclear power plants to suspend operations. At the same time demand is at its highest since 2011, when Japan was hit by the strongest earthquake in its recorded history. The ministry warned the mismatch between supply and demand is becoming “severe.”\n\nBut with recent temperatures soaring to dangerous levels, rationing electricity will not be easy.\n\nOn Tuesday, Tokyo experienced scorching heat for a fourth successive day after setting records for the month of June at the weekend.\n\n

Japan is asking 37 million people living in Tokyo to use less electricity.

\n\nNew records have been set as temperatures topped 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) across much of Spain and Portugal Wednesday amid a persistent heat wave across western Europe.\n\nIn northwest Spain, the city of Ourense set its all-time temperature record of 43.2 degrees Celsius (109.76 degrees Fahrenheit) on Tuesday, according to Spain’s meteorological agency, AEMET.\n\nOn Wednesday, Zamora set its own record after reaching 41.1 degrees Celsius (105.98 degrees Fahrenheit), according to climate statistician Max Herrera. Soria set a record of 38.7 degrees Celsius (101.66 degrees Fahrenheit) that same day.\n\nThe central Portuguese town of Lousã set an all-time record of 46.3 degrees Celsius (115.34 degrees Fahrenheit) and Lisbon set a July record of 41.4 degrees Celsius (106.52 degrees Fahrenheit).\n\nBut the worst is yet to come.\n\nOfficials in Spain and Portugal are bracing themselves for the hottest day of the heat wave so far.\n\nTemperatures are set to reach around 45 degrees Celsius (113 degrees Fahrenheit) in parts of western and southern Spain, according to AEMET. In its afternoon update, AEMET warned that Spain is set to experience its hottest day of the heat wave on Thursday.\n\nSimilar is being said of Portugal. Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Costa told reporters that Thursday is set to be the “most serious day” for Portugal as far as the extreme weather is concerned, warning that the country needs “to be more careful than ever to avoid new occurrences.”\n\n

Temperatures topped 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) across much of Spain and Portugal on Wednesday.

Europe is experiencing extreme heat waves.


\n\nUrgent plans to defuse tensions and address fury over disproportionate police action against black and minority ethnic people are being drawn up by the mayor of London, as Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests are expected in dozens of towns and cities by the weekend.\n\nThe initiative from Sadiq Khan to apply pressure on the Metropolitan police, the UK’s largest force, over the use of stop and search, Tasers and other practices comes amid concerns about the spread of coronavirus in crowds, and fears of violence as it emerged that far-right groups were planning counter-demonstrations.\n\nSteps to address anger over systemic racism, brought into sharp focus after the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, contrast with UK ministers’ rhetoric and pressure from Tory backbenchers for police and prosecutors to crack down on disorder.\n\nBoris Johnson acknowledged the “incontrovertible, undeniable feeling of injustice” behind the BLM protests, in an article for the black newspaper the Voice, in which he also strongly condemned those who have flouted social distancing to attend them.\n\nHe wrote that he would not support such action “for the obvious reason that we risk a new infection at a critical time and just as we have made huge progress”, adding that: “Those who attack public property or the police – who injure the police officers who are trying to keep us all safe – those people will face the full force of the law.”\n\n

In UK, far-right groups are planning counter-demonstrations.

\n\nIn the nearly three weeks since videos surfaced of George Floyd's death at the hands of Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, thousands have participated in the Black Lives Matter protests. In Los Angeles, Athens, Tel Aviv, Sydney, and Mexico City, protestors have left their homes and taken to the streets amid the coronavirus pandemic to honor Floyd, to stand against racism, and to demand justice for others killed by the police. Here are powerful photos from those protests, from multi-lingual signs to Compton Cowboys on horseback.\n\nTo support the Black Lives Matter movement, you can also donate your travel rewards points to groups fighting for racial justice and spend your money at Black-owned bookstores and Black-owned restaurants throughout North America.\n\nDemonstrators honor George Floyd at the site of his murder on June 3. After 13 days of around-the-clock demonstrations, the city of Minneapolis met protestors' demands and announced plans to disband their police department, focusing instead on community-led initiatives. \n\nDutch protestors gathered on and around the Erasmus Bridge in Rotterdam to march in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter protests around the world. The Democrats 66, a political party in the Netherlands, is currently calling for a ban on police chokeholds within their own police forces.\n\nSparked by Floyd's murder, protestors gathered in Paris last week with signs that read “Justice pour Adama.” Adama Traoré was a Malian-French man who died in police custody in 2016, in the Paris suburb of Beaumont-sur-Oise.

Videos of George Floyd's death at the hands of Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was released.

\n\nViolence has erupted in cities across the US on the sixth night of protests sparked by the death in police custody of African-American George Floyd.\n\nDozens of cities imposed curfews, but many people ignored them, leading to stand-offs and clashes.\n\nRiot police faced off with protesters in New York, Chicago, Philadelphia and LA, firing tear gas and pepper bullets to try to disperse crowds.\n\nPolice vehicles were set on fire and shops were looted in several cities.\n\nThe country is experiencing the most widespread racial turbulence and civil unrest since the backlash to the assassination of Martin Luther King in 1968.\n\nThe outpouring of anger began last Tuesday after a video showed Mr Floyd being arrested in Minneapolis and a white police officer continuing to kneel on his neck even after he pleaded he could not breathe and fell unconscious.\n\nMore than 75 cities have seen protests, with streets only days ago deserted because of coronavirus full of demonstrators marching shoulder to shoulder. Some US officials have warned of protest-connected virus outbreaks.\n\nThe Floyd case has reignited deep-seated anger over police killings of black Americans and racism. It follows the high-profile cases of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Eric Garner in New York and others that have driven the Black Lives Matter movement.\n\nFor many, the outrage also reflects years of frustration over socio-economic inequality and discrimination, not least in Minneapolis itself, where George Floyd died.\n\n

Police vehicles set on fire and shops looted in several cities.

Riot police face off with protesters, firing tear gas and pepper bullets.


Turmoil happened in natural gas, coal, electricity, and oil markets.

\n\nEurope is struggling to contain an energy crisis that could lead to rolling blackouts, shuttered factories and a deep recession.\n\nThe primary cause: Russia has choked off the supplies of cheap natural gas that the continent depended on for years to run factories, generate electricity and heat homes. That has pushed European governments into a desperate scramble for new supplies and for ways to blunt the impact as economic growth slows and household utility bills rise.\n\nThe crisis deepened when Russia’s state-owned exporter Gazprom said the main pipeline carrying gas to Germany would stay closed, blaming an oil leak and claiming the problems could not be fixed because of sanctions barring many dealings with Russia.\n\nEuropean officials say it’s energy blackmail, aimed at pressuring and dividing the European Union as it supports Ukraine against Russia’s invasion.\n\nHere is the latest on Europe’s efforts to avoid an energy disaster:\n\nJust about. The halt in the Nord Stream 1 pipeline means Russian gas shipments have fallen 89% from a year ago. Russia used to supply 40% of Europe’s natural gas, and even more to Germany, where inexpensive energy was a pillar of the economy.\n\nThere’s still some Russian gas flowing to Europe through a pipeline passing through Ukraine into Slovakia, and another crossing the Black Sea to Turkey and then to EU member Bulgaria. Russia started cutting back gas as early as last summer, before the war in Ukraine started. That sent gas prices sharply higher.\n\n

Some Russian gas is still flowing to Europe through pipelines passing through Ukraine and Bulgaria.

European officials accuse Russia of energy blackmail.

\nGermany\'s economy minister warns of a "market collapse" if natural-gas prices continue to soar.\nGermany has triggered the second stage of its three-stage emergency gas plan on supply fears.\nThat\'s after Russia —citing a techincal reason — slowed piped natural-gas supplies to Germany.\n\nGermany warned the country\'s energy crisis may trigger a "Lehman effect" across the utility sector as it moved one step closer to rationing natural gas.\n\nGermany — Europe\'s largest economy — moved into the second of its three-stage emergency gas plan on Thursday after Russia slowed supplies to the country, exacerbating concerns over an energy crunch. These supply fears have already driven European natural gas futures up by 85% year-to-date.\n\nUnder the second stage of Germany\'s emergency gas plan, utility companies can pass on price increases to customers. The government is holding back on triggering the clause for now. But Habeck said they could kick in if the supply crunch and price increases persist, as energy suppliers that buy power on the wholesale market are running up losses and many could ultimately fail as a result.\n\n"If this minus gets so big that they can\'t carry it anymore, the whole market is in danger of collapsing at some point — so a Lehman effect in the energy system," said German economy minister Robert Habeck at a press conference, according to a Bloomberg translation. Habeck was referring to financial services firm Lehman Brothers, which filed for bankruptcy in 2008 amid the subprime mortgage crisis — which spilled over and caused the Global Financial Crisis.\n\n

Germany triggered the second stage of its three-stage emergency gas plan on supply fears.


\n\nIt has created a wave of awareness and brave confrontations over sexual harassment and assault, taking down powerful men in the process. And now the #MeToo movement has been named Time magazine\'s Person of the Year for 2017.\n\nOn its cover, Time called the people behind the movement "The Silence Breakers." Its story features women and men who have spoken out — including activist Tarana Burke, who started the hashtag 10 years ago.\n\n#MeToo rose to prominence as a social media campaign in the wake of high-profile accusations against Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein. After actress Alyssa Milano popularized the hashtag, thousands of women began sharing their stories about the pervasive damage wrought by sexual harassment and by "open secrets" about abuse.\n\nThe movement\'s empowering reach could be seen in the platform on which Time announced its choice: the Today show. It was just one week ago that NBC fired the morning program\'s longtime and powerful co-host, Matt Lauer, over a detailed complaint of "inappropriate sexual behavior in the workplace."\n\nWhile the most high-profile #MeToo stories have come from women and men who work in the movies and media, the Time article also features women who work hourly jobs, some of whom want to remain anonymous. The magazine\'s cover portrait includes strawberry picker Isabel Pascual, lobbyist Adama Iwu and former Uber engineer Susan Fowler along with Ashley Judd and Taylor Swift.\n\n

Matt Lauer fired from NBC over complaint of "inappropriate sexual behavior in the workplace"

Actress Alyssa Milano popularized the hashtag #MeToo

\n\nHollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein has been found guilty of rape and sexual assault by courts in New York and Los Angeles.\n\nHere is a summary of the key events that led him to court:\n\n- Weinstein issues an apology acknowledging he "has caused a lot of pain" - but disputes allegations he harassed female employees over nearly three decades.\n\n- It is announced that Harvey Weinstein has been sacked by the board of his company, with immediate effect. \n\n- The organisation behind the Oscars votes to expel Weinstein. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences says: "What\'s at issue here is a deeply troubling problem that has no place in our society."\n\n- Weinstein\'s former company files for bankruptcy, months after the Oscar-winning producer was accused of multiple sexual assaults.\n\n- Weinstein faces fresh sexual assault charges in New York from a third woman, in a case dating back to 2006.\n\n- After five days of deliberation, the jury finds Weinstein guilty of a criminal sexual act in the first degree and third-degree rape.\n\n- Weinstein goes on trial in LA, facing 11 charges involving five alleged victims.\n\n- Weinstein is found guilty by a Los Angeles jury of raping a woman.\n

Weinstein issues an apology but disputes allegations he harassed female employees.

\n\nIt’s the hashtag that rocked the world.\n\nSince #MeToo went viral two weeks ago in the wake of sexual harassment allegations against producer Harvey Weinstein, Twitter reports that more than 1.7 million women and men have used the hashtag in 85 countries.\n\nIn Italy, women rallied behind a version called #QuellaVoltaChe, which translates to “That time when,” while French women decided to out their harassers by name under #BalanceTonPorc, which roughly translates to “snitch out your pig.”\n\nAt least nine well-known powerful men have been accused of various forms of sexual assault, including former President George H.W. Bush, Hollywood producer James Toback and journalist and author Mark Halperin. And just last week, California Rep. Jackie Speier launched #MeTooCongress, asking Washington staffers to share their stories on harassment on the Hill.\n\nBut can a hashtag, a meme or any viral moment – no matter how widespread – really turn into a lasting movement that that will create social change and reduce sexual abuse of women?\n\nMaybe. But experts say it’s going to take a coordinated effort between antiviolence organizations, the media and Hollywood as well as concrete actions from each and every one of us, especially men.\n\n“I am really tired of talking about women,” said Toni Van Pelt, president of the National Association of Women. “We must focus on the men. We must be demanding that the men step forward and take responsibility, whether they think they are the good guy or not.

Twitter reports that more than 1.7 million women and men have used the #MeToo hashtag.


Shares in banks all over the world have plummeted in recent days as fears that the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) could precipitate a wider crisis in the sector.\n\nThe speed at which market jitters have spread across the world have forced bank executives and regulators to move with unprecedented swiftness: US authorities guaranteed all deposits in SVB – and smaller bank Signature – 48 hours after it collapsed. Just hours after Credit Suisse’s share price plunged on Wednesday, the Swiss central bank stepped in with a $54bn loan.\n\nWhile there’s nothing new about a financial emergency, these crises – and their resulting responses – are unique in having been accelerated by a frenzy of social media chatter that has fuelled the panic.\n\n‘It was a bank sprint, not a bank run’\nA bank run occurs when customers lose faith in an institution’s ability to look after their money, and large numbers withdraw their deposits all at once. As more people withdraw their funds, the likelihood of the bank being able to cover the withdrawals falls, leading more customers to pile in and demand the return of their money.\n\n“If you see a bomb disposal expert running down the street, don’t ask them what’s happened, just try to keep up,” writes Daniel Davies, the managing director of Frontline Analysts, in the Financial Times.\n\nRumours around a bank’s solvency can build up for months or years before it leads to a run. Or it can happen in a matter of hours.

The Swiss central bank stepped in with a $54bn loan to Credit Suisse.

President Biden says customers of U.S. banks should have confidence that their money will be there when they need it, as he seeks to limit the damage done by the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and other problems. He also promised accountability for leaders and investors of banks that fail.\n\nBiden\'s words didn\'t prevent anxiety over the banking emergency from hammering stock prices of financial institutions on Monday morning. The pain was particularly acute for regional and middle-sized banks.\n\nThe banking emergency has prompted federal regulators to take extraordinary actions to close two banks and guarantee all their deposits.\n\nBecause of those actions, Biden said, "every American should feel confident that their deposits will be there if and when they need them."\n\nCompanies with accounts at the collapsed banks "can breathe easier, knowing they\'ll be able to pay their workers and pay their bills," Biden said. "Their hardworking employees can breathe easier as well."\n\nBiden spoke from the White House at 9 a.m. ET Monday, just 30 minutes before the New York stock market opened. But one hour into trading, a number of banking stocks were down.\n\nMany eyes are on First Republic Bank, the San Francisco institution whose clients include tech companies and wealthy investors. The bank\'s stock plummeted below the $20 mark early Monday — one week after it closed at $122.\n\nBank of America and Wells Fargo also saw their stock prices slip, both of them falling by 4% or more in the first hour of trading.

Bank of America and Wells Fargo see their stock prices slip by 4% or more.

Stefan Kalb was in the middle of a meeting around 1 p.m. on Thursday when a fellow company executive sent him a panicked Slack message: "Do you know what\'s happening at SVB?"\n\nKalb, the CEO and co-founder of Seattle-based food management startup Shelf Engine, had been following news of a bank run at Silicon Valley Bank. Droves of depositors were attempting to pull out as much as $42 billion from the bank on Thursday alone, as fear spread that the bank was teetering on the brink of collapse.\n\nThe bank seemed to be on firm financial footing on Wednesday. The following day, it appeared to be under water.\n\nFor Shelf Engine, a 40-person startup founded in 2015 that uses artificial intelligence to help grocery stores reduce food waste, this was a big problem.\n\nNot only did Silicon Valley Bank help the company process checks and payments, but millions of dollars of the startup\'s cash was locked up in the bank.\n\nKalb sprung into action. He and his team quickly opened an account at JPMorgan Chase and attempted to wire transfer every last penny out of Silicon Valley Bank.\n\n"Unfortunately, our wire was not honored and our money is still at Silicon Valley Bank," Kalb, 37, said in an interview on Friday. "We woke up this morning hoping the money would be in that JPMorgan bank account, and it was not."

CEO & co-founder of startup "Shelf Engine" attempts to wire transfer their money out of SVB

Stock prices of financial institutions suffer when the New York stock market opened.

President Biden speaks on the banking emergency and assures customers of U.S. banks that their money will be there when they need it


\n\nMore than 50 people have died and dozens more were missing on Thursday, as heavy flooding in Germany and Belgium turned streams and streets into raging torrents that swept away cars and caused houses to collapse.\n\nRecent storms across parts of western Europe made rivers and reservoirs burst their banks, triggering flash floods overnight after the saturated soil couldn’t absorb any more water.\n\n“I grieve for those who have lost their lives in this disaster,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel said during a visit to Washington, expressing shock at the scope of the flooding. “We still don’t know the number. But it will be many.”\n\nShe pledged that everything would be done to find those still missing, adding, “’Heavy rain and flooding’ doesn’t capture what happened.”\n\nAuthorities in the North Rhine-Westphalia state said at least 30 people had died, while 19 deaths were reported in Rhineland-Palatinate state to the south. Belgian media reported eight deaths in that country.\n\nAmong the worst-hit German villages was Schuld, where several homes collapsed and dozens of people remained unaccounted for.\n\nRescue operations were hampered by blocked roads and phone and internet outages across the Eifel, a volcanic region of rolling hills and small valleys. Some villages were reduced to rubble, as old brick and timber houses couldn’t withstand the sudden rush of water, often carrying trees and other debris as it gushed through narrow streets.\n\nKarl-Heinz Grimm, who had come to help his parents in Schuld, said he had never seen the small Ahr River surge in such a deadly torrent.\n\n

German Chancellor Angela Merkel expressed shock at the scope of the flooding.

\n\nStorms caused heavy flooding across parts of western and central Europe overnight, with one man missing after being swept away by a raging stream in eastern Germany.\n\nFirefighters resumed their search for the man in Joehstadt, in Saxony state, on Wednesday morning [July 14]. German news agency dpa reported that he had been trying to secure his property from rising waters when he disappeared.\n\nHof county near the eastern border with the Czech Republic issued a disaster alert late Tuesday as basements filled with water, trees were uprooted and some areas lost power overnight. Germany’s DWD weather service said the region saw 80 liters (more than 21 gallons) of rain per square meter in the space of 12 hours.\n\nIn Hagen, firefighters had to rescue several drivers whose vehicles had become stuck in a flooded underpass. Videos on social media showed streets in the western city knee-deep in water and others buried by landslides.\n\nResidents in the nearby town of Erkrath were warned not to shower or use their washers as the sewage system was overloaded by rain.\n\nThe neighboring Netherlands and Belgium were also hit by flooding.\n\nWater authorities in the southern Dutch province of Limburg warned that the heavy rainfall will turn streams into dangerously fast-flowing torrents and urged the public to stay away from them.\n\nBoat owners were advised to steer clear of the Maas river due to strong currents and debris being washed downstream.\n\n

The Netherlands and Belgium were hit by flooding.

\n\n“In some areas we have not seen this much rainfall in 100 years,” Andreas Friedrich, a German weather service spokesman, told CNN. He added that “in some areas we’ve seen more than double the amount of rainfall which has caused flooding and unfortunately some building structures to collapse.”\n\nShocking images of the devastation in Germany and Belgium showed entire villages underwater, with cars wedged in between collapsed buildings and debris. The Netherlands and Luxembourg have also been affected by the extreme rainfall.\n\nIn Germany, at least 105 people have been killed across two western states. In the hard-hit district of Ahrweiler, in the state of Rhineland-Palatinate, authorities told CNN that 1,300 people remained unaccounted for.\n\n“There is no end in sight just yet,” Ulrich Sopart, a police spokesman in the city of Koblenz, told CNN. He said that authorities are hopeful that they will be able to revise down the number of missing people as the rescue operation continues and phone lines are restored.\n\n”Our hopes are that some people might have been registered as missing twice or even three times – if for example a family member, a work colleague or a friend has registered a person as missing,” Sopart said.\n\n”Also, [in] some places phone lines are still down and reception is difficult. We do hope that people will get in touch with a relative, work colleague or friend to let them know they are fine,” he said.\n\nA dam along the river Rur in the western German state of North Rhine-Westphalia broke Friday night, according to the regional government.

Building structures collapsed in Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg.


The Panama Papers are an unprecedented leak of 11.5m files from the database of the world’s fourth biggest offshore law firm, Mossack Fonseca. The records were obtained from an anonymous source by the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, which shared them with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ). The ICIJ then shared them with a large network of international partners, including the Guardian and the BBC.

What do they reveal?
The documents show the myriad ways in which the rich can exploit secretive offshore tax regimes. Twelve national leaders are among 143 politicians, their families and close associates from around the world known to have been using offshore tax havens.

A $2bn trail leads all the way to Vladimir Putin. The Russian president’s best friend – a cellist called Sergei Roldugin – is at the centre of a scheme in which money from Russian state banks is hidden offshore. Some of it ends up in a ski resort where in 2013 Putin’s daughter Katerina got married.

Among national leaders with offshore wealth are Nawaz Sharif, Pakistan’s prime minister; Ayad Allawi, ex-interim prime minister and former vice-president of Iraq; Petro Poroshenko, president of Ukraine; Alaa Mubarak, son of Egypt’s former president; and the prime minister of Iceland, Sigmundur Davíð Gunnlaugsson.

An offshore investment fund run by the father of British prime minister David Cameron avoided ever having to pay tax in Britain by hiring a small army of Bahamas residents to sign its paperwork.

David Cameron admits to owning shares in a Panama-based offshore trust set up by his late father.

\n\nThe Panama Papers are an unprecedented leak of 11.5m files from the database of the world’s fourth biggest offshore law firm, Mossack Fonseca. The records were obtained from an anonymous source by the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, which shared them with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ). The ICIJ then shared them with a large network of international partners, including the Guardian and the BBC.\n\nWhat do they reveal?\nThe documents show the myriad ways in which the rich can exploit secretive offshore tax regimes. Twelve national leaders are among 143 politicians, their families and close associates from around the world known to have been using offshore tax havens.\n\nA $2bn trail leads all the way to Vladimir Putin. The Russian president’s best friend – a cellist called Sergei Roldugin – is at the centre of a scheme in which money from Russian state banks is hidden offshore. Some of it ends up in a ski resort where in 2013 Putin’s daughter Katerina got married.\n\nAmong national leaders with offshore wealth are Nawaz Sharif, Pakistan’s prime minister; Ayad Allawi, ex-interim prime minister and former vice-president of Iraq; Petro Poroshenko, president of Ukraine; Alaa Mubarak, son of Egypt’s former president; and the prime minister of Iceland, Sigmundur Davíð Gunnlaugsson.\n\nAn offshore investment fund run by the father of British prime minister David Cameron avoided ever having to pay tax in Britain by hiring a small army of Bahamas residents to sign its paperwork.

The records were obtained by the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung.

An offshore investment fund run by the father of British prime minister David Cameron avoided ever having to pay tax in Britain.

\n\nThe new head of world football has been caught up in the sport’s corruption scandal because of documents that have been revealed by the Panama Papers leak.\n\nFiles seen by the Guardian will raise questions about the role Fifa’s president, Gianni Infantino, played in deals that were concluded when he was director of legal services at Uefa, European football’s governing body.\n\nAccording to records, Uefa concluded offshore deals with one of the indicted figures at the heart of an alleged “World Cup of fraud” despite previously insisting it had no dealings with any of them.\n\nThe emergence of the contracts from 2003 and 2006, which were co-signed by Infantino, link Uefa for the first time to one of the companies involved in the huge unfolding scandal that has brought down former Fifa president Sepp Blatter.\n\nUefa has denied any wrongdoing by any of its officials or any other marketing partner.\n\nIt said the contracts were all above board. Fifa has previously insisted Infantino had no dealings with any of the officials currently under investigation – or their companies. Infantino said he was “dismayed” by the reports and “will not accept that my integrity is being doubted”.\n\nThe disclosures are based on the leak of 11m documents from the files of the offshore financial law firm Mossack Fonseca, which were obtained by Süddeutsche Zeitung and shared by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists with the Guardian and other news organisations.\n\n

Documents revealed by the Panama Papers leak have implicated the new head of world football.

Süddeutsche Zeitung shared the records with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ).


The collapse of Silicon Valley Bank continues to reverberate, hitting bank stocks, revealing hidden stresses, knocking on to Credit Suisse, and setting off a political blame-game.\n\n\nWhy the $212bn tech-lender abruptly collapsed, triggering the most significant financial crisis since 2008, has no single answer. Was it, as some argue, the result of Trump-era regulation rollbacks, risk mismanagement at the bank, sharp interest rate rises after a decade of ultra-low borrowing costs, or perhaps a combination of all three?\n\nFederal investigations have begun and lawsuits have been filed and no doubt new issues at the bank will emerge. But for now, here are the main reasons experts believed SVB failed.\n\nThe Vermont senator Bernie Sanders argues that the culprit was an “absurd” 2018 law, supported by Congress and signed by Donald Trump, that undid some of the credit requirements imposed under the Dodd-Frank banking legislation brought in after the 2008 banking crisis.\n\nDodd-Frank required that banks with at least $50bn in assets – banks considered “systemically important” – undergo an annual Federal Reserve “stress test” and maintain certain levels of capital as well as plans for a living will if they failed.\n\nSVB’s chief executive, Greg Becker, argued before Congress in 2015 that the $50bn threshold (SVB held $40bn at the time) was unnecessary and his bank, like other “mid-sized” or regional banks, “does not present systemic risks”.\n\nTrump said the new bill went a “long way toward fixing” Dodd-Frank, which he called a “job-killer”.

President Biden speaks on the banking emergency and assures customers of U.S. banks that their money will be there when they need it

Interest rates rise after a decade of ultra-low borrowing costs.

SVB depositors pull out up to $42 billion from the bank.

Another Bay Area bank was affected Monday by uncertainty in the financial markets following the failure of Silicon Valley Bank on Friday.\n\nStock in San Francisco-based First Republic Bank sank nearly 62% Monday and shares of other regional banks suffered losses, reportedly. First Republic has 86 locations across the country. Its Midpeninsula offices include two in Menlo Park and one each in Los Altos, Mountain View, Palo Alto and Redwood City.\n\nOn Sunday, regulators seized Signature Bank in New York after it failed.\n\nBut a San Jose State University professor of finance and accounting does not see the failure of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank as signs of a coming crisis.\n\n"I don\'t think it is a huge contagion issue," said assistant professor Matthew Faulkner. "It\'s more toward an isolated incident."\n\nOver the weekend and Monday, top federal officials including President Joseph Biden appeared to be getting ahead of the issue.\n\nBiden sought to ease American\'s fears by making all deposits held by Silicon Valley Bank customers available regardless of the amount of their deposits, federal officials said over the weekend.\n\nThat includes businesses who must pay their employees and their bills, officials said.\n\n"Americans can have confidence that the banking system is safe," Biden said Monday morning. "Your deposits will be there when you need them."\n\nInvestors will not be protected, Biden said. According to the president, they took a risk and "that\'s how capitalism works."\n\nTaxpayers will not be on the hook for the losses.

Regulators seized Signature Bank in New York on Sunday.

On Wednesday, Silicon Valley Bank was a well-capitalized institution seeking to raise some funds.\n\nWithin 48 hours, a panic induced by the very venture capital community that SVB had served and nurtured ended the bank’s 40-year-run.\n\nRegulators shuttered SVB Friday and seized its deposits in the largest U.S. banking failure since the 2008 financial crisis and the second-largest ever. The company’s downward spiral began late Wednesday, when it surprised investors with news that it needed to raise $2.25 billion to shore up its balance sheet. What followed was the rapid collapse of a highly-respected bank that had grown alongside its technology clients.\n\nEven now, as the dust begins to settle on the second bank wind-down announced this week, members of the VC community are lamenting the role that other investors played in SVB’s demise.\n\n“This was a hysteria-induced bank run caused by VCs,” Ryan Falvey, a fintech investor at Restive Ventures, told CNBC. “This is going to go down as one of the ultimate cases of an industry cutting its nose off to spite its face.”\n\nThe episode is the latest fallout from the Federal Reserve’s actions to stem inflation with its most aggressive rate hiking campaign in four decades. The ramifications could be far-reaching, with concerns that startups may be unable to pay employees in coming days, venture investors may struggle to raise funds, and an already-battered sector could face a deeper malaise.

Silicon Valley Bank attempted to raise $2.25 billion from investors.