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The Heat's reaction highlights the difference in Cuban sentiment in Florida versus that of the rest of the U.S. In research released earlier this month, 41 percent of Cuban-Americans in Florida supported normalizing relations, compared to 69 percent outside the state.
Still, if major U.S. sports leagues tread carefully, outreach in Cuba can lay the framework for a potentially valuable—and geographically close—international market.
"The proximity is very attractive. These types of camps are ways to dip your toes into the water without making a big statement," said Manish Tripathi, an Emory University marketing professor and co-founder of Emory Sports Marketing Analytics.
Read MoreOne way to (possibly) make money in Cuba
The NBA and FIBA camp can build grass-roots support for the sport in Cuba, Tripathi said. While the Cuban men's team has played in six Olympic Games and some Cuban nationals have made NBA rosters, basketball has room to grow there, he said.
Retired stars Steve Nash and Dikembe Mutombo will headline the group going to Cuba. Aside from teaching the game to Cuban youth, the NBA and FIBA plan to renovate three outdoor courts in Havana.
The NBA declined to comment on how the event will affect its business growth, pointing CNBC to its press release on the camp.
"We've seen the bridges that basketball can build between cultures," NBA Deputy Commissioner Mark Tatum said in the release. "We look forward to sharing the values of our game with Cuban youth and learning together through the common language of sports."
But that doesn't mean that league doesn't have to be careful.
"There is the potential for it to negatively impact the NBA brand. The whole workshop has to be carefully orchestrated, and the NBA knows this," said Ross Steinman, chairperson and associate professor of psychology at Widener University, who has studied fan psychology. | The NBA is going to the island nation for a youth basketball camp, but political undertones may force the league to tread lightly. |
Excessive leverage is not a problem as long as China's No. 4 property developer manages debt payments and credit markets remain liquid, but analysts say it has a small margin of error if markets dry up or lose momentum or if it runs into liquidity issues.
"Evergrande needs to rely on short-term loans such as bank and trust lending to refinance when the short-term debt matures. This is risky capital management because banks loosen and tighten lending from time to time and it's unpredictable," said Moody's Investors Service analyst Franco Leung.
Evergrande declined to comment for this article on its strategy for managing its debt.
It began issuing perpetuals in 2013, doubling the amount to 52.9 billion yuan ($8.5 billion) as of end-December, equivalent to nearly half of its equity, corporate filings show. It has the highest value of perpetual use among China's 10 biggest developers by sales, according to a Reuters review of the companies' 2014 balance sheets.
Read MoreChina market bubble? Bull vs. bear
Evergrande executives have previously said it has issued perpetuals to finance projects. Asked whether it would issue more this year, Chief Financial Officer Tse Wai Wah told a March 30 earnings briefing: "It depends on market conditions... and market reaction," he said.
An economic slowdown and a raft of cooling measures have focused investor attention on the high levels of debt that developers took on to build projects that were not sold. China's property sales in the first two months of 2015 dropped the most in three years amid a housing supply glut and slower property investment.
Smaller homebuilder Kaisa Group Holdings is negotiating with bondholders on restructuring $2.5 billion in offshore debt. Failed talks may mean it risks becoming the first Chinese developer to default on offshore debt.
In Evergrande's 2014 earnings report, published on March 30, its net debt-to-equity ratio was 85.9 percent. If perpetuals were classified as debt, that figure jumps to 292 percent, Barclays said in a note published a day later.
CFO Tse told the earnings briefing that shrinking debt was a priority for 2015. He set a mid-to-long term target for a net debt-to-equity ratio of 70 percent and put a moratorium on bond issues for the year.
Read MoreWill China's slowdown derail reforms?
Among developers, Evergrande has been particularly hard hit with most of its projects in less developed cities, where home prices have had some of the biggest drops. It has also borrowed heavily to diversify into food, energy and sports: it finances the Guangzhou Evergrande Taobao soccer club along with e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holdings.
Evergrande reported gross debt rose 43 percent to around 156 billion yuan ($25.2 billion) at end-2014, and concerns about its leverage have led to speculative-grade ratings from Moody's and Fitch.
Independent financial analysts CreditSights, which classifies perpetuals as debt, says Evergrande's 2014 debt was 11.7 times earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA), meaning it would take 11.7 years to repay based on its current cashflow.
That ratio is 50 percent higher than the sector average, according to Thomson Reuters data.
Evergrande has also increased fair value gains on investment properties, with the largest single-year gain - 9.4 billion yuan - recorded last year. The gains are based on a unbiased estimate of an asset's potential market price, and help boost a company's equity.
Tse told Reuters after the earnings briefing the majority of the fair value adjustments were on shops and car parks and the revaluations were not inflated. | Evergrande Real Estate Group has cut leverage on its balance sheet by classifying some of it debt as equity, according to analysts' calculations. |
Sometimes Jim Cramer never know what will come from an interview.
The "Mad Money" host spoke with various top brass CEOs from around the country this week, and they each provided their inside perspective on how their companies are fairing in the market. Don't take it from Cramer, this one comes straight from the horse's mouth!
CEOs featured in order of appearance:
Performance Sports Group CEO Kevin Davis
---------------------------------------------------------- Read more from Mad Money with Jim Cramer Cramer: How to pick a stock Cramer: Stocks that signal a raging buy Cramer: Effective pro trading technique ---------------------------------------------------------- | Executive guests from the week tell “Mad Money” host Jim Cramer how they take on the competition. |
Aspen, a Koch Poultry Company division, is recalling 1,978,680 pounds of frozen, raw, stuffed and breaded chicken, which was produced between April 15 and July 10 with "best if used by" dates between July 14, 2016 and October 10, 2016.
The impacted items have the establishment number "P-1358" inside the USDA inspection mark and were shipped across the country.
Read MoreBlue Bell attracts billionaire in comeback quest
This comes on the heels of a separate massive chicken recall from Barber Food this week totaling 1.7 million frozen, raw stuffed chicken products that may be contaminated with Salmonella.
To put these two recalls totaling 3.7 million pounds in context, approximately 18.7 million pounds of food were recalled during the entire year in 2014.
On June 23, the USDA's inspection branch was notified of a cluster of Salmonella illnesses, which were linked to the Aspen chicken.
Read MoreLatest victim of the egg shortage: Fried rice
Consuming food contaminated with Salmonella can cause a bacterial foodborne illnesses with symptoms including diarrhea, abdominal cramps, and fever within 12 to 72 hours after exposure. While most recover without treatment, people with weakened immune systems are more likely to develop a severe illness from it.
Also on Wednesday, Murry's recalled about 20,000 pounds of Bell & Evans gluten-free breaded chicken breast nuggets due to Staphylococcal enterotoxin contamination.
For more information about which chicken items were recalled from Aspen Foods, check out the USDA's website. | If you cook chicken, it's time to check your fridge and freezer. |
Citigroup analyst, Mark May, pointed out that Dorsey himself had sold 400,000 shares of stock in the last couple of quarters amid turbulence after Dick Costolo stepped down as CEO and stock dropped.
"I think the endorsements from the insiders who are buying stock is a good sign, but you have to take it into the broader perspective," he said Monday in an interview with CNBC's "Squawk on the Street."
"The amount of stock that these insiders have bought in the recent weeks pales in comparison with the amount they sold in the last few months. So I'm not reading too much into that," Dorsey said.
Read MoreTweet this: Twitter has lost nearly half its value in 4 months
It's worth noting that there have been several calls for Dorsey to remain the permanent CEO of the company, despite his role as executive chief at Square.
Early Twitter investor Chris Sacca on Friday urged the company's board to keep Dorsey as CEO, saying he has "product vision." In a string of tweets, Sacca also recommended Twitter name executive Adam Bain president and chief operating officer, while making co-founder Evan Williams chairman of the board.
—CNBC's John Melloy and Jacob Pramuk contributed to this report.
Disclosures: Mark May does not own shares of Twitter, but his firm owns shares in excess of 1 percent. | Twitter interim CEO Jack Dorsey is just one of a few insiders to buy the stock in recent days. Could this signal a bottom? |
The potential for a rate hike in the next year will hit utilities stocks hard, pointed out Andrew Burkly, head of institutional portfolio strategy at Oppenheimer. He also warned against counting on the consumer staples sector, which has more global and emerging market exposure.
Instead, Burkly recommends turning to telecom stocks, which have fallen 6 percent year to date.
"They tend to be more domestic plays, and they've been big underperformers so they yield pretty attractively at this point too," Burkly said, also on "Trading Nation."
For instance, AT&T yields 5.8 percent, and Verizon nearly 5 percent. That beats out yields of utilities stocks like ConEd (4.2 percent) and PG&E (3.8 percent).
On Wednesday morning, the utilities sector was the only S&P 500 sector in the red, losing about 0.3 percent.
Want to be a part of the Trading Nation? If you'd like to call into our live Wednesday show, email your name, number and a question to TradingNation@cnbc.com. | As stocks sell off, traders warn that a "safe-haven" sector could be in danger as well. |
George Michael in 1990, with Christy Turlington and Linda Evangelista
09/03/2015 AT 10:45 AM EDT
In 1990, the pressure was on for
. The star had succeeded in breaking away from his early success with Wham! with his hit solo album
in 1987, which sold over 25 million copies and sent four singles to the top of the charts.
arrived on Sept. 3, 1990, and seemed almost purposefully designed to fail, even before people heard its largely acoustic, moody cuts. Michael announced in advance of the album that he would not be doing any press to promote it, nor would he be appearing in any of its videos or on its cover. Instead, the album shipped with a 1940 photograph of Coney Island's jam-packed beach, shot by Arthur "Weegee" Fellig, a photographer known primarily for his black and white shots of crime scenes.
But it was "Freedom '90," the third single from the album, that made the biggest cultural impact. Directed by David Fincher, who was then hot off his video for Madonna's "Vogue,"
for "Freedom '90," true to Michael's promise, didn't feature the singer at all. Instead,
, Tatjana Patitz, Christy Turlington and
all appeared in his place, lip-syncing the song's lyrics. Propelled by the bold choice and photogenic cast, the video went into heavy rotation on MTV.
was far more successful in the U.K. than Stateside, the record went onto sell eight million copies worldwide, and was certified platinum in Canada, the Netherlands, Spain and Switzerland in addition to the U.S. and U.K. | Michael famously refused to do any promotion for the album, or appear on its cover or videos |
The waning deficit may temper some demands in Congress for deeper spending cuts or weaken resistance to lifting the "sequester" spending caps on discretionary programs as lawmakers negotiate new spending legislation for the 2016 fiscal year, which starts on Oct. 1.
But Senate Budget Committee Chairman Mike Enzi, a Republican, warned against budget complacency.
"I would caution those who would use this report as an opportunity to take these short-term savings and push for more spending. If our nation is serious about balancing our budget and reducing Americas debt, real, substantive budget reforms and savings will have to be on the table during any spending negotiations," the Wyoming Republican said in a statement.
The stronger-than-forecast tax collections mean that the U.S. Treasury's extraordinary cash management measures, employed since a debt limit extension expired in March, can stave off a federal default on payment obligations a bit longer.
Read MoreMarket talk suddenly turns to specter of QE4
The CBO previously said that the Treasury would likely exhaust all remaining borrowing capacity in October or November. In its latest guidance, it said that deadline will now likely come between mid-November and early December due to the additional revenues.
The CBO also revised its forecast for real gross domestic product growth for 2015 to 2.3 percent from 2.8 percent, bringing it in line with private forecasters. The data used for the changes, however, was locked on July 7, before the start of a global sell-off in financial markets sparked by worries about China's economic slowdown.
The revised forecasts do not change the CBO's view that based on current tax and spending laws, deficits will start to rise again later in the decade due to the costs of caring for the rapidly aging Baby Boom generation, topping $1 trillion again by 2025. | The U.S. budget deficit is likely to fall by $60 billion in 2015 due to strong revenue gains, the Congressional Budget Office said on Tuesday. |
"In the tech sector, you want to have a more growth-oriented approach," said Eddie Perkin, chief equity investment officer at Eaton Vance on "Power Lunch" Monday, who prefers companies such as Facebook. "You want to favor some of these mega trends, whether it's mobile, or advertising."
August's technology sector swings are far from the first to spur the growth versus value debate, which dates back to famous investors like T. Rowe Price and Warren Buffett.
But even if an investor squabbles with the details of investment strategies, Katz and Perkin said there are technology stocks that meet both value and growth criteria, like Hewlett Packard, trading down 30 percent year to date, and Google, trading up 18 percent year to date.
Disclosure: Eddie Perkin owns shares of Google.
Read More6 trades on momentum tech stocks | With shares of large-capitalization technology companies in correction territory, value and growth investors debate good buys. |
Aside from China's domestic concerns, Thursday's holiday showcase contains a message for the Asian region too.
The President will be accompanied by more than 20 global leaders, including Russian President Vladimir Putin, Omar Hassan al-Bashir of Sudan and Venezuela's Nicolas Maduro. Notably, Western and Japanese leaders won't be in attendance, with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe rejecting Beijing's invitation, a move that may further strain ties between the two Asian giants.
"Official sources suggest Abe was further concerned that his presence would be interpreted as conceding to aggressive Chinese activity in disputed waters," noted the CFR's Dickey, referring to a long-standing territorial conflict over a set of islands in the South China Sea.
Indeed, state-owned Chinese newspaper The People's Daily reported earlier this year that the parade was aimed at intimidating Japan and discouraging Tokyo from pursuing an "unrestrained China policy," all the more significant now that Japan has amended its pacific constitution.
However, South Korean President Park Geun-hye will be there despite Beijing's close relationship with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, who will not be not be attending. Analysts say her presence is aimed at expressing solidarity with China seeing as both countries suffered from Japan's war crimes and both are awaiting a "sincere" apology from Prime Minister Abe.
At Japan's WWII anniversary last month, Abe expressed remorse over his country's war actions but stopped short of a formal apology.
Ultimately, Thursday's festivities have been engineered to send a message to those who challenge China's regional and global standing, Dickey said.
"The intent is to remind onlookers near and far of China's commitment to its own strength and prosperity - through any and all means necessary." | A parade of military firepower may be Beijing's latest means of reinforcing its legitimacy in the eyes of mainland citizens. |
I'm talking specifically about the robo-advisor movement. For nearly two years, the financial services industry, and the media that cover it, have been obsessed with these online investing platforms. While there's a lot of hype, too many advisors are ignoring what the new technology really means.
Robo-advisors have already gathered more than $19 billion of assets. And some forward-looking "traditional" advisors have begun integrating them into their businesses—letting the robos handle automatable tasks such as asset allocation and security selection, as well as the more mundane operational tasks, reallocating those resources to a better client experience.
Read MoreTrust a robo-advisor—at age 64?
Those advisory firms have come to understand that robo-advisors can do these things just as well as they can, at lower cost. By using them, advisors can free up time to focus on value adds such as tax advice and estate planning. Moreover, computers can rebalance and tax-loss harvest far better than any human, offering enhancements that most advisors fail to provide.
But plenty of advisors have their heads in the sand. In a recent survey by consulting services firm Accenture, just 19 percent of U.S. and Canadian advisors said they see robos as a serious threat. A full 40 percent say they pose no threat at all. | Financial advisors, slow to use automated wealth management technology for client benefit, risk losing important millennial mind share. |
For millennials, retirement can seem like a very distant goal. But there's one big incentive to start saving early: If you start contributing to a retirement account when you're young, your money can grow exponentially by the time you need it.
"It's magical stuff," said certified financial planner Harriet Brackey, director of investments at GSK Wealth Advisors in Hollywood, Florida. "Retirement is such a distant concept for younger people. A lot of people miss the opportunity to make themselves millionaires simply by saving."
That milestone is not out of reach if you save early and consistently. Let's say you're 25 and making $60,000 a year, for example, and have an employer that matches your 401(k) contributions up to 5 percent of your salary. If you contribute just $250 a month (or 5 percent of your current pretax income) and your employer matches it, you could stick with the same contribution amount until you retire at 65 and end up with nearly $1 million in your account. (That's assuming a 6 percent average annual return.) Increase your contribution a little more, and your retirement nest egg could be even larger.
Want to make sure you're maxing out your savings? Here are four common mistakes and how to avoid them.
Don't assume the default rate is enough.
A whopping 64 percent more workers between the ages of 18 and 34 started contributing to 401(k) plans last year compared to 2013, according to data on the 2.5 million people participating in retirement plans administered by Bank of America Merrill Lynch. A big reason for the increase: widespread adoption of auto-enrollment programs.
By the end of 2013, about 65 percent of companies reported having auto-enrollment programs, in which employees are automatically defaulted into a plan with an option to opt out, a feature that became increasingly widespread after passage of the Pension Protection Act in 2006, which provided safeguards for employers that adopted it. (Before the law passed, an estimated 20 percent of employers had retirement plans with auto enrollment; the number has nearly quadrupled since.)
But the default contribution rate for most of those plans remains at 3 percent, the amount many companies adopted when they first added the feature.
"A lot of folks accept the default, and it's not until later they realize they are invested way too conservatively for someone their age," said certified financial planner Howard Pressman of Egan, Berger & Weiner in Vienna, Virginia. Most advisors suggest a 10 to 15 percent contribution, including the match.
Don't leave match money on the table.
Each employer is different, but one 2013 analysis found that companies match up to 4.5 percent on average. That means that if you contribute 4.5 percent of your pre-tax salary to your 401(k), your employer will match that 4.5 percent—typically at 50 cents or a dollar per every dollar you put in. It's essentially free money.
Read MoreEmployees miss out on $24B in match money
By 2013, the "vast majority [of employers] offered some type of employer-matching contribution" to encourage workers to save more, according to a recent Aon Hewitt analysis of nearly 150 plans with 3.5 million eligible employees. | Millennial retirement savers have time on their side. But in order to max out their savings, they should avoid these four common mistakes. |
As the recent energy rally cools off, technical and fundamental traders have very different ideas about what the next move will be.
Oil services stocks have risen nearly 10 percent in the last month, as crude has bounced back 24 percent.
But as the oil services ETF (OIH) fell alongside crude on Tuesday, Cowen's head of equity sales trading, David Seaburg, pronounced the energy bounce over.
"A lot of the rallies we've seen have been predicated by short covering," he said on CNBC's "Power Lunch." "I think the short-cover rally is over. I think you're going to look back and see these stocks at much lower levels going forward."
Further, Seaburg warns that many of the companies in the OIH look vulnerable ahead of earnings.
"There is a lot of small names that make up that ETF that are at massive risk of missing. So I think there is a lot of concerns out there," he said.
But Rich Ross, head of technical analysis at Evercore ISI, has a very different forecast.
"We think the pullback in crude has created a compelling buying opportunity here," he also said on "Power Lunch."
"We know there's going to be volatility in here. It's not all rainbows and unicorns out there. But you have to take advantage of days like today so you don't feel like you're chasing the move." | Is the recent energy bounce over? The charts and the fundamentals appear to tell different stories. |
By Naja Rayne and Christine Pelisek
09/14/2015 AT 09:00 PM EDT
actor Manu Bennett was arrested for assault early Sunday morning after he allegedly punched a 29-year-old male at a Comic Con party in San Antonio, Texas.
According to a police report obtained by PEOPLE, Bennett, 45, was asked to leave the party at the Grand Hyatt San Antonio hotel because "he had too much to drink and was causing a scene."
A witness told San Antonio police that Bennett agreed to leave the party, but before he did he "picked up a chair in the air and was laughing at the situation," the report states. The witness said everyone thought he was playing around, but several seconds later he set the chair down and "started to stare down everyone inside the room."
Before he left the party, Bennett allegedly stopped in front of the victim who was standing by the door, stared him down for several seconds, and then punched him in the nose, the report states.
After the alleged attack, police went to Bennett's room and woke him up. Bennett told officers he had no recollection of the incident, but later said he was defending himself.
The incident was called in around 4:30 a.m. Sunday, after which Bennett was held on a $1,600 bond.
star was scheduled to make an appearance at the event on Saturday and Sunday. Reps for Bennett have not responded to requests for comment on his arrest.
Bennett was later released from jail around 1 p.m.,
He is scheduled to appear in court on Oct. 19, PEOPLE confirms. | The Hobbit actor was taken into custody on Sunday |
I felt compelled to write to you after reading Lennie James's open letter (Cover story, last week). I am 17 years old and have grown up in south-west London. I'm only just beginning to realise how lucky I am to have never come across knife crime personally. James's letter was understanding rather than accusing and encouraging rather than displaying the suffocating self-righteousness that has become the norm for most young people, be it knife-carriers or 'law-abiding citizens'. I wish I could thank him personally. I have friends who I feel need to see this and whose lives it could change.Anna CondryLondon
I work with young people who are subject to intensive supervision in the community. On the weekends they have to report to a youth session in which they have breakfast and touch base. Many of the young people who come have committed offences relating to violent crime or are on bail for offences such as possessing weapons. A few of the lads read the open letter from Lennie James last Sunday and it made them stop and think (at least for a moment). I thought it would of be of interest to Lennie James that some young people did get to read The Observer on Sunday and found his comments interesting.Name and address withheld
I was extremely moved by Lennie James's letter. He put into words some of the most profound feelings we all share on these tragedies. I admire his ability to express the complexity of these problems and without denying our collective responsibilities. I thank him for his honesty. It is most certainly a word and a code of honour some of us have long forgotten.Gaelle Warner Paris
That is a hell of a letter. Really powerful stuff - let's get it to where it needs to be heard. Spray it on the sidewalk, print it on trainers and stitch it into the seams of every baseball cap and hoodie. Erica Packington Sheffield
I well remember my youth growing up in various parts of London. Wherever I looked there were halls and other meeting places which offered boxing, judo, music, dance, amateur theatre, and just about every kind of activity dear to any youngster's heart. Where are they now? Has the land that they occupied been found too valuable for our young to be allowed to use, and must be sold for profit? Well, we are paying the price.
We have many elders and young people who would be delighted to lend a hand to gainfully employ our youth and help them to channel their excess testosterone into creative endeavour. Many of these violent youths are looking for a way out other than jail. Let the men and women of this country help our young to channel their endeavours and earn the respect of their fellows. Rayner Garner London
What a powerful and honest letter by Lennie James. I shared the article with a few young people and one said: 'But how many of those young men will be reading these articles?'
In Africa the saying is: 'It takes a village to raise a child.' We need that here in the UK. We the community need to become the village. My fear is that some of us (myself included) have become too comfortable in our own protected lives to be motivated to do anything about what is happening. Those of us in professional jobs or doing well, who have benefited from our parents' hard labour, have a role to play in what is happening to our young people. We need to speak out when we see gangs congregating. It's not OK to stay silent on buses and trains when young people misbehave and threaten others. We all have blood on our hands. Those children who are taking the lives of another have parents, aunts, uncles etc, people who know them, who have raised or haven't raised them. Part of moving forward will be taking responsibility for our own part in what has been created. It has to begin at home, right on our doorsteps. Feeding our children with material possessions they don't have to work for is leaving our children as hungry souls.
Our parents' generation was fuelled by the strong will to better themselves. They didn't always get it right when it came to raising us but there was so much that was good. We cannot allow our history to come to this.Jackee Holder | Letters: Lennie James's impassioned open letter to knife carrying youths drew a huge response ... |
06/17/2015 AT 04:30 PM EDT
Anika is a 2-year-old who is seen having a very lively conversation with her grandma over the phone. It is too bad that the only thing we can understand is her exclaiming, "What the heck!" We are dying to know the daycare drama prompting this convo. Next is a little boy who is facing a pretty challenging decision – whether to sleep or eat ice cream. Somehow, he manages to do both – and we are impressed. Lastly, there is big sister "Em," who is very confused as she meets her little sister for the first time. Em was shown baby photos of herself before making her way to the hospital to meet her new little sister, Caitlin, and the resemblance really throws her off – she explains to her family, "That's not Cait! It's me!" | See this week's sassy, hilarious and downright adorable kids |
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I was inspired by the triathlon today and the Brownlee brothers to try and write a triathlon myself. So I've written three short poems on three different sporting events today: the javelin, the triathlon itself and two events in the velodrome. I was struck by the idea that sharing somebody's disappointment is as intense and intimate as sharing their success. I used to be a long-distance runner, a Scottish school girl champion, until I broke my leg and didn't walk properly for a year and a half. So I was thinking about that too when I wrote the poem. How quickly we move into our unfit futures!
i Goldie and the Three No Throws
I remember the fancy footwork of the discus or javelin,That feeling as a spear left your body, as if it'd come from withinTo be thrown into the future: the armchair of a middle-aged woman, watching the Olympics, twenty-four seven, shouting instructions!(The only thing worse than an armchair politician is an armchair athlete, who no longer gets athlete's feet; or has to nurse her Achilles heel.)Now, the woman from the Czech Republic, takes the chalk circleAn ancient Amazonian, her spear spikes the flaky air.Then, out comes Goldie and the great bear of the crowd's roar.But Goldie loses the qualification and her despairIs as ancient as it is modern: hindsight is a golden thing –Goldie Sayers' words are wise – and the crowd adores.Belief puts itself on the line; hope is not far behind.My tears for her bravery, the biggest surprise.
When the race begins, the swimmers togetherSeem shaped like a great bird in the river,The green-capped feathers all of a quiver.The big bird cracks open; and from the bird's-eye viewSingle swimmers emerge, brothers first – phew!Alistair and Jonny Brownlee – sibling stars,Shedding their wet suits first (the fourth elementSome say, of this transition) and mount the bikes fast.The road to ambition is a road to perdition.All transitions come with great risks.The river, red tarmac and the Serpentine RoadWhere one brother will get crowned with a goldAnd the other brother a bronze, but heyIt is not the swimming, cycling, runningThat is the biggest feat; it's the 15-second penaltyPossibility of defeat – that's the real deal.Sport's biggest test is a character testAnd sport reveals true pluck and natureAs the bird in the river unfurled the swimmers.
It was a day of drama in the VelodromeAs you watched agog, OMG,As Trott took the OmniumAgainst the odds of a collapsed lungComing home, coming home.Not one but two golds to her name.You saw the photo of not so long agoWith young Laura and her Bradley hero.
Not long later, you watched VictoriaWho rode as close to her rivalAs a synchronised swimmerAnd all the drama was in the lane errorWhere the line was crossed in the VelodromeAs close as step to pets; palindromes,The Mearest of lines, the closing line.
So, farewell Victoria dearest, you say.You salute her. She runs her last lap, and bows.The last time I'm going to go through that, she says.And even her brave coach is in bits.We knew it would end in tears, the TV says.And they roll down your cheeks too – you armchair, you.The greatest ever theatre – sport's soap opera.Victoria. Oh Victoria. Collect your silver!Your ordeal is over: take your seat on throne. | Scottish poet Jackie Kay draws inspiration from Team GB's highs and lows in the triathlon, javelin and cycling to create three short poems that capture the spirit of the Games |
Beverly Hills uses its own tiered-pricing system for its water use. The city government is holding it back from the rest of its water use restriction program until the matter is resolved in order to ensure compliance with the law, according to Therese Kosterman, a spokesperson for the city.
While tiers aren't the only conservation measure available to cities and localities, some say regulators need them amid limited options in the crisis.
"The most important thing is that to get through this historic drought, we are going to have to call on Californians to do a lot of different things, and local agencies are going to need as many tools as they can have," said Michael Lauffer, chief counsel for the State Water Resources Control Board.
"We are encouraging local agencies to continue their efforts to send the right price signals. There are local agencies who have adopted block rate structures they think are completely defensible, and this court decision doesn't set those aside," he said. "This was really about San Juan Capistrano."
In a statement, Gov. Jerry Brown chided the ruling. "The practical effect of the court's decision is to put a straitjacket on local government at a time when maximum flexibility is needed," he said. "My policy is and will continue to be: employ every method possible to ensure water is conserved across California."
Read MorePepsi to ditch aspartame in Diet Pepsi
Yet charging different people different prices is just one of several wrinkles in water-use laws and enforcement that Californians need to iron out. Part of the battle will be updating or overturning old policies that exist in various parts of the state, observers say.
Sacramento, the state's capital and a city of slightly less than 500,000 people, had previously prohibited water meters on houses in its city charter until the state finally passed a law overturning it, UC Davis' Frank said. The city has been installing meters since then, but they have not reached all of the houses in the area. The city government expects the project to be completed by 2025.
Read MoreNY banana mogul sentenced in fatal sex romp
A lack of meters in certain regions may complicate demands for citizens to restrict the amount of water they're using, a feature of new conservation regulations. Under the governor's new order, residential and industrial consumers are required to reduce water consumption by 25 percent of what they used in 2013. This threshold does not apply to agricultural users, however, which account for 75-80 percent of all water used in the state.
Many California communities already have strict water-restriction measures in place, and have for a long time. Many houses come equipped with low-flush toilets and special shower heads in bathrooms meant to conserve water, for example.
"What the governor's announcement does is give cover to local officials who might have been reluctant to impose restrictions, now they can say, 'Golly, we have no choice,' " said Sherry Bebitch Jeffe, a professor at the University of Southern California. "The bottom line here is not whether local communities pass restrictions, it's how will they be enforced."
Frank also said the difficulty of enforcement is the other main challenge to conservation efforts. "In California the resources dedicated to enforcement have always been very limited, and that deficiency is coming into starker contrast now that the crisis is so great," he said.
Lauffer said existing regulations already capture a lot of "low hanging fruit," and the State Water Resources Control Board directly enforces rules about water conservation affecting larger industries, such as the hospitality industry. Enforcement on a local level is carried about by the roughly 400 water agencies in the state, who can ticket violators or even take them to court.
"There are plenty of examples all over the state—Sacramento, the Santa Clara Valley Water District—undertaking a significant hiring effort to bring inspectors on board who can go out and help with that code enforcement." Lauffer of the State Water Resources Board said.
"And it is not a 'one-and-done' situation. People are trying to educate their customers, give them notice, and if they see repeated bad behavior, they are issuing fines and penalties," he added. | Challenges have bedeviled some of California water conservation efforts, and experts expect uneven levels of compliance and success. |
The dollar was down against a basket of major currencies. Weak earnings dragged stocks lower.
"We're seeing a mild consolidation rally," said Bill O'Neill, co-founder of commodities investment firm LOGIC Advisors in New Jersey.
"The dollar has lost a little ground and we have nervousness surrounding equities."
Investors have abandoned bullion during a broad commodities sell-off and on expectations that the Fed may raise interest rates as early as next month.
The looming rise in U.S. rates dims the appeal of non-interest yielding gold, instead pulling more funds towards the dollar.
Data on Thursday showed the number of Americans filing new applications for unemployment benefits rose less than expected last week.
Read MoreGold under pressure after US data, rate rise in focus
Expectations that the Fed could increase rates at its next policy meeting in September gained ground this week after Atlanta Federal Reserve President Dennis Lockhart said only a "significant deterioration" in the U.S. economy would make him not support a rate rise next month.
But Fed Governor Jerome Powell said policymakers had not yet decided whether to raise rates next month, adding that more recent employment data had been mixed.
Holdings of SPDR Gold Trust, the world's largest gold-backed exchange-traded fund, fell to 21.47 million ounces on Wednesday, the lowest since September 2008.
"In the medium term, with rising bond yields, EM (emerging markets) currencies collapsing, no safe haven demand and with the dollar potentially going higher on U.S. rate expectations, there is no gold-friendly news out there," Saxo Bank senior manager Ole Hansen said. | Gold edged higher on Thursday, supported by the retreating U.S. dollar and a tumble in global equities as traders awaited U.S. jobs data. |
"Everyone is looking to bring down the cost of space programs because it is incredibly expensive," Ben Bourne, aerospace analyst at Liberum, told CNBC in a phone interview.
The European Space Agency and the U.K. Space Agency will be among national and private bodies and companies at the Farnborough Airshow to discuss their activities as the space race heats up.
Airbus has been the dominant player in the industry for some time, leading a consortium of companies to build the Ariane space rocket, with the first model being operational in 1979. But the industry has been shaken up by the entry of Elon Musk's SpaceX, which as has successfully created lower cost rockets known as Falcon 9 and Dragon.
SpaceX focuses on low manufacturing and operational costs and in 2012 Musk fired a warning shot at the Ariane project, telling BBC News that it had "no chance" against his spacecraft.
Read MoreAmerica's weapon in the US-Russia space war
Last month, Airbus and Safran, the French aerospace companies, announced plans to team up and work on space launchers to fight off challenges from SpaceX.
"Airbus is thinking that if they want to survive and continue to dominate, they need to transform into something different and cannot afford to have the same type of Europe space structure," Damien Lasou, global managing director of aerospace and defence at Accenture, told CNBC in a phone interview.
"When you look at the market share, the Europeans are the dominant player. Ariane is now in the position of being the incumbent dominant but with challengers coming from the U.S."
Airbus and the European Space Agency who commission the building of Ariane, are working on an upgraded model that will be released over the next few years, with the aim at cutting costs and making it cheaper to fly.
Revenues from the satellite launch industry rose between 2010 and 2012 but dropped in 2013 to $3 billion from $3.8 billion the year before, but revenues from U.S. players continued to rise, according to the SIA. While Europe continued to dominate, U.S. companies are clearly catching up.
Read MoreWhy are space companies flocking to Colorado?
This trend could continue as geopolitical tensions with Russia mean U.S. companies turn away from Russian space launchers and look at the domestic market, according to analyst.
"The current dynamic with the Russian has put a new dent on all of this," Wayne Plucker, director of aerospace and defense at Frost and Sullivan, told CNBC in a phone interview.
"I think everybody is looking for alternatives to the Russians so I think this is one of those offerings could be SpaceX. Whether they can compete is another matter."
- By CNBC's Arjun Kharpal | The space race has moved on from the battle between Cold War rivals, to a contest between companies to blast off in the space market. |
Coleman said he was particularly struck by how high the percentage increases were for young adults. He said it raises the question of "whether this contributed to the low rates of enrollment for younger adults."
Young adults make up around 40 percent of the uninsured, who are the main target group for the Affordable Care Act. But they only account for about 28 percent of enrollment on the government-run ACA exchanges this year.
When asked about the dramatically higher rates under Obamacare, PwC's Connolly said, "It's just impossible to compare the ACA exchanges with the pre-ACA individual market, which, by the way, was not a market at all. It's really just apples and oranges."
Connolly noted that before Obamacare, "individuals could be charged sky-high rates or even denied coverage" if they had pre-existing medical conditions. That's no longer the case." She also pointed to the subsidies that reduce costs for most exchange enrollees, and caps on what people can be forced to pay out-of-pocket for health services.
HealthPocket acknowledged those differences from 2013 to 2014 in its report, and also noted that Obamacare now mandates certain minimum health benefits that must be covered by plans with no cost-sharing by enrollees, such as contraception and preventative care.
But HealthPocket's Coleman said, "You can't just say it's an apples to oranges market for a consumer of health insurance."
"It's a product they're going to buy or not going to buy," Coleman said. He said that people made insurance choices before Obamacare based on affordability and how plans met their health needs, as well as other factors that they valued.
Read MoreMicrosoft launches wearable fitness device for $199
"So we have to be careful of being dismissive of the pre-reform market and imagine they were all 'junk plans,' " Coleman said. "That is clearly as much of an unjustifiable position as to say all the plans in the new market are too expensive."
Coleman also said that while Obamacare advocates are "quick to say" that most enrollees get subsidies if they buy exchange-sold plans, "it's more complicated than that."
Some people are not eligible for the subsidies because they earn too much—the subsidies as a rule are available to people earning between one and four times the federal poverty level, or $11,670 to $46,680 for an individual. And in some places, an available health plan's premium may not be a high enough percent of the customer's income to trigger the right to a subsidy.
A previous HealthPocket study of eight cities found that the income range for adults ages 18 to 34 was 41 percent lower than the income range dictated by the Affordable Care Act. In other words, it took significantly less income to reach the point where the subsidy amount decreased to zero.
And, Coleman noted, if someone buys off-exchange plans, they get no subsidy, and therefore would feel the full impact of the price increase. | Whether recent price changes in individual insurance plans are a good or a bad thing depends on your perspective. |
Why would a city or large company spend $4,000 for a solar-powered trash can? Big picture, people. A company called Big Belly sells expensive, solar-powered trash compactors. By using the sun's power to compact trash, the Big Belly reduces the need for weekly trash pickups, eventually recouping the upfront cost with fuel savings down the road. | The airplane Solar Impulse isn't the only unusual item being powered by the sun. Here are five unusual items already using solar energy. |
The S&P 500 index was up 9.9 percent this year through Nov. 7. The top two performing sectors of the 10 S&P 500 sectors this year, however, are utilities (up 21.4 percent through Nov. 7) and health care (up 20.7 percent), both defensive sectors of the economy that are supposed to perform better later in the business cycle and in periods of recession. Consumer staples, another defensive sector, has blown away the normally stronger early and midcycle consumer discretionary sector—10.9 percent to 1.7 percent. The three other worst-performing sectors have been energy (–1.4 percent), telecom services (3.6 percent) and materials (4.8 percent).
Most analysts attribute the unusually strong performance of utilities at this stage of the business cycle to investors' search for yield in an environment of ultralow interest rates. While the Fed has ended its quantitative easing program, the yield on the 10-year Treasury bond is a paltry 2.3 percent—down from just over 3 percent at the beginning of the year. With their fat dividends and consistent if uninspiring economic performance, utility stocks have become a popular alternative to fixed-income investments. The strength of health-care stocks and consumer staples is likely a reflection of investors' continuing lack of confidence in the economy.
Read MoreLike it or not, Obamacare's juicing health stocks
"Normally, you want health-care stocks and consumer staples in down markets and consumer discretionary when markets are up," said Jerry Miccolis, manager of the Giralda Fund. He rotates in and out of sector exchange-traded funds based on technical price momentum, not business-cycle indicators. "It's hard to figure." | While the US economy seems to be in midcycle, sectors like utilities and health care continue to buck the historical trend. |
On January 15, the Swiss National Bank rocked financial markets and Swiss business when it gave up attempts to cap the franc's value against the euro.
Switzerland's export-oriented manufacturers have been hit badly by the franc's strength — a side effect of the European Central Bank's "quantitative easing" programme to prevent the eurozone falling into a deflationary slump. The country was also widely expected to become a casualty of economic turbulence and aggressive monetary policies in other parts of the world.
But Swiss hoteliers and tourist resorts have not fared as poorly as expected during the summer season, thanks in part to good weather and tourists from emerging market economies. Unemployment, meanwhile, remains low and second-quarter growth was boosted by consumer spending — even though price-conscious Swiss shoppers are increasingly crossing the border to shop in neighbouring eurozone countries.
The steep currency appreciation "was a shock but it was less severe than we expected — and that is a bit of a surprise", said Yngve Abrahamsen, senior analyst at the Zürich-based Kof Swiss economic institute.
Thomas Jordan, the SNB's chairman, has warned repeatedly that the franc is overvalued. But despite setting the lowest interest rates in the world, the SNB has failed to weaken the currency significantly.
More from the FT: Swiss shoppers stock up on eurozone goods Shock puts question over Swiss credibilityCurrency ceiling enjoyed short-lived success
"We have better [growth] data than expected — but 'better' is not 'good'. This is still far below Switzerland's potential growth rate," warned Claude Maurer, economist at Credit Suisse.
Switzerland's economy remains gripped by deflation with the franc's steep rise forcing exporters to slash prices and cutting import costs. Annual inflation was minus 1.3 per cent in July. "We don't see any growth impulses in the near future," Mr Maurer added.
During the Greece crisis, the franc acted as a haven for investors. Although it lost some of that status during the financial market turbulence of recent weeks, it remains about 11 per cent higher both against the euro and on a trade-weighted basis than before the January 15 decision.
The "Frankenschock" has left deep scars on the country's manufacturing sector, and is likely to be a campaign theme ahead of Swiss federal elections on October 18. New orders in the second quarter were the lowest since early 2009, when the world economy was reeling from the collapse of Lehman Brothers, the Swissmem industry association reported last week.
"We're still in the middle of this crisis, we don't know when it is going to end," said Ivo Zimmermann, Swissmem executive board member. A Swissmem survey of 400 companies showed 35 per cent expected to report an operating loss in 2015.
Among those complaining loudest are Swiss watchmakers, which have seen demand tumbling for their luxury products as a result of the slowdown in Chinese growth and Beijing's crackdown on corruption. Swiss watch exports in July were 9.3 per cent lower than a year earlier with sales to Asia down 21.4 per cent, according to the Swiss watch industry federation.
January's "Frankenschock" also alarmed the tourist sector, which feared steep falls in visitor numbers, especially from eurozone countries. Hoteliers in city locations, however, reported their worst fears had not been realised.
Patrick Hauser, joint owner of the luxury Schweizerhof hotel in Lucerne — with its historic buildings and breathtaking views of the Alps, a popular destination for Asian visitors — said US visitor numbers had remained stable while there had been a "tremendous increase" in tourists from Gulf states.
"On January 15 and 16 it was really hectic around here but looking at the situation now, we're really happy with the way things turned out," Mr Hauser said.
In the St Moritz mountain resort, near the Italian border, bookings at the start of the summer were 10 per cent lower than a year before. But the year-on-year drop is expected to be nearer 5 per cent by the end of the season in late October, according to the local tourist association. "The nice weather half-compensated for the strong franc," reported Ariane Ehrat, the association's chief executive.
Few in the industry are confident about making predictions for the coming months, however. Ms Ehrat said worries about future tourism flows from China and countries such as Russia "are something that we can feel . . . I'm not ready now to give you a forecast for the winter season". | Switzerland has escaped falling into recession, weathering a steep rise in the value of the Swiss franc, the Financial Times reports. |
"What is everybody upset about?" Landrieu asked from the Senate floor on Tuesday. "We already have 2.6 million miles of pipe in America." She noted that the Keystone project would add "basically 1,000 miles."
Landrieu, who faces a runoff against Republican Rep. Bill Cassidy in her home state Dec. 6, has fought to make the issue a top priority during the lame-duck congressional session. However, critics see her efforts as a last-minute attempt to win over voters in Louisiana, where the bill has gained public support.
Read MorePrivate equity bets on 'revolution'—in oil and gas
The House passed Cassidy's version of the bill on Friday.
Earlier in the year, the State Department concluded that the project would create 42,100 jobs and about $2 billion in earnings throughout the country. However, it defined those jobs as lasting for about a year.
Proponents of the construction argue it would help the U.S., which still imports about 30 percent of its oil supply, move away from relying on energy sources in unstable areas of the world. However, environmental activist who oppose the pipeline say it would jeopardize public health and spike carbon emissions.
The White House has indicated that President Barack Obama would veto the bill if it passed.
Read MoreCracks widen at OPEC as oil prices tumble | The Democrat-controlled Senate failed to gather the 60 votes it needed to approve the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline. |
Still, the central bank found pain points in examining factors including housing, savings, student loans and retirement, among others. The most common reason for renters not being able to afford a home was inability to pay a down payment.
Read MoreEconomists, markets mixed on 2015 rate hike
Nearly half of part-time workers said they would prefer to work more hours at their current wage. While 63 percent of respondents noted that they had saved at least some money in the year leading up to the survey, 20 percent said they spent more than they made in that period.
Roughly 40 percent of non-retirees had given little or no thought to retirement planning, while 31 percent had no retirement savings or pension.
About 5,900 responded to the survey, which the Fed conducted last October. It emphasized surveying individuals with incomes under $40,000 to accurately compare demographics.
Read MoreRates rising in 2015 if economy improves: Yellen | Americans took a more optimistic outlook on their economic future last year despite only "mild improvements" in their well-being. |
Women may be leaning in and climbing corporate ladders, but on the homefront, couples often still divide chores like it's 1965.
It turns out that same-sex couples are much less likely to use traditional standards for allocating chores. A newly released survey by the Families and Work Institute of 225 dual-earner couples found that, for the most part, same-sex couples used "a lot of mixing and matching" to divvy up household duties, said Kenneth Matos, the institute's senior director of research.
While that doesn't mean they share all responsibilities, there are lessons straight couples might learn from the process many same-sex couples use to divvy up household tasks.
Read MoreChore wars for working parents
Overall, the study found that same-sex couples tend to share more duties and assign various chores based on personal preference, while straight couples tend to slip back into traditional gender roles, with women, lower earners, and those with fewer work hours, taking primary responsibility for stereotypical female chores.
While the survey, which included 103 same-sex couples and 122 straight couples, found that same-sex couples did not have an "overabundance" of shared responsibilities, it found a greater proportion of same-sex couples do share the laundry, household repair and child care responsibilities than dual-income straight couples do.
In fact, same-sex couples were much more likely to share child care duties, the study found. About 74 percent of the same-sex couples shared routine child care and 62 percent shared sick child care, versus 38 percent of straight couples sharing routine child care and just 32 percent sharing the care of sick children. (Tweet this)
Part of the difference may stem from the fact that same-sex couples have already broken out of the normative family structure, said Matos. Male-female couples "sort of have a template," he said. "There is a lot of going ... really fast into the traditional gender roles and then saying, 'Wait a second, this isn't really where I want to be.' " Same-sex couples, in contrast, have already broken a mold, so they can have "a richness of imagination" when they divide domestic chores. | Opposite-sex couples tend to divide housework more traditionally than gay couples, but is that really a problem? You'd be surprised. |
While the cost-sharing trend began before Obamacare, researchers say more employers are making changes to lower plans' costs before the so-called Cadillac tax takes affect in three years.
One in four large companies has dropped traditional health plan coverage and now offers only high-deductible plans, according to PwC's "Behind The Numbers 2016" report. That's up 40 percent from a year ago, and an increase of 300 percent from 2009.
Read MoreInflection point for health-care costs
For workers, the shift has meant a big jump in out-of-pocket costs. Health-plan deductibles for in-network care have gone from an average of $600 in 2009 to $1,200 this year, according to PwC, citing data from Gallup.
Along with benefit changes, employers have added more health-care advisors, support programs and mobile search tools to help workers choose more affordable medical care options.
"It's certainly putting consumers in the driver's seat, whether they want to be there or not," said Thompson.
Read MoreWill these big Obamacare rates get approved?
The report cautioned employers to be careful about shifting too much of the cost burden to workers, because it could backfire. Some employees may avoid getting care for chronic ailments until they're sick, which could make treating their disease costlier in the long run. | Employer health-care costs will rise 6.5 percent, the slowest rate in 10 years, according to a forecast from PwC on medical cost trends. |
This year's rainfall is already expected to be below average and the additional impact from El Niño could see a return of high consumer price inflation, said Radhika Rao, economist at DBS.
"Assuming food inflation quickens to 7.5 percent on year in 2015, headline inflation could rise above the RBI's 2-6 percent inflation target." That will derail India's disinflationary trend, and delay rate cuts until the end of the year, she added.
Read MoreRBI cuts rates forthird time this year
In the Philippines, drier-than-normal weather conditions have seen vegetable prices rise and with a strong El Niño looming, the central bank won't be taking any chances despite a drop in near-term inflationary pressures, Barclays said in note.
"We continue to think it is unlikely the BSP will join other central banks in easing monetary policy. We forecast the next policy move to be a hike, most likely in the fourth-quarter."
Bucking the trend, the Bank of Thailand will likely be less concerned about price pressures, said BoFA's Chua.
"Thailand may be better placed this time given the large rice inventory (which will benefit from higher food prices), a more diversified economy, and negative headline inflation."
The central bank left its benchmark interest rate unchanged at its policy review on Wednesday following two straight cuts. | Severe weather shocks could hit central banks' scope for stimulating emerging markets, economists have warned. |
"The available choice of cargoes for some mills is still rather limited, but I don't think they're in a rush to buy now," said an iron ore trader in Shanghai.
Iron ore for immediate delivery to China's Tianjin port added 10 cents to $63.90 a ton on Tuesday, the highest since Feb. 16, according to The Steel Index (TSI).
Some traders at China's ports cut prices slightly "to stimulate sales," said TSI.
Inventory of imported iron ore at China's ports fell to 83.8 million tonnes as of June 5, according to consultancy SteelHome, which tracks the data. The port inventory, which has fallen 17.5 percent this year, is at its lowest since November 2013.
Read MoreChina's bid to lock in cheap iron ore
Among steel mills covered in a survey by Chinese consultancy Mysteel, the average inventory level of iron ore has dropped to 20 days of consumption from an average of 23 days in the first quarter, Goldman Sachs said in a report on Monday.
"Although the decline in inventory is relatively modest, the Chinese steel industry was operating with a lean supply chain that minimizes working capital, but that exposes steel mills to unexpected supply disruptions," Goldman Sachs said.
On Wednesday, the most-traded September iron ore contract on the Dalian Commodity Exchange was up 0.2 percent at 437 yuan ($70) a ton by the midday break. c | Iron ore held at its highest level in nearly four months as stocks of the commodity at China's ports dropped for the eighth consecutive week. |
Cornell said Target would benefit from CVS' scale, expertise and deep experience, as well as its large pharmacy benefit management network, which will now be shopping inside Target locations.
That gives Target the opportunity to leverage its wellness-related products, including over-the-counter health and beauty merchandise, wearables, fitness apparel and food offerings, he added.
Read MoreWhat CVS-Target deal means for you
"We think it complements our strategy, our focus on wellness, and we now have an expert in that space and a long-term partner that I think is going to help us drive traffic and growth," Cornell said.
The retailer is in the early stages of reinventing its food selection, and is acting on customer feedback by enhancing its assortment and presentation of natural, organic and gluten-free products, he said. Target is testing the initiative and will accelerate the changes early next year, he added.
—Reuters contributed to this story. | Target CEO Brian Cornell said a deal announced this week with CVS will help his company focus on signature categories. |
Sites and Sections was commissioned to give us an in-depth understanding of how GNM consumers interact with our content across print and online. The research provides an unrivalled insight into the readership of all individual print sections in the Guardian and Observer and all sites within guardian.co.uk.
Sites and Sections employs an innovative methodology to provide us for the first time with a detailed view on the audience cross-over between individual sites and sections, enabling us to size our total audience by content area across print and online.
Sites and Sections was conducted in conjunction with BMRB, the suppliers of the TGI database.
Its unique and innovative approach combines both self-reported recall data with web analytics tracking data to give an accurate picture of how GNM content is consumed.
The survey is based on a sample size of nearly 8,500 respondents, whose responses were linked to behavioural data on guardian.co.uk. This enabled us to accurately gauge online usage and it's cross-over with print.
• Topline readership and demographic profiles of all Guardian and Observer sections and guardian.co.uk sites within the last 7 days and the past 4 weeks• Cross-over readership of all GNM print and online sections• Rating of all sites and sections by interest• Frequency of reading / usage• Engagement with sites and sections, including time-spent• Media consumption habits
• 44% of Monday Guardian readers read MediaGuardian, whilst 43% of Wednesday readers read SocietyGuardian• Of the four weekly recruitment supplements, SocietyGuardian has the most positive influence on newspaper purchase, with a third of readers claiming that it positively influences their decision to buy Wednesday's Guardian• 37% of EducationGuardian* readers have also visited guardianjobs.co.uk in the past four weeks
*Base: Those currently looking for a job
62% of jobseekers who look in the Guardian's recruitment supplements do not look at guardianjobs.co.uk, giving you a pool of jobseekers that cannot be reached online
guardianjobs.co.uk offers a unique audience.
Proportion of guardianjobs.co.uk users who have not looked at the following sites in the last 4 weeks:
• fish4jobs.co.uk - 76%• totaljobs.com - 64%• jobs.ac.uk – 71%• monster.co.uk - 64%• reed.co.uk - 66%
• MediaGuardian/guardianjobs.co.uk has a past four week reach of 1.9 million in the UK• 60% of guardianjobs.co.uk users do not read MediaGuardian, enabling advertisers to really extend their reach by running cross-media campaigns across guardian platforms• Cross media insights are available across all Guardian sites and sections in print and online
For more information about Sites and Sections, please contact: | Find out about readership of each of our supplements or vertical sites |
10/01/2015 AT 04:45 PM EDT
's new single is titled "Music to Watch Boys To," but the singer puts her own physique on display in the video.
Rey, 30, dons a bikini for a swim with girlfriends in the dreamy clip. The eye candy doesn't stop there – various scenes show the songstress lounging in a luxe backyard as her handsome man works his muscles on the basketball court.
Although the plot isn't clear, there's no denying this video pays homage to California – a staple of Rey's work.
The new single follows up "High By the Beach," the
It's been an exciting year for Rey. Prior to releasing new music in August, she took a trip to Italy for the
, Pierre Casiraghi and Beatrice Borromeo, and inspired pal | The songstress shares endless eye candy in her new clip |
"Data is being courted by overseas cloud providers, so this is clearly hurting U.S. cloud providers," said Elad Yoran, chairman and CEO of Valutive, a cloud security solutions company. "Many places around the world are seeing this as an opportunity."
Another factor likely to accelerate the trend: Countries like Brazil and Germany are strengthening their data residency laws, which force companies to keep their data stored locally. In other words, if a company wants to store data in the cloud, it needs to do so on servers in the country in question.
A recent survey of 1,000 information and communications technology decision-makers from France, Germany, Hong Kong, the UK and the U.S. revealed that many businesses are in fact aggressively changing the way they store their data.
According to the survey, which was carried out by NTT Communications, 90 percent of respondents had changed the way they use the cloud and 16 percent had delayed or canceled contracts with cloud service providers.
"This is a big deal. It's a terrible problem being foisted on companies. And it's the Achilles' heel of cloud computing. It forces them to replicate their infrastructure around the world in the countries that are implementing these laws," Yoran said.
"The U.S. had such a strong position which is being in effect weakened by the proliferation of these laws and creates an opening for global competitors to get into the cloud market at the expense of business that would have otherwise gone to the U.S."
—By CNBC's Cadie Thompson. Follow her on Twitter @CadieThompson. | Snowden revelations about the NSA may be costing U.S. cloud companies billions, and their loss means big business for firms outside the country. |
Last week, Russia seized and destroyed tons of foods due to an import ban on Western foods. The ban was a reaction to sanctions imposed on Russia by the international community after it annexed Ukraine in March 2014. Earlier this week, Russia authorities hinted that new countries may be added to its list of banned food import ban.
According to Reuters, the watchdog's chief sanitary inspector, Yekaterina Slakova, appeared on Russian television earlier this week to show workers setting fire to boxes of roses while stating: "These are freshly cut flowers from the Netherlands infected with western Californian flower thrips."
Read MoreRussia's 'dreadful' recession set to continue
Russia has not directly imported Dutch flowers since 2007, as the Netherlands does not have fields free from flower thrips and thus stopped issuing certificates for cut flowers. Instead, shipments are sent through nearby EU countries (such as Bulgaria, Latvia and Lithuania) which check and certify the flowers.
However, Rosselkhoznadzor has claimed that Latvia and Lithuania will consult with Russia over the future of certifying Dutch flower imports; Latvia may remove Dutch flowers from shipments heading to Russia.
"We saw the pictures of Russian authorities burning flowers. According to their information these were Ecuadorian, Spanish, Italian and a small amount of Dutch flowers," Robert Roodenburg, director of the Dutch Association of Wholesale Floricultural Products, told CNBC via email.
"We would very much like to discuss the matter with the Russian authorities to assess how we could comply with the Russian demands."
- By Luke Graham, special to CNBC. Follow him on Twitter @LukeWGraham | After bulldozing a mountain of imported cheese from the West, Russian authorities have now turned to burning flowers from the Netherlands. |
The winner of the 2009 Stirling prize for architecture will be announced tomorrow night. Now in its 14th year, the prize is named in memory of James Stirling – one of Britain's most original and audacious modern architects – and sponsored by the Royal Institute of British Architects and the Architects' Journal. It's awarded to the "building that has made the greatest contribution to British architecture in the past year".
This week I revisited the 1998 winner for the first time in – well, three months, actually. In fact, I think I must have visited at least a dozen times, and glimpsed it many more times. This is the American Air Museum at the Imperial War Museum, Duxford, a thoughtfully landscaped, handsomely designed aircraft hangar of a building by Foster and Partners. The graceful structure is designed to fit around the wingspan of the terrifying Boeing B-52 Stratofortress bomber that broods, like some mechanical moray eel, at its heart. This is a highly popular venue, and a building that will endure both aesthetically and functionally for as long as it's called on to continue housing a superb display of US military aircraft. Even pacifists can enjoy it. The building is the modern equivalent of a medieval tithe barn, or some great 19th-century warehouse or train shed. Its handsome-is-as-handsome-does looks will endure, even if its use is changed. Admittedly, it's unlikely to be used for storing clapped-out tractors or bales of hay, but it would do the job all too well.
While I was there, I took the opportunity to ask people ambling through which was their favourite Stirling prize winner. Sadly, not one had heard of the prize, although one chap in a tweed jacket and immaculately pressed cavalry twills told me he had, for a brief while, been a navigator in a Stirling – a four-engined second-world-war bomber rather than a leading-edge architectural award. While we shouldn't be surprised that the Stirling prize is a mystery to most people wandering in and out of the latest buildings – which of us could list the winners of the Turner or the Mercury prize from years gone by? – we might stop for a moment to wonder what has happened to the reputation of other prize winners over the past 14 years, and what the prize is really about. Can you, for example, conjure the Centenary Building at the University of Salford by Stephen Hodder, the first Stirling prize winner, from 1996, in your mind's eye? Without looking it up, can you recall the Music School in Stuttgart by Michael Wilford, which won in 1997?
Although both Hodder and Wilford are active today, both have been overshadowed by louder talents over the past decade. As the prize got into its stride, buildings that are hard to ignore came to the fore, such as the truly eye-catching Lord's Media Centre (1999) by Future Systems, the Gateshead "Winking Eye" Millennium Bridge (2002) by Wilkinson Eyre, 30 St Mary Axe (aka "the Gherkin") by Foster and Partners (2004), and the hugely controversial, costly and yet undeniably fascinating Scottish Parliament Building (2005) by Enric Miralles, Bernadetta Tagliabue and RMJM.
Looking back on the Stirling's history does provide a kind of barometer of architectural fashions – what was hot at a particular point, what wasn't. But fashion is a fickle thing; architecture, on the other hand, takes a long while to settle down. What was all the rage in 1996 might seem outdated in 2009 – although who knows how such design might be judged 20 years from now? This is, in fact, my issue with the Stirling prize: it's all about instant appeal, the latest buildings. By its very nature, it is barely concerned with the life of buildings and their architects years down the line. I'd certainly be happier with the idea of the Stirling if it was awarded either for a building that had proved its worth, or one that had done the most to make some place – a street, a village, a town, a city – substantially and measurably better.
But I'd be interested to know what you think. Should we continue to award prizes and publicity to the most fashionable new buildings, or should we think more carefully about old ones that have served us well, even if – or perhaps especially because – they've been around for years? | Jonathan Glancey: Instead of rewarding the latest architecture, we should honour buildings that have had time to prove their worth |
Colin Andrew, who has died aged 79, was a gifted artist, a dedicated socialist and a decent, principled man with a gift for friendship and a wry wit.
He was born in Dundee to working-class parents who were both Tories. He started work as a teenager at the DC Thomson newspaper and comics publishing firm in his home town and Bill McCail's Mallard Features Studio in Glasgow. His first published work was in Lilliput magazine and in the local newspaper. Colin was entirely self-taught but his gifts were recognised by his fellow cartoonists early on and it was from one of them that he came to his lifelong commitment to leftwing politics.
After doing his national service in the RAF in his late teens, Colin moved to Kentish Town, north London, and spent the rest of his life in the area. He worked for the King-Ganteaume company, for whom he produced historical and western drawings for the L Miller and Son publications Pancho Villa and Rocky Mountain King. He met his future wife, Janet Quesnel, through mutual friends and they married in the early 1960s.
Colin was employed by a number of publications including Zip (for whom he did the Captain Morgan strip), the Daily Express (for whom he worked on the Jeff Hawke strip), the New English Library (for whom he did many book covers) and the comics Buster, Boys' World, Eagle, Lion and Tiger.
Colin was a member of the Kentish Town Communist party but he sided with China in the Sino-Soviet dispute of the 1960s. This led him and Janet to go to China in 1965. They ended up in the south-west province of Sichuan teaching English. Later they moved to Tientsin (now known as Tianjin) in northern China, and ultimately to the capital Beijing.
That was at the height of the Cultural Revolution and, faced with the closure of all the schools, they decided to return to London in the late 1960s. Colin worked in this period for a variety of publications including the Doctor Who Magazine, for which he did strips, while also developing his considerable gifts as an oil painter. He drew cartoons for the campaigning Camden New Journal from its inception in the 1980s. Though Colin ceased to be politically active, he never wavered from his socialist principles or forgot whose side he was on.
Although he and Janet had led separate lives for a number of years, they remained close. She and their daughters, Catriona and Shona, survive him. | Other lives: Illustrator and cartoonist who worked on magazines, newspapers and comics |
Earnings: AIG, Marathon Oil, Anglogold Ashanti, Tenet Healthcare, Sysco, CNA Financial, Ryan Air, Sysco, Herbalife
9:30 a.m.: Chicago Fed President Charles Evans
12:40 p.m.: Dallas Fed President Richard Fisher
2:00 p.m.: Senior loan officer survey
Earnings: Albibaba, Archer Daniels Midland, Burger King, Discovery Communications, Michael Kors, Estee Lauder, Intercontinental Exchange, Transcanada, Valero Energy, FireEye, Activision Blizzard, Regeneron, Motorola Solutions, Talisman Energy, Time Inc, Red Robin Gourmet Burger, Priceline, Dish Networks
Earnings: Time Warner, Tesla, Mondelez, Qualcomm, CBS, Toyota Motors, Tim Hortons, Holly Frontier, ING Group, Chesapeake Energy, Duke Energy, Towers Watson, Lamar Advertising, Rowan Cos, NRG, Scotts Mircale-Gro, Whole Foods, Tesla Motors, News Corp, Soar City, Zillow
9:15 am Minneapolis Fed President Narayana Kocherlakota
9:30 am Richmond Fed President Jeffrey Lacker
10:00 am Boston Fed President Eric Rosengren
Earnings: Disney, AstraZeneca, Siemens, AOL, AMC Networks, Molson Coors Brewing, Advance Auto Parts, First Solar, Cablevision, Echostar, Henry Schein, Apache, Scripps Networks, Wendy's El Pollo Loco, Lionsgate, Zynga, Biocryst Pharma, Cablevision, Enbraer, Calpine, Windstream, Con Ed, Tekmira
8:30 a.m.: Productivity and costs
10:40 a.m.: Chicago Fed's Evans
7:05 p.m.:Cleveland Fed President Loretta Mester
Earnings: Berkshire Hathaway, Allianz, Nippon Telegraph, ArcelorMittal, Humana
9:15 a.m.: Chicago Fed's Evans
10:15 a.m.: Fed Chair Janet Yellen on policy in Paris
1:00 p.m.: Chicago Fed's Evans
2:30 p.m.: Fed Vice Chair Daniel Tarullo | Stocks launch into November at record highs, but that does not mean the volatility that punctuated October's roller-coaster trading will end. |
Swain said the technology would not be used to replace a human in the process, but rather the devices would be used in collaboration with claims adjusters.
USAA filed for permission to begin testing last week, and by law the FAA has to respond within 120 days. If approved, the company will use five pound drones made by PrecisionHawk and will do all testing on the USAA campus and privately owned land in San Antonio that is unpopulated. A call to the FAA was not returned.
The FAA has kept a pretty tight reign on the use of commercial drones in the U.S. But the organization has increasingly come under pressure from numerous industries, as well as Congress, to implement the infrastructure so that drones can be used for business purposes.
Until recently only a handful of companies operating in the Arctic have the FAA's permission to operate drones commercially.
Read More Drones are invading the Arctic!
In September, however, the U.S. government gave six movie and television production companies permission to use drones for filming.
Tech giants like Amazon and Google hope to someday use the technology for deliveries and other industries like real estate companies aim to use the unmanned aircraft for photography.
Read MoreAmazon's big drones plans may stay grounded | Drones may someday be used in your insurance claims assessments. A San Antonio-based insurance company has filed a request for permission with the FAA. |
"The report is very bearish given the large increases in refined product inventories, and even though the crude drawdown was close to expectations, it seemed to disappoint," said John Kilduff, partner at Again Capital LLC in New York.
Brent crude for October delivery was down more than $1 to near $98 a barrel, off for a fifth straight session. and within view of its weakest levels since April 2013. Brent prices are off by 15 percent since hitting a year high above $115 a barrel in June, with fast-rising U.S. output and the return of exports from Libya creating a market that looks increasingly over-supplied.
U.S. crude finished down $1.08 at $91.67 a barrel, the lowest since January 9.
Oil prices on both sides of the Atlantic have dropped over the past three months, dragged down by soaring U.S. shale oil production which has replaced many imports from West Africa, Europe and other regions.
Total production from members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries rose last month despite Saudi Arabia saying it had cut output, according to the group's monthly market report on Wednesday. The OPEC report also cut the forecast for the expected demand for crude from the group by 160,000 barrels per day (bpd) in both 2014 and 2015.
The U.S. EIA said on Tuesday that U.S. output in August hit its highest level since 1986.
As prices have fallen due to higher production, traders and analysts have said that risks to supply from the Ukraine crisis and the difficult security situation in Iraq still remain. | Crude was hammered from all sides, dropping more than 1 percent on the day to new multi-month lows as traders feared the demand outlook. |
Earlier Monday, analyst Peter Boockvar said Greece may be a "sideshow" in the international economy, but developments there could exacerbate the biggest risk to global assets.
Investors have recently seen a global rise in interest rates, which could put pressure on U.S. stocks, which were "very expensive," said Boockvar, chief market analyst at the Lindsey Group.
"To me, Greece is sideshow to the global rise in interest rates that we've seen," he told CNBC's "Squawk Box." "Let's just say that Greece is temporarily solved, interest rates are going to start heading higher again, and to me that's the risk to global asset prices."
Read More Mohamed El-Erian: Grexit 'high probability'
Higher interest rates present an alternative to stocks for investors. When rates run up significantly, it can lead to a flight from equity markets.
Greece's "no" vote on new austerity was largely symbolic because the proposal was no longer on the table, but it moved Greece closer to default on an European Central Bank loan and signaled a potential first step toward its exit from the 19-nation euro zone.
While the U.S. 10-year Treasurys fell to 2.3 percent Monday, Boockvar noted that the yield went from about 1.85 percent to 2.5 percent between the end of January and the end of June.
Further uncertainty over the outcome in Greece and the broader euro zone would presumably lead investors to demand higher yields on the continent's debt to offset the risk of holding those assets.
Greek banks remained closed and capital controls in place ahead of a European Central Bank meeting Monday on emergency lending to the country and a summit of European Union leaders set for Tuesday. The ECB froze increases to emergency lending last week after Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras called the national referendum.
Read More'Toxic' Varoufakis is out: Time for a deal?
Greece has a 3.5 billion euro payment due July 20 on a bond held by the ECB. It entered arrears last week after failing to pay 1.6 billion euros on a bond held by the International Monetary Fund. | Developments in Greece and China bear watching but will have limited or no effect on the U.S. economy or markets, strategist Tom Lee says. |
Donald Urquhart's pen-and-ink drawings revel in tarnished glamour, dark dreams and kohl-black humour, and feature a cast of Hollywood sirens of yesteryear, broken divas, melancholy young men, drag queens and literary anti-heroes. All are realised in a style that mixes the simplicity of the Beano with the graphic finesse of Aubrey Beardsley.
Urquhart's leading ladies may have seen better days, but they're defiant to the end. In one 2005 drawing, the hollow-cheeked Judy Garland delivers the killer line: "We're all over the goddamned rainbow", while Urquhart's Joan Crawford Alphabet wallchart (2007) begins with "A is for Axe". His latest series, depicting Vanity Fair's irrepressible Becky Sharpe, takes as its model the hard-nosed Hollywood heroine Bette Davis.
Like the characters he celebrates, the Scottish artist is not one for being typecast. When he wasn't admitted into Glasgow art school he ended up in London, in the middle of the performance-art and drag-club scene of the 1980s, where he became a key figure in Leigh Bowery's circle. The 1990s saw him launch his own club night, The Beautiful Bend, co-hosted with friends Sheila Tequila and DJ Harvey. Urquhart has also worked as a postman, model and fashion journalist, but it was at the club that he created the drawings that would unexpectedly bring him art-world success.
Photocopied and stuck to the walls of the club, the pictures remixed history with droll social commentary and gothic camp. For one theme night, gay references were paired with images of hooded medieval plague doctors. They caught the attention of the likes of Wolfgang Tillmans, Cerith Wyn Evans, Michael Clark and gallerist Gregorio Magnani, who gave Urquhart his first gallery show in 2002. Only three years later, the artist was shortlisted for the Beck's Futures Award. His exhibition, Another Graveyard (2004–05), was bittersweet, provoked by the deaths of several friends that year, and containing drawings of roses scented with a specially created perfume.
Urquhart's fallen stars cling obstinately to a more exciting past, where the dialogue is always razor-sharp and the wardrobes are eternally stunning. But their fabulousness is maintained through gritted teeth, and their histrionics are tempered by heartache and disappointment.
Why we like him: For his alphabetical wallcharts, which feature characters such as Alfred Hitchcock as well as Joan Crawford – defiantly not the kind of thing you'd expect to find in a schoolroom. From his Alphabet of Bad Luck, Doom and Horror (2004) to his wicked A-Zs on the pitfalls of stardom, they're fiendish fun.
Phwoarh! Urquhart was once a pin-up model for the teen mag of yesteryear, My Guy.
Where can I see him? Urquhart's solo exhibition Bi is at both Maureen Paley and Herald Street galleries in London until 23 May 2010. | This drag queen turned draughtsman takes Judy Garland and other faded film stars far beyond the rainbow – with bittersweet results |
Following the usual political playbook, Jeb Bush, the former Florida governor who had been considered by many the favorite for the Republican nomination, has gone on the attack, calling Trump a Democrat in disguise and bashing him for speaking highly of Democrat Hillary Clinton. The rest of the Republican field has been happy to pile on.
Cruz, however, previously has had some words of praise for Trump. Cruz, the son of a Cuban immigrant, in July said he stood with Trump on immigration after Trump said that many illegal immigrants from Mexico are criminals.
But in the unprecedented move by Cruz to hold a dual event is a hope that he will benefit from the media attention Trump receives and get the real estate mogul's fans to give Cruz a serious look if—or when—the front-runner falls.
Read MoreThis may be the undoing of Donald Trump
The entire Republican field opposes the Iran deal, struck by President Barack Obama and five other world powers, which will lift sanctions on Iran in return for curbs on its nuclear program. On Tuesday, Obama secured 41 votes in the Senate for the deal, just enough to block a final vote on a measure for disapproval.
"Trump draws the media and we want to draw attention to the Iran deal," Cruz campaign spokesman Rick Tyler said. "He brings a lot of people into the process who have been checked out of politics and I like to imagine that a lot of those people have not heard from Senator Cruz directly." | Ted Cruz is hoping an unusual move will give him a boost: embracing Donald Trump to get his message in front of more Republican voters. |
The immediate next goal in that saga would be a second, headline-grabbing debate performance come Wednesday night, when the Republican contenders round up at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California.
Last month, Kasich received glowing praise with his performance in the first GOP presidential debate, where his measured, open-hearted response to a question about gay marriage captured a political press surfeited by a summer of Donald Trump. Slate called Kasich's comments "gracious"; The Washington Post described them as "touching"; and The New York Times instantly score him a winner.
Following this up with steady, gaffe-free work on the stump, Kasich has scaled to second in the latest New Hampshire polls. This, despite a very late entry into the race, which has given the Ohio governor comparatively little national ID, money to burn or room for error.
"As long as he is not on the cover of Sports Illustrated, when you are running a campaign against people with a lot more money or dynastic support, it doesn't hurt to get as much media as you can," Weaver told CNBC.com.
"In this cycle, it has its advantages to Gov. Kasich," said Matt David, an advisor to the pro-Kasich super PAC New Day for America who previously served with Weaver on the Huntsman campaign. "One of our biggest challenges is name ID, so anyone who is covering Kasich and covering him favorably is increasing his name ID."
But the press' assessments have not all been so welcome: Since Kasich's announcement, the campaign has faced repeated comparisons to Huntsman's failed effort, in no small part because of the familiar faces on both campaigns.
Although careful not to speak ill of their former client, Weaver et al. are relying on the supposition that Kasich is a more battle-tested political animal who can appeal to the base.
"You are talking about someone who has been in politics for a very long time, has faced very difficult elections in a swing state like Ohio, faced a couple elections to become governor and won a pretty convincing re-election," said David. | Presidential candidate John Kasich is trying to parlay some good press into something more than his preceding center-right media darlings could. |
Blame Jus Oborn, crabby despot of English doom-metal outfit Electric Wizard. Like a hapless sap twisting the Lament Configuration in a “Hellraiser” flick, Oborn, in sacking drummer Mark Greening and vilifying Rise Above label head Lee Dorrian, unwittingly conjured an unholy trinity. First, Greening reconnected with fellow erstwhile Wizard Tim Bagshaw, his rhythm-section partner on landmark 2000 LP “Dopethrone.” The pair then linked up with Dorrian, the former Napalm Death vocalist whose long-lived doom-stoner juggernaut, Cathedral, dissolved in 2013. On the trio’s self-titled debut, Bagshaw’s obsidian fuzz on guitar and bass congeals potently with Greening’s elephantine lurch; Dorrian’s howl matches the baleful peaks he achieved on the first and last Cathedral albums. Yet amid the Sabbath-ian undertow is ample range: gallows swing on “The Cross,” understated guitar heroics on “Nephthys,” obsessive meditations in “Living With the Dead” and “I Am Your Virus,” even desolate beauty on instrumental bonus track “Celestial Suicide.” Selfishly, you have to hope these guys held onto a few demons to purge another day.STEVE SMITH | You bet the members of this doom-metal supergroup hold a grudge, resulting in a debut that’s suitably sludgy and morose, yet maintains a surprisingly regal bearing. |
The federal government has processed less than a third of data retention plans submitted by internet service providers, while hundreds more have not even put forward proposals, placing them in technical breach of the country's metadata laws.
The Attorney-General's Department has confirmed that of the 229 plans submitted by ISPs to show that they comply with the laws - which require them to collect and store the metadata - just 79 have been processed.
Hundreds more ISPs have not even submitted plans, as they struggle to understand what is required of them in collecting and storing the metadata of Australians, despite the data retention laws coming into effect on October 13.
The more than 400 ISPs operating in Australia, which includes large telcos such as Telstra and also many smaller operators, had been given six months to ready themselves.
Internet Australia chief Laurie Patton says the process was flawed from the start, and has called on Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull to fast-track a review of the legislation, arguing it was rushed through when introduced, is too complex and will make some ISPs unviable.
"Successive attorneys-general, from both sides, rejected pressure from law enforcement agencies to bring in data retention legislation," he told AAP on Wednesday, adding that Attorney-General George Brandis and his department "were just following the then prime minister (Tony Abbott's) instructions".
The laws include a mandatory review of the data retention scheme within three years but Mr Patton said many ISPs cannot wait that long.
"It needs to be fixed now," he said.
"The information we got from Senate estimates last night confirms the implementation process is a mess."
Mr Patton also said the $131 million set aside to support ISPs through the implementation process fell well short of what was needed.
"Not only is the funding inadequate, there is no support for the ongoing cost of complying," he said.
"You don't have to be a rocket scientist to work out consumers are going to be slugged with additional access fees or that smaller ISPs are going to go broke." | Hundreds of internet service providers have failed to meet a federal government deadline for submitting plans for collecting and storing metadata. |
Law runs in part of the Goodell family. Charles went to Yale Law School and practiced before becoming a politician, and two of his sons have become successful lawyers.
Bill Goodell, the oldest in the family of five boys, is chief operating officer of Maverick Capital, Lee Ainslie's $9 billion hedge fund firm. He previously was with hedge fund legend Julian Robertson, as general counsel of Tiger Management.
During his roughly 10 years at Tiger, Goodell worked with the "Tiger Cubs," alumni—including Chase Coleman, Andreas Halvorsen, John Griffin, Steve Mandel and Chris Shumway—who left to launch their own funds.
Like his father, Bill Goodell has dabbled in politics and political influence. In 2012 and 2013, he was chairman of the Managed Funds Association, the top hedge fund lobbying group; he's still on the executive committee. He is also co-chair of the Environmental Defense Action Fund, the lobbying arm of the Environmental Defense Fund.
Bill said that his father taught him about the business of lobbying.
"You should never be afraid to walk away from a client—you need to keep your reputation," he said in an interview with CNBC.com. "That's a corollary to my dad's life. He was prepared to stand up for what he believed in and take heat for it." | The family of the NFL's Roger Goodell includes a maverick U.S. senator, the COO of a large hedge fund and the general counsel of a major company. |
In previous legal rulings judges have stopped short of saying Libor is relevant to all claims against banks but said it could be used in cases where contracts have been linked specifically to the benchmark.
Barclays is being sued for up to 70 million pounds ($112 million) by Guardian Care Homes, a UK residential care home operator, which alleges the bank mis-sold it interest rate hedging products that were based upon Libor.
The case has been delayed until April 2014 so the appeal decision can be heard. It started out as a complaint about the alleged mis-selling of interest rate swaps but a judge ruled last October that it could be amended to include claims of fraudulent misrepresentation connected to Libor manipulation.
(Read more: Libor rate to be administered by NYSE Euronext)
Barclays said the case has no merit because Guardian Care Homes had sufficient understanding of the products to make its own judgment over whether to enter into the agreements.
"The addition of a claim based on what happened with Libor does not change the bank's view. This business had a suite of advisors and a lot of financial experience and skill in-house," it said on Friday.
Barclays last year paid a $450 million to settle allegations it manipulated Libor, and UBS and Royal Bank of Scotland have been fined for manipulating Libor. Deutsche is among several other banks under investigation.
Deutsche Bank last year sued Indian property firm Unitech for the repayment of a $150 million loan made in 2007 by a consortium of lenders and for the repayment of $11 million owed for a related interest-rate swap.
(Read more: Europe sets out plans to stop Libor rigging)
But Unitech counter-sued, saying the loan and swap deal were linked to Libor interest rates, which at the time were being manipulated by some banks.
A U.K. court last month said Unitech must repay the loan, but said the dispute over the related swap should go to trial.
The judge said just because there was evidence the Libor rate had been manipulated did not make a loan void. But he said the terms of the swap agreement and its specific link to a Libor contract were more contentious.
"The defendant's attempts to introduce broad and unsupported allegations about Libor, which have already been rejected once by the High Court, are a bid to delay payment and divert attention from its unpaid debts," Deutsche Bank said on Friday.
Lawyers for Guardian Care Homes and Unitech declined to comment. ($1 = 0.6268 British pounds) | A British court will this week consider whether attempted manipulation of the benchmark interest rate Libor can invalidate loans and other deals. |
(Read more: Moore Capital set to hire SAC traders)
Karp's Tourbillon Capital Partners is a prime example.
Karp worked at SAC's CR Intrinsic unit from 2005 to 2009, where he was a generalist portfolio manager and director of research. After a stop as co-chief investment officer of Carlson Capital, Karp launched his own long/short equity hedge fund firm on Jan. 14, 2013 with about $250 million under management, half of it from U.K. pension funds.
Tourbillon has sucked in assets ever since.
The firm managed $750 million as of Jan. 1, according to a person familiar with the situation, and plans to add about $250 million more from investors over the second quarter. The fund plans to stop all new investment at about $1 billion, known as a "hard close."
Investors were evidently focused on Karp's investing skills. Tourbillon's flagship fund gained 20.7 percent net of fees in 2013, about the same as at SAC and nearly twice the return of the Absolute Return Global Equity Index, which gained 11.85 percent through November.
Impressively, the return was accomplished with an average net exposure over 2013 of 14.5 percent, meaning Tourbillon long bets on stocks barely outweighed its shorts. Some of the best performing hedge funds had exposures closer to 35 percent or 40 percent as of December.
Successful long trades included Japanese tech company SoftBank and Chinese online travel business Ctrip.com, according to investor letters obtained by CNBC.com.
Amy Zipper, Tourbillon's chief operating officer, declined to comment.
(Read more: No letup on risk for hedge funds this December)
Cowen's Suvretta Capital Management is another fast-rising fund run by an SAC alum.
Cowen worked as chief investment officer at SAC from 2008 to 2010, where he co-managed the firm's multi-billion dollar central investment portfolio with Cohen himself.
After time at Soros Fund Management in between, Cowen launched Suvretta, a long/short equity focused firm. The shop's funds opened to outside capital in October 2012 and attracted $165 million as of Jan. 1, 2013.
But thanks to a strong 26.3 percent net gain in 2013, the firm has more than $700 million as of Jan. 1 this year, according to investor materials obtained by CNBC.com. Cowen declined to comment.
(Read more: Hot new eBay item: SAC Capital polar fleece)
A third example is Shaver's Electron Capital Partners.
The firm's utility and infrastructure stock-focused team and strategy was part of SAC from 2008 to 2012 and managed an average of$1.3 billion. Shaver spun out and opened Electron to external investors on May 1 with $20 million.
Electron has already grown to $191 million after gaining 14.72 percent net of fees from March through December 2013, according to investor materials obtained by CNBC.com. That's more than double the MSCI World Utilities Index gain of 7.20 percent over the same period. Recent winners include long bets on the stocks of energy companies NRG Yield and Pattern Energy. Shaver declined to comment.
Of course, not all SAC alums have fared as well.
Paul Orwicz, a portfolio manager at SAC for 11 years, left to launch Sursum Capital Management in March 2010 and raised significant assets to run $720 million by April 2011. But double-digit losses in 2011 causes Orwicz to shut the long/short equity firm and rejoin SAC.
(Read more: Jury finds SAC Capitol Advisors' Michael Steinberg guilty)
A more recent stumble came at Adams Hill Partners, run by SAC alum Andrew Schwartz. An SAC portfolio manager from 2004 to 2012, Schwartz raised $334 million from investors as of Dec. 1, 2013 after launching in January 2013.
But redemptions could come after his industrials, mining and materials-focused fund performed poorly in 2013, losing 8.58 percent through November, according to investor materials obtained by CNBC.com. Recent losers for the low-net exposure fund were short bets on two unnamed chemical companies and a refining company.
Adams Hill didn't respond to a request for comment.
Regardless, observers don't expect investors to automatically reject the funds of future SAC alums. Recent or planned launches have come from SAC portfolio manager David Vogt's Point Harbor Partners and Anil Stevens, who co-managed recently-shut SAC unit Parameter Capital Management.
"There is very little sense of stigma," said one investor consultant who tracks hedge fund launches closely.
SAC has been reeling from a string of insider trading convictions and settlements. Most recently, portfolio manager Michael Steinberg was found guilty on Dec. 18 for various violations. He faces time in prison. Another, Mathew Martoma, faces trial imminently.
In early November, SAC pleaded guilty to criminal insider trading charges and agreed to pay a $1.2 billion fine. Cohen, who has not been personally charged with any crime, also agreed to stop managing outside capital. That was on top of a $616 million fine by the Securities and Exchange Commission for related charges.
(Read more: Trial to Begin for Ex-SAC Trader Who Cut No Deal)
A spokesman for SAC didn't respond to a request for comment, but a recent SAC statement made clear it didn't believe there was a culture of corruption, as the government alleged.
"We take responsibility for the handful of men who pleaded guilty and whose conduct gave rise to SAC's liability," the firm said on Nov. 4, 2013. "These wrongdoers do not represent the 3,000 honest men and women who have worked at the firm during the past 21 years." | The SAC brand starts 2014 severely sullied, but that negative reputation hasn't stopped recent alums of the firm from raising piles of cash. |
In fact, wheezing was three times as common among children who had less exposure to those allergens early in life.
The protective effect of early exposure to allergens was amplified if the home also contained a wide variety of bacteria.
The reason may be that "a lot of immune system development that may lead someone down the path to allergies and asthma may be set down early in life," Wood said.
Read MoreThe OpenTable for doctors hits the office
Researchers aren't ready to try to translate the new findings into practical advice for parents. But, Lloret said, we now know that "strict avoidance of allergens from the beginning does not protect you, and early exposure in the right context may make the difference between disease and tolerance. You could say that this is the downside of cleanliness."
The new findings may upend advice experts have been giving to parents on the topic of pets and newborns.
"Twenty years ago we used to tell parents to get the cats and dogs out of the house," Wood said. "This shows that the younger the child is when you get a pet, the better."
—By Linda Carroll, NBC News | A study suggests that exposure to cat dander, bacteria, and even rodent and roach allergens may help protect infants against allergies. |
Popeye, you've had enough spinach.
Ovie dressed up as Matt Harvey ... Batman. His fiancee, Nastya Shubskaya, matched as Batgirl.
The Washington Capitals winger's wife has her dalmatian on a leash. Lauren Oshie dressed as Cruella De Vil from 101 Dalmatians.
There is a lot going on here, but take note of Steven Adams as the Joker from The Dark Knight, Kevin Durant as Miles Logan of Blue Streak and Russell Westbrook as Steven Adams.
D-Will jumps on the Game of Thrones bandwagon with a Khal Drogo costume.
Apparently Lurch from The Addams Family is a hit among Germans. After all, Frankenstein was created in Germany.
Tony Stewart dressed as his alter ego, "Tanya." Here he is with Kurt Busch's crew chief, Tony Gibson, who dressed as an expletive.
This kid is not an athlete (yet), but he dresses the part.
Oh, and here is the canine version.
The Around the Horn analyst went all in with a James Harden costume on-air.
Tim Tebow dressed as (an incredibly jacked) SWAT team officer arresting Paul Finebaum, costumed as a jockey.
The Oklahoma coach turned into Yoda after the Sooners handled Kansas, 62-7.
The Cougars dress up as players from Remember the Titans, which may have outdone their costumes from The Sandlot a year ago.
The two-time NBA champ is Captain America for a night.
The Penguins winger is timely with a Marty McFly costume, while Pascal Dupuis dons a respectful Minion costume.
The Lakers rookie embraces Los Angeles as Eazy-E.
The Maple Leafs captain takes Halloween seriously.
The couple turns into vampires by night.
The USWNT goalkeeper usually intimidates, but on this night, she was chicken.
The Buffalo Sabres mega-rookie is also a fashionable unicorn.
The NHL legend is some sort of vampire-alien.
This is probably photoshopped, but it should still make Bill Belichick cringe.
Even a king can be Prince.
The skier gets in the spooky spirit.
The Panthers linebacker mocks his quarterback. Never hit the redshirt in practice.
The man, the myth, the legend.
The soccer star couple crushes the Serena-Drake game.
Not that Smith ever acts like a baby ...
K-Love rocking the fictional Flint Tropics jersey from Semi-Pro.
Russell Wilson goes with the standard Dark Knight look. Girlfriend Ciara complements as Catwoman.
The current and former tennis stars apparently take this picture from Paris.
Good, the U.S. could use some top-notch American tennis talent.
He is new to New York and does not know there is only one Thor: Mets pitcher Noah Syndergaard.
Brook Lopez (Darth Vader) would not be outdone by his twin brother and rival center, Robin. | Most of the time, fans only get to see the serious side of athletes. Halloween weekend always seems to bring out the best in people. Below are some of... |
Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner
11/18/2015 AT 08:55 AM EST
As they've done since announcing their
, 43, continue to put their differences aside for their three children – and the holidays will be no different.
"Jen and Ben are figuring out right now how they can best spend the holidays together," a source tells PEOPLE in this week's issue, adding that Garner, "wants to get along with Ben for the kids' sake."
in Boston on his next film
which he stars in and directs, he was back in Los Angeles on Nov. 14, where he and Garner took the kids cupcake decorating and to a toy store.
"Ben and Jen chatted a bit," says a source. "But mostly they seemed focused on making the day fun for the kids."
David Beckham is PEOPLE's 2015 Sexiest Man Alive | Despite their recent split, Jennifer Garner and Ben Affleck plan to rally together for their children during the holidays |
Having late-night T service is like owning a pair of Manolo Blahniks.
Expensive, impractical, and yet aspiring and completely necessary.
But these are tough times for the MBTA, and the fiscal control board is ready to do away with frills. Yankee frugality runs deep in this fiscally conservative Baker administration, and the bottom line is that a T struggling to run trains in the winter can’t be splurging on shepherding bar-hopping millennials.
I admit the numbers are jaw-dropping, just like a $695 pair of Manolos: Late-night is bleeding $14 million a year to ferry 13,000 riders a weekend night between 12:30 and 2 a.m. That amounts to a subsidy of $13.38 a rider.
But here’s the thing: Public transportation is a money loser. Governments run trains and buses so people can get around whether it’s to a job, to attend school, or to go out to dinner. You shouldn’t be looking at how much money is lost, but how much the region can gain. Late-night service helps Boston proclaim itself a world-class city with a straight face — and attract the young and talented who crave being in a city that hardly sleeps. The service also offers an affordable option home for blue-collar restaurant workers who otherwise have to take expensive cabs.
Agency officials deem their experiment with extended hours unsuccessful and expensive to subsidize.
You can’t do the simple math and just conclude that the numbers don’t add up on late-night service.
Mayor Marty Walsh, for one, is not happy. He wants the T to yet again extend its late-night pilot which began in March 2014. He wants to build a late-night culture in Boston and is studying whether to keep bars, restaurants, and nightclubs open past 2 a.m.
“Cutting service, I don’t think that necessarily helps the MBTA,” said Walsh. “What we’re trying to do is encourage people to take the train.”
If anything, the mayor thinks ending the late-night schedule could hurt ridership in the earlier evening hours because more people will decide to drive. If the T wants to boost ridership, Walsh thinks it can do a better job marketing the extended hours.
At the control board meeting Wednesday, late-night service felt like it was on life support, with board member Monica Tibbits-Nutt declaring: “I’m fine with just getting rid of it.”
When I got on the phone with her on Thursday, she clarified her position: “I’m not against late-night service. I love late-night service. I am against this particular pilot. I don’t think it is working.”
Night owls, this is what counts as good news. I think everyone can agree late-night service as currently conceived is too expensive. The best we can hope for is that the control board and T brass seriously look at alternatives that make more financial sense, namely by finding private partners and raising fares.
Initially, the pilot included private-sector support from organizations such as Dunkin’ Donuts, the Massachusetts Restaurant Association, and The Boston Globe. The hope was that more companies would become corporate sponsors, but that never took off.
Yet you also have to wonder how hard the T is trying to save late-night T. Bob Luz, the president of the restaurant association, told me that his group is so happy with the program that its board agreed to double its initial investment if the pilot continued. Luz said he has yet to hear from the T on whether it could use the money.
If late-night service were to continue in some form, Brian Shortsleeve, the T’s new chief administrator (a.k.a. chief bean counter), is setting the bar high on what would be acceptable. The average subsidy for regular MBTA service, including commuter rail and the paratransit program The Ride, is about $2. That’s how much late-night should cost the agency.
“If we are going to be fair,” said Shortsleeve, “I compare everything against the average.”
To rein in costs, the T will need to get creative. For starters, the bus subsidy is nearly five times the cost of the subway. So cut after-hours bus service, keep the trains, and hire Bridj, the pop-up bus service that runs 14-passenger shuttles on demand-based schedules.
Shortsleeve thinks Bridj is innovative. One idea is to let the Boston startup use the T stations as pick-up and drop-off points, and design routes.
The T is also open to the idea of partnering with Uber and Lyft. Perhaps there’s a way to integrate the ride-hailing services into the T system to make them after-hours options. Atlanta, for example has linked Uber to its transit authority app.
For its part, Lyft is in discussions in other cities about providing late-night service by offering a 50 percent discount, a program that would be underwritten by transit agencies. It’s an idea that could be brought to Boston. We shouldn’t subsidize all late-night riders, but the T could give breaks to monthly passholders.
The agency could also classify late-night as a special service and charge say, $4 a ride instead of $2.10. The T already upsells trains from South Station to Patriots games in Foxborough for $15 per round trip.
No doubt the T control board can figure something out. There is a way, but the bigger question is if there is a will. | It’s expensive and impractical, but its success is also about more than dollars and cents |
This sponsorship is just the beginning of the journey toward acceptance as a medium of exchange. I have also partnered with Moolah (www.moolah.io) so that any retailer in the world can accept Nautiluscoin and convert those coins into seven major fiat currencies. In the next few weeks, retailers will be able to accept Nautiluscoin for both online and offline transactions. As well, members of the Nautiluscoin community are launching several new ventures that will use Nautiluscoin exclusively.
Read MoreOp-ed: Why Warren Buffett is wrong on bitcoin
As digital currencies mature, they have the potential to become a new investment asset class. Some will be used as a broad medium of exchange, while others will solve specific economic problems. This emerging asset class is in training daily and fighting to become a new way to diversify an investment portfolio.
Brian Kelly is founder and managing member of Brian Kelly Capital LLC, a global macro investment firm catering to high net worth individuals, family offices and institutions. He is also the creator of the BKCM Indexes, benchmarks for multi-asset money managers. Kelly, a CNBC contributor, often appears on "Fast Money." Follow him on Twitter @BrianKellyBK. | "Fast Money" regular Brian Kelly created his own bitcoin-like currency. So what happens now? Naturally, a fight! |
Luftwaffe ("Germany's Thomas Muller's header got more air than the Luftwaffe.")
Pincer movement ("I haven't seen a pincer movement like that since Ardennes!")
Vichy ("Looks to me like the French are flopping to buy time. It didn't work for the Vichy government, and it won't work now.")
Axis or Allies ("The Germans have tilted the axis in their favor, and the French are running out of allies.")
Read MoreUS-Belgium game prompts angry waffle backlash
World War III ("Oh, that was a nasty foul. Is he trying to start World War III?")
Invasion ("And the German invasion begins anew.")
Panzer ("France is getting mowed over by German Panzers.")
Gaul, or de Gaulle ("GAAAAUUUUUULLLLL!!!!" when France scores. "He scored de Gaulle!")
Well, I'd say based on my bad puns, it looks like Germany may prevail.
Let's kick it up a notch. | Since most of us are off Friday, let's make the match more fun. Here's a proposed France vs. Germany ESPN drinking game. |
1. Maintain a clean machine.
Keep any device connected to the Internet free of malware infections. Make sure you're running up-to-date security software, operating systems and applications—important, because application updates often include security advances.
2. Have long, strong, unique passwords.
Create a password you can remember but that's difficult for others to guess. Lock your mobile devices and tablets. Thirty percent to half of users have not enabled a password or PIN on their mobile devices.
When in doubt, throw it out. An antenna should go up if a pop-up threatens you to act immediately or else. Do not click!
(Read more: Zeus is loose: The remaining suspects)
4. Censor yourself on social networks.
How much of your data is public? What do you post about yourself—location, habits, plans? Disclosing where you're taking your vacation or turning on the tracker enables identity theft.
In addition, be mindful of what you post online about others. We sit on vast amounts of data concerning family, friends and colleagues. Be a good steward of that information.
There are simple ways to ensure that a website is secure. Make sure the URL begins with "https," as such sites encrypt log-in information before sending it to the server, thus keeping it safe from hackers. You also can check for an icon that looks like a lock somewhere in the browser window.
6. Back up your files.
Ransomware—a malware that places restrictions on a computer that can be lifted only when payment is made—is one of the latest developments in hacking. For example, CryptoLocker scrambles files with essentially unbreakable encryption and demands a ransom to retrieve them.
(Read more: With this malware, you pay to get files back)
Backing up files on an external hard drive will help keep them safe, even if those on a computer are deleted
The best way to ensure that online accounts are safe is to have a separate computer that's used only for banking. An alternative for the average person is to ask about which security services your bank offers, such as multifactor authentication.
—By Fredricka Ransome, Special to CNBC | Cybercrime is on the rise, with some hackers even demanding ransom. Learn how to ward off the bad guys. |
The multibillion‐dollar men's clothing industry, in a determined effort to increase its sales, is concentrating its efforts around a single word that has paid for many Florida vacations for women's garment manufacturers.
Never before has this traditionaily staid and slow‐changing industry, which includes many companies whose origins date back to the 19th century, placed such emphasis on style, color, fabrics and patterns. And while the transformation of men's wear into a 100 per cent fashion industry still has a long way to go, the changes in recent years have indeed been significant.
The changes of the past, as well as the changes expected in the future, will be highlighted this week in Los Angeles at the 46th annual convention of the National Association of Retail Clothiers and Furnishers.
More than 6,000 retailers of men's and boys' apparel throughout the country are expected to attend the meetings, which begin today and end on Thursday. At the Biltmore Hotel in downtown Los Angeles, they will listen to speeches and panel discussions, trade ideas with their colleagues and visit the exhibits of some 350 manufacturers who will have their fall, 1964, lines on display.
Retailers and manufacturers preparing for the convention last week were discussing the changes that the new fashion approach has brought to their industry. Large‐scale marketing and advertising campaigns built around design and styling, a deemphasis on price as a consumer selling tool and the introduction of a host of new accessories for
This business, started in tiny lofts and cramped garages largely by immigrants from Europe, is a major force in the economy today. For the former tailors, operators and bushel men who founded the industry have created large corporations with factories throughout the country and modern showrooms at 1290 Avenue of the Americas.
On the wholesale level, men's and boys' apparel sales amounted to $3,694,806,000 out of total apparel sales of $10,026,855,00(in 1962, the latest year for which Department of Commerce figures are available.
At retail, sales ot male apparel were $9.4 billion last year, according to the American Institute of Men's and Boys' Wear. Total retail apparel sales in 1963 came to an estimated $26.3 billion. The increase in men's wear sales to the consumer was 3 per cent last year, a percentage that industry sources expect will be topped in 1964.
Sales of the some 24,000 stores that specialize in male apparel will surpass $3 billion in 1964, the National Association of Retail Clothiers estimates, up about 5 per cent from $2,822,500,000 last year.
In units of clothing, last year's volume included more than 20 million suits, about 12 million sport jackets, more than 100 million pairs of trousers and some 6 million overcoats and topcoats.
To this must be added the millions of dress and sport shirts shorts, sweaters, bathing suits, jackets, raincoats, hats, ties and other items of attire sold by men's wear merchants.
Fewer and fewer manufacturers are producing this clothing and furnishings. Louis Rothschild, executive director of the retail clothiers association, estimates that there are about 900 manufacturers of tailored clothing today, compared with 1,900 in 1944.
A similar decline has taken place in the number of concerns making men's furnishings, he says. Mr. Rothschild's estimate is 1,500 such manufacturers currently operating, half the number 20 years ago.
“Our industry is growing in volume while shrinking in terms of the number of firms involved,” notes Louis G. Pfeifle, president of the American Institute of Men's and Boys' Wear. “In recent years there has been an accelerated pace of mergers, consolidations and liauidations in the industry.”
President Johnson, in his short tenure so far, has already had an effect on styling of men's clothing. The president of a major corporation in the field says that designs of shirts, suits and hats will all reflect the President's Western influence.
In hats, particularly, the influence is expected to be strong. The hat industry is planning to bring out many new modified Western models soon to capitalize on this consumer interest in Western styling.
One hat maker notes “the people on Madison Avenue may not wear 10‐gallon hats but they will wear a modified Western hat.”
The Johnson influence comes at a time when the hat industry can use an extra push. The late President Kennedy was rarely photographed with a hat, even though he was understood to wear them. And Friday, the John B. Stetson Hat Company announced that it was planning to close its plant in Danbury, Conn., once a thriving hatproducing center.
To sell more apparel, manufacturers and retailers are promoting fashion to the hilt. Speakers at the convention this week will analyze fashion as a selling tool and exhibitors will stress the fashionability of their merchandise whenever they can buttonhole a buyer.
Hart Schaffner & Marx has even gone so far as to hire a Boeing 727 jet airplane for a one‐hour flight around Los Angeles this afternoon during which it will present a show entitled “The Flight of Fashion” for men's fashion editors.
This emphasis is, of course, reflected in the advertisements appearing in publications read by men's wear retailers. An example: the February issue of Gentlemen's Quarterly has ads that use phrases that might be found in women's fashion magazines. These include such terms as “really great scents,” “the elegance of simplicity” and “the ultimate in wash ‘n’ wear.”
Nor is it only by inference that men's wear merchants and manufacturers are imitating the successful fashion techniques of the women's wear field. Leaders of the industry are coming right out and saying so.
For instance, Charles H. Salesky, president of the Hat Corporation of America, declares, “We can learn a great deal from the women's wear industry where competitors are on the ball and change fashion and give women what is fashionable immmediately and a 'wait until next eaar' attitude”
According to Mr. Pfeiffe of
Fashion no longer Is something that the he‐men regards as strictly for women and sissies Mr. Pfeifle believes. “The American man of today,' he says, ”does not think fashion is an ugly word but believes it lends a dash and dignity to his appearance.”
This sentiment was endorsed by Stanley Goldman, president of Eagle Clothes, Inc. “It should be emphasized, however, that quality standards are just as important an adjunct to men's clothing as they are to women's apparel,” he said.
Michael Daroff, chairman and president of Botany Industries, Inc., says fashion “is the major selling force in our industry. It gives the consumer a primary reason for replacing his wardrobe.”
But Mr. Daroff, a practical man, doesn't underestimate the power of a woman in the fashion consciousness of men. “A man goes into a store with his wife and she has a lot to say about what he buys,” he observes. “She wants her husband to buy stylish clothes because then he compliments her.”
The post‐World War II trend toward casual living stimulated the sale of sportswear and furnishings, which had previously been overshadowed by tailored clothing. In recent years, fashions iin such items of casual wear as sport shirts and sweaters have affected the entire men's market and made it much more responsive to changing times.
Fashion ‐ awareness among men has also been stimulated by clothing imported from such European countries as Britain and Italy. Gerald Abrahams, deputy chairman of the British Mennswear Guild, says that a bold look in the clothing produced by many manufacturers in his country has helped create a strong image for the industry there.
A major spur to fashion in men's clothing is the emergence of the style‐conscious and affluent teen man's (14 to 17 years old) and young man's (18 to 24 years old) market. Tailored clothing, sportswear and furnishings have all been affected by the changing tastes of the teen‐ager and college man, who are proving to be the influentials in the development of styles that permeate through all age brackets.
Thus, Edward G. Salloom of Eddy's men's store in Worcestor, Mass., reports that “we have to get new looks all the time” to satisfy the demands of this burgeoning market. Tapered shirts and trousers are examples of such looks that started in the young men's field and caught on everywhere.
Not only are members of this rapidly expanding group setting style trends but they are also buying the merchandise that develops from these trends. A recent survey by E. I. du Pont de Nemours & Co. indicates that the average college man bought more units of apparel, paid more them and selected more of them himself than the average man 15 years older.
The survey revealed that college men added an average of $387 worth of clothing to their wardrobes last year, while the older group, members of Junior Chamber of Commerce, bought $265 worth of apparel.
Fashion is even an important element in selling clothing to young boys. Clara Hancox, director of programming of the Boys' Apparel Manufacturers' Association, tells of mothers of 6‐year‐olds who exclaim indignantly to clerks selling unfashionable boys' merchandise. “He'll never wear that” and really mean it.
Shirley Trosk, executive secretary of the Boys' Apparel Buyers' Association, says that boys' clothing has become fashionable as well as utilitarian. Shoppers “are very happy to find this,” she believes.
Fashion, of course, has many faces. In tailored clothing, for example, there are three basic styles that have won‐acceptance
While all of these styles have their proponents, the classic look‐known in the trade as the bread ‐ and ‐ butter line—represents close to 50 per cent of all men's suit sales. In this style,shoulders are trim, lines are straight and slim and trousers are either plain or pleated.
A number of men's wear manufacturers are counting on stretch fabrics to give an impetus to their business this year. This development—which took hold in the women's wear field a few years ago and has since become an important factor in sales of such items as sportswear, bathing suits and foundation garments—is beginning to make slight inroads in male apparel.
For instance, Timely Clothes, Inc.; is planning a big promotion of all‐wool stretch suits this fall. Among the other manu facturers that have produced and sold stretch suits are Hart Schaffner & Marx and B. Kuppenheimer & Co. McGregorDoniger, Inc., is active in the production of sportswear with stretch fabrics.
Stretch fabrics offer one‐way (either horizontal or vertical) or two‐way stretch. Their advantages in men's apparel are functional, giving greater comfort, and esthetic, offering attractive fit. McGregor believes that “this will be the year when stretch becomes widely wanted, distributed and appreciated.”
However, some manufacturers report that stretch fabrics have a long way to go before they they become the standard in tailored clothing. One big producer says, “We're still feeling our way in this area.”
Howard Shapiro, manager of the stretch fabrics department of Waumbec Mills, Inc., notes that in the men's wear field,stretch has made its biggest impact thus far in sportswear. “The last place stretch will have a major effect,” he says, “is in tailored ciothinm.”
Retailers and manufacturers agree that the recent trend toward a greater use of lighter shade—like irridescents, gray, olive, wheat and clay — and lighter fabrics in clothing will continue next fall. However, John D. Gray, president of Hart Schaffner & Marx and president of the Clothiing Manufacturers Association says that the darker colors are still selling well and will continue to do so next fall.
“There's also a definite trend to fluffy fabrics in sport coats,” Mr. Gray asserts, “with more of a nap. This is also true for topcoats and overcoats.”
The clothiers and furnishers at the Los Angeles convention of their working time trying to learn new ways to persuade men to buy more clothes. The success that they have will play a large role in determining what the American male will wear in 1964.
This article can be viewed in its original form. Please send questions and feedback to archive_feedback@nytimes.com | Traditionally staid indus turns to stress on style as sales incentive; illus; some mfrs and retailers int |
Pope Francis is a popular pope.
A poll released Thursday from Quinnipiac University found that 66% of Americans have either a “favorable” or “very favorable” view of the Pope, who arrives in America in late September.
The Pope’s popularity crosses wide—and often surprising—swaths of American society. While it might not come as a shock that 87% of Catholics are fans of the Pope, 61% of Protestants and 63% of people who follow “no religion” count themselves as Francis fans.
“Pope Francis is sparking a resurgent confidence in the Catholic Church as more Catholics, Protestants and those with no religion believe the Vatican is steering The Church in the right direction,” Tim Malloy, assistant director of the poll, said in a statement.
Pope Francis’s leadership of the Catholic Church has presented a clear gender divide, with women in favor of the pontiff more than men. While 69% of female respondents had positive views of Pope Francis, 63% of males felt the same.
The poll found that 76% of Catholic women felt the Catholic Church was moving in the right direction, compared to 62% of Catholic men. The gender divide played out again when adult Catholics were asked if church leaders were in touch with modern American Catholics: 57% of women felt so, compared to 47% of men.
The poll’s results come a day after the Pew Research Center released a survey of the changing state of American Catholicism. While 9 out of ten American Catholics believe a household headed by married heterosexual parents is ideal, growing segments of the faith are willing to accept non-traditional families—whether they be unmarried heterosexuals, gay or lesbian couples, single parents, or divorced individuals.
The Pew study points to an American Catholicism that is much more flexible than ever before and has embraced Pope Francis—whose popularity among even ex-Catholics and those who consider themselves “cultural” Catholics is strong (at 59% and 73%, respectively). Francis’ liberal bent and willingness to address contemporary social issues like gay marriage, abortion, poverty, and climate change have made him an icon that transcends the religion. And within the faith, Catholics believe the Church must address these issues, with overwhelming majorities saying the Catholic Church should allow for birth control and acceptance of divorce.
Much of this support for the Church’s direction come from Millennials, with older generations—particularly those in the 65-and-over bracket—being much more reluctant to bending from conservative views. But Catholics are increasingly positive that by 2050, the Church will change its views on contraception, cohabitation, and maybe even gay marriage, respondents said.
Read next: The Top 4 Misconceptions About Pope Francis
Download TIME’s mobile app for iOS to have your world explained wherever you go | Most Americans like the pontiff, even if they aren't Catholic |
Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures/Lucasfilm Ltd./Everett; Inset: ChinaFotoPress/Getty
12/18/2015 AT 02:10 PM EST
James Bond has gone undercover.
has an incognito cameo in the latest
movie – but good luck spotting him behind a stormtrooper mask.
Multiple unnamed sources confirmed to
were filming near each other,
and Craig decided to sneak the actor into the film.
"He did it for sh--s and grins," a source told
of Craig's motives for filming his uncredited cameo.
Craig even has a line in the film, and read
's story for a spoiler-y account of his scene. | The Spectre star has a small, uncredited role in Star Wars: The Force Awakens |
By Chancellor Agard and Emily Strohm
12/21/2015 AT 06:45 PM EST
If you think HSN superstar
's inventions are inspiring, just wait until you see her organized (and product-filled) closet.
, took PEOPLE Now through her home and gave us a peek inside her closet, which is filled with her greatest hits on HSN.
"I see the world through product," says Mangano, 59. "If there's a problem can it be solved in a better way? That's just the way I think. I just can't stop thinking that way."
Inside her pristine closet, you'll find clothes on her Huggable Hangers, the No.1 best selling product in the history of electronic retailing; her own My Little Steamer neatly tucked away on the side; and a basket of her bleach-safe and cosmetic resistant.
But don't try to ask the single mother of three which of her products is her favorite. "There is not an answer to that question," she says, comparing it to being asked which one of her children is her favorite.
The Brooklyn-born inventor's Long Island mansion is just as neatly organized as her closet.
"This home means my family has a place to come. I always my whole life of having a big welcoming home," she says of her 42,000 sq.-ft. house. It's my space to really kind of chill out and think of more product." | Joy Mangano takes PEOPLE Now inside her incredible closet |
12/29/2015 AT 09:35 AM EST
Helen Strickland, the wife of country singer Craig Strickland, asked fans to "keep praying" following her husband's
in Oklahoma over the weekend.
Craig and friend Chase Morland went duck hunting amid winter storm Goliath. After family and friends didn't hear from them, a search party began looking for the pair. Morland's body was discovered, but Craig is still missing.
Helen, who was Miss Arkansas USA in 2014, has been regularly posting updates on her Twitter, first writing on Monday that "Craig's dog Sam has been found."
She continued, "His boat has been confirmed as being capsized. They are still searching for Craig. Please keep praying."
Helen Strickland asked fans to pray for her missing husband
Craig's dog Sam has been found. His boat has been confirmed as being capsized. They are still searching for Craig. Please keep praying.
A few hours later Helen informed fans that Craig was still missing and the search party had been called off for the night.
"It will resume again in the morning with a sonar boat," she wrote. "Still need prayers."
Craig is still missing. The search has been called for the night. It will resume again in the morning with a sonar boat. Still need prayers.
Morland posted a Tweet about the trip over the weekend, ominously foreshadowing what was to come.
"In case we don't come back, @BackroadCRAIG and I are going right through Winter Storm Goliath to kill ducks in Oklahoma. #IntoTheStorm," Morland
Craig is one of the lead vocalists for country rock band Backroad Anthem. The group has also been using social media to share updates on the search for the 29-year-old.
"The search has been called off for the night, bringing boat with sonar in morning," Craig's father, Randy Strickland, wrote through the band's Facebook. "A friend gave me these words! We are trying to think of a scenario where he is still alive. Hoping against the odds. We can't even stand to think about it. We are devastated. Only God & time can put us back together. Love all!"
Helen, however, had the most simple message for her husband as the search restarted.
"We love you Craig Michael," she | Craig and his friend went missing during a hunting trip in Oklahoma |
Of all the cars that might've come from electric-vehicle startup (and presumed Tesla rival) Faraday Future, a single-seat racecar with 1,000 horsepower may be the most surprising. The company, which is on track to break ground for a billion-dollar factory in North Las Vegas, Nevada, fittingly chose the 2016 Consumer Electronics Show to pull the wraps off the FFZERO1 Concept, a wholly outlandish — but wildly compelling — battery powered hypercar. This isn't the company's first production model, but it is a dazzling showcase of the technology — and the philosophy — that will define Faraday's future offerings.
If you would like to comment on this or anything else you have seen on BBC Autos, head over to our Facebook page or message us on Twitter. | After months of teasing, the billion-dollar US-based startup has finally shared its vision for the future of the electric car: a 1,000-horsepower single-seat racer. |
Ever since Sihan Zhou tried cheese for the first time she’s been captivated by its flavour and texture and on the hunt for more.
Her first taste was at the age of seven when she ate a Hawaiian pizza with her family at a recently opened Pizza Hut restaurant in Beijing. The cheese topping was unlike anything else she had eaten and she was instantly hooked.
“It’s special because in China we don’t have something like that,” said Zhou, a 20 year old student of math and finance at Wuhan University. “When we go to eat Western food we try to order something that is made of cheese.”
While Zhou doesn’t cook often in her dorm in Wuhan, a city in China’s central Hubei province, when she’s home on winter and summer break she likes to explore recipes that incorporate cheese. “Mozzarella is my favourite,” she said, adding that she and her friends love to see the gooey strings when the cheese is hot.
The country's bourgeoning wine sales have also helped cheese's popularity.
But it's not just China's foodies like Zhou who are discovering the deliciousness that is fromage. There's an increased appetite for dairy products, driven by flourishing international tastes amongst Chinese consumers, many of whom now travel and study abroad. The expansion of Western-style fast-food chains and restaurants has also put cheese on the menu. And, the country's bourgeoning wine sales have helped cheese's popularity as gourmands learn the two pair well together.
A slice of the market
Cheese sales in China rose by 20% in 2015 to 3.5bn yuan (about $540m), compared with a year earlier, and average unit prices increased 3%, according to market research firm Euromonitor International.
Most of China’s cheese is imported from New Zealand and Australia and appetites for packaged cheese — cheddar, Gouda and the like — have grown the fastest. Like Zhou, many Chinese first discover cheese in Western restaurants and then want to experiment with it in their kitchens at home.
The country’s younger generation is driving much of the cheese trend.
The country’s younger generation is driving much of the cheese trend. Many Asians are lactose-intolerant, but younger, more affluent couples and their children are exposed to — and can afford to try — Western foods, contributing to a slight shift in diet. While those suffering from lactose intolerance have difficulty digesting fresh milk, they can often eat dairy products like cheese and yogurt without discomfort as the fermentation process breaks down the lactose in milk.
Children’s cheese products, such as string cheese, which are marketed as high in calcium and protein have also helped boost growth, market researchers say. And, with food scandals eroding trust in some Chinese domestic brands, many consumers have become accustomed to imported milk powder and other items from abroad that they view as safer.
Packaged, block cheese accounts for more than 50% of the market. Sliced cheese, for burgers and sandwiches, is the second most popular segment, followed by grated and cream cheese, respectively, according to research firm Mintel Group. More “fragrant” types of cheese, such as Roquefort and Gorgonzola, still remain niche products in China.
With so many cheeses being imported, prices for hunks of basic cheddar and Parmesan can add up quickly. A 250g block of Dutch Farms cheddar at a foreign import market costs about 35 yuan ($5.40) in Beijing, while artisanal cheeses can cost upwards of 100 yuan ($15.43).
Zhou said she often buys her cheese online, where prices can be nearly 50% less than in the grocery store. To ensure she’s buying a quality product, she purchases from an online seller who has been in business for several years and reads many reviews before making a selection.
Liu Yang is one of a handful of domestic cheese makers trying to tap the Chinese marketplace. After learning how to make cheese in France, Liu spotted a gap in the Chinese market. So, he imported equipment from France and started his Beijing-based company, Le Fromager de Pekin, in 2009.
When I opened my cheese shop in the beginning about 95% of my clients were foreigners living in Beijing. Today, I have more Chinese customers than foreign customers.
His cheeses are gaining traction among Chinese and foreigners alike, who can order online or pick them up in several stores in the capital. Products range from a “Beijing Grey” camembert with black pepper crust to a Tomme, which is a type of cheese made in the French Alps and Switzerland. His cheese is also served at a handful of restaurants in the city.
"When I opened my cheese shop in the beginning about 95% of my clients were foreigners living in Beijing," Mr. Liu said. "Today, I have more Chinese customers than foreign customers."
While the cheese market in China is expected to continue growing, cheese might be destined to remain a niche product outside of the mainstream Chinese diet.
“Cheese is more used to make western-style food, which is not a part of a typical Chinese diet,” Mintel researchers noted in a recent report, adding that cheese isn’t even a mainstream snack and that it’s difficult to change local consumer eating habits.
But for Isabella Chen, a public relations staffer in Shanghai, cheese became a daily staple for her when she studied abroad in Marseille in 2013. “I bought one ham and cheese and I was totally shocked that it tasted so great,” she said.
Cheese might be destined to remain a niche product outside of the mainstream Chinese diet.
Unsurprisingly, when she came back to Shanghai last year she found it difficult to find good cheese unless she went to a fancy restaurant or imported food market. She recently ate at a Spanish restaurant, where a small plate of cheese with only five or six pieces cost 180 yuan (about $28). At home, she only buys cheese when friends come and visit.
As for her preference, “I was afraid of blue cheese at the beginning, but now it’s my favourite one,” Chen said. “Some say it’s stinky. I say it’s just a strong, pure flavour and that’s why we love cheese.”
To comment on this story or anything else you have seen on BBC Capital, head over to our Facebook page or message us on Twitter. | The Middle Kingdom is growing hungry for this dairy product. But will the niche ever become mainstream? |
drinking and carousing at the public place known as the "One Mile House," kept by PATRICK O'BRIEN, on the corner of the Bowery and Rivington-street; that between 8 and 9 o'clock in the evening the parties became involved in a dispute, during which one WM. C. WHITTLESEY, drew a revolver and fired two shots in quick succession. One of these shots took effect in the right breast of the deceased, killing him almost instantly. As soon as the shots were fired all the parties fled from the house, in every direction. Capt. DAVIS, of the Tenth Precinct, with officers MCCLOUD and MCCORD were promptly on hand, and after a long and diligent search, the accused was found at a disreputable house in Canal-street, near Elizabeth. He was taken to the Station-house and locked up. The coroner's jury rendered the following verdict: "That deceased came to his death by a wound from a pistol at the hands of the prisoner, WM. C. WHITTLESEY." In answer to the usual questions by the Coroner, the prisoner stated that he was 29 years of age, a native of Connecticut, and resided at No. 88 Elizabeth-street. He said the occurrence was entirely accidental on his part, he not having the most remote intention of injuring any one at the time. | Coroner COLLIN held and inquest Saturday, at the Tenth Precinct Station-house, upon the body of the unknown man who was shot in an affray in a public house in the Bowery on Saturday evening, an account of which we published in the Truss of yesterday. There was a large amount of testimony taken, all tending to show that the deceased, the prisoner, and some six or eight other parties were... |
David Bowie’s wide-ranging “Blackstar” is the rocker’s 25th studio album.
David Bowie turns 69 on Jan. 8, and has chosen to celebrate by releasing his 25th studio album, whose title is a small black star and is pronounced “Blackstar.”
Ardent fans know better than to have pre-conceived notions about what the British rock icon might be up to. They’ve realized it’s far wiser simply to let Bowie wander where he will, and to follow along and enjoy the ride — whether to inner or outer space, or somewhere right here among us earthlings.
And “Blackstar” is indeed a ride: intentionally bumpy and appealingly smooth, cacophonous and melodious, noisy and joyous, quiet and bleak, and touching on just about every mood and sound in between, from jazzy to industrial and electronic. The album is dense and intriguing, neither a straightforward rock record nor so wildly experimental as to be inaccessible. It encourages spending meaningful time to digest all the sounds and ideas at work. And even then, the non-linearity of the lyrics may never fully emerge from the gauzy cloud of moondust obscuring any literal interpretation — and that is totally groovy.
Bowie enlisted frequent and longtime lieutenant Tony Visconti to co-produce, and a group of disparate and talented collaborators to help realize his musical intricacies and oddities. Some songs are immediately compelling, like the clattering “Tis a Pity She Was a Whore” and the skittering, rubbery “Sue (Or in a Season of Crime),” a new version of a cut from his 2014 compilation “Nothing Has Changed.” Others take time to set in, like the epic title track, which transitions from woozy and muffled to spirited and jubilant.
Bowie deploys all the weapons in his vocal arsenal, from his brooding low register to a whimsical falsetto, setting a specific mood for each track. The album’s secret weapon is saxophonist Donnie McCaslin, an integral voice in the proceedings whether silken or skronky. Members of McCaslin’s quartet contribute muscularly.
Bowie ends the album with the lovely, surging flourish of “I Can’t Give Everything Away,” his voice cresting an elegant wave of synth washes and strings. Maybe he can’t give everything away, but he certainly put his all into “Blackstar.” | Marking his 69th birthday, British art-rock icon David Bowie offers a new album with an enigmatic title and an obstinate refusal to be predictable. |
With his chiseled jaw and easy smile, it's no wonder
found fame as Dr. Michael McBain on
. But his friends, family and the fans who he'd stop in the middle of New York City's bustling streets to chat with remember him more for the warm way he'd greet them: a bear hug.
About 100 mourners gathered during Marston's memorial Saturday in N.Y.C's grand Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine, and those who gave eulogies all remembered how he'd envelop everyone he met in his arms.
Speaking to PEOPLE in a pew after the service, his mother Elizabeth Jackson explains that after the soap star died, doctors revealed his heart was reversed, resting in the right side of his body because of a rare condition called situs inversus.
"So when he was hugging you, it was directly heart-to-heart," she says. "That's why his hugs were so special."
Marston died Nov. 11 after spending nearly two weeks hooked up to a ventilator in the hospital and
in an Oct. 30 car accident. He was 40 years old but looking for a fresh start in Hollywood after kicking the drug habit that had ground his acting career to a halt.
Despite rumors at the time of the wreck, police say Marston was sober that night and likely fell asleep at the wheel.
"He struggled, as many of us do, with demons," says Jackson of her son, who moved out to Nevada to live near her after completing rehab in N.Y.C. "He was struggling with drug addiction, and so he went into a treatment program, and he came out to me, and he was doing really good. The moment of redemption for Nat happened just before he died."
A single mother, Jackson gave birth to Marston when she was just 16 years old and trying to make it as an actress herself.
"It was hard, but he was always the reason I got out of bed in the morning, and he was grateful for every little thing," she tells PEOPLE. "And he was smart beyond comprehension. He had like a 160 IQ, he spoke four languages. He spoke Portuguese, Italian, Spanish and English fluently. He had a photographic memory ⦠he was just bright and he was kind and he was a good little boy."
Nathaniel Marston and Elizabeth Jackson
"I did the best I could do," she continues. "I was a little kid. I was a baby. He was my best friend, he was my pal, he was my buddy. He taught me everything I know about love, responsibility, kindness, compassion, empathy."
Born in Connecticut but raised in Hawaii, California and New York, Marston was discovered while working at a Beverly Hills bakery and landed a role on
in 1998, earning a Soap Opera Digest Award nod. He joined
in 2001 as Al Holden and, following outcry over the character's death, began playing Michael through 2007.
, who played Marcie on the show, was an especially electrifying storyline. At the memorial, Brier sang "Hallelujah," his favorite song, as the clergy led a processional of candles.
Those who worked with him say his stardom never changed him.
One fan wrote to Jackson after her son's death with a heartwarming story from nine years ago.
"My wife had just been diagnosed with breast cancer and it had taken a toll on us, especially my daughter, Kayla. As a distraction getaway I arranged a visit and walk-on role for my daughter on
," he told her. "While there we met Nathaniel, who was so kind to all of us and spoke to Kayla at length about acting. None of the actors knew we were personal friends of the producers. Many of them just looked down on us as 'extras,' but your son was sweet, kind and personable. We have always used him as an example of how you treat someone no matter who they are, to our children."
Beloved on set, Marston had two highly publicized brushes with the law.
In 1999, he was arrested for attacking an ATM machine in Manhattan. Jackson defends her son, saying he lost his temper because he had a cab waiting outside to take him to a job and the machine ate his card.
"He was a generous, kind, sweet, gentle soul who was larger than life – and had a big temper, he got in trouble," she says. "Who doesn't?"
Jackson says Marston returned to the bank and apologized – and that's when police took him into custody. "But nobody tells that story," she says. "It doesn't sell newspapers."
Then, in 2007, Marston was let go from
after a brawl with three taxi drivers. A court found him guilty of resisting arrest in 2010.
His mother says she believes the substance abuse began in 2003, when he fell from a roof, smashing his heel and breaking his back. He began taking prescription medications.
"I think the hardest thing for Nathaniel was that he didn't know how much he was loved," Jackson says now. "I think because he was an empath that he felt other people's pain, and that caused him pain. ... I think he felt people's spiritual pain, and I think that's where his demons came from."
But inside the resplendent cathedral, it was clear how much he is missed – by the crew and costars from his soaps who recalled his humility and friendliness, and by the diehard fans who he invited to annual mixers well after he left their television screens.
In 2012, Marston moved to Gerlach, Nevada, after getting clean and found new life in the rural community where Jackson also lives.
He decided to give back, spending time with children at the local Gerlach School where there is now a scholarship set up in his name.
"He played with them, he signed their homework folders, he taught them how to brush their teeth and floss, he took them swimming," Jackson says of his relationship with the students. "He inspired them to believe that they could do or be anything they wanted because Nat was a famous actor, and he made so little of that all the time."
Josh, the father of a pupil named Lokai, wrote a letter to Jacskon about Marston's impact.
"Your son was one of the greatest beings that I have had the pleasure and opportunity to know," he said. "Nate always took time for kids, was always patient with them, and simply enjoyed their presence and honored them by playing with them or teaching them every time he had the chance. It is a trait that I truly respect and seek in others whom I wish to surround myself with. For him it was completely natural, and this is true beauty. Your loss is the entire world's loss, but simultaneously we were all blessed to have had the opportunity to feel his presence while he walked this planet."
One Christmas, Marston cooked and delivered 100 dinners and handmade cards to everyone in the small town, including the chef at Gerlach's only restaurant.
In the winters, Marston fed cows on a nearby ranch, and the day of his accident, he excitedly told his mom about a new labor opportunity in the Smoke Creek Desert. He promised her he'd save money for the both of them and vowed to return to show business and audition for TV.
"He was on track, and he was ready to roll," Jackson says. "He was ready to go back to pilot season. He said, 'Mom, I'm gonna buy you a ranch and we're going to raise the most beautiful cattle that you've seen in your life. I finally found something that I love to do beside acting.' "
"And he said, 'and we're going to get some foster kids and we're gonna mentor them, and we're gonna pay it forward because Father God has been so good to us,' " she adds, crying. "And he goes, 'I finally get it.' "
The day of the crash, Marston was supposed to go to his mom's house for tea. She recalls being angry and worried when he flaked – until the phone rang.
"He said, 'Hi Mommy. I'm calling you to tell you that I love you and I know how much it hurts you when I just blow you off.' He said, 'I don't ever want to hurt you again,' " Jackson says, tearing up. "And he said, 'So I'm calling to tell you that I love you and I'm just too tired to come drink tea right now.' And we talked for an hour ⦠and I told him how proud I was. I said, 'You see how this is? Nobody's mad ⦠no hard feelings ⦠I am so proud of you.' I said, 'Nat, you have turned a corner. You've been sober, and you're ready to go back and get your career on track, and I can't wait to see you on Sunday so we can have our family dinner.' "
That meal never happened. While driving to help a friend in need, Marston's pickup truck flipped. He was not wearing a seat belt and flew through the windshield, according to Nevada Highway Patrol.
He broke his shoulder, ribs and five vertebrae. Jackson actually drove past the wreckage on her way back home through Reno, but without her cell phone, she had no idea her child was the one injured.
"I saw all this stuff out in the desert and I thought, that looks like Nat's sleeping bag," she says. "I was like no, and I got home and there were these two calls. It was horrible."
Though her first instinct was to suspect her son had relapsed, Jackson says she quickly realized "the rumor mill" was wrong.
"He was sober," she says. "The police said he was sober, and I went to talk to the officers before I left to come [to New York], and they were like, 'No, your son was sober.' And they tested him in the hospital. He was sober."
At the hospital, Jackson learned her son was dying. He needed a machine to breathe and, even if he recovered, faced life
"He wanted to fight," Jackson says, but a surgery to relieve pressure on his brain and procedure to try to stabilize him both failed.
Jackson explained the dire circumstances to Marston, who was mentally cogent but could barely talk or move.
"I said, 'Listen son, you've got a ventilator in your throat, and that's how you're breathing. I need you to listen to me like you're never listened to me in your life. Do you understand? You know you're in the hospital, right?' And he said, 'Yes.' And I said, 'Honey, how can you go through a windshield and be thrown 100 ft. and not have a mark on your body? You even still have your teeth.' And you know what he did, he went like this," she said, smiling slightly. "I said, 'I'm not lying to you, you've still got those teeth. You're as Hollywood handsome as the day you were born, pal, but I need you to listen to me.' And I told him about the two operations, and tears started streaming down his face."
After a fight for power of attorney with Marston's estranged wife – who Jackson says left him after he was fired from
in 2007 – and the hospital, she bid him goodbye and honored his wishes by removing the ventilator Nov. 11. Less than 20 minutes later, he was gone.
"It was a very sad story," she says, "and I'm grateful I had those two weeks with him, that I could tell him how much I loved him and ask for any forgiveness."
During his health crisis, Jackson posted regular updates on his condition to her Facebook page, finding solace in the prayers that poured in.
"He touched so many – I had no idea," she says. "I knew he was loved, but he hasn't worked on
since 2007 and then all these people took that journey with me on Facebook."
The N.Y.C. service was the last of three memorials, all open to fans.
Producer Vincent De Paul gave a remembrance during the memorial, recalling how he met Marston on the set of
and worked with him on what would be his final project, the 2011 movie
Nathaniel Marston (left) and Vincent De Paul
"We all mourn the loss of a great actor, friend, and family member," he says in a statement to PEOPLE. "He was always so encouraging to his cast and crew on set. What a liked man who had such a deep and kind compassion to all that he encountered. ... He could memorize his lines so easily within minutes. Everything about him was on a trajectory of a Hollywood star."
As for Jackson, she is comforted by her younger son, Ikaika. After posting a Facebook status about a baby boy Marston had fathered, she's reconnecting with her grandchild. ("I'm in contact with him again," she says simply, hoping to protect him.)
And the grieving mother believes that the rainbows that have colored the sky throughout her travels since Marston's death are his way of saying he'll always be with her.
"We don't have a lot of time on this earth and we never know when our last moments are going to happen. Nathaniel was always kind to people," she says of his legacy. "Take that time to be kind to all the people that you love." | Though he struggled with addiction in the past, Nathaniel Marston was sober and ready to re-enter Hollywood when he died from a tragic car wreck |
Sixty years ago, the Museum of Modern Art in New York opened a landmark exhibition: Latin American Architecture Since 1945. That survey of the region’s buildings was part of a larger, Rockefeller-backed advocacy of Latin American culture at the museum during the first years of the cold war – but since then, MoMA has never again mounted a full-scale study of the region’s architecture.
Now, at last, we have a successor. Latin America in Construction: Architecture 1955-1980, a thumping new exhibition four years in the making, features more than 500 objects from Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, Venezuela, Uruguay and six other countries – and it confirms that nowhere on the planet witnessed as much experimentation in building arts and urban design. Where the 1955 show relied solely on photographs, this one includes models, films, drawings, blueprints and all sorts of ephemera. Give yourself several hours, or several days, to see it all.
Latin Americans flocked to cities in the years after the second world war, and the region’s governments saw urban policy as part of a larger project of national redevelopment. So did the cold war superpowers. The Kennedy administration provided huge aid for housing in Uruguay and Venezuela, while the Soviet Union assisted projects in Cuba, as well as Chile before the 1973 coup d’état. “Cinquenta anos em cinco” – 50 years in five, the slogan of the reforming Brazilian president Juscelino Kubitschek – could describe whole waves of progress across Latin America: a leap forward in industrialization and urbanization, to accompany a wholesale transformation in national character.
In the first gallery here, seven simultaneous film loops feature archival footage of the breakneck modernization of the region’s cities. Mexico City, sprawling to infinity under the soaring Torre Latinoamericana; swinging Havana, thronged by American tourists before the fall of Batista; and above all São Paulo, transformed from a regional capital into the largest city in the hemisphere – these cities, more than anywhere in the United States and western Europe, were the testing grounds for architects’ utopian dreams.
Related: Oscar Niemeyer: the man behind the monuments
The show blows up our expectations of Latin American architecture, which is too often stereotyped as Bauhaus-on-the-beach. Hulking brutalist projects get their due, in the form of a large-scale model of the Banco de Londres y América del Sur, a concrete temple in Buenos Aires, or else an unrealized Machu Picchu hotel that would have brought the space age to the Peruvian highlands. Other architects turned to folkloric traditions, and fused International Style buildings with decorative schemes derived from pre-Columbian civilizations. The Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, now the largest university in Latin America, was the work of a team of dozens of architects, notably Mario Pani and Enrique del Moral, whose sometimes severe towers of concrete and glass are covered in vibrant murals incorporating both Spanish and Aztec motifs.
Like other universities in the region – in Bogotá, in Rio, in Caracas – UNAM was conceived not as a bunch of individual buildings, but as a modernist mini-city in its own right, a laboratory for the grander projects to come. And the grandest of those was Brasília – one of the great achievements of the 20th century, though not the most liveable. The purpose-built Brazilian capital, inaugurated in 1960, rightly sits at the heart of this show, evoked through dozens of sketches, maquettes, construction documentation, aerial photography and contemporary images of the city. Black-and-white photographs of 1960 by Ilsa Hofman abstract the capital’s Praça dos Três Poderes into people-free abstractions of shape and line. But Brasília is not just a symbol; it’s a city of nearly 3 million citizens, who have had to transform the capital’s superblocks for their own purposes.
Not all modern architecture in Brazil, or indeed in Latin America, was a state project. Lina Bo Bardi, an Italian-born architect, designer and editor, may be less famous than Oscar Niemeyer and the other modernists who brought Brazilian architecture to the world’s attention, but her unadorned, socially engaged buildings offer a rare model of how the building arts can improve the lives of everyday people. (She is, I might as well tell you, my favorite architect of the 20th century – and a retrospective of her work opens at the Graham Foundation in Chicago later this month.) Bo Bardi’s designs in São Paulo, notably her glass and concrete museum suspended above Avenida Paulista, dominate the presentation here. But even more than Brazilian-born architects, Bo Bardi devoted herself to projects in the poorer north of Brazil. Her Museu de Arte Popular, built in 1963 in Salvador, gave native Brazilian and African-Brazilian culture the attention that the country’s elite routinely denied them.
Related: Lina Bo Bardi: buildings shaped by love
The region’s modernizing governments of the 1950s and 1960s gave way, as the cold war wore on, to anti-democratic regimes that put paid to utopian dreams of recasting society through architecture. Latin America in Construction is a little too quiet about the dictatorships that arose, usually with American backing, from Chile to Panama, and about how architects and firms that seemed committed to democratic works were more than happy to make their peace with tyrants. Some architects went into exile; Niemeyer, for one, left Brazil for Paris after the coup of 1964. Many others stayed, with mixed fortunes. Bo Bardi turned to theater and interior design, and eventually was able to build her masterwork, the São Paulo community center SESC Pompéia, as the Brazilian military government loosened its grip. Others had little problem with the new regimes, and it shows.
Toward the end of the show one comes across a model for a football stadium in Mendoza, Argentina, without much explanatory text. (One of its architects was a young Rafael Viñoly, whose Piketty-tastic 432 Park Avenue, the tallest residential building in the western hemisphere, with a $95m penthouse, is rising around the corner from MoMA.) The stadium was built for the 1978 World Cup – a hideous spectacle, complete with match-fixing, put on by a murderous junta and rightly called “the most obvious political manipulation suffered by sport since the Olympic Games of 1936 in Nazi Germany”.
Now, it’s hardly uncommon for architects to build for monstrous regimes and then disclaim political responsibility. As the Guardian has reported, the stadiums for the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, designed by Norman Foster, Zaha Hadid, and other celebrity architects, are being built by slaves who are dying at a rate so precipitous that the tournament will soon have a higher death toll than 9/11. Yet this show, so happy to celebrate the national ambitions of architecture in the early days, gets very shy regarding the later ones. Why? The torturers are gone; one of their Brazilian victims is now president. Surely it’s not too soon for a full reckoning of who built the torture chambers, or at least the pleasure palaces beside them.
I feel slightly uncharitable making this criticism of such an ambitious and important show. But even its title (“in construction”? Still?) and its exhibition design – the galleries’ temporary white walls are unfinished, with steel and wiring exposed – give the impression that the period of utopian building in Latin America is still going on, as opposed to lying decades in the past. All utopias fail, but it’s worth acknowledging not only what these architects built, but whom they built for and what their projects have turned into. Otherwise it is far too easy to equate the grand ambition of Brasília to the grim present of Rio de Janeiro: the most beautiful city in the world, currently in the middle of an awful disfigurement at the hands of the Olympic nomenklatura. Some architects will build for anyone.
Latin America in Construction: Architecture 1955–1980 is at the Museum of Modern Art, New York to 19 July | Latin America’s rapid modernization in the mid-20th century led the region’s finest architects to push boundaries. This show captures the grandeur of their vision, but unfortunately glosses over the period’s nasty bits |
By Lindsay Kimble and Melody Chiu
01/25/2016 AT 01:00 PM EST
extends far beyond just Hollywood.
Joining a host of other industry elites who have
about the lack of actors of color being considered for an Academy Award, Page tells PEOPLE at the
that the issue "means a lot to me as an audience member and as a human being."
Page, who was nominated for a Best Actress Oscar in 2008 for
, designed to address that lack of diversity among its voting body, are "crucial."
"It means a lot to me as someone who does this job," she explains, adding, "I think the issue is much more systemic and I hope that's what changes, hearing more diverse stories, but I feel like finally there's some steps going in the right direction."
The star, who was at the annual Utah festival to promote her new drama
, also issued some suggestions for the continued implementation of positive changes across Hollywood.
"There needs to be more diversity behind the camera, and more people getting hired in every aspect of the business, and more support for those stories and more opportunity," she tells PEOPLE. "You look at something like
, and how many actresses we were introduced to who we may not otherwise have seen because they had no opportunity."
(And the connection is personal for Page, as she shares the screen with
"That makes me feel like, how could you not feel angry at that, you know?" Page says. "And I hope that is what is going to continue to happen, and just as an audience member I want to go see more stories from different perspectives. We do this job, sure to entertain, but also to reflect aspects of what it means to be a human."
Page also opens up about her own aspirations to get behind the camera – if she can work up the nerve, that is.
"I am really liking producing to be honest," she says of her dual role for
. "And when I say that, learning to do it and that's something I'm continuing to do – there are things in the pipeline, is that what people say? And I do think about someday directing, but not next week."
The eventual venture "scares the s---" out of Page, who says she's continually impressed by directors.
"I feel like I'm enjoying learning so much because obviously when you're a producer you're so much involved in post, you're so much involved in different components, and I feel grateful to be learning so much about that right now," she explains. "Maybe in the future, I'd love to direct." | Ellen Page opens up to PEOPLE at the Sundance Film Festival |
Don’t believe the web-hype. Fake links promising unsuspecting web surfers “shocking” videos of missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 are scams. Video links are spreading on Twitter and Facebook with titles suggesting that the flight was discovered and that handfuls of passengers have been saved, CNET reports.
How to spot a bad link? Sample hoax links could include headlines such as these:
“Shocking Video: Malaysian Airlines missing flight MH370 found at sea”
“Malaysian Airplane MH370 Already Found. Shocking Video Release Today by CNN”
“Plane has been spotted somewhere near Bermuda triangle. Shocking videos released today. CNN news”
The Facebook links require those who click to complete a survey similar to ones frequently found on the site that request access to profiles. But in this case the information users provide goes to hackers. CBS News reports the company has removed the links; phishing scams and spam violate the sites community standards. | Facebook and Twitter links promising video of the missing plane are bogus |
Is the Shell CEO on firm ground? There are few companies as financially robust as Shell. Unlike many of the mining finance houses hit hard by the collapse in commodity prices, it is relatively lightly geared, with net debt of less than 13 per cent of equity. What’s more, the money it saved on cutting back on capital spending last year was alone virtually enough to cover the entire cost of the dividend.
Shell certainly has the capacity to withstand a prolonged siege of sub-$50 a barrel oil prices, and keep paying the dividend regardless. In this sense, it is probably better placed than any of the other oil majors, all of which are on similar yields. If it does eventually cave, it will almost certainly be the last to do so.
Yet there is also only so far you can slash spending to finance the dividend before the company deprives itself of a long term future, and the dividend has to be chopped any way. Gearing looks low, but it would become unbearably high if the "stranded assets" brigade get their way, and for environmental reasons, big fossil fuel producers were forced to leave it in the ground. A consistently low oil price would have much the same effect, making it uneconomic to develop some proven reserves.
Think back to Lloyds Bank, which for years paid a dividend many believed to be unaffordable. If nothing else, Lloyds proved that the unsustainable can be sustained an awfully long time before it stops.
Then along came the banking crisis, and the rest is history. The dividend was indeed unsustainable. Pension funds can only pray that Shell is different, for as things stand, it accounts for more than 8 per cent of all dividends paid in the UK. Shell is the dividend gusher we can ill afford to lose.
To read the rest of Jeremy Warner's column, click here and here | Analysts worry that Shell's dividend, a corner stone of pension fund returns, is under threat. |
02/01/2016 AT 10:20 AM EST
stepped out for date night at celebrity hot spot The Nice Guy in Los Angeles on Sunday.
Winter, 18, stunned in high-waisted white shorts, a plunging red top and a black lace bralette that matched her lacy Louboutin pumps.
Laurent Claude Gaudette and Ariel Winter
Photographer Group / Splash News
star and Gaudette have been
, though they seemingly split for a brief period in December when Winter
. ("Start of a new week, start of a new chapter #dancinglikebeyoncemood," she captioned a photo from
's "Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It)" video.)
But the couple celebrated Winter's 18th birthday together last week.
"Had the pleasure of spending the day with this beautiful and perfect birthday girl," Gaudette wrote on
on Thursday. "Happy Birthday, love you!"
On Sunday, Gaudette also shared a series of photo booth pictures of the two from Winter's birthday bash. | Ariel Winter and her boyfriend, both 18, are back together after apparently splitting briefly in December |
VIOLET Boston Conservatory grad Alison McCartan shines as a young North Carolina woman who takes a bus journey across the South in 1964, clinging to the conviction that a TV preacher can heal her disfigured face. Director Paul Daigneault deftly pulls together the disparate pieces of this idiosyncratic musical. Through Feb. 6. SpeakEasy Stage Company at Wimberly Theatre, Calderwood Pavilion, Boston Center for the Arts. 617-933-8600, www.speakeasystage.com
DISGRACED Ayad Akhtar’s Pulitzer-winning drama about a Pakistani-American attorney who has repudiated his Islamic faith plunges right into the choppy currents of contemporary discourse. Akhtar finds tragedy in the dilemma of a man locked in an unwinnable war with himself, his heritage, and the assumptions the wider world makes about him. Through Feb. 7. Huntington Theatre Company in association with Long Wharf Theatre at BU Theatre, Boston. 617-266-0800, www.huntingtontheatre.org
SONDHEIM ON SONDHEIM Leigh Barrett and Aimee Doherty are the standouts in this fine revue, though the real star is Stephen Sondheim. The nonpareil composer-lyricist is seen frequently in videotaped interviews that offer an illuminating blend of backstage anecdotes, autobiographical insights, and glimpses of his creative process. Through Feb. 21. Lyric Stage Company of Boston. 617-585-5678, www.lyricstage.com DON AUCOIN | A guide to area productions, including “Disgraced,’’ “Violet,’’ and “Sondheim on Sondheim.’’ |
02/10/2016 AT 05:55 PM EST
It's a piece of Kardashian history.
Almost 22 years ago, the Kardashian-Jenner clan and the Simpson family jetted off to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, for an Easter vacation.
While they were there, they snapped this massive family photo, which features a teenage Kim and Kourtney, 10-year-old Khloé and 7-year-old Rob.
In it, we also get a glimpse of a very happy Kris being hugged by then-husband Caitlyn (then Bruce) Jenner. The couple had been married for three years when this photo was taken.
and his ex-wife Nicole stand side by side.
The trip was reportedly a chance for O.J. and Nicole to attempt to reconcile, though during the vacation, Nicole allegedly maintained that she didn't want to get back together with O.J.
Two months later, she was murdered, and the "trial of the century" was beginning.
Said trial is being revisited the buzzy
, with Cuba Gooding Jr. in the role of O.J., and Selma Blair as Nicole's close friend Kris. | Take a step back in time |
I ADORE NEARLY everything about Yorkshire, England. Years ago, I spent whole days walking the green-covered Dales, a stretch of hills and valleys where you can roam freely. But before I'd even been to Yorkshire, I was a fan of artist David Hockney, born there in the city of Bradford, in 1937. In my room growing up, I had a poster of his 1981 crayon drawing of his friend and muse, textile artist Celia Birtwell; it's still a favorite.
In the late 1990s, Mr. Hockney began making regular trips back to Yorkshire, temporarily...
I ADORE NEARLY everything about Yorkshire, England. Years ago, I spent whole days walking the green-covered Dales, a stretch of hills and valleys where you can roam freely. But before I'd even been to Yorkshire, I was a fan of artist David Hockney, born there in the city of Bradford, in 1937. In my room growing up, I had a poster of his 1981 crayon drawing of his friend and muse, textile artist Celia Birtwell; it's still a favorite.
In the late 1990s, Mr. Hockney began making regular trips back to Yorkshire, temporarily leaving behind his adopted Los Angeles home where he had spent the better part of his career basking in California light. Seeing his native land with fresh eyes, he began painting it, in watercolor and oil, and drawing it in charcoal and via an iPad app. In 2005, he was working largely en plein-air, in all weather and seasons. Over the last decade, he's produced a collection of impressive works, some of which will appear in an exhibition opening at New York's Pace Gallery on Sept. 5.
Earlier this month, as summer's heat became oppressive, I started looking to Mr. Hockney's large-scale Yorkshire landscapes to dream a little about somewhere cooler and greener. As the inspiration for my August arrangement, I settled on his monumental oil painting "Woldgate Woods, 26, 27 & 30 July 2006." Six canvases combined to create a 72-by-144-inch work, it's one in a series of paintings he executed in the exact same spot in different seasons. Just letting my eyes linger on the intense greens of the vegetation in this work seemed to cleanse New York's muggy air, however briefly.
For the arrangement, I started with an old, green-glazed pitcher that was collecting dust on my shelf, somewhat nondescript but perfect in its mottledness. Besides, pitchers are great for arranging flowers: A good choice for the novice, their form easily shapes floral designs into satisfyingly open displays. To convey the lushness of the trees in this painting, I massed field pennycress in the pitcher. Though I got mine from a flower market, it can be found along roadsides or in fields in northern parts of the U.S. this time of year. I could have easily left the arrangement like that but, in keeping with Mr. Hockney's painting, I added a hit of the large orange flowers of asclepias 'Beatrix' to represent the glowing patch at its horizon line. Finally, I poked in some mauve astrantia major 'Rubra' from my garden to depict the old country road that had become Mr. Hockney's makeshift open-air studio. | For a late-summer bouquet, floral designer Lindsey Taylor interprets one of David Hockney's multipanel Yorkshire tree paintings. |
APRIL IS OFTEN a time of foggy, gray days and premonitions of rain, as the land—at least here on the East Coast—stirs to life. I happen to love this time of year for what I call its “carwash” effect: The misty landscape, dotted with impressionistic dapples of color, reminds me of the view through wet, soapy glass that you get while driving through a carwash, when everything seems to be just a bit out of focus.
The paintings of German-born artist Gerhard Richter have a similar effect, especially the abstract works he...
APRIL IS OFTEN a time of foggy, gray days and premonitions of rain, as the land—at least here on the East Coast—stirs to life. I happen to love this time of year for what I call its “carwash” effect: The misty landscape, dotted with impressionistic dapples of color, reminds me of the view through wet, soapy glass that you get while driving through a carwash, when everything seems to be just a bit out of focus.
The paintings of German-born artist Gerhard Richter have a similar effect, especially the abstract works he makes using a squeegee. In his 2009 canvas “Bouquet”—one of my favorites and the inspiration for this month’s arrangement—he has painted a small cluster of flowers with a brush, then deliberately obscured it by raking red and green paint across the image, until it resembled a streaked windshield. As I attempted to capture the canvas’s essence and color palette with blooms, I would at times clearly see the flowers he depicted as if it were a straight representation; at others, I would see only the surface abstraction. Like a ghost, the image seemed tangible one moment, gone the next.
For the arrangement, I selected three vertical ceramic vessels that were heavy with glaze and had the texture and tones of a gessoed canvas. I like to cluster vessels together before filling them with flowers, nudging them here and there to create a still-life of their own—it’s a refreshing alternative to the no-brainer lone vase.
I also took inspiration from Mr. Richter’s squeegee technique and left a certain amount to chance. I couldn’t tell what kind of flowers were hidden in the painting, so I focused on matching its colors using tulips in salmon pink, orange and cherry red. The nearly white, soft pink-colored lilacs offered a foil to the stronger colors while the eucalyptus foliage hinted at the semi-visible stems and approximated the painting’s gray-green tones.
For me, the horizontal rhythm of the trio of vases and the repeating flowers brings to mind the ephemeral, sometimes blurry nature of this rainy season, when the windows of your car are streaked, somehow comfortingly, with April showers. | For an April-themed arrangement, floral designer Lindsey Taylor welcomes the rainy season with a riff on Gerhard Richter’s windshield-wiper-ish painting ‘Bouquet.’ |
By Richard Nieva, reporter Martin Casado.FORTUNE — On Monday, VMware — the “server virtualization” company which makes software that allows multiple operating systems to run on one machine — announced a $1.05 billion deal to acquire Palo Alto-based startup Nicira.
But what is Nicira exactly? If it’s still a mystery to you, that’s perfectly natural. One, its focus is “network virtualization,” a sect of computing infrastructure that is so nascent it’s not even on the radar of many research analysts. (The short answer is, the company produces software that makes data centers less reliant on old-line routers and switches.) And two, its founder Martin Casado is a former intelligence agent, so a certain mystery and mystique comes with the territory. (Fortune profiled the company in April.)
In addition to the cash transaction, Nicira will receive about $210 million in equity rewards. While nothing has been officially decided, Martin Casado, Nicira’s cofounder, said he expects to continue his role as technology chief for his team, probably in a software architect role. The Nicira brand will be subsumed by its new parent, and Casado and Co. will be employees under VMware VMW .
MORE: He could tell you, but he’d have to kill you
The process moved fairly quickly, and had not been in the works for a very long time, says Ben Horowitz, co-founder of venture firm Andreessen Horowitz, which poured $17.7 million into the startup over three rounds of funding. The deal is expected to close before the end of the year.
The two biggest advantages the tie-up gives Nicira are credibility and scale, says Horowitz. While the company was founded in 2007, the infant — and for now still largely unproven — company only officially unveiled itself this February, so the high price tag may raise eyebrows. Still, Nicira’s upside may be worth the big bet. “Five years from now, this is going to end up looking like a very cheap deal,” said Horowitz, who also sits on Nicira’s board. “They basically bought an option on the future of networking.”
It’s certainly a move that hardware incumbents Cisco JNPR and Juniper Networks JNPR will have to pay attention to. For VMware, it’s deja-vu, says Stephen Herrod, the company’s chief technologist. “It feels very much like the early days of server virtualization,” says Herrod, who was involved with VMware before its founding at Stanford, before he rejoined in 2001. “We could see the tide coming in.” | Nicira is a little company that just scored a big payday. |
Military sources in Turkey's southeast told Reuters that two or three warplanes had bombed the Iraqi border region on Wednesday evening after Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) forces were identified in the area.
The military sources said that they landed on an uncontrolled part of the border, but would not say if the bombs landed inside Iraq. The action was not significant and it was not clear what damage had been caused, the sources said.
A Turkish foreign ministry official declined to confirm the report, which comes after Turkish media reported that F-16 aircraft had attacked PKK positions inside Iraq.
Armed clashes have intensified since April, when the Turkish military sent tens of thousands of extra troops to the southeast to reinforce more than 200,000 soldiers already stationed there.
George Bush told Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish prime minister, last month that the US wanted to deal more aggressively with cross-border attacks by PKK rebels.
However, diplomats in Ankara say that the government and the armed forces are frustrated at little action on the ground despite mounting casualties in Turkey, which many believe has given the PKK time to regroup.
Several thousand PKK separatist fighters are based in the mountains of northern Iraq and Turkey has insisted that it has the right to conduct cross-border operations should Washington and Baghdad fail to crack down on the fighters.
Iraq has repeatedly warned Turkey not send troops into its territory.
The PKK has denied the reports in a statement: "News that Turkish military forces' F-16 planes bombed south Kurdistan border areas are lies and unfounded." | Turkish jets have bombed Kurdish separatists' bases in the Iraqi border region, in a bid to crackdown on fighters operating in the Kandil mountains after an upsurge in violence in Turkey's southeast. |
The Iraq war marks the first test of the all-volunteer US military during a protracted war, and army officials have conceded that all three components of the army will likely miss their recruiting goals for fiscal 2005, which ends on 30 September.
The army, aiming to get 80,000 recruits this year, stood 11% behind its year-to-date goal at the end of July, with just two months left to overcome a shortfall of more than 7000. It has not missed an annual recruiting goal since 1999.
The army provides the bulk of ground troops in the Iraq war, in which about 1840 US troops have been killed and nearly 14,000 wounded.
It achieved its second-straight monthly goal - sending 8,085 new soldiers into boot camp in July, topping its goal by 9% - after falling short in the previous four months, according to figures released by the Pentagon on Wednesday.
Guard and Reserve "We've had some positive momentum, and I can assure you that it makes us feel better to have a couple of good months" Douglas Smith, US Army Recruiting Command The situation was bleaker in the part-time Guard and Reserve, used heavily in Iraq as the Pentagon seeks to maintain troop levels.
"We've had some positive momentum, and I can assure you that it makes us feel better to have a couple of good months" Douglas Smith, US Army Recruiting Command
"I know our recruiters are going to do what they can to close the gap, but right now it looks like we will miss both active and reserve (goals) at the end of the year," said Army Recruiting Command spokesman Douglas Smith.
The Reserve missed its July recruiting target by 18%, getting 2131 recruits with a goal of 2585, and stood 20% behind its year-to-date target. It had a shortfall of about 4700 recruits toward its 2005 goal of 28,485.
The Army National Guard has missed every monthly goal in fiscal 2005 after falling short in 2004 and 2003, the Pentagon said. It missed its July goal by 20% - getting 4,712 recruits with a quota of 2,585 - and was 23% behind its year-to-date target.
Recruiting problemsWith two months left, it had a shortfall of more than 11,600 toward an annual goal of 63,002. The army has attributed the recruiting problems to a growing number of families who are wary of military service because of the Iraq war, and an improving economy that is creating more civilian jobs.
The Pentagon is looking at new ways to retain military numbers"We've had some positive momentum, and I can assure you that it makes us feel better to have a couple of good months," Smith said, referring to active-duty recruiting in June and July. "The problem is that with the deficit we face for the remainder of the year, it's just a matter of time running out on us."
The Pentagon is looking at new ways to retain military numbers
The Army has upped the financial incentives for enlistment and added recruiters.
Lowering the barLast month the Pentagon asked Congress to raise the maximum age for enlistment in the military to 42. The ceiling now is 35 for active-duty service and 39 for enlisting in the reserves or National Guard with no prior military service.
The Marine Corps made its July goal and was 2% ahead year-to-date. While the Air Force hit its targets, the Navy missed its July goal by 1% but remained slightly ahead of its year-to-date quota.
Some defence analysts have argued the United States may have to consider resuming the draft, abolished in 1973 during the Vietnam War era, if the military is unable to attract sufficient numbers of recruits. The Pentagon opposes resumption of the draft. | <P>The US Army, hard pressed to attract new soldiers amid the Iraq war, seems doomed to miss its target for the year. </P> |
Freeing George Bush's top political adviser from possible indictment on perjury charges allows him to concentrate on Republicans winning the key congressional elections coming up in November.
"On June 12, 2006, special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald formally advised us that he does not anticipate seeking charges against Karl Rove," Rove's lawyer, Robert Luskin, said in a statement.
Fitzgerald has gotten an indictment from a federal grand jury against another top White House aide, Vice President Dick Cheney's former top aide, Lewis "Scooter" Libby.
In October, Libby was charged with obstruction of justice and lying to FBI agents and a grand jury during the investigation. He has pleaded not guilty to the charges and is to go to trial in January.
That prompted speculation that Rove could face perjury charges since he also had spoken to reporters in the case.
"We believe the special counsel's decision should put an end to the baseless speculation about Mr. Rove's conduct," Luskin said.
The Democratic national chairman, Howard Dean, said the fact Rove will not face indictment "does not excuse his real sin, which is leaking the name of an intelligence operative during a time of war. He doesn't belong in the White House."
"So I think this is probably good news for the White House, but it's not very good news for America," Dean told NBC's Today Show.
But Republican National Chairman Ken Mehlman told CNN this was an example of how Democrats "rush to judgment."
"They owe him an apology," Mehlman said of Democratic leaders.
Fitzgerald's investigation centers on who blew the cover of CIA officer Valerie Plame after her husband, former US diplomat Joseph Wilson, criticised the Bush administration for manipulating intelligence before the March 2003 invasion of Iraq.
Libby and Rove spoke to reporters about Plame before her identity was made public by newspaper columnist Robert Novak in July 2003.
Rove testified to the grand jury five times. | <P>White House aide Karl Rove will not be charged in the CIA leak case, his lawyer said on Tuesday. </P> |
Paul Gilroy has a lot to answer for. Not since Edward Said's Orientalism has a book – Gilroy's The Black Atlantic – generated such intellectual curiosity and exerted so wide an influence over cultural studies and the way we look at the modern, post-colonial world. Edward Said exposed the near-east as largely an invention of the west – a representation of people and places that would facilitate exploitation of a vast region and its diverse occupants in the name of a civilising zeal. He quotes from "Lui", a poem by Victor Hugo written for Napoleon:
By the Nile I find him once again.Egypt shines with the fires of hisdawn;His imperial orb rises in theOrient.Victor, enthusiast, bursting withachievements,Prodigious, he stunned the landof prodigies.The old sheikhs venerated theyoung and prudent emir.The people dreaded hisunprecedented arms;Sublime, he appeared to thedazzled tribesLike a Mahomet of the Occident.
The images of victor and vanquished aren't hard to see, but more subtle and solicitous of our complicity is the grateful reception by the masses of Napoleon and his ersatz divinity.
In his groundbreaking book, Gilroy argued for the Atlantic to be reconceived as a "continent in negative", a space in which three land masses with distinct cultural and historical markers – Africa, Europe and the New World – became unified, a new chemistry of humanity. This new, more complex cultural formation was indebted to centuries of brutal slavery, which stitched the three separate histories together.
Gilroy's ideas, which have their roots in the work of CLR James and Stuart Hall, throw up telling symbols – the slave ship (for physical pain), the estranging sea (for psychic severance), the subjugated black body (for death and destruction). But, refreshingly, he is mindful of slavery's obverse, its unintended consequences, which are renewal and creativity. Instead of Lear's "nothing will come of nothing", for Gilroy, decimated, enslaved peoples summon much out of abject despair. Maps of desolation are reimagined as spaces of possibility, the promise of a new life.
The curators of Tate Liverpool's big-thinking exhibition Afro Modern: Journeys through the Black Atlantic, Tanya Barson and Peter Gorschlüter, clearly have Gilroy's triangular past in mind. There's enough material in the show to merit repeated visits.
The first of the seven rooms takes on the difficult task of declaring a start date. In this case, it is 1907, the year of Picasso's oil on canvas entitled Bust of a Woman – a geometry of broken boxes for a head that morphs as you gaze at it into a body made up of an amalgam of spheres. What's African about it? We know that Picasso studied African art, which begins in realistic representations of figures denoting ritual and worship. These figures are then transformed by a stretching of features and body parts in a way that is akin to states of mind brought about by trance or possession by some deity. In other words, we see the beginnings of cubism in this primitivism, secreted in it and extracted from it by Picasso's eye. Widely accepted as the father of modernism, Picasso drew inspiration and content from Africa; he used it as a regenerative tool for a moribund western artistic practice.
The exhibition's start date could just as easily have been 1903, the year WEB Du Bois published The Souls of Black Folk, in which he declared that the 20th century would be defined by race and not by class. Further – and here Du Bois presaged much artistic practice from the Harlem renaissance of the 1920s and early 30s up to the black arts movement of the mid-60s onwards – he described the double consciousness faced by blacks in white America: they must wear a veil of American-ness acceptable to whites but which hides a blackness not yet approved of by white society. Frantz Fanon took this notion further in his 1952 book Black Skin, White Masks. Black artists trained in the west may compromise an African artistic sensibility – a translation is needed into western aesthetic terms before the art can receive any plaudits from western purveyors of taste.
So many arguments line up about black being in Afro Modern that text and context vie for attention with image and picture, but ultimately both work in harmony. Politics in art wears not so much a veil here as a series of masks. While many will know of the Harlem renaissance in the 20s or the Négritude movement (which privileged a black experience, including black speech, as a governing principle for black artistic practice) founded in the 30s by Aimé Césaire and others, far fewer will be familiar with the Brazilian Manifesto Antropófago of 1928, which argued that artists should consume European influences before those influences consumed them. Mercifully short-lived, it reduced the arts to consumption, and lacked the subtlety of imaginative give-and-take.
Room two is devoted entirely to Maya Deren's footage from the late 40s and early 50s, later edited and released as Divine Horsemen: The Living Gods of Haiti. The black and white film is rich in detail and makes compelling viewing. Haitian music and dancing, the confident commentary asserts, gave rise to jazz and the blues. African voodoo and Catholic rituals come together in a replenished spirituality.
Does art contribute to social change? This question is posed not only at Tate Liverpool but by residencies and exhibitions city-wide. There are interviews with artists and films such as Marcel Camus' Black Orpheus from 1959, and the Walker Gallery focuses on the work of Aubrey Williams – an Afro Modern if ever there was one. The question is a vexed one, if only because of the complexity of black engagement with European art traditions. At Tate Liverpool, Isaac Julien's Cast No Shadow, an image in a lightbox of a woman standing at open iron gates with a very blue and enticing sea in the background, appears to replay the departure of slaves at the point of no return found at so many coastal forts in Ghana. Julien's image derives its power in part from its rigidity and stillness, along with an appeal to the group memory of the experience.
Looking through the lens of the black arts movement seems as good a way as any to test the predictive and prescriptive nature of the visual arts over the last century in the UK, US, Africa, Caribbean and South America. "Afro Modern" may be too precise a term to contain such multitudes and "black diaspora" too loose. There is a tussle, too, within the arts between furthering art in the direction of experimental art-for-art's-sake, and art engaged with politics since it is only valuable if it is moral in scope. Ellen Gallagher's Bird in Hand works against such a division: a lone figure, who could be male, stands in the middle of a huge canvas, surrounded by roots and hanging flora, sporting a massive afro. The strands of hair suggest a nest of sorts, and the message becomes one of conservation: the person cannot be detached from the natural environment and there is symbiosis in the entanglement.
In Frank Bowling's upright rectangular 1968 tri-colour, entitled Who's Afraid of Barney Newman?, two wide bands of red and green sandwich a thin line of yellow. Without knowing the subject there is a molten quality to Bowling's work. He moves efficiently beyond biography to essences steeped in emotional responses to primary colours, which retain their impression of being poured on the canvas and which threaten to spill over the edges at any moment. Bowling is not just modern, he's way past that.
A surprising omission from the show are Clement Cooper's exacting photographs of black lineages in Liverpool and elsewhere. His use of natural light and his veneration of the vulnerable black and mixed-race young body are worthy of any exhibition, never mind one devoted to historicising blackness. Also absent is Tam Joseph, a personal favourite for his acerbic mix of word and image. His work deepens any narrative of black ascension invested in the poor and the powerless.
Sonia Boyce and Keith Piper display historical imaginations wedded to complex counterculture narratives. And among the most arresting work in the first room are two paintings of Josephine Baker by Paul Colin. He captures her wiry movement and limber flesh unconstrained by mere bones. He makes it clear, too, that her trade has a primitive appeal, her banana and palmleaf skirts barely cover her and reveal more of her than I imagine a peepshow would. She is topless, and her skin is her only covering. She completes a picture of primitive energy and boundless sex appeal, horribly dubbed negrophilia (these were living, breathing subjects), which was supposed to rejuvenate a clapped-out Parisian art world with its vapid futurism. Baker turns out to be a saviour of European modernity, but her dance and trance traps black women in a new prison of the one-dimensional, sexual body.
Colin's eye for voyeurism and the black female body as fetish is debunked by Candice Breitz's Ghost Series, where black nudity stands out with white paint and resembles a blazing photographic negative. Her women push back at the viewer, inviting questions about what is depicted and how certain effects are achieved. As emblems of domesticated, quotidian nudity, her women are made resistant to fetishisation.
A similar rebellion against outrageous convention emerges in Tracey Rose's photographic self-portrait, Venus Baartman (2001). Rose poses as Sarah Bartmann, or Saartjie Baartman in Afrikaans, a Khoi-San (or Hottentot) woman from Cape Town, South Africa. Brought to England in 1810, Bartmann toured London and Paris as a sideshow nude attraction to prove how black female anatomy, in this instance her large buttocks, differed markedly from white women's features. Bartmann died in London and her private parts were surgically removed and stored. Rose's moving work is an act of empathy and imagined solidarity. It goes well with Carrie Mae Weems's photos of "negroid types", which critiques white scientific attempts to establish black unsuitability for equality with whites. Under these racist terms, black physical characteristics are somehow different, and black people become not-quite-human.
That isn't much of a change from the enslaved African female body of the preceding centuries, as Kara Walker charts in her black-and-white short film from 2005 entitled 8 Possible Beginnings or: The Creation of African-America, A Moving Picture. Shot in silhouette, her work parades draughtsman-like precision with jarring polemic to form a new political aesthetic for an art that is moral as much as it is beautiful.
Somehow Gilroy's vision predates Atlantic slavery and plays out in literary and visual imagination from time immemorial, or at least since Aristotle's fourth-century-BC Poetics. Art can never be post-race. Why fly in the face of history, culture, the body and being?
• Afro Modern: Journeys through the Black Atlantic is at Tate Liverpool until 25 April. Tel: 0151 702 7400. Aubrey Williams: Atlantic Fire is at the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool until 11 April. Tel: 0151 478 4199. | Fred D'Aguiar salutes Tate Liverpool's Afro Modern, celebrating the power of art to debunk historical stereotypes |
George Clooney (left) and Donald Trump
Isa Foltin/WireImage; Scott Olson/Getty Images
03/03/2016 AT 04:40 PM EST
is not mincing words when it comes to presidential candidate
the Republican frontrunner will go down in history as a laughing stock at the
, Clooney took a more serious tone while describing Trump in a recent interview with
"He's just an opportunist. Now he's a fascist; a xenophobic fascist," he said bluntly. "You can count on Americans to do the right thing after they've exhausted all the other possibilities."
Even if Trump were elected, Clooney believes his political proposals would never come to fruition. "The truth of the matter is, in election season, things go crazy, and the loudest voices are the furthest and most extreme," he explained.
"So you hear a massively stupid idea, like we're going to ban Muslims from the country. Now, we're not ever going to do that," he said with a shrug. "It says in the Statue of Liberty, bring us your huddled masses. It's not what's going to happen."
star will not be voting for the real estate magnate, he did express his support for
and hinted at a planned fundraiser for her campaign.
"I am a Hillary supporter. I am doing a fundraiser for her," said the actor, who raised $15 million for
at an event in 2012.
Clooney also noted his admiration for Vermont Senator
. "I really love Bernie Sanders, and am really glad he is in the debate," he said.
"He is forcing the conversation to things that never get talked about in U.S. politics: disparity between the rich and the poor, which is getting worse and worse every day." | George Clooney accused Donald Trump of being a "xenophobic fascist" in an interview with The Guardian |
In 1994, long before chocolate fountains became the kind of thing that people pulled out at dinner parties, Helen Chadwick set gallons of melted chocolate bubbling as part of a piece she called Cacao (it came complete with a pump rising phallically from the centre of the pool). Chadwick is a master of confusing our notions of the horrific with the sensual and desirable, and her most famous work is resurrected in Pot Luck: Food and Art at the New Art Gallery Walsall, a group exhibition exploring consumables. Artists including Damien Hirst, Gayle Chong Kwan and Subodh Gupta bring something to the table.
By way of contrast, it's ideas of health and fitness that fill the Collective Gallery in Edinburgh. A double show, Commonweath Suite, presents two newly commissioned films based around the city's Royal Commonwealth pool, built for the 1970 Commonwealth Games. Henna-Riikka Halonen became fascinated by the building's modernist interior – which reminded her of the set for Vladimir Mayakovsky's Russian constructivist play The Bathhouse, a 1930 satire on state bureaucracy – and co-opted a local diving team to film a restaging. Another artist, Jordan Baseman, has created a documentary work called A Hypnotic Effect. This follows a lifelong gym user, Ian Colquhon, who lost his legs in a fire at the age of 24. Though Colquhon is unable to swim, his description of his watery dreams – and the film's images of light flickering on water – create a moving portrait of both building and man.
At the Simon Lee Gallery in London's Mayfair, meanwhile, American artist Sherrie Levine's exhibition contains lovingly decorated childhood relics made into gilded bronzes, as well as a mystifying dog-size skeleton and statues of Hindu household deities. Carefully selected poems from Charles Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du Mal are reprinted and framed alongside 24 individually framed, mass-produced postcards of Aspen woodland. Levine is a borrower of sorts, copying the work of others and transforming it according to her own desires.
If you do happen to need a tranquil moment in the bustling West End, stop in at David Claerbout's exhibition of new film installations at Hauser & Wirth. In the dark depths of this former bank, you will find a film of a maid quietly cleaning a beautiful modernist house in the darkness, the light slowly creeping in as she finishes and leaves. A beautiful two-screen installation, Riverside (2007-8), follows a boy and a girl treading the same circular path through a valley. You're never quite sure if they'll meet.
There are more contemplative London moments at Camden Arts Centre, where you'll find Michael Raedecker's Line-Up, an exquisite exhibition of pallid grey and rain-soaked blue paintings. Back yards, washing lines, cakes and flowers are among Raedecker's subjects; they tremble on the canvas, threatening to dissipate entirely. | Walsall throws a banquet of excess, watery dreams haunt Edinburgh's Collective, and three London galleries offer busy shoppers a tranquil escape |
Stocks barely budged Monday. Trading was quiet ahead of the Federal Reserve’s meeting this week, which is expected to shed light on the possibility of an interest rate increase. US stocks missed out on a global rally that lifted stocks in Europe and Asia; the S&P 500 fell for just the second time this month. Starwood Hotels jumped 7.8 percent after a consortium led by China’s Anbang Insurance Group offered $14 billion for the chain. Last year, Marriott International agreed to buy Starwood for $12.2 billion. Marriott rose $3 percent; it will get $400 million if Starwood backs out of the deal. The news lifted other travel companies. TripAdvisor gained 4.5 percent, while Expedia rose 1.3 percent. C. Patrick Scholes, at SunTrust Robinson Humphrey, said investors in Expedia and TripAdvisor hope Starwood will be sold to Anbang. He said if Marriott and Starwood combine, they’d have more power to negotiate lower commissions with online travel agencies. ‘‘If there’s no deal, that strength and bargaining power is taken away,’’ he said. Energy and materials stocks fell. The price of US crude lost 3.4 percent after Iran dismissed the idea of a production freeze. | US stocks barely budged Monday, finishing mixed as lower oil prices pulled energy companies down while hotels and travel-related companies rose. |
TDIndustries 100 Best Companies to Work For Rank: 82 Headquarters: Dallas Employees: 1,800 Compensation: Project managers average an annual salary of $90,000.
Eighteen construction workers took a break in January from job sites around Texas to attend a class at TDIndustries headquarters in Dallas. One of the teachers was Mexican-born Alberto Sandoval, who began at the contracting services company as a plumber’s apprentice in 1998. Sandoval’s lesson plan that day had nothing to do with his expert trade. Instead he was teaching a “servant leadership” management course in his native language, Spanish.
As someone who struggled with English earlier in his career and overcame the language gap to climb through the ranks and become a superintendent, Sandoval says TD’s emphasis on active listening and talent development contribute to the company’s success: “When you have respect for people, they’ll respect you. When you earn the respect from a lot of guys, that’s going to take you a long way.”
Offering training courses in Spanish is part of a new push to expand advancement opportunities at TD, a firm with $430 million in sales where Hispanic and Latino workers make up 37% of the company’s total workforce. The new course joins the company’s many other training options, which include classes to learn Spanish and English, as well as GED test-prep offerings in both languages — some of the reasons it has been named one of Fortune’s Best Companies every year since the list made its debut in 1998. “We want our young leaders on the front lines to look up and say, ‘Wow, they look like me. I can go there,’ ” says Harold MacDowell, the company’s third CEO since 1946.
TD also prides itself on hiring people for life, not as temps on a given project. That boosts performance, productivity, and innovation across the company’s different services, which include engineering, renovations, and maintenance. So even while executing a four-year, $100 million contract for the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, the company focuses on lining up future projects. “We will reduce our margins to win the right work so our people don’t get laid off,” MacDowell says.
The company is 100% employee-owned, which reinforces the long view. About 1,200 people hold all the stock, at $140 a share, and senior management owns less than 20% of the pie. People department manager Jessica Pastor, who helps run TD’s Hispanic resources group, plans to grow that stockholder pool with more outreach to Spanish speakers. “Hopefully, they’ll gain a better understanding of how that investment works and how it pays out for them in the long run,” she says.
Aiming for full participation in the company’s ESOP is good business — in any language.
This story is from the March 17, 2014 issue of Fortune. | A construction firm levels the playing field for minority workers. |
A 6.3 percent unemployment rate remains higher than where many policymakers would like, but the rate is as low as it's been in more than five years. Though the International Monetary Fund has slashed its growth forecast for the U.S. economy to 2 percent this year, that is still better than the 1.9 percent gain the economy registered last year.
"I continue to be bullish on the consumer going forward in the second half of the year and into 2015," said David Bettencourt of ETF Daily News, in an email. "Exceptionally low rates, low inflation and an uptick in jobs will fuel the consumer and the [consumer ETF] XLY. XLY also has a dividend which makes it attractive."
The SPDR Discretionary ETF (XLY), the SPDR S&P Retail ETF (XRT), and the Vanguard Consumer Discretionary ETF (VCR) have all posted declines this year even as the broader market indexes reached record highs. More specialized ETFs betting on consumer spending, such as the PowerShares Dynamic Media Portfolio (PBS) and PowerShares Dynamic Leisure & Entertainment fund (PEJ), have also turned in lackluster performance.
The approaches these ETFs take to targeting consumer spending is varied.
Read MoreAging stinks—at least profit from it
XLY, for instance, has media companies including Walt Disney and Comcast in its top 10 holdings with Home Depot, McDonald's and Priceline.com. Vanguard's VCR also has significant exposure to media companies. The sector accounts for roughly 30 percent of both ETFs.
"Some of the media companies—it could be a push to say they are consumer discretionary companies. It's not right or wrong, but some could contest that," said Spencer Bogart, an analyst with ETF.com, though he added that XLY and VCR represent the sector well overall.
XLY is among the editors' picks at ETF.com and has a low 16 basis point expense ratio, among the lowest in the sector.
VCR, the Vanguard ETF, casts a wider net than its rival, holding many more stocks—385 to XLY's 84. VCR's expense ratio is 14 basis points.
Read MoreHow to build your own ETF
There are slight sector diversions among the two biggest consumer ETFs. VCR has a 17 percent weighting in hotel and entertainment stocks; XLY reports a 1 percent stake in software and IT service.
Both ETFs should do well if consumer confidence continues to slowly, but surely, improve.
That hasn't yet happened in anything resembling a straight line. Recent data released by Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan June sentiment index showed an increase to 82.5, up from a preliminary reading of 81.2 and a May reading of 81.9. That was better than expectations, but still below the April level and the year-ago reading.
"We are cautiously optimistic (about the future)," said Scott Hoyt, an economist at Moody's Economy.com. "The economy should be positioned to move forward more powerfully," in the second half of the year, he said. | Americans are choosing to save over spend, and that's creating an unwanted discount on these consumer spending-linked investments. |
Daniel Acker | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Duracell batteries hang on a display rack at a supermarket in Princeton, Ill., Nov. 13, 2014.
Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway announced it will acquire Duracell from Procter & Gamble in a deal valued around $4.7 billion. The battery maker now joins Heinz, Fruit of the Loom, Benjamin Moore, Geico and other widely recognized names that make up his company's portfolio.
Read More 10 top brands Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway owns
Although Buffett's buy may delight some, P&G shareholder Carl Boeckman isn't so happy. He fears that P&G has an agenda.
"When you sell off parts of a car you can make money but you don't have a car anymore," Boeckman said on CNBC's "Street Signs," suggesting he's concerned that the divestiture was an early sign of a breakup.
Boeckman cited reports that P&G intends to sell up to 100 brands, or about half its brands, over the next two years, a move he finds concerning. "I asked (CEO) Alan Lafley about this and he assured me this isn't a sign of a breakup," Boeckman said.
But Boeckman remains skeptical. "They've also sold Folgers coffee, Jif peanut butter, and Pringles potato chips," Boeckman said. "All these brands are making money for their new owners."
Boeckman, who holds about 2,000 shares of P&G and has owned P&G stock for decades, worries that shareholders are ultimately going to pay the price for these decisions.
Read MoreDuracell trade is sign Buffett is bearish on P&G
P&G did not immediately respond to CNBC's request for comment. | Some shareholders are unhappy about P&G's sale of Duracell to Warren Buffett. |
"I know they have the ability to do at least as much damage as they did in Estonia and Georgia," he said.
Estonia suffered a 10-day attack on its Internet services in 2007, which caused major disruptions to its financial system, during a spat with Moscow over a Soviet-era war memorial, and Georgia was hit by mass cyberattacks during a brief 2008 war with Russia over its pro-Moscow South Ossetia region.
Russian authorities denied direct involvement in both attacks, saying they had no influence over the actions of self-styled patriotic hackers.
Much of Ukraine's telecommunications infrastructure was built when it was part of the Soviet Union, along with what is now the Russian Federation, and is particularly vulnerable to penetration by Moscow.
"The Russians have the place completely wired," said Jim Lewis, a former U.S. foreign service officer and now senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.
"They are right next door and most traffic has to go through Russia. That they haven't done more probably reflects their confidence that they're going to come out ahead and there's nothing anyone can do about it," Lewis said.
Cyberwarfare experts say that while Russia certainly has the ability to conduct such campaigns against Ukraine, it has yet to need to use those capabilities.
"This would show the Russians acting with more discretion and targeting than recently," said John Bassett, former head of the London and Washington stations of GCHQ, Britain's top secret government communications center.
(Read more: Ukraine crisis: Latest news and market reaction)
"This wouldn't expose any great depth of their technological capability and they would be keeping the harder stuff back," said Bassett, now associate at Oxford University's Cyber Security Centre.
Marty Martin, a former senior operations officer with the CIA, said Moscow would likely only take action to damage Ukraine's Internet and internal communications systems if hostilities broke out.
"A lot of times you don't want to shut things down. If you do that, then you don't get your flow of intelligence. You are probably better off monitoring it," Martin said.
Experts believe Russia was behind the hacking of a confidential phone conversation between senior U.S. State Department official Victoria Nuland and U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt, which was leaked over YouTube last month.
"Russia's strategy is control the narrative, discredit opponents, and coerce," Lewis said. | Some telephone services were severed after Russian forces seized control of airfields in Crimea, but now lawmakers are being targeted, Ukraine says. |
March 27, 2016 6:25 p.m. ET
There aren’t many Christians left in Pakistan, but that’s still too many for the Taliban. A splinter group of the Pakistani faction of the Islamist terror group claimed responsibility for a suicide bomb attack on Christians celebrating in a park in Lahore on Easter Sunday.
At least 65 people, mostly women and children, were killed and more than 300 others were injured as the terrorists targeted a children’s park in Pakistan’s most cosmopolitan city. “Members of the Christian community who were celebrating Easter today...
There aren’t many Christians left in Pakistan, but that’s still too many for the Taliban. A splinter group of the Pakistani faction of the Islamist terror group claimed responsibility for a suicide bomb attack on Christians celebrating in a park in Lahore on Easter Sunday.
At least 65 people, mostly women and children, were killed and more than 300 others were injured as the terrorists targeted a children’s park in Pakistan’s most cosmopolitan city. “Members of the Christian community who were celebrating Easter today were our prime target,” said a Taliban spokesman who called NBC News from the safety of an undisclosed location.
Islamist attacks on Christians during religious holidays is becoming routine, as the jihadists strive for maximum political impact. While Europe tries to find and break up jihadist networks after last week’s bombing in Brussels, the Pakistan murders are a reminder that the jihadists are killing even more people in Muslim-majority countries. The victims are Muslims and Christians.
Mass-casualty terrorism has become an almost daily occurrence, and there’s a danger that the world will become inured to it as a new normal. That is dangerous. A terror group that targets women and children without remorse wouldn’t hesitate to kill tens of thousands, even millions, if it can acquire the means. | A Taliban Easter: The casualties will be worse when jihadists acquire WMD, says a Wall Street Journal editorial. |
"RQ is NOT about spending. It's about productivity of that spending," said Anne Marie Knott, professor of strategy at Washington University in St. Louis and creator of the Research Quotient (RQ) model for measuring optimal R&D.
This year Oshkosh had a higher RQ (a measure of R&D productivity that links R&D spending to corporate revenue growth and market value) than Silicon Valley darlings like Google and Netflix.
How did Oshkosh do it? A good place to begin answering this question is with a fire hydrant.
"A hose that fits a hydrant in Phoenix will not fit a hydrant in New York City," said Gary Schmiedel, executive vice president of technology at Oshkosh, the market leader in fire truck manufacturing. "It's not exactly high tech, but from a practical standpoint, you have to deal with all those things."
The average buyer of a fire truck has about 20,000 options to consider, according to Oshkosh. There are decisions to be made about suspension, ladder height, color and water pumping.
Read MoreThe all-time R&D hall of fame: Who got in?
Product challenges with many variables require innovation, but the products don't need to be sexy to require advanced R&D thinking. At Dow Chemical, a product as ordinary as exterior house paint is a global innovation challenge. When designing a new paint, Dow needs to take into account the materials that are most commonly used for home exteriors across the regions of the U.S., and the fact that in Saudi Arabia the sand will erode paint, and that in India it pours for months every year.
"How can one project attack all of those problems?" said A.N. Sreeram, vice president of research and development at Dow.
Not just dealing with but also constantly improving and rethinking all of the variables has made Oshkosh a hotbed for innovation. One of the company's most popular fire truck innovations is Side-Roll Protection: a system of electronic sensors, automatic-tighten seatbelts and side-curtain air bags developed, in part, as a response to a troubling number of firefighter deaths en route to the scene of a fire (since 2004, 62 firefighters have been killed while driving or operating their vehicles, according to the U.S. Fire Administration).
You may not expect to hear it from Oshkosh, but Schmiedel said, "If we don't innovate, we die." | Investors seeking steady gains on innovation should look past tech buzz. When R&D productivity is measured, 'boring' stocks often lead. |
Archaeologists in 2012 at the Flores dig site. (AAP)
New discoveries at the Indonesian cave site of Liang Bua are changing the way we look at the mysterious Homo floresiensis – known as "hobbits" because of their short stature.
We originally believed these hobbits disappeared around 12,000 years ago, but it appears they may have actually died out long before this, around 40,000 years earlier. Research published in Nature today shows they used the cave between 190,000 and 50,000 years ago.
The finding, by ourselves and a team of international researchers, puts the disappearance of Homo floresiensis at around the same time that modern humans (Homo sapiens) first spread through the region and reached Australia.
But whether these two species of hominin (primates more closely related to modern humans than to living apes) ever interacted, and our ancestors can be blamed for the hobbits' demise, remain open questions until direct evidence is found placing modern humans at the scene.
At present, the earliest evidence for modern humans on Flores is just 11,000 years old.
An artist's depiction of the so-called 'Hobbit'. (National Geographic/AP Photo)
The original discovery of Homo floresiensis was made back in September 2003, in the fading light of an archaeological excavation on the Indonesian island.
The skeletal remains of this primitive, small-brained and diminutive hominin were found buried six metres below the ground surface at Liang Bua, an impressive limestone cave in the island’s western highlands.
In the same deposits as the remains of this new species were stone artefacts and the remains of pygmy elephant (Stegodon), giant marabou stork, vulture and komodo dragon.
Samples of charcoal and sediment were collected for radiocarbon and luminescence dating. The resulting age estimates of just 18,000 years ago for the type specimen – i.e. the specimen that is used to name the species – of the hobbit, known as LB1, sent shock waves through the paleoanthropological community.
Fragmentary remains of other individuals were found in layers then thought to be deposited as recently as 12,000 years ago.
The tiny hominin presented us with puzzles aplenty. It has an appearance most similar to fossil human species that lived in Africa and Asia between one and three million years ago.
So how and when did this species or its ancestors get to this remote island? And how did it apparently manage to survive on Flores for 40,000 years after the first Australians had already passed through this island archipelago?
Elsewhere in the world, first contact of a native fauna with modern humans usually ends badly for the endemic animals. Not so, it seemed, with the hardy hobbits.
The revision in the last-appearance age for Homo floresiensis is the culmination of eight further years of painstaking excavation and study of the cave deposits at Liang Bua by many of the same researchers involved in the original discovery.
The key breakthrough has been the recognition of a major break in the deposit of the sedimentary layers – a “stratigraphic unconformity” – immediately above LB1 as a result of one or more erosional events in the past.
As the excavations were extended each year, it became increasingly clear that all of the skeletal remains of Homo floresiensis, and the stone tools made by the hobbits, came from a large remnant pedestal of deposit that accumulated between 190,000 and 50,000 years ago.
At the location of LB1, the hobbit-bearing deposits are truncated by a steeply sloping surface, which is capped by sediments that accumulated only in the last 20,000 years. It was those sediments that had been inadvertently dated in the original study.
We now know that the stratigraphic sequence at Liang Bua is far more complex than had originally been thought. So, can we be confident in our new interpretation of the stratigraphy and chronology for the home of the hobbit? We think so.
By excavating more of the cave deposits in the past decade, we have added many new pieces to the jigsaw puzzle of how the site has formed. This results in a vastly improved picture of what was deposited where, when and how in the cave.
We have also used a range of new dating techniques, some of which were not available in 2003. As with technical developments in other fields of science, such as ancient DNA, time has also marched on with improvements to geochronology methods.
For example, the bones of LB1 and two other hobbits were dated using the latest uranium-series methods, while the associated sediments were dated using infrared stimulated luminescence procedures that were developed only in 2011.
These and other dating techniques, including radiocarbon, thermoluminescence and argon dating, provide a new, more robust chronology for Liang Bua and the prehistoric hominins that used this cave in the past.
There are still many chapters of hobbit history to be written.
When did the ancestors of Homo floresiensis first arrive on Flores and what did they look like? When did hobbits finally go extinct, and did modern humans play any role in their downfall?
Liang Bua still holds many secrets, but a single site can provide only a snapshot in time.
So the search is on for more hobbit sites, spanning a wider geographic area, both on Flores and elsewhere in the Indonesian archipelago. A decade from now, we hope to have found many more pieces of this prehistoric puzzle in human evolution.
Thomas Sutikna, PhD candidate in archaeological science, University of Wollongong; Matthew Tocheri, Canada Research Chair in Human Origins, Lakehead University, and Richard 'Bert' Roberts, ARC Australian Laureate Fellow, University of Wollongong
This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article. | A group of extinct human relatives dubbed "hobbits" disappeared much longer ago than previously thought, archaeologists said yesterday. |
Colin Kaepernick (7) walks off the field toward the locker room as the San Francisco 49ers played the Atlanta Falcons at Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara, Calif., on Sunday, November 8, 2015.
Colin Kaepernick (7) walks off the field toward the locker room as the San Francisco 49ers played the Atlanta Falcons at Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara, Calif., on Sunday, November 8, 2015.
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick speaks during a news conference following an NFL football game against the St. Louis Rams Sunday, Nov. 1, 2015, in St. Louis. The Rams won 27-6. (AP Photo/Billy Hurst)
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick speaks during a news conference following an NFL football game against the St. Louis Rams Sunday, Nov. 1, 2015, in St. Louis. The Rams won 27-6. (AP Photo/Billy
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick (7) walks on the sideline during the second half of an NFL football game against the Atlanta Falcons in Santa Clara, Calif., Sunday, Nov. 8, 2015. (AP Photo/Ben Margot)
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick (7) walks on the sideline during the second half of an NFL football game against the Atlanta Falcons in Santa Clara, Calif., Sunday, Nov. 8, 2015. (AP Photo/Ben
Colin Kaepernick (7) smiled as the last seconds ticked off for a 49er victory Sunday January 12, 2014. The San Francisco 49ers beat the Carolina Panthers 23-10 in Charlotte, North Carolina to advance to the NFC title game against Seattle.
Colin Kaepernick (7) smiled as the last seconds ticked off for a 49er victory Sunday January 12, 2014. The San Francisco 49ers beat the Carolina Panthers 23-10 in Charlotte, North Carolina to advance to the NFC
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick (7) tries to get away from Atlanta Falcons outside linebacker Stephen Nicholas (54) and defensive tackle Peria Jerry (94) during the first quarter at Candlestick Park on Monday, Dec. 23, 2013 in San Francisco, Calif.
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick (7) tries to get away from Atlanta Falcons outside linebacker Stephen Nicholas (54) and defensive tackle Peria Jerry (94) during the first quarter at Candlestick
49er quarterback Colin Kaepernick, (7) warming up before the start of the game as the San Francisco 49ers prepare to take on the St. Louis Rams at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, Ca., on Sunday Dec. 1, 2013.
49er quarterback Colin Kaepernick, (7) warming up before the start of the game as the San Francisco 49ers prepare to take on the St. Louis Rams at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, Ca., on Sunday Dec. 1, 2013.
Colin Kaepernick completed a short pass to Frank Gore in the second half. The San Francisco 49ers defeated the St. Louis Rams 23-13 at Candlestick Park Sunday December 1, 2013.
Colin Kaepernick completed a short pass to Frank Gore in the second half. The San Francisco 49ers defeated the St. Louis Rams 23-13 at Candlestick Park Sunday December 1, 2013.
Colin Kaepernick shows off his many tattoos at the 49ers practice facility.
Colin Kaepernick shows off his many tattoos at the 49ers practice facility.
Colin Kaepernick (7) congratulates Vernon Davis in the endzone after his touchdown. The San Francisco 49ers defeated the St. Louis Rams 23-13 at Candlestick Park Sunday December 1, 2013.
Colin Kaepernick (7) congratulates Vernon Davis in the endzone after his touchdown. The San Francisco 49ers defeated the St. Louis Rams 23-13 at Candlestick Park Sunday December 1, 2013.
Seattle's Ricardo Lockette, (left) and 49ers' quarterback Colin Kaepernick, exchange uniforns at the end of the game, as the San Francisco 49ers beat the Seattle Seahawks 19-17, at Candlestick Park on Sunday Dec. 8, 2013, in San Francisco, Ca.
Seattle's Ricardo Lockette, (left) and 49ers' quarterback Colin Kaepernick, exchange uniforns at the end of the game, as the San Francisco 49ers beat the Seattle Seahawks 19-17, at Candlestick Park on Sunday
San Francisco's Colin Kaepernick, (7) reacts after further review of a catch by the 49ers Vernon Davis, was ruled a touchdown, during the second quarter as the San Francisco 49ers take on the Carolina Panthers in the NFC divisional playoffs in Charlotte, North Carolina on Sunday Jan. 12, 2014, at Bank of America stadium.
San Francisco's Colin Kaepernick, (7) reacts after further review of a catch by the 49ers Vernon Davis, was ruled a touchdown, during the second quarter as the San Francisco 49ers take on the Carolina Panthers
Colin Kaepernick (7) ran over the goal line for a touchdown early in the third quarter Sunday January 12, 2014. Luke Kuechly (59) tried to defend. The San Francisco 49ers beat the Carolina Panthers 23-10 in Charlotte, North Carolina to advance to the NFC title game against Seattle.
Colin Kaepernick (7) ran over the goal line for a touchdown early in the third quarter Sunday January 12, 2014. Luke Kuechly (59) tried to defend. The San Francisco 49ers beat the Carolina Panthers 23-10 in
Colin Kaepernick (7) took off for a first down run in the second half Sunday January 19, 2014. The Seattle Seahawks defeated the San Francisco 49ers 23-17 to win the NFC championship and a trip to the Super Bowl at CenturyLink Field in Seattle, Washington.
Colin Kaepernick (7) took off for a first down run in the second half Sunday January 19, 2014. The Seattle Seahawks defeated the San Francisco 49ers 23-17 to win the NFC championship and a trip to the Super
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick (7) walks off the field after the 49ers defeated the Atlanta Falcons at Candlestick Park on Monday December 23, 2013 in San Francisco, Calif. It is the last home game the 49ers will have at Candlestick Park before the stadium is demolished.
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick (7) walks off the field after the 49ers defeated the Atlanta Falcons at Candlestick Park on Monday December 23, 2013 in San Francisco, Calif. It is the last
49ers qb Colin Kaepernick The San Francisco 49ers play the Jacksonville Jaguars in game two, of the NFL International Series at Wembley Stadium in London on Sunday, October 27. 27/10/13, photo: Sean Ryan /NFL
49ers qb Colin Kaepernick The San Francisco 49ers play the Jacksonville Jaguars in game two, of the NFL International Series at Wembley Stadium in London on Sunday, October 27. 27/10/13, photo: Sean Ryan
Quarterback Colin Kaepernick puts on his helmet on Nov. 19, 2012, the day of his first NFL start.
Quarterback Colin Kaepernick puts on his helmet on Nov. 19, 2012, the day of his first NFL start.
Kaepernick relaxing at home in Turlock with his 100-pound pet tortoise Sammy.
Kaepernick relaxing at home in Turlock with his 100-pound pet tortoise Sammy.
Colin Kaepernick celebrates a touchdown with Alex Boone and Joe Staley during a game against the New York Jets at MetLife Stadium on September 30, 2012 in East Rutherford, New Jersey.
Colin Kaepernick celebrates a touchdown with Alex Boone and Joe Staley during a game against the New York Jets at MetLife Stadium on September 30, 2012 in East Rutherford, New Jersey.
From his college days: Kaepernick of the Nevada Wolf Pack looks to pass against the UNLV Rebels in the third quarter of their game at Sam Boyd Stadium October 2, 2010 in Las Vegas, Nevada.
From his college days: Kaepernick of the Nevada Wolf Pack looks to pass against the UNLV Rebels in the third quarter of their game at Sam Boyd Stadium October 2, 2010 in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Colin Kaepernick was congratulated by the Dolphins Cameron Wake at the end of the game. The San Francisco 49ers defeated the Miami Dolphins 27-13 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, Calif. Sunday December 9, 2012.
Colin Kaepernick was congratulated by the Dolphins Cameron Wake at the end of the game. The San Francisco 49ers defeated the Miami Dolphins 27-13 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, Calif. Sunday December 9,
Kaepernick, seen here when he was a pitcher for the Pitman High School baseball team. He once threw a seven-inning no-hitter while sick with pneumonia.
Kaepernick, seen here when he was a pitcher for the Pitman High School baseball team. He once threw a seven-inning no-hitter while sick with pneumonia.
Quarterback Colin Kaepernick for a gain in the second quarter of the San Francisco 49ers game against the Chicago Bears at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, Calif., on Sunday November 19, 2012.
Quarterback Colin Kaepernick for a gain in the second quarter of the San Francisco 49ers game against the Chicago Bears at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, Calif., on Sunday November 19, 2012.
Little Colin's now-famous fourth grade essay in which he proclaimed he planned on someday playing for the San Francisco 49ers.
Little Colin's now-famous fourth grade essay in which he proclaimed he planned on someday playing for the San Francisco 49ers.
San Francisco 49ers Quarterback Colin Kaepernick (7) celebrates with coach Jim Harbaugh after a touchdown in the third quarter of the San Francisco 49ers game against the Green Bay Packers in the NFC Divisional Playoffs at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, Calif., on Saturday January 12, 2013.
San Francisco 49ers Quarterback Colin Kaepernick (7) celebrates with coach Jim Harbaugh after a touchdown in the third quarter of the San Francisco 49ers game against the Green Bay Packers in the NFC Divisional
Kaepernick in San Francisco: the college QB looks to pass the ball against Boston College during the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl at AT&T Park on January 9, 2011 in San Francisco, California.
Kaepernick in San Francisco: the college QB looks to pass the ball against Boston College during the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl at AT&T Park on January 9, 2011 in San Francisco, California.
Colin Kaepernick #10 of the Nevada Wolf Pack throws the ball against Boston College during the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl at AT&T Park on January 9, 2011 in San Francisco, California.
Colin Kaepernick #10 of the Nevada Wolf Pack throws the ball against Boston College during the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl at AT&T Park on January 9, 2011 in San Francisco, California.
Kaepernick "Kaepernicks" after scoring a touchdown in the third quarter of the San Francisco 49ers game against the Green Bay Packers.
Kaepernick "Kaepernicks" after scoring a touchdown in the third quarter of the San Francisco 49ers game against the Green Bay Packers.
Colin Kaepernick calls out to his teammates at the line of scrimmage during the first half of the Seahawks and 49ers game Sunday, Dec. 23, 2012, at CenturyLink Field in Seattle, WA.
Colin Kaepernick calls out to his teammates at the line of scrimmage during the first half of the Seahawks and 49ers game Sunday, Dec. 23, 2012, at CenturyLink Field in Seattle, WA.
Frank Gore and Colin Kaepernick celebrate after scoring a touchdown against the New Orleans Saints at the Superdome on November 25, 2012 in New Orleans, Louisiana.
Frank Gore and Colin Kaepernick celebrate after scoring a touchdown against the New Orleans Saints at the Superdome on November 25, 2012 in New Orleans, Louisiana.
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick speaks at an NFL football media availability in Santa Clara, Calif., Wednesday, Jan. 16, 2013. The 49ers will face the Falcons in the NFC championship game on Sunday.
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick speaks at an NFL football media availability in Santa Clara, Calif., Wednesday, Jan. 16, 2013. The 49ers will face the Falcons in the NFC championship game on
Colin Kaepernick shares a light moment with Michael Crabtree and Carlos Rogers.
Colin Kaepernick shares a light moment with Michael Crabtree and Carlos Rogers.
Kap walks off the field after defeating the Green Bay Packers in the NFC Divisional Playoff Game at Candlestick Park.
Kap walks off the field after defeating the Green Bay Packers in the NFC Divisional Playoff Game at Candlestick Park.
Kaepernick tries to leap away from St. Louis Rams outside linebacker Jo-Lonn Dunbar and defensive end William Hayes, right, during the first quarter of an NFL football game Sunday, Dec. 2, 2012, in St. Louis.
Kaepernick tries to leap away from St. Louis Rams outside linebacker Jo-Lonn Dunbar and defensive end William Hayes, right, during the first quarter of an NFL football game Sunday, Dec. 2, 2012, in St. Louis.
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick stands on the sideline in Seattle.
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick stands on the sideline in Seattle.
More tattoos, mostly of the religious variety.
More tattoos, mostly of the religious variety.
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick warms up prior to an NFL football game against the Seattle Seahawks on Dec. 23, 2012.
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick warms up prior to an NFL football game against the Seattle Seahawks on Dec. 23, 2012.
Quarterback Colin Kaepernick and others gather for prayer following the San Francisco 49ers game against the Miami Dolphins at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, Calif., on Sunday December 9, 2012.
Quarterback Colin Kaepernick and others gather for prayer following the San Francisco 49ers game against the Miami Dolphins at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, Calif., on Sunday December 9, 2012.
Kaepernick runs in for a touchdown in the third quarter of the San Francisco 49ers game against the Green Bay Packers in the NFC Divisional Playoffs at Candlestick.
Kaepernick runs in for a touchdown in the third quarter of the San Francisco 49ers game against the Green Bay Packers in the NFC Divisional Playoffs at Candlestick.
Quarterback Colin Kaepernick runs in a touchdown in the first quarter of the San Francisco 49ers game against the Green Bay Packers in the NFC Divisional Playoffs at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, Calif., on Saturday January 12, 2013.
Quarterback Colin Kaepernick runs in a touchdown in the first quarter of the San Francisco 49ers game against the Green Bay Packers in the NFC Divisional Playoffs at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, Calif.,
Kap celebrates at the end of his first postseason start: a resounding victory over the Packers.
Kap celebrates at the end of his first postseason start: a resounding victory over the Packers.
Colin Kaepernick scrambles in the fourth quarter under pressure from Israel Idonije. The San Francisco 49ers played the Chicago Bears on November 19 and won 32-7.
Colin Kaepernick scrambles in the fourth quarter under pressure from Israel Idonije. The San Francisco 49ers played the Chicago Bears on November 19 and won 32-7.
Remember these guys? San Francisco 49ers quarterbacks Jeremiah Masoli, Alex Smith, Colin Kaepernick and McLeod Bethel-Thompson practice during training camp in Santa Clara, Calif., back in 2011.
Remember these guys? San Francisco 49ers quarterbacks Jeremiah Masoli, Alex Smith, Colin Kaepernick and McLeod Bethel-Thompson practice during training camp in Santa Clara, Calif., back in 2011.
Kaepernick calls the play against the New Orleans Saints at the Louisiana Superdome in New Orleans, Friday, Aug. 12, 2011.
Kaepernick calls the play against the New Orleans Saints at the Louisiana Superdome in New Orleans, Friday, Aug. 12, 2011.
Kaepernick throws against the Arizona Cardinals at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, Calif., on Sunday December 30, 2012.
Kaepernick throws against the Arizona Cardinals at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, Calif., on Sunday December 30, 2012.
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick (7) is tackled by Green Bay Packers free safety M.D. Jennings (43) and outside linebacker Erik Walden (93) during the second quarter of an NFC divisional playoff NFL football game in San Francisco, Saturday, Jan. 12, 2013.
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick (7) is tackled by Green Bay Packers free safety M.D. Jennings (43) and outside linebacker Erik Walden (93) during the second quarter of an NFC divisional playoff
Kap warms up before his first NFL start. The 49ers beat the Chicago Bears 32-7.
Kap warms up before his first NFL start. The 49ers beat the Chicago Bears 32-7. | Quarterback Colin Kaepernick will report for the opening of the 49ers’ offseason workout program today in Santa Clara, a source said. Denver, which is just $1.62 million under the cap, wants the 49ers to pay $4.9 million of his 2016 base salary, ESPN reported. Kaepernick, who has had surgeries on his shoulder, thumb and knee in the past five months, has not been medically cleared to participate in workouts, a source said. The first two weeks of the offseason program consist of strength and conditioning, with no on-field sessions with coaches allowed until April 18. Kaepernick last returned to the Bay Area on March 17 to have a checkup with team doctors, but he didn’t meet with Kelly or general manager Trent Baalke during his brief visit. |
Brent Lewin | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Alibaba Group's founder and executive chairman, Jack Ma, waves as he arrives for a meeting at the Ritz-Carlton hotel in Hong Kong.
A few could still net hundreds of millions of dollars. But none—at least according to the filing—will join the 10-figure club. That's surprising given that Alibaba is the largest IPO ever. And it stands in contrast to Facebook, where the 11 top executives and officers below Mark Zuckerberg owned 13 percent of the company and several became billionaires.
Read MoreMeet Simon Xie: Alibaba's unassuming No. 2
Of course, some shareholders of Yahoo and Softbank, which hold big positions Alibaba, could become indirectly rich. Masayoshi Son owns around 20 percent of Softbank, which owns 34 percent of Alibaba—so his share of the Alibaba IPO would theoretically be worth more than $10 billion.
Yet Alibaba's IPO riches will be notably top heavy, even by tech standards. Twitter's IPO had four big shareholders—DickCostolo, Evan Williams, Peter Fenton and Jack Dorsey—who each had more than 1.6 percent of the company. All executive officers and directors as a group held 25.5 percent.
Read MoreWorld's billionaire population hits record high
GoPro's IPO wealth went well beyond its founder, Nicholas Woodman, who became a billionaire with the IPO. The other 11 officers or directors held nearly a quarter of the company. | Alibaba's IPO will unleash a flood of wealth for Jack Ma and Joseph Tsai, but unlike some other tech IPOs, the big money isn't being spread around the company. |
HOPEWELL JUNCTION, N. Y., Jan. 14 (AP)—Sig Buchmayr, owner of a chain of ski and sporting goods shops, was killed today in an automobile accident. A woman in the car who also died in the crash was identified as Mrs. Irmfried Ferentzi, 42 years old, of Manchester, Vt.
Sig Buchmayr Killed in Crash; Operated Chain of 5 Ski Shops
Mr. Buchmayr, of New York and Manchester, apparently was returning to New York. Both victims wore ski clothes, and there were two pairs of skiis in the car.
The police said Mrs. Ferentzi was driving the car, which left the Taconic Parkway near this Dutchess County community and struck a tree.
Ski shops bearing Mr. Buchmayr's name are at 18 East 53d Street, at the Cross County Center in Yonkers, at Essex
A native of Hof Gastein in the Austrian Alps, Mr. Buchmayr came to the United States in 1929 and established, at Peckett's on Sugar Hill in Franconia, N. H., one of the first ski schools in this country. After teaching there for eight years he went to Vermont, to Suicide Six at Woodstock and then to Mount Snow in Manchester.
“Eventually I had to give up teaching,” he once said. “In 1942 my wife Sally blessed me with triplet sons. I knew I never could support them with a ski teacher's salary.”
At one time Mr. Buchmayr also operated shops at Lake Placid, N. Y., and Manchester. As a competitive skiier he won some Class A events.
This article can be viewed in its original form. Please send questions and feedback to archive_feedback@nytimes.com | Ferentzi, (Mrs) Irmfried |
Donald Trump wasted no time in being Donald Trump. “I’ve brought some things for you,” he said, handing me a sheaf of papers as he boarded his private 727. These included some glossy brochures and a copy of New York Construction News, which, it seemed, had named Trump owner and developer of the year for 1999. “Owner and developer of the year,” he pointed out with his uncommonly stubby fingers, “which is unusual.”
It was early January, and the plane was headed for Minnesota, where Trump was to meet with Governor Jesse Ventura to discuss running for President on the Reform Party ticket. Onboard were a handful of journalists, Trump’s son Donny Jr., and his political adviser, Roger Stone, a former Nixon and Reagan handler who favors three-piece pinstriped suits and a pocket watch. Also onboard were some gold-plated sinks, a double bed, and gilt-framed works of art with signatures like “Renoir.” Nobody I asked seemed to know if they were real, or to care.
“We’ve done internal polls that have been amazing,” Trump was saying, ensconced in a red-velvet seat while Stone sat nearby in his Jay Gatsby getup. “If I feel I could win—win—then I’d run. I think I have a good chance.” He explained why. “Hey, I’ve got my name on half the major buildings in New York,” he said. “I went to the Wharton School of Finance, which is the No. 1 school. I’m intelligent. Some people would say I’m very, very, very intelligent.” Plus, he had written three best-selling books. “Not bestsellers,” Trump clarified. “No. 1 bestsellers.” Another thought occurred to him: “You know I am the highest-paid speaker in the country?”
Trump had inked a deal with Tony Robbins, the frighteningly upbeat motivational speaker, by which Robbins would pay Trump $1 million to give ten speeches at his seminars around the country. Crucially, Trump had timed his political stops to coincide with Robbins’ seminars, so that he was “making a lot of money” on those campaign stops. “It’s very possible that I could be the first presidential candidate to run and make money on it,” Trump said, adding that “there’s no way a good businessman” would have blown the kind of money Steve Forbes had. I wondered whether Trump was proposing his own special version of campaign finance reform here. I also wondered where he was planning to come up with the $100 million he was promising to spend if nominated, considering that his cash flow seemed much more precarious than he claimed.
Trump is contemplating taking out a mortgage on his Palm Beach palace, Mar-a-Lago.Greg Miller for Fortune
But talk turned to Trump’s women, prompting a reporter from the New York Post to ask whether he found Monica Lewinsky attractive. Trump screwed up his face and stuck his tongue out slightly, as if to gag.
“There’s a John F. Kennedy-type charisma that’s very hard to put your finger on,” Stone told me later on, when I asked him to describe Trump the politician. “He’s probably the best speaker on the circuit.” Once on the ground in Minneapolis, Trump was greeted on the frozen tarmac by a passel of Reform Party officials, who whisked him off by limousine to the hotel conference center.
After the Jesse Ventura action figures went on sale in the lobby, and not long after Ventura insisted he once saw Muhammad Ali levitate—no kidding, levitate!—off somebody’s kitchen floor, Trump took the stage to address an audience of Ventura backers. Though he dispensed with his usual critiques of Pat Buchanan (“a Hitler lover”), Bill Bradley (“a total disaster”), George W. Bush (“no Einstein”), Fidel Castro (“a bad guy”), North Korea (“run by some very bad people”), and Russia (“totally mixed up”), Trump did tell an unflattering joke about his second wife, Marla Maples, and crescendoed from a story about Jay Leno to the oblique observation that he’d count on people’s support “if I decide to do the thing that I very well might decide to do.” This, it turned out, was the applause line. “It was awfully disjointed,” one of Ventura’s people worried afterward. “Does he speak better than that?” But by then Trump had already headed out the door, past the “Trump 2000” posters, for a weekend of golf at Mar-a-Lago, his Palm Beach estate.
At age 53, a good decade and a half after he came to national prominence, Donald Trump is possibly the most famous businessman in America. According to the Gallup Organization, fully 98% of Americans know who he is. Bill Gates and Ross Perot also score in the high 90s. None of the other grandees of American business—not Jack Welch, not Warren Buffett, not Steve Jobs, not Ted Turner—even come close.
This embarrassing state of affairs might be likened to the time when Betty Crocker polled as the second-most-admired woman in America (behind Eleanor Roosevelt, who had the advantage of being a real person) or when kids voted Hulk Hogan their favorite athlete a few years back. For Donald Trump is to business what professional wrestling is to sports: part of it, certainly, but also a cartoonish parody of it. Which is why Fortune decided it was necessary to investigate and uncover, once and for all, why it is we feel compelled to write about Donald Trump in the first place.
The most impressive aspect of Trump’s celebrity, to begin with, is not its grandeur but its durability. Not only has he far outlasted the decade that produced him, but—unlike other products of the 1980s who’ve managed to stay in the limelight through self-reinvention a la Michael Milken—Trump has done it without any discernible personal growth. Like a cryogenically frozen Austin Powers, he stands as an almost perfectly preserved specimen of the era, an unreconstructed hedonist who persists in calling the plantings on his new golf course the “Rolls-Royce of oak trees.”
That changelessness, no doubt, is partly to account for his appeal. In an age when wealth is paper, assets move electronically, and moguls wear jeans, Trump’s mandarin tastes and almost sensual love of money can seem a refreshing throwback. “I, personally, like feeling the asset,” he said during a stop in Silicon Valley. “With the dot-com, it’s nothing that you see so easily.”
“When I don’t put my name on it,” Trump explains, “nobody knows that I own it.”Greg Miller for Fortune
It’s one of the paradoxes of Trump that this aura of exclusivity goes over best with some of the most excluded elements of society. In an 800-person survey conducted by Democratic pollster Rob Schroth, Trump scored a 67% favorable rating among blacks (vs. 21% unfavorable), 62% among Hispanics, and 66% among whites earning under $25,000, substantially higher than either Al Gore or Bill Bradley in each category. Real estate agents say Trump is also big among immigrants, many of whom flock to his buildings. Admiring rap artists have recorded odes like “Black Trump” and “Trump Change.” “I think people say, ‘If I won the lottery, that’s how I’d want to live,’ ” says Roger Stone. “The plane, the boat, the estate in Florida, the beautiful girls—our polling showed that people identified with it.” Trump is, in short, a workingman’s plutocrat: a nonbusinessman’s idea of what a businessman should be. (Supporters standing in line at a Trump Tower book signing included a Greenwich Village artist who was “attracted to the power of myth in our society,” an Orthodox rabbi who “heard he loves the Jews,” and a soccer mom who noted, optimistically, that “he’s never been indicted.”)
Among Trump’s theoretical peers, which is to say other rich business people, the situation is different. When Fortune asked several thousand of them to rank 469 companies for its 1999 list of Most Admired Companies, they put Trump’s casino company dead last. More specifically, they ranked it worst in quality of management, use of corporate assets, employee talent, long-term investment value, and social responsibility.
Trump tries to shrug off such opinions, noting in his new book, The America We Deserve, “Rich people who don’t know me never like me. Rich people who know me like me.” But deep down, the disrespect clearly rankles. “I was a little surprised Fortune hadn’t done a cover on me in the last year and a half, because I’m the biggest developer in New York,” he said on the plane. “Now I’m getting a story not because I’m the biggest real estate developer but because I’m running for President. There’s something about that that I don’t really like.”
Did he mean he doesn’t get the recognition he deserves as a businessman? “I don’t think anybody knows how big my business is,” Trump replied. “People would rather talk about my social life than the fact that I’m building a 90-story building next to the U.N….They cover me for all sorts of wrong reasons.”
For more on Donald Trump, watch this Fortune video:
Right or wrong, his presidential dalliance had generated coverage and then some; Trump recounted how Don King, the furious-haired boxing promoter, called up to declare, “This is the single greatest promotion I have ever seen!” It was widely presumed, of course, that Trump’s political noodlings were just that: a promotion, a cynical ploy to sell books and condos—politics as the continuation of salesmanship by other means, if you will. But after spending time with Trump over several weeks, I became convinced otherwise. The man seriously wanted to seek the American presidency—to win, as he put it, “the whole megillah.”
If that sounds far-fetched, it may be because you haven’t yet grasped the governing principles of the Trumpian universe. Consider, for instance, his beef with America’s trade representatives: It’s that they have low name recognition. “Who are these people?” Trump sputtered at one point. “Nobody’s ever heard of them!” As for candidates who had made less money than he: “They’re losers. Who the hell wants to have a person like this for President?” More famous, more money: To those who objected that he had no obvious qualifications for politics other than a Bob Dole-like tendency to refer to himself in the third person, Trump offered the vaguely articulated but firmly held notion that he was, like, the top guy, and therefore worthy of the nation’s top office. He even noted at several points that he was good at sports in high school. “Because I’ve been successful, make money, get headlines, and have authored bestselling books,” he wrote in his new book, “I have a better chance to make my ideas public than do people who are less well known.”
Just so. But it all raised the question: Just how successful a businessman is he?
A couple of weeks after the Minnesota trip I was sitting in the Trump Tower offices of the Trump Organization, surrounded by magazine covers featuring Donald Trump and flanked by two of Trump’s lieutenants. In front of me sat Donald Trump. He was wearing a blue suit, cuff links, and one of his famous red ties; his hair, as usual, seemed to be levitating slightly above his skull in a baroque swirl. “People liked the speech,” Trump began. “You even liked it, I heard. Did you like my speech?” I mumbled something polite, then turned the conversation to the task at hand: figuring out what Trump’s empire actually consisted of.
Easier said than done. Trump delights in the sort of elaborate shell games and impenetrably complex deals that frustrate the most conscientious efforts to assess a person’s true worth. “It’s always good to do things nice and complicated,” he once told an interviewer, “so that nobody can figure it out.”
That difficulty is compounded by Trump’s astonishing ability to prevaricate. No one’s saying Trump ought to be held to the same standards of truthfulness as everyone else; he is, after all, Donald Trump. But when Trump says he owns 10% of the Plaza hotel, understand that what he actually means is that he has the right to 10% of the profit if it’s ever sold. When he says he’s building a “90-story building” next to the U.N., he means a 72-story building that has extra-high ceilings. And when he says his casino company is the “largest employer in the state of New Jersey,” he actually means to say it is the eighth-largest.
The predictable result is the steady stream of articles debunking Trump’s exaggerated claims—particularly his oft-repeated assertion that he’s worth $5 billion. Trump and his aides are so used to their veracity being questioned that they went to almost laughable lengths to assure me they weren’t lying, as when Abe Wallach, Trump’s finance man, produced a letter from a company offering $120 million for a piece of Trump property. “This is not concocted,” Wallach told me, though I’d never suggested such a thing. “This is real.” And to assure me that Trump had received many, many offers on his building at 40 Wall Street, Wallach summoned his assistant Diane to tell me about a recent call from a potential buyer, “just so you know I’m not making this up.”
“What did he want to know?” Wallach asked Diane.
“If it was for sale,” Diane responded.
Turning to me, Wallach added, “This is unrehearsed.” That bit of office theater complete, Wallach pulled out the partnership agreements for several of Trump’s properties so that I could check, among other things, whether Trump’s ownership stakes in them were in fact what he said they were.
But here’s the weird thing about Donald Trump: Try as he might to be a figure of ridiculous fun, lie as he might about things large and small, Trump appears to be an enormously skilled developer. Associates describe an unfailing knack for spotting and ferreting out waste; a memory like a Zip drive; a grasp of byzantine zoning laws so detailed that he routinely requires the city to close loopholes only he had the wherewithal (many would say gall) to exploit. There’s Trump walking the construction sites every day, yelling that the concrete is the wrong kind, that the marble isn’t flat enough, that the ceiling should be ripped out and redone. “He can look at a type of window glass and tell you what type it is and its energy-efficiency rating,” says a former employee.
Then, too, Trump brings the sheer power of his persona to bear. He negotiates with subcontractors himself instead of relying on a purchasing department and isn’t opposed to using his celebrity to better the terms. To seal one deal, Trump agreed to call the subcontractor’s mother and wish her a happy birthday. “He has this ability to relate to the doorman, to the guy who’s carrying the iron or steel, and make that guy feel good and important,” says Colony Capital CEO Tom Barrack.
And while Trump’s lifestyle hasn’t changed much since the 1980s, his dealmaking approach has. Chary of the sort of leverage that pushed him close to bankruptcy in the early 1990s, he refrains from putting up large sums, instead partnering with financial backers—General Electric’s pension fund among them—that want to tap the power of his name and retain him as a sort of jungle guide. (Yes, people do pay more to live in Trump buildings: The Corcoran Group, a New York real estate agency, estimates his condos command an 80% premium.) In one extreme instance, developers paid Trump a flat $5 million licensing fee for the right to brand a Trump Tower in Seoul.
Trump’s rivals seize on such deals to label him a mere front man for financial interests—a brand slapped on buildings he doesn’t own—which in turn sends Trump into paroxysms of outrage. “I own at least 50% of everything I do,” he says, not quite accurately. “I’m the biggest developer in the hottest city in the world.”
In truth, Trump’s strategy resembles less a Potemkin village than a fast-expanding game of SimCity, which is to say he has a lot of big projects in the works. On Manhattan’s East Side, he and partner Daewoo are erecting Trump World Tower, the “90-story” colossus that is going to cast a shadow on the United Nations and block Walter Cronkite’s view. Over on the West Side, he and a group of Hong Kong investors are two buildings into an 18-building residential project along the Hudson River, the creatively titled Trump Place, which will fill up Manhattan’s last big parcel of undeveloped land. Condo sales from both are benefiting from the hottest real estate market anyone can remember. As for the three trophy properties Trump calls “my other children”—Trump Tower, 40 Wall Street, and the General Motors Building, which he purchased in 1998 with insurance company Conseco—he has lately succeeded in jacking up rents.
Trump hits the links at his new Palm Beach golf club.Greg Miller for Fortune
Trump’s partners seem pleased. “We were never projecting the numbers that he’s producing routinely now,” says Conseco executive vice president Ngaire Cuneo. “His attention to detail and to what potential tenants will want has been uncanny,” adds CEO Steve Hilbert. “The results have been stunning for us at Conseco.”
Colony Capital’s Barrack, who hired Trump to convert the Mayfair Regent Hotel into condos, has similar words: “Bottom line is, the project came in under budget, four months ahead of schedule, and at sales prices that were 40% above what we had pro forma’d. We didn’t have one work stoppage, not one strike, not one city red tag. Everything was perfect.” Even former New York mayor Ed Koch, a Trump hater if there ever was one, told me he is a great builder.
If only Trump were content to leave it at that. For the rest of the story is much darker. Nowhere are Trump’s self-defeating tendencies more evident than with his casino company, Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts, which he took public in 1995 under the monogram ticker symbol DJT. It was Trump’s salvation at the time, raising $140 million that he used to pay off creditors. “Without the casino company, Donald would not be alive today,” one of his employees says. The stock climbed to $34—then headed straight for the toilet. These days it’s hovering somewhere above $3, and Trump’s 42% stake in the company has shriveled from more than half-a-billion dollars to $53 million.
Surprisingly, the underlying assets are in good shape. Trump’s three New Jersey casinos command nearly a third of all gaming revenues in Atlantic City, a slow-growing market that has nonetheless withstood challenges from Connecticut’s new megacasinos. All are well-run operations with top-drawer management; the New Jersey Casino Control Commission says they all have clean records. The flagship Taj Mahal, an onion-domed complex with some 4,500 slot machines, throws off nearly $100 million in cash annually; the smaller Trump Marina has almost doubled its own cash flow to $53 million in three years. Add in Trump Plaza and a riverboat outside Gary, Ind., and the company generates more than $240 million in cash a year. “Donald is not blowing smoke when he says there is a lot of money in that business,” says Barrack.
A cash cow it may be, but most of the cash goes toward the care and feeding of another beast: the $1.8 billion in high-yield debt that has saddled the company almost since its inception. The debt servicing eats up $216 million of the cash flow, leaving the company precious little capital to reinvest in its properties and even less in the way of earnings for shareholders. The company lost $134 million after depreciation and special items in 1999, and S&P recently lowered Trump’s bond rating from junk to junkier.
But most disquieting is Trump’s tendency to use the casino company as his own personal piggy bank. It’s not just the $5 million bonus he drew one year, or the fact that the pilots of his personal 727 are on the casino company’s payroll. In 1996 he sold Trump Marina (then called Trump’s Castle) to the company for what many shareholders considered too rich a price. Trump insists it was a “good deal.” Yet he further angered investors in 1998 when he had the already cash-strapped company lend him $26 million to pay off a personal loan from Donaldson Lufkin & Jenrette.
Trump denies misusing company funds and says he’ll repay the $26 million when it comes due May 15. Two sources close to Trump say that to raise the money, he is trying to mortgage Mar-a-Lago. Trump confirms that he is considering a $25 million to $30 million mortgage on that property, but insists he has the money to meet the obligation. “Our cash flow has been tremendous,” Trump says. He is sensitive on this point: Trump had his lawyer send a letter threatening to sue Fortune and me, saying, “It is our information that the article will contain false and misleading material concerning, among other things, the net worth and cash flow of The Trump Organization and/or Mr. Trump.” During one of our telephone discussions (which Trump later admitted he had begun taping), Trump said he would “sue the ass off of Fortune” if I were to “disparage [his] cash flow.” But one of Trump’s senior executives confirmed that Trump is seeking a mortgage on Mar-a-Lago, and possibly on Trump Tower, to pay back the $26 million.
Meanwhile, a shareholder has sued for breach of fiduciary duty. And as if all this weren’t enough to undermine Trump’s Street cred, the company was accused of overstating last year’s third-quarter results when it failed to disclose that $17 million in revenues came from a one-time event.
A couple of people close to Trump and otherwise sympathetic to him suggested to me that he’s unfit to be running a public company. Given that the low stock price seems partly a function of Wall Street’s allergic response to Trump’s flamboyance—analysts call it “the Donald factor”—the obvious solution would be for Trump to remove himself from management. One industry executive estimates that step alone would bring a 30% bump in the stock.
But Trump has chosen the opposite tack: Having paid little attention to the casinos for several years, he’s promising to become more involved with them than ever. He says he’ll even join investor conference calls. “When I get involved in something, it gets hot,” he says, stabbing the air with his index finger for emphasis. “Watch what I do to that company. Just watch.”
Mary MacLeod Trump, Donald’s mother. Her husband, Fred, was a developer too.Greg Miller for Fortune
Trump has started by firing Taj Mahal President Rudy Prieto the day before Christmas Eve. He may soon be searching for a new CEO too: Recent word is that the highly capable Nick Ribis, tired of having his hands tied by restrictive debt covenants and his stock options several million dollars underwater, is on his way out. And in February, Trump settled his five-year feud with Mirage Resorts’ now former boss Steve Wynn—a feud that had Trump flinging lawsuits to stop Mirage from entering Atlantic City, Wynn countersuing for restraint of trade, both men throwing around words like “imbecile,” and a Mirage operative allegedly wearing a “modified jockstrap” equipped with listening devices. The settlement should save Trump $3.5 million a year in legal fees.
Now it appears Trump will attempt to deleverage the company by unloading one of the casinos within the next six months; the Indiana riverboat seems the likely candidate. If that doesn’t goose the stock price, well, there are already internal discussions about taking the company private.
Another puzzling aspect of Trump’s public image is that even though he runs two companies that together employ 22,000 people, one never gets the sense of an organization underneath him. Indeed, one could easily come to the conclusion that he’s not only a sole proprietor but a sole employee. But in fact Trump has assembled an extremely loyal crew within his 50-person corporate office: CFO Allen Weisselberg began working for Trump’s father in 1973; Nick Ribis began as Trump’s lawyer in 1977. Both current and former employees describe Trump as a loyal if not especially well-paying boss, citing stories of birthdays remembered, of sick relatives visited in the hospital. Yet some of them bristle at the popular perception of Trump as a one-man show. “He’s got a very good team. It’s not just a show front,” says Abe Wallach. “This is a professionally run real estate organization.”
His point is perhaps blunted by the I <3 DONALD TRUMP bumper sticker on his office wall, but then theirs is a complex relationship. Around 1990, when Trump’s empire seemed on the verge of collapsing under its own weight, Wallach—then a senior vice president at New York real estate firm First Capital Management but a stranger to Donald—began speculating to the press about Trump’s fate, telling the Washington Post that people would soon be saying “Donald who?” On the MacNeil/Lehrer Newshour, he said of Trump, “If your ego is as large as his is and you just buy everything in sight, part of the blame has to squarely rest in your own lap.”
Never one to sit idly by and take that sort of treatment, Trump decided he wouldn’t. According to one account, Wallach opened his door one day to find himself served with a $250 million lawsuit. When Trump and Wallach got in touch to discuss the situation, the story goes, they ended up hitting it off, and Trump eventually hired Wallach instead of suing him. Trump says he never threatened litigation but confirms the rest of the story. Wallach at first denied it altogether, saying he met Trump in a cordial fashion through Trump’s father, then admitted it was all true. Whatever.
Oddly enough for a man who all but lives in the media, Trump has no public relations machinery to speak of. In a day when even petty tycoons insulate themselves with platoons of spokespeople and media consultants, he relies only on his longtime assistant Norma Foederer and returns most reporters’ calls personally, making him one of the most accessible businessmen anywhere. Sometimes overbearingly accessible: When Fortune once assembled a list of billionaires, Trump called so many times to haggle over his net worth that an intern was assigned to field his calls.
And while Trump can spend workaholically long hours at the office, sleeping only four hours a night and consuming as many as eight newspapers a day, one wonders how much of that time is spent calling celebrities like Leonardo DiCaprio or simply turning the media wheels. During one of my stops at his office he handed me a thick care package of clippings that included the same New York Construction News honor and an article naming him the second-best self-promoter of all time, behind only Muhammad Ali, an act that presumably put him on a still more select list of people who have self-publicized their own abilities as a self-publicist.
All the while, Trump takes pains to maintain a pretense of exclusive access, at one point summoning Foederer into his office so that she could show me the stack of requests for interviews (59 last week alone!). “Half of the press corps in the country is upset that they’re not on this plane,” Trump assured me on the way to see Ventura, which may not have been entirely untrue: Given the alternatives of covering Steve Forbes’ robodork routine in New Hampshire or living it up on Air Trump, political reporters seemed all in favor of the latter.
A portrait of Trump made in 1989 hangs in one of Mar-a-Lago’ s 118 rooms.Greg Miller for Fortune
It occurred to me, though, that for a guy who seems to value “loyalty” so much, Trump’s media-soaked life must feel like a series of betrayals, as journalist after journalist chooses to accept his advances and then turns on him. While at first blush Trump can come off as a thick-skinned believer in the adage that there’s no such thing as bad publicity, that doesn’t quite hit the mark: Like a true publicity-holic, Trump repeatedly indulges in publicity and then rails against the consequences. “A lot of reporters are scum,” he told me, denouncing “that little moron” from such-and-such financial publication and the “piece of shit” from another. Recently, he threatened to sue George after the magazine seemed to suggest that he had filed for personal bankruptcy in the early ’90s. This got me thinking that the cause of his behavior perhaps wasn’t so much egotistical as medical. I even called a psychiatrist to get his clinical assessment of Trump. (He suggested an overmastering need to escape the shadow of his father, Fred, a successful outer-borough developer who died last year and whom Trump rarely mentions.)
But the real puzzler is what, exactly, Donald Trump wants. As we walked through the half-gutted lobby of the General Motors Building, Trump insisted he most wanted to be respected as a builder. “The thing I do best is I build,” he said. “Everyone says, ‘Oh, Trump is a great promoter.’ I don’t think I’m even a good promoter. You build a great product, it becomes successful.” He paused to touch some tiny bronze fixtures. “See, these were all corroded—they looked disgusting,” he said. “Now it’s great, right?”
But even while Trump complains he’d like to be covered “more in business and less in social,” he can’t seem to help himself. In the end, one is simply humbled before the awesome insularity of his logic. “I own a lot of things that I don’t have my name on,” he explained at one point. “But when I don’t put my name on it, nobody knows that I own it. That’s one of the reasons I like putting my name on things.”
Outside the General Motors Building, Trump and I paused by his limo for a few seconds to stare up at the huge trump lettering on the facade. “See how understated that is?” he said in a rare outburst of irony. A foreign-sounding woman on the street recognized him. “Are you going to be a President?” she asked. “Absolutely,” said Trump. “No doubt about it.”
Three weeks later (after Fortune had flown with him to St. Louis for some final politicking and, yes, a Tony Robbins speech) Trump announced he wasn’t running. The proximate cause was the Reform Party meeting that ended with red-faced delegates screaming and jostling one another for microphones, and Jesse Ventura’s subsequent secession from the “dysfunctional” party. Privately, I wondered if Trump had begun to doubt his own constitutional capability for certain political rituals, notably the concession speech. But the final nail in the coffin was John McCain’s surprise surge in the polls. Roger Stone felt robbed: “He’s running on Trump’s message.”
As I was finishing up the story, Trump called me nearly every day, unsolicited, to offer tidbits of information, including details of the “very successful” tennis tournament he’d hosted over the weekend. (He and a partner had beaten Michael Milken and John Lloyd in the finals.) He deluged me with faxes about recent triumphs, had friends and associates call me to serve as character witnesses of sorts.
“One more thing,” he said one time just before hanging up. “Did you know that New York Construction News named Donald Trump the developer and owner of the year?”
A version of this article was originally published in the April 3, 2000 issue of Fortune. | The girl and the car, obviously. Respect, maybe. And he could definitely use a mortgage—soon. |
05/02/2016 AT 08:15 PM EDT
actress, 30, and her new beau, professional equestrian Karl Cook, were photographed kissing over a gas pump on Sunday.
"She's really happy," a source tells PEOPLE of the budding romance.
Karl Cook and Kaley Cuoco
The smooch is just the latest PDA between the two – over the past month, Cuoco has
showing the couple in various states of affection. From sweet selfies and playful shots to cuddling on the beach, the actress seems to be enjoying her new relationship following her
last September from her husband of almost two years, Ryan Sweeting.
As for why they click, Cuoco and Cook, whose father Scott has a reported net worth of around $2 billion, obviously have bonded over their love of horses.
Kaley Cuoco and Karl Cook
Cook, 25, is a Grand Prix winner while the actress has enjoyed riding for years and has several horses of her own. | The actress and the pro equestrian took their romance public in April |
As advisers continue to break away from the largest securities firms and registered investment advisory firms become larger, more of these independent RIAs are setting up investment committees.
These committees may help advisers formalize their investment decision-making process, set guidelines for how investments are screened and decide which securities the firm should or shouldn’t invest in. If managed well, committees can make firms more efficient.
But there are mistakes to avoid with these committees. Below, practice-management coaches and investment professionals weigh in on four of them and what advisers should do instead:
The mistake: Not having a formal process
Without a formal process for making policies and weighing specific securities, investment-committee meetings may drag on, and committee members may be left wondering their purpose. Time can be wasted if members come to meetings unprepared, says Scott Welch, chief investment officer of Dynasty Financial Partners, a New York-based company whose services to independent firms include helping them set up investment committees.
Develop a policy manual that states the purpose of the committee, how often it will meet, what decisions the committee will make and a process for periodically reviewing past decisions, says Mr. Welch. The manual won't only create an organizational “memory” but also a road map for the continuing running of the committee after the initial excitement settles into a routine, he says. Distribute a formal agenda ahead of each meeting so members can prepare, he says.
“A primary purpose of investment committees is to drive discipline and consistency through the portfolio-management function,” he says. So any investment in a client portfolio that the adviser has discretion or control over should be reviewed and approved by the committee. To do otherwise negates the reason the adviser established the committee in the first place, he says.
The mistake: Insisting on agreement
The biggest mistake investment committees make is managing to consensus, says George Tamer, managing director of strategic relationships at TD Ameritrade Institutional, a unit of brokerage TD Ameritrade Holding Corp. “Committees often will reach a bad decision just to get 100% agreement,” says Mr. Tamer, who is based in Fort Worth, Texas.
Everyone on the committee should have a say, but everyone doesn’t have to agree, he says. Some firms may want to have decisions made by majority vote. But Mr. Tamer suggests there should be a chair who is responsible for making the decision, should there be disagreement within the committee. Typically, the chair is the head of the company, but if the chief executive doesn’t have an investment management background, it could be the chief investment officer, he says.
The mistake: Approving too many products that work for too few clients
John Anderson, managing director of practice-management solutions at SEI Advisor Network, a unit of SEI Investments Co. , has seen committees where a few advisers are eager to adopt a new product even if it may not work well in many client portfolios. Too many one-off situations from an investment committee can lead to confusion and inconsistency throughout the firm and thus affect the brand of the firm, he says. “By chasing every shiny object that a few advisers are keen to adopt for a single client or two, the investment committee can create a compliance and due-diligence nightmare to monitor,” he says.
The committee should set a high bar for approving investments that are likely to make sense only for a limited number of clients. If there is another product already on the list that is similar, the committee might plan to monitor the two together for some time before adding the second one, Mr. Anderson, in Oaks, Pa., says.
Also, “think about adding a noninvestment person, maybe a financial planner, into the mix,” says Mr. Anderson. This person can help the committee avoid “group think” and help the committee consider other issues that may impact how the investment will perform in client portfolios, such as taxes, he says.
The mistake: Weighing too many options
When an investment committee has to sort through countless investment choices, it can seem overwhelming. Members may not have time to thoroughly research the options, which could cause them to overlook key risks.
Firms might assign each person on the committee a particular industry or sector to research, says TD Ameritrade’s Mr. Tamer. “It helps when you break up the work,” he says. How many securities to discuss depends on the agenda, he says. For example, some meetings may be sector discussions that touch on up to 30 individual stocks. The following meeting might involve drilling down into a list of five stocks, or even as few as two or three, when the committee could make a buy-or-sell decision, he says.
Write to Veronica Dagher at veronica.dagher@wsj.com | Here are tips for advisory firms to get the most value from these groups and mistakes to avoid. |
The City Planning Commission approved the $60 million Bellevue South urban renewal plan yesterday.
The plan calls for the revitalization of seven blocks just west of Bellevue Hospital, bounded by 23d and 30th Streets and First and Second Avenues.
The vote came during a public meeting at City Hall at which such varied matters as parking lots and garages, street changes, new housing projects and zoning rules were discussed.
The Bellevue South proposal calls for the bulldozing of most of the seven‐block site, except for institutional buildings and some residences. About 2,200 low and middle‐income apartments will be built along with additions to the institutional complex around Bellevus Hospital
Yesterday's approval followed a lengthy public hearing on June 17 at which residents and business owners opposed the city's plan, while city officials, civic groups and representatives of the hospital complex supported it. The hospitals are hoping that new housing will help ease their problems of chronic staff shortages.
The urban renewal designation still requires the approval of the Board of Estimate, which also must hold a public hearing.
In other matters, the Planning Commission took the first public move toward plugging what it considers a loophole in its zoning regulations regarding parking lots and garages.
A public hearing was set for Aug. 12 on amendments that would establish controls over parking facilities ostensibly built to serve the apartment houses or commercial buildings. The zoning resolution terms this accessory parking.
Regular commercial parking garages and lots can be constructed only under permit from the commission, insuring that the traffic flow, the area and other matters will be considered.
Accessory parking facilities for fewer than 150 cars need no permit. And sometimes, the planners say, they are overbuilt and, in effect, become commercial garages serving the community. The proposed amendments would require permits for accessory parking, among other things.
Commissioner Harold Sirns, whose Department of Buildings enforces the zoning laws, illustrated the situation with an anecdote.
He told of the man whose application for a parking garage permit was denied. He then leased a rooming house and proceeded to construct a 150‐car garage as an accessory to the structure. On investigation it was found that only two of his roomers had cars.
In otner action yesterday, the commission approved amendments to the Park Row Extension urban‐renewal plan. These would close a small part of Park Street between Baxter and Mulberry Streets to add to Columbus Park, and would increase the number of dwelling units in the middle‐income Chatham Towers development from 223 to 240.
Arguments were also heard on acquiring a strip of land between 39th and Roosevelt Avenues in Flushing, Queens, for a pedestrian way to a large municipal parking lot near Main Street.
This article can be viewed in its original form. Please send questions and feedback to archive_feedback@nytimes.com | City Planning Comm sets pub hearing on proposed amendments giving it control over accessory parking facilities |
05/06/2016 AT 02:20 PM EDT
that Penn State football coach Joe Paterno was aware that assistant coach Jerry Sandusky was sexually abusing boys as early as 1976 have sparked many questions. Here are five things to know about the allegations.
Joe Paterno allegedly was made aware of the sexual abuse allegations against assistant coach Jerry Sandusky as early as 1976. A Pennsylvania court order, released Thursday and obtained by PEOPLE, also states that the Pennsylvania Manufacturers' Association Insurance claimed other "Penn State agents" witnessed four cases of inappropriate conduct by Sandusky towards children between 1976 and 1988. Prior to these allegations, the earliest known incidents involving Sandusky were in 1994.
Penn State is embroiled in a dispute with its insurance carriers over the $60 million-plus it is on the hook for in Sandusky-related civil settlements. Penn State had hoped to see some of those funds reimbursed through various insurance coverages, but one of the college's primary carriers, the aforementioned PMAI, has pushed back.
, "The key legal issue for purposes of whether Penn State has a right to collect on its insurance policy with PMA is whether Penn State expected or intended the bodily injuries that Sandusky inflicted upon his many victims."
Judge Gary Glazer is charged with assessing whether Penn State trustees or shareholders knew about Sandusky's conduct.
Glazer ruled that because there was no evidence that the allegations went any higher than Paterno, the university's executives and higher-ups weren't made aware of them and therefore could not be expected to provide PMAI with any warning.
Many of the aspects of the case are still pending.
The 1976 incident has not been corroborated. McCann writes that it's unlikely it will ever be known whether the allegation is true or false because the record containing the transcript of the deposition referenced by Glazer is sealed. Also, the victim who made the allegation against Paterno may have reached a confidential settlement with Penn State.
A statement about the allegations from the Paterno family said, "Joe Paterno's reputation has once again been smeared with an unsubstantiated, forty-year-old allegation. In response to this allegation and the subsequent media hype, the Paterno family is demanding a full public review of the facts."
The statement continued, "The reckless, all-out rush to accept accusations as legitimate without a full fair review of the facts, cannot be allowed to happen again. Fighting shadows and rumors on issues that are this significant is a disservice to everyone who cares about the truth."
of 45 of 48 charges stemming from the allegations he molested 10 boys at Penn State and elsewhere,
to 30 to 60 years in prison. Last year, he launched an effort
on the grounds that his rights were violated in the original trial and that his lawyers were ineffective.
while his lawyers continue their efforts. | New court documents cast doubt that Penn State coach Joe Paterno may only have heard about Jerry Sandusky's abuse in 1994 |
Here’s another sign that consumers are ready to shake off the heavy saving habits ingrained by financial crisis.
Based on data from the Federal Reserve, outstanding credit card debt is set to hit $1 trillion in 2016, the Wall Street Journal reported. That’s a level not seen since its all-time high of $1.02 trillion in July 2008, on the eve of the crisis.
Back then, Americans’ personal savings rate was 4.4%. That number went as high as 11% in December 2012 and is currently 5.4%.
In March, the total level of outstanding credit card debt rose to $951.6 billion. That stems in part from the steadier economy and improving job market, leading consumers to think they have more to spend. Even auto loans are on the rise, while consumer sentiment has rebounded.
But there’s another side to the story. Rising credit card balances can also attributed to how banks are trying to do business in a low interest-rate environment that squeezes their profits. Banks have been aggressively seeking more business via rewards points, and, troublingly, subprime borrowers.
According to data from Equifax, lenders issued 10.6 million credit cards to subprime borrowers in 2015, up 25% from the year prior. It’s also the highest level since 2007.
Moreover, actual spending in the U.S. is still a mixed bag. Retail sales climbed to their highest level in over a year in April, though, as the Journal reported, there were signs that consumers were pulling back on nonessentials. The U.S.’s personal saving rate is also still hovering above pre-recession levels.
Either way, credit card companies will try to keep their profits up in a low-interest-rate environment. | As they save less |
Ever wonder why you didn’t hear back on that dream job? It could be that you were fishing with the wrong bait — which is to say, your résumé was filled with skills that didn’t impress.
Three out of four full-time employed workers are open to or actively searching for a new job opportunity, CareerBuilder reported in March, which means open positions are still scarce and competition is fierce. One in four people said they received no response from more than 75% of the applications they submitted to potential employers, according to the same CareerBuilder survey of more than 5,000 U.S. workers.
So in today’s market, it pays to know which skills are doing you a disservice. And it turns out, there actually are a number of skills most people should leave off their résumés completely — because they tend to correlate with lower pay across the board, even when you hold constant factors like age, experience, job title, and location, according to a new analysis from MONEY and compensation data and software company PayScale.com.
Read More: 25 Career Skills That Deliver the Biggest Salary Boost
The analysis focused on skills that workers defined as being the most critical to their job — and then, within that set, identified those that showed the greatest negative correlation with compensation.
Among the “top” 25 listed below, more than half are very general job functions, points out Lydia Frank, PayScale’s editorial director. Filing, for instance — the skill with the greatest negative correlation to pay — is such a common function that it won’t set you apart, she says: “It’s implied knowledge.” Indeed, she adds, many of the skills that made the list are basic job functions employers already expect you to know.
“Nobody in this day and age should be listing Microsoft Office on their résumé if they’re going for any job where you have to use a computer,” Frank says. “Instead, you really want to call out things that the employer is looking for or things that differentiate you.”
On the other hand, some of the more specific skills on the list — such as competency with the Delphi programming language — suggest that workers had fallen behind the times, Frank says. Demand for specific software skills tends to ebb and flow, she adds. “If that’s the pinnacle of a job applicant’s knowledge and they don’t know newer technologies, it may make [the applicant] seem weaker,” she says.
If you’re trying to reshape your résumé for a job search, one easy tactic is to declutter the skills section. Hiring managers look at a résumé for 6.5 seconds, on average, says Ryan Kahn, found of The Hired Group and host of MTV’s Hired series — so your résumé needs to grab their attention immediately, with relevant information.
Before applying, compare your résumé against a given job description. For each skill you’ve listed, Kahn says, ask yourself: Is this a skill set they’re looking for? “If it’s not, then you should take it off because otherwise, these extra words are going to clutter up your résumé and make it harder for a hiring manager to see the skills that do make you very qualified for the position,” Kahn says.
Read More: The Career Skills Most Likely to Win You a Promotion
Fine tune your phrasing, too, rewriting your résumé to highlight key experience and skills requirements in the job posting. “You want to match the lingo you see in the job descriptions,” says career coach Kristina Leonardi.
The following were the 25 skills that correlated with the largest negative pay gap in the MONEY/PayScale analysis.
To see full coverage of MONEY’s Best Career Skills 2016, click here. | Want to boast about your 'online research' skills? Big mistake. |