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Sam Bankman-Fried must now convince a jury that the former crypto king was not a crook
NEW YORK (AP) — For a while, Sam Bankman-Fried tried to convince politicians and the public that he was the next J.P. Morgan. Now, he has to convince a jury that he wasn’t, in reality, the next Bernie Madoff. The trial of Bankman-Fried, the founder of failed cryptocurrency brokerage FTX, will begin Tuesday with jury selection. Prosecutors from the Southern District of New York are expected to lay out a case against Bankman-Fried that shows he stole billions of dollars in FTX customer deposits to fund his hedge fund and make millions of dollars on illegal campaign donations to Democrats and Republicans in an attempt to buy political influence over cryptocurrency regulation in Washington.
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Fed’s Powell gets an earful about inflation and interest rates from small businesses
YORK, Pa. (AP) — Federal Reserve officials typically gather many of their insights and observations about the economy from some of the top Ph.D. economists in Washington. On a visit Monday to York, Pennsylvania, Chair Jerome Powell got an earful from a group with a different perspective: small-business people who are grappling personally with inflation, high interest rates, labor shortages and other challenges of the post-pandemic economy. Powell traveled to York to learn about the efforts of the long-time manufacturing hub to diversify its economy. The businesspeople they spoke with were generally optimistic but expressed a range of concerns: They are still having trouble finding all the workers they need. Higher interest rates have discouraged some of them from expanding.
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A riled Trump sounds off outside the New York fraud trial that accuses him of lying about wealth
NEW YORK (AP) — Former President Donald Trump has sat through hours of sometimes testy opening statements in a fraud lawsuit that could cost him control of some of his most prized properties. As he left court during a lunch break Monday, he called it a “disgraceful trial.” Democratic New York Attorney General Letitia James’ lawsuit accuses the Republican ex-president and his company of deceiving banks, insurers and others by habitually lying about his wealth in financial statements. Trump attorney Alina Habba said in the trial’s opening statements Monday that Trump’s holdings are “Mona Lisa properties” that can command top dollar. The judge already has ruled Trump committed fraud in his business dealings. If the ruling is upheld on appeal, it could force Trump to give up several New York properties.
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The UAE holds a major oil and gas conference just ahead of hosting UN climate talks in Dubai
ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — The Emirati president-designate of the upcoming United Nations COP28 climate talks has called on oil and gas companies to be “central to the solution” to fighting climate change as the industry boosts its production to enjoy rising energy prices. His remarks on Monday came at a marquee oil industry event highlighting the state oil company he oversees — either feeding the concerns of those already critical of his appointment while also drawing applause from the same energy firms he wants to court at the upcoming COP28 talks starting in November.
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Tesla 3Q sales rise 27% but fall short of expectations due softening demand and factory downtime
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Tesla’s summertime deliveries of electric vehicles surged 27% from last year but still fell below analyst projections as Elon Musk’s car company navigated through softening customer demand as well as factory upgrades. The Austin, Texas, automaker sold 435,059 vehicles during the July-to-September period, up from 343,830 at the same time last year. Analysts had predicted Tesla would sell about 461,000 vehicles during the latest quarter, according to FactSet Research. As usual, Tesla’s sales consisted primarily of its Model 3 and Model Y vehicles, which have been made even more attractive by rounds of price cutting that have eaten into the company’s profit margins. The third-quarter sales also marked a step back from Tesla’s 466,140 vehicle deliveries during the April-to-June period.
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Microsoft CEO says unfair practices by Google led to its dominance as a search engine
WASHINGTON (AP) — Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella says unfair tactics used by Google led to its dominance as a search engine, tactics that in turn have thwarted his company’s rival program, Bing. His comments came Monday in a landmark antitrust trial against Google’s parent company, Alphabet. Nadella told a packed Washington, D.C., courtroom that Google’s dominance is due to agreements that made it the default browser on smartphones and computers. He downplayed the idea that artificial intelligence or more niche search engines like Amazon or social media sites have meaningfully changed the market in which Microsoft competes with Google.
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Stock market today: Most of Wall Street slips as the bond market cranks up the pressure
NEW YORK (AP) — Most stocks closed lower as the constrictor of higher interest rates tightened its coils around Wall Street. The S&P 500 ended little changed Monday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 74 points, and the Nasdaq composite rose 0.7%. Slumps for oil-and-gas stocks weighed on the market after crude prices gave back some of the sharp gains made since the summer. More than three out of four stocks within the S&P 500 fell alongside them, but gains for Apple and other influential Big Tech stocks helped to support indexes. Treasury yields rose further into heights unseen in more than a decade.
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All Onewheel electric skateboards are under recall after 4 deaths and serious injury reports
NEW YORK (AP) — All models of Onewheel self-balancing electric skateboards are under recall after at least four deaths and multiple injuries were reported in recent years, federal regulators say. The 300,000 now-recalled skateboards, manufactured by Future Motion, can stop balancing a rider if the boards’ limits are exceeded — which risks serious crashes, according to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. To address the crash hazard, a new safety alert feature called “haptic buzz” will be available through a firmware update for Onewheel GT, Pint X, Pint and XR boards in the coming weeks, Future Motion’s Onewheel team said. Original Onewheel and Onewheel+ boards are not eligible for the firmware update — so eligble riders can arrange to receive a prorated refund in the form of store credit.
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Where are the homes? Glaring need for housing construction underlined by Century 21 CEO
LOS ANGELES (AP) — The highest mortgage rates in more than two decades are keeping many prospective homebuyers out of the market and discouraging homeowners who locked in ultra-low rates from listing their home for sale. The combination of elevated rates and low home inventory has worsened the affordability crunch, especially for first-time buyers and threatens to extend the nation’s home sales slump. Mike Miedler, CEO of real estate brokerage franchisor Century 21, recently spoke to The Associated Press about the challenges homebuyers face. Miedler says the impact high rates are having on affordability and home inventory underscores the need for construction of more affordable homes.
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The S&P 500 rose 0.34 points, less than 0.1%, to 4,288.39. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 74.15 points, or 0.2%, to 33,433.35. The Nasdaq composite gained 88.45 points, or 0.7%, to 13,307.77. The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies lost 28.28 points, or 1.6% to 1,756.82.
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