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Stocks rally, close out their first winning week in last 4
NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks rallied on Wall Street, climbing to their biggest gain in six weeks. The S&P 500 jumped 1.6% and marked its first winning week in the last four. Big gains for tech giants like Apple helped propel the Nasdaq composite to an even bigger gain of 2%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average also rose. The gains came as easing bond yields took some pressure off of the stock market. Stocks have found their feet following a swift rise and fall to start the year. Reports on the economy were mixed, which helped to slow the swift recent ascent for Treasury yields.
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Ford to raise production as US auto sales start to recover
DEARBORN, Mich. (AP) — Ford says it will increase production of six models through the year as the company and the auto industry start to rebound from sluggish U.S. sales in 2022. The automaker announced Friday that it plans to build more of the Mustang Mach-E, the Bronco Sport SUV and Maverick small pickup. Also slated for production increases are the F-150 Lightning electric pickup and the Transit and E-Transit gas and electric full-size vans. For roughly the past two years, U.S. auto sales have been depressed largely due to a shortage of computer chips that started during the coronavirus pandemic. But the chip shortage is starting to ease and automakers like Ford are starting to increase production and build supplies on dealer lots.
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Federal Reserve officials sound warnings about higher rates
WASHINGTON (AP) — A run of strong economic data and signs that inflation remains stubbornly high could lead the Federal Reserve to raise its benchmark rate higher in the coming months than it has previously forecast, several Fed officials say. Christopher Waller, a member of the Fed’s Board of Governors, said that if the economy continued to show strength and inflation remained elevated, the Fed would have to lift its key rate above 5.4%. That would be higher than Fed officials had signaled in December.His suggestion was in contrast to a speech he gave in January, titled “A Case for Cautious Optimism,” that captured a prevailing sentiment at the time that inflation had peaked and was steadily declining.
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The implications of Walgreens’ decision on abortion pills
Walgreens says it will not start selling an abortion pill in 20 states that had warned of legal consequences if it did that. The drugstore chain’s announcement Thursday signals that access to mifepristone may not expand as broadly as federal regulators intended in January. That’s when they finalized a rule change allowing more pharmacies to provide the pill, which is one of two used in medical abortions. The Food and Drug Administration requires pharmacies to go through a certification process before they dispense the pills. Walgreens says it plans to dispense the pills where it can legally do so.
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Amazon pauses construction on 2nd headquarters in Virginia
NEW YORK (AP) — Amazon is pausing construction of its second headquarters in Virginia following the biggest round of layoffs in the company’s history and shifting landscape of remote work. Amazon’s real estate chief John Schoettler said in a statement the Seattle-based company is delaying the beginning of construction of PenPlace, the second phase of its headquarters development in Northern Virginia. He says the company has already hired more than 8,000 employees and will welcome them to the Met Park campus, the first phase of development, when it opens this June. The company says it still plans to welcome 25,000 workers to the area when the entire project is completed. State and local officials say the company has not been given any incentive money.
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Close call, turbulent flight add to aviation safety concerns
Federal officials are investigating a string of close calls between planes, including one this week at Boston’s Logan Airport. The incidents are raising questions about whether air travel is getting less safe. The Federal Aviation Administration plans a safety summit this month, to look at whether some measures used to prevent accidents are less effective than they used to be. The number of close calls could end talk of easing experience requirements for newly hired pilots. President Joe Biden’s pick to run the FAA says he opposes easing the pilot-qualification standards.
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KLM, Delta sue Dutch government over Schiphol flight cuts
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — A group of airlines including KLM, Delta and easyJet say they are suing the Dutch government over its plans to reduce the number of flights from Amsterdam’s busy Schiphol Airport. The government said last year it was seeking a “new balance” between the economic benefits provided by Schiphol and its impact on nearby residents and the environment. It aims to cut the number of flights per year from a half-million to 440,000. The airlines said Friday that the reductions would negatively impact the Dutch economy, inconvenience consumers, and violate European and international legislation. They argue the aviation industry “is already achieving significant results in relation to reducing CO2 emissions and lowering noise levels.”
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In dry West, farmers balk at idling land to save water
WASHINGTON (AP) — With drought, climate change and overuse of the Colorado River leading to increasingly dire conditions in the West, the federal Bureau of Reclamation is looking at fallowing as a way to cut water use. That means idling farmland, with payments to major users to make it worthwhile. That has farmers primarily in California’s Imperial Valley and Arizona’s Yuma Valley weighing the possibility. Many are reluctant. They say it threatens economic harm not just to them but also to rural communities reliant on farming as an economic engine. Despite the reluctance, there’s a growing sense that fallowing needs to be part of efforts to conserve the region’s water.
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Officials: China real estate recovering from debt crackdown
BEIJING (AP) — A Chinese central bank official says the country’s vast real estate industry is recovering from a slump triggered by tighter debt controls. Those controls led to a wave of defaults by developers that rattled global financial markets. The official, Pan Gongsheng, mentioned Evergrande Group, the global real estate industry’s most heavily indebted developer. But he gave no update on government-supervised efforts to restructure its $310 billion in debt. Pan said market confidence is recovering and financing for healthier companies is improving. China’s economic growth slid in mid-2021 after regulators who worry debt levels are dangerously high blocked Evergrande and others with high debt loads from borrowing more money.
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The S&P 500 rose 64.29 points, or 1.6%, to 4,045.64. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 387.40 points, 1.2%, to 33,390.97. The Nasdaq composite rose 226.02 points, or 2%, to 11,689.01. The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies rose 25.60 points, or 1.3%, to 1,928.26.
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