- By Byron Kaye SYDNEY (Reuters) – Elon Musk’s X, formerly called Twitter, disabled a feature that let users report misinformation about elections, a research organisation said on Wednesday, throwing fresh concern about false claims spreading just before major U.S. and Australian votes. After introducing a feature in 2022 for users to report a post they […]
- By Byron Kaye SYDNEY (Reuters) – Elon Musk’s X, formerly called Twitter, disabled a feature that let users report misinformation about elections, a research organisation said on Wednesday, throwing fresh concern about false claims spreading just before major U.S. and Australian votes. After introducing a feature in 2022 for users to report a post they […]
- By Nate Raymond (Reuters) -Consulting firm McKinsey & Co has agreed to pay $230 million to resolve lawsuits by hundreds of U.S. local governments and school districts alleging it fueled an epidemic of opioid addiction through its work for bankrupt OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma LP and other drug companies. The settlements, which require a judge’s […]
- By Lisa Richwine and Dawn Chmielewski LOS ANGELES (Reuters) -Hollywood’s writers union said its members could return to work on Wednesday while they decide whether to approve a three-year deal that provides pay raises and some protections around use of artificial intelligence among other gains. The Writers Guild of America (WGA) leadership voted unanimously to […]
- By Steve Gorman LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – California Governor Gavin Newsom on Tuesday signed into law a first-in-the-nation state excise tax on sales of firearms and ammunition, aimed at raising a projected $160 million annually to prevent gun violence in schools and elsewhere. The California excise tax, due to go into effect in July 2024, […]
Recent Posts
- What caused the Hollywood writers’ strike and is it over?on September 27, 2023 at 10:32 am
(Reuters) -The strike by Hollywood screenwriters ended after their union said its members could return to work on Wednesday while guild members vote to ratify the agreement. Is the strike over? Yes, the Writers Guild of America leadership voted to end the strike on Wednesday after nearly five months on picket lines. Guild members will have until Oct. 9 to cast votes for the proposed agreement. What caused the strike and what were the demands? Writers began the strike on May 2, demanding higher royalties, mandatory staffing of TV writing rooms and safeguards to their jobs from the use of artificial intelligence. Another demand was for residual payments when a show becomes a hit. Writers said they have suffered financially during the streaming TV boom in part due to shorter seasons and smaller residual payments. Details on the new three-year contract suggest that studios have given in to several demands, including pay raises, increased health and pension benefits and AI safeguards. When will TV shows and movies return? The strike’s end means daytime and late-night talk shows can return to the air. Late-night talk shows such as “Jimmy Kimmel Live” and “The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon” could be among the first to be back. But for everything else, it could take longer as the actors and performers’ union is still on strike. Their demands are similar to that of writers, including higher wages and protection against AI use. The Screen Actors’ Guild (SAG) is considerably larger than the WGA with 160,000 film and television actors, stunt performers and other media professionals. Analysts said studios will try to move negotiations quickly with the SAG-AFTRA, but it could still take more than a month for an agreement to be ratified. That means viewers will have wait more for the latest seasons of top shows like Billions, Stranger Things and Abbott Elementary. (Reporting by Yuvraj Malik and Zaheer Kachwala in Bengaluru; Editing by Arun Koyyur) Brought to you by www.srnnews.com
- Explainer-What caused the Hollywood writers’ strike and is it over?on September 27, 2023 at 10:12 am
(Reuters) -The strike by Hollywood screenwriters ended after their union said its members could return to work on Wednesday while guild members vote to ratify the agreement. Is the strike over? Yes, the Writers Guild of America leadership voted to end the strike on Wednesday after nearly five months on picket lines. Guild members will have until Oct. 9 to cast votes for the proposed agreement. What caused the strike and what were the demands? Writers began the strike on May 2, demanding higher royalties, mandatory staffing of TV writing rooms and safeguards to their jobs from the use of artificial intelligence. Another demand was for residual payments when a show becomes a hit. Writers said they have suffered financially during the streaming TV boom in part due to shorter seasons and smaller residual payments. Details on the new three-year contract suggest that studios have given in to several demands, including pay raises, increased health and pension benefits and AI safeguards. When will TV shows and movies return? The strike’s end means daytime and late-night talk shows can return to the air. Late-night talk shows such as “Jimmy Kimmel Live” and “The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon” could be among the first to be back. But for everything else, it could take longer as the actors and performers’ union is still on strike. Their demands are similar to that of writers, including higher wages and protection against AI use. The Screen Actors’ Guild (SAG) is considerably larger than the WGA with 160,000 film and television actors, stunt performers and other media professionals. Analysts said studios will try to move negotiations quickly with the SAG-AFTRA, but it could still take more than a month for an agreement to be ratified. That means viewers will have wait more for the latest seasons of top shows like Billions, Stranger Things and Abbott Elementary. (Reporting by Yuvraj Malik and Zaheer Kachwala in Bengaluru; Editing by Arun Koyyur) Brought to you by www.srnnews.com
- Explainer-What caused the Hollywood writers’ strike and is it over?on September 27, 2023 at 10:11 am
(Reuters) -The strike by Hollywood screenwriters ended after their union said its members could return to work on Wednesday while guild members vote to ratify the agreement. Is the strike over? Yes, the Writers Guild of America leadership voted to end the strike on Wednesday after nearly five months on picket lines. Guild members will have until Oct. 9 to cast votes for the proposed agreement. What caused the strike and what were the demands? Writers began the strike on May 2, demanding higher royalties, mandatory staffing of TV writing rooms and safeguards to their jobs from the use of artificial intelligence. Another demand was for residual payments when a show becomes a hit. Writers said they have suffered financially during the streaming TV boom in part due to shorter seasons and smaller residual payments. Details on the new three-year contract suggest that studios have given in to several demands, including pay raises, increased health and pension benefits and AI safeguards. When will TV shows and movies return? The strike’s end means daytime and late-night talk shows can return to the air. Late-night talk shows such as “Jimmy Kimmel Live” and “The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon” could be among the first to be back. But for everything else, it could take longer as the actors and performers’ union is still on strike. Their demands are similar to that of writers, including higher wages and protection against AI use. The Screen Actors’ Guild (SAG) is considerably larger than the WGA with 160,000 film and television actors, stunt performers and other media professionals. Analysts said studios will try to move negotiations quickly with the SAG-AFTRA, but it could still take more than a month for an agreement to be ratified. That means viewers will have wait more for the latest seasons of top shows like Billions, Stranger Things and Abbott Elementary. (Reporting by Yuvraj Malik and Zaheer Kachwala in Bengaluru; Editing by Arun Koyyur) Brought to you by www.srnnews.com
- FTC’s Amazon antitrust lawsuit faces high bar in US court -expertson September 27, 2023 at 10:10 am
By Mike Scarcella (Reuters) – The U.S. Federal Trade Commission’s lawsuit accusing Amazon.com of abusing its retail market power to stifle competition faces hurdles in court, testing the scope of U.S. antitrust law and posing roadblocks for the agency, legal experts said. The U.S. consumer agency, which enforces federal antitrust law, and 17 states filed their lawsuit against Amazon in Seattle federal court on Tuesday, asking a U.S. judge to consider an injunction and other penalties to combat alleged unlawful conduct. Several legal experts told Reuters that the FTC faces a high bar in trying to show that U.S. consumers would be better off in a world without Amazon’s policies in place. The lawsuit said Amazon has unfairly given preference to its own products and that the company’s policies punish merchants that want to sell products for lower prices on other platforms. Under U.S. law, the FTC has the burden to prove that Amazon is not just a big market player with power but also that it has taken illegal steps to acquire or maintain its dominance. The agency also must define and prove the relevant markets, a key threshold issue. Antitrust lawyer David Balto, a former policy director at the FTC, described the FTC’s hard climb ahead as trying to surmount Washington state’s Mt. Rainier in tennis shoes. “You know, it’s conceivable — you could get to the top — but it’s 20,000 feet and it’s going to be really cold,” he said. As part of the case, Amazon will have a chance to assert pro-competitive justifications for its alleged conduct, said antitrust lawyer Diane Hazel of law firm Foley & Lardner. Hazel said Amazon would need to show its reasons are “legitimate” in order to counter the FTC’s claims. Amazon’s argument, said antitrust scholar Tom Cotter of the University of Minnesota Law School, will be “We provide consumers with access to a wide variety of goods at affordable prices quickly.” Indeed, Amazon general counsel David Zapolsky said in a statement the challenged policies have “helped to spur competition and innovation across the retail industry.” Zapolsky said the FTC’s complaint pretends that “everyday retail competition doesn’t exist.” FTC Chair Lina Khan said in a statement Amazon used “punitive and coercive tactics” to unlawfully maintain a monopoly. The FTC’s lawsuit is related to but broader than a series of private consumer cases filed in recent years against Amazon that are pending in the same U.S. federal court. The private antitrust cases offer an early window into some of the legal arguments Amazon could be expected to make to challenge the FTC’s lawsuit. In one of the cases, a prospective class action challenging the platform’s pricing policies, Amazon’s lawyers argued that no court “has ever condemned a business practice that requires low prices in a retail store for consumers.” Amazon is also fighting claims from another private civil lawsuit that said the company has stifled competition for shipping and fulfillment services. U.S. District Judge Ricardo Martinez in April dismissed that lawsuit, saying consumer plaintiffs were not buyers of logistics services. But the court gave the consumers a chance to bring a new case. Martinez, an appointee of former U.S. President George W. Bush, could be assigned to the FTC’s lawsuit because the agency said several Amazon cases pending before him were related factually and legally to the new complaint. Generally speaking, U.S. judges are “wary of using antitrust law to punish low-pricing behavior,” said antitrust scholar Sean Sullivan of the University of Iowa’s law school. Sullivan said it is not always a clear line between “good low pricing” — based on market competition — and “bad low pricing” that helps a company acquire or maintain market power. (Reporting by Mike Scarcella; Editing by Leigh Jones and Muralikumar Anantharaman) Brought to you by www.srnnews.com
- US investors want clarity on Biden’s vague curbs on China techon September 27, 2023 at 9:37 am
By Pete Schroeder, Michelle Price and Carolina Mandl WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) – U.S. financial firms are pushing for greater clarity on proposed new rules curbing U.S. investments in some China technology sectors which they say are too vague and put the onus of compliance on investors. Aiming to protect national security and prevent U.S. capital from aiding China’s military, President Joe Biden issued an executive order last month restricting new U.S. investments in sensitive Chinese technologies. The Treasury Department subsequently kicked off a rule-making process to implement the order, and financial firms have been rushing to meet a Sept. 28 to provide input. The rules are expected to be implemented sometime next year. The proposed rule applies to U.S. persons – including U.S. citizens, residents, businesses and U.S. units of overseas businesses. They must notify the Treasury when making certain investments in China in the semiconductors and microelectronics, artificial intelligence and quantum information technologies sectors, and bans other such investments altogether. In addition to venture capital and private equity firms, hedge funds, banks and potentially funds that track indexes are likely to be affected by the proposal, which financial industry executives and lawyers complain is broad and ambiguous. Among their key concerns: how the rules would apply to U.S. persons; which specific Chinese entities would be subject to the restrictions; and better defining a proposed exemption for publicly traded securities. “The scope is pretty broad,” said Timothy Keeler, a partner at law firm Mayer Brown, noting it applies to Chinese entities operating beyond China. “It could apply to companies that are outside of China but are subsidiaries of Chinese companies or controlled by a Chinese person.” While the U.S. already has restrictions on some Chinese investments in the U.S. and U.S. investments in China, the order creates a new program. Unlike a process conducted by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, a panel comprising U.S. government agencies, the new program will not involve case-by-case reviews of investments. And in contrast to sanctions, it does not envisage a list of restricted entities or companies. That means investors have to figure out which investments come under the scope of the new rule and how to comply, creating significant compliance costs and legal risks. “That puts a fair amount of burden on an investor,” said a former Treasury official. They may also bar U.S. persons from “knowingly directing” covered transactions by non-U.S. persons. But the threshold for knowledge, or what directing means, is unclear. “We are hearing a lot about the issue of a U.S. person directing the activities of a non-U.S. person,” said Jen Fernandez, a partner at law firm Sidley Austin. “At what level does ‘directing’ kick in and what does that mean for these non-U.S. private equity funds that may have a dual national sitting as a partner?” The program proposes exempting publicly traded securities and index and mutual funds, but financial firms want those securities to be more tightly defined. One key question is whether shares in initial public offerings allocated prior to trading would be carved out. To address these and other issues, some firms plan to push for a list of restricted entities and investments, similar to a sanctions regime. Former Securities and Exchange Commission chair Jay Clayton, now an adviser with law firm Sullivan & Cromwell, voiced this idea when he told a House of Representatives committee on China this month that “Wall Street responds very quickly” to lists of barred entities. Some sources, though, said they doubted the Treasury would go that route, which would reduce the program’s flexibility and, since the target is cutting-edge technology, quickly become outdated. “That just doesn’t appear to be where this process is heading,” said Keeler. DE-RISKING A Treasury spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment but said in the proposal that it welcomes input. The rules are necessary because U.S. investments can be exploited to accelerate the development of sensitive technologies that threaten U.S. national security, the Treasury and administration has said. Financial firms say they support the administration’s national security goals but worry about increased liability and the economic costs of restricting capital flows. U.S.-China tensions have already seen acquisitions of Chinese companies by U.S. firms sink almost 60% from January this year through early August compared with the same period last year. “Protecting U.S. national security is a paramount obligation of the federal government, but as the Treasury states, maintaining global capital flows need not be inconsistent with that,” said Peter Matheson, a managing director at the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, a financial industry lobby group. Lobbying to contain the rules, however, is politically sensitive, especially because China hawks in Congress are pushing bills to make the restrictions tougher. Given the uncertainty, companies may start avoiding the covered sectors altogether, said Fernandez. “I do think we’re going to see a lot of de-risking,” she added. (Reporting by Pete Schroeder and Carol Mandl; Writing and reporting by Michelle Price; Editing by Deepa Babington) Brought to you by www.srnnews.com
Recent Comments