Ships Reroute Around Africa as Suez Canal Stays Blocked: Live Updates

This is what you need to know:.

Ships anchor in the Suez Canal in Ismailia on Thursday.Credit…Khaled Elfiki/EPA, via Shutterstock

Shipowners are starting to divert ships destined for the Suez Canal around the Cape of Good Hope in Africa, an expensive solution to avoid the congestion caused by a giant container ship blocking the canal.

There are growing indications that the attempt to move the ship, Ever Given, could take many days, if not weeks. More than 100 ships are already blocked on both sides awaiting free passage.

In deciding on a diversion, the shipping company is weighing the likely cost of a few days out of the canal against the extra time it would take to sail around Africa. It’s not an easy decision.

It’s like picking a row at the post office; it’s never the right decision, said Alex Booth, head of Kpler’s research team, which tracks oil supply.

Already seven giant tankers carrying liquefied natural gas have apparently decided to leave the canal, Kpler reports.

One of these ships, chartered by Royal Dutch Shell, had picked up a cargo of gas at Sabine Pass, Texas, and was on its way to the canal when it made a sharp turn in the Atlantic towards Africa. The other vessel, operated by state energy company Qatargas, was loaded at Ras Laffan, Qatar’s energy hub, and was heading for Suez, but then diverted to the Cape of Good Hope before reaching the Red Sea.

Container ships are also changing their plans. Korean shipping company HMM has booked one of its ships crossing the Channel from the UK to Asia for the African Circle, according to its spokesman NOH Ji-hwan.

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A large container ship nearly a quarter of a mile long has been stuck in the Suez Canal since Tuesday night after high winds grounded it on one of the canal’s banks. The canal is one of the most important shipping routes in the world. Credit… Airbus.

Sir, I want to thank you for your support. Booth thought it unlikely that a ship already waiting at the canal could make a full circle around Africa. This would have meant a journey of almost six weeks to Amsterdam in the Netherlands, compared to 13 days from the Channel.

But if the call is made at the beginning of the trip, it can be useful. For example, Kpler estimates that it would take 39 days to bypass Cape Town from the Saudi oil terminal at Ras Tanour, compared with 24 days at the Port of Suez.

Personal spending fell in February, but a new round of federal aid payments is expected this month. linked to Laura Moss credit for the New York Times.

Personal income and spending fell last month as the impact of stimulus measures softened after a sharp rise in January, but both are expected to pick up when a new round of federal payments comes in in March.

The government said Friday that personal income fell 7.1 percent in February from the previous month and consumer spending fell 1 percent. As most Americans received a $600 check from December’s bailout package, incomes rose 10.1 percent in January, while consumer spending rose 3.4 percent, a figure revised Friday from the 2.4 percent initially reported.

Despite last month’s decline, a large influx of $1.4 trillion in payments is expected for March for most Americans, thanks to the $1.9 trillion bailout package approved this month.

In the coming months, most economists expect consumers to return to stores, restaurants and other gathering places in greater numbers as vaccination efforts gain traction and consumers put stimulus money and blockchain savings to work.

In February, households expected a bigger stimulus check in March and increased consumer spending, especially on services, said Gus Faucher, chief economist at PNC Financial Services in Pittsburgh.

Faucher noted that all of the cuts over the past month have been to goods, as consumers have been holding back and buying more expensive items like cars and appliances. He added that services should benefit in the coming months as people have more opportunities to go outside and life is increasingly normalising, more than a year after the outbreak of the pandemic.

Consumer spending will be very important for the rest of this year and into 2022, Faucher added. I saved a lot of money.

Economists have improved their forecasts for US economic growth: Bank of America expects gross domestic product to grow 7% this year.

GameStop store in New York. The retailer’s shares have been on a roller coaster this week after a disappointing earnings report.

Stock prices rose Friday, as did Treasury bond yields, on optimism about the economic recovery.

President Biden said Thursday that he wants the United States to be a world leader on its 100th anniversary. anniversary in office, April 30, deliver 200 million vaccines – a goal the country should have already reached. Federal Reserve Vice Chairman Richard Clarida dismissed concerns that the government’s spending plans will fuel inflation in a sustainable way.

Following the defeat of financial institutions, the central bank said pledge rules restricting share buybacks and dividend payments by banks will expire for most companies in mid-2021. On the economic front, gross domestic product data for the fourth quarter were also revised slightly Thursday.

Shares and bonds

• The S&P 500 Index rose nearly half a percent in early trading and was poised to end the week with a small gain. Bank stocks traded better than the broader market, with the KBW Bank Index up about 1.5%.
• The European equity market Stoxx 600 rose 0.6% and gained for the fourth consecutive week.
• The yield on 10-year government bonds rose by 4 basis points, or 0.04 percentage point, to 1.67%.

Economic data

• US personal income and spending fell last month as the impact of stimulus measures softened after a sharp rise in January, but both should pick up again when a new round of federal payments comes in in March.
• UK retail sales rose 2.1% in February, after falling 8.2% in the previous month as the country entered its third national standoff.
• A survey of German business expectations has reached its highest level in almost three years.

Oil

• Oil prices rose 1.7 percent to $63 a barrel with futures on Brent crude, the global benchmark.

Clothing stored at ThredUp’s Phoenix sorting facility. Lean’s stock had a starting price of $14 per share, raising $168 million. credit linked Matt York/Associated Press

ThredUp’s launch Friday marks the latest IPO for a clothing resale site that aims to capitalize on the growing interest in thrift stores among young people.

In the IPO, the company sold 12 million shares at $14 each, raising $168 million and valuing the company at $1.3 billion.

ThredUp, founded in Oakland in 2009, creates its inventory by sending prepaid bags or cleaning kits to vendors, who fill the bags with used clothing and accessories and return them.

The site joins Poshmark, which went public in January, and The RealReal, which went public in 2019, on the Nasdaq Stock Market.

All three companies are leaders in the used car industry, but they have different approaches to resale. RealReal only delivers the highest quality brands. Poshmark offers sellers the possibility to offer their products for sale directly. ThredUp has partnered with brands like Gap, Walmart and Macy’s to help these major retailers integrate resale into their stores and e-commerce platforms.

All three emphasize the environmental benefits of resale – but ThredUp more than its competitors. The company describes itself as a force for good and is critical of the fashion industry’s carbon footprint, including writing open letters to luxury brands like Burberry that have burned their unsold stock.

James Reinhart, CEO and co-founder of ThredUp, said Thursday that the company is ushering in a more circular future for fashion by helping new waves of consumers, brands and retailers take steps toward sustainability.

In partnership with retail analytics firm GlobalData, ThredUp also publishes a widely cited annual resale report that tracks the growth of the second-hand market. By the end of 2021, the value of the online resale market will reach $12 billion, up from $7 billion in 2019, according to last year’s report.

Much of this growth can be attributed to Generation Z’s preference for online shopping and their passion for sustainability. ThredUp generated $186 million in revenue in 2020 (up from $163.8 million in 2019). Last year’s net loss was $47.9 million.

However, the company is not immune to retail shocks in the event of a pandemic, according to a report filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission in March. Average monthly orders are now back to pre-recession levels, ThredUp said, but the company has not seen sustained growth since then.

Elon Musk in 2019. The National Labor Relations Board ruled that a tweet with the phrase Why pay union dues and give up stock options for nothing? was an illegal attempt to coerce employees. in connection with the Jefferson Siegel credit for the New York Times.

The National Labor Relations Board on Thursday upheld a 2019 ruling that Tesla illegally fired a union employee and that CEO Elon Musk illegally threatened employees with the loss of their stock options if they unionized.

The panel ruled that the employee, Richard Ortiz, should be reinstated with pay and that Musk should delete his tweet. The company must also post a notice stating that it will not violate labor laws in the future and that it will pursue legal remedies.

Ortiz was instrumental in organizing, including handing out flyers in the factory parking lot in Fremont, California, before he was fired in October 2017. The company said it had fired him for posting screenshots of employee profiles on an internal Facebook platform. The administrative judge ruled that this was retaliation for his attempts to organize.

The judge also ruled that the company illegally sent a warning letter to another employee for taking screenshots and sending them to Ortiz – a decision the jury also upheld Thursday.

In May 2018, Musk posted a tweet highlighting, among other things, why people should pay union dues and give up stock options for nothing. Both the judge and the panel held that the mail constituted an unlawful attempt to coerce employees by threatening to pay damages.

The jury went beyond the judge’s earlier ruling in a number of ways, finding that Tesla’s non-disclosure agreement, which employees must sign, unlawfully prohibits them from speaking to the media about Tesla without permission, even if the material is public. Thursday’s decision requires the company to amend the agreement.

Tesla did not respond to a request for comment.

Collector NFT, which goes under the handle @3fmusic, has made a last-minute offer of 350 airplay.

A unique digital collectible inspired by the New York Times’ technology column has sold at auction for more than $500,000 – the first sale in the newspaper’s history.

The image of the column – titled Buy this column at the roadblock! – was converted into an unreadable token, or NFT, and sold in a hot auction that attracted more than 30 bids on the NFT Market Foundation website.

The NFT, a single bit of digital code stored on the Ethereum blockchain that references a 14-megabyte columnar graph hosted on a decentralized file-hosting service, cannot be duplicated or modified, making it potentially valuable to collectors. In recent weeks, some NFTs have sold for hundreds of thousands of dollars. One of them, a collection of artworks by the digital artist Beeple, fetched more than $69 million at auction.

In addition to the token, the winner of the auction – if they come forward – will receive additional perks, including a voicemail message from Michael Barbaro, host of The Daily Podcast. All proceeds from the auction will go to Neediest Cases, a charity affiliated with The Times.

The winner of the auction, collector NFT, who goes by the name of @3fmusic, made a last-minute bid of 350 Airwaves, a digital currency equivalent to about $560,000, based on Wednesday’s exchange rate. The link in the user’s profile was to the website of a music studio in Dubai.

@3fmusic has been down since Wednesday afternoon. It appears that the user is an avid collector of NFT works. In addition to the Times token, his collection on the Foundation’s website includes works such as Result 2020, an image of Kermit the sad looking frog, and Mushy’s Midafternoon Dream, an image of a cartoon toad sitting on a tree trunk.

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Technical Authority Certificate for disinformation

Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, Google’s Sundar Pichai, and Twitter’s Jack Dorsey testified remotely before Congress about misinformation and false information harming online platforms.

I don’t think anyone wants a world where you can only say what private companies think is true. Our mission is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful. We believe in free debate and conversation to find the truth. At the same time, we must balance this with our desire that our ministry not be used to sow confusion, division or destruction. There are two faces on each of your platforms. Facebook has a family, friends and a neighborhood, but it’s right next door to where the white nationalist rally is held every day. On YouTube people share weird videos, and on the other side are Covid deniers, QAnon supporters and Flat Earthers. You have failed to bring about meaningful change after your platform played a role in fomenting rebellion, aiding and abetting the spread of the virus, and trampling on American civil liberties. And while it’s true that some bad actors shout fire and promote harmful content in a crowded theater, your halls give them a megaphone so they can be heard in theaters across the country and around the world. Their business model itself has become a problem. How is it possible that you don’t at least acknowledge that Facebook played a central or leading role in the recruitment, planning and execution of the attack on Capitol Hill? President, I think the onus here is on the people who took the initiative to break the law, to make and commit the riots, and then on the people who put this content out there, including the president, but also other people. Their platform bears some responsibility for spreading false information related to the election and the Stop the Steal movement that led to the attack on the Capitol. Just a yes or no answer. Mr. Speaker, this is a tough question. We? – Okay, let’s go. Sir, I want to thank you for your support. Dorsey. Yes, but you also have to look at the broader ecosystem. We don’t just use technology platforms. We all know about the increasing censorship of conservative voices by major tech companies and their desire to serve a radically progressive agenda by influencing a generation of children – by removing, shutting down, or de-registering all news, books, and now even toys that are not considered benevolent. First of all, do you realize that there is a real concern that there is an anti-conservative bias on the part of Twitter? And do you agree that this must stop? If so, is Twitter seen by both parties as a place where everyone is treated fairly? We do not write policy based on particular political preferences. If we find anything, we take it outside.

Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, Google’s Sundar Pichai and Twitter’s Jack Dorsey testified before Congress about misinformation and false information affecting online platforms….. Credit….Via Reuters

On Thursday, lawmakers questioned executives from Facebook, Google and Twitter about the link between online misinformation and Jan. 6 Capitol Hill riots.

Here’s what you need to know.

• Jack Dorsey, Twitter’s chief executive, said the site played a role in the attack on the Capitol, which appeared to be the first public admission by a top social media executive about the platforms’ influence on the riots. When asked by a Democratic congressman if the platforms were somehow responsible for the misinformation that contributed to the riots, Dorsey replied that they were. Neither Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg nor Google’s Sundar Pichai wanted to answer this question directly.
• As lawmakers threatened Thursday to undo the liability protections enshrined in Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, leaders of major social media organizations failed to agree on how or if the law should be changed. Zuckerberg urged Congress to thoughtfully reform Section 230. He said the law needs to be updated to reflect modern times. Pichai said that while regulation plays a role in repairing harm and increasing liability, he warned that recent proposals to amend Section 230 would have unintended consequences.
• Democratic lawmakers have accused leaders of making money from spreading misinformation online, reflecting their growing frustration with the spread of extremism, conspiracy theories and lies online in the wake of the turmoil on Capitol Hill.
• Republican lawmakers came to the sedition hearings on Capitol Hill, but their hostility focused on the platform’s decisions to bar right-wing figures, including former President Donald J. Trump. The decisions, Mr. Ban Trump, many of his associates and other conservatives amount to liberal bias and censorship, they say.

in connection with the Chris Gash credit

Interest rates on 10-year Treasuries have risen sharply in recent weeks, suggesting that traders are taking the threat of inflation more seriously. And if the trend continues, bond investors will be on a collision course with the Biden administration, which wants to spend trillions more on infrastructure, education and other programs.

The potential confrontation reminds some market veterans of the 1990s, when Treasury bond yields skyrocketed as the Clinton administration considered more spending, Nelson D. Schwartz reports for the New York Times. As a result, officials quickly made reducing the deficit a priority.

Ed Yardeni, an independent economist, coined the term bond avenger in the 1980s to describe investors who sell bonds when there are signs that the budget deficit is getting out of control.

Every time inflation comes back, they seem to get up and form a group, Yardeni said. Of course they went back to the United States. So even though the Fed says inflation will be temporary, be vigilant and watch for inflation to get out of control.

However, inflation numbers remain elusive and bond watchers remain on the sidelines. Even many financial economists who expect faster growth from the stimulus package are not ready to predict a return of inflation.

Even if inflation rises slightly, the Fed’s 2% inflation target is acceptable, said Alan S. Blinder, a Princeton economist who was an economic adviser to former President Bill Clinton and a former senior Fed official.

Bond traders are excitable people, and they go to extremes, he said. If they stay with their habit, they will overreact.

frequently asked questions

Why did the ship block the Suez Canal?

The ship departed on March 23 and ran aground after being overcome by a 40-knot wind and a sandstorm, resulting in poor visibility and navigation, the Suez Canal Authority said.

Which ship is blocking the Suez Canal?

The Ever Given ran aground Tuesday while sailing northbound in the Channel from China to the Netherlands with two Channel pilots aboard. Evergreen Marine stated that the vessel probably moved out of the channel due to a sudden strong wind.

Who is the owner of a cargo ship stuck in the Suez Canal?

The ship’s owner, Shoi Kisen, said his goal was to have the ship operational on the night of January 27-28. March. On March 26, an adviser to the Egyptian president told Agence France-Presse that traffic would resume within 48 to 72 hours.

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