Imports plummet in April as tariffs weigh on trade
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REAL ESTATE
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Healey administration sets aside more than $7 million for office-to-residential conversions
The Healey administration this week announced it had awarded more than $7 million to help spur two office-to-residential conversion projects in downtown Boston. Woburn-based KS Partners won $3.4 million to convert 15 Court Square.
Jessica Rinaldi/Globe Staff
The Healey administration this week announced it had awarded more than $7 million to help spur two office-to-residential conversion projects in downtown Boston. A proposal to convert 31 Milk St. from Dinosaur Capital Partners of Newton was awarded $4 million, while Woburn-based KS Partners won $3.4 million to convert 15 Court Square. The Milk Street conversion is due to carve out 110 new rental units on the building's office floors, including 22 income-restricted apartments, while 80 apartments are planned for 15 Court Square, including 16 affordable ones. The state money is coming from $15 million that Governor Maura Healey set aside last year from the state's Affordable Housing Trust Fund, to help developers planning larger office conversions in downtown Boston finance their projects. So far, at least 15 applications have been filed in Boston to take advantage of the city's own program for office-to-residential conversions, which offers as much as 75 percent off property tax bills for up to 29 years. But construction has so far begun on only one project, building 15 apartments at 281 Franklin St. The Wu administration said on Wednesday that construction on the Milk Street and Court Square projects should begin by the end of the year. — JON CHESTO
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LAYOFFS
Pampers maker Procter & Gamble to cut up to 7,000 jobs as companies are buffeted by higher costs
The Proctor & Gamble headquarters complex is seen in downtown Cincinnati in 2015.
John Minchillo/Associated Press
Procter & Gamble will cut up to 7,000 jobs over the next two years as the maker of Tide detergent and Pampers diapers implements a restructuring program at a time when tariffs are raising costs for American companies and consumers are growing anxious about the economy. The job cuts, announced at the Deutsche Bank Consumer Conference in Paris on Thursday, make up approximately 6 percent of the company's global workforce, or about 15 percent of its nonmanufacturing positions, said chief financial officer Andre Schulten. Procter & Gamble, based in Cincinnati, had approximately 108,000 employees worldwide in June 2024. The cuts are part of a broader restructuring program. Procter & Gamble will also end sales of some of its products in certain markets. Procter & Gamble said it will provide more details about that in July. — ASSOCIATED PRESS
ECONOMY
The number of Americans filing for jobless benefits last week rises to highest level in eight months
Filings for US unemployment benefits rose to their highest level in eight months last week but remain historically low despite growing uncertainty about how tariffs could impact the broader economy. New applications for jobless benefits rose by 8,000 to 247,000 for the week ending May 31, the Labor Department said Thursday. That's the most since early October. Analysts had forecast 237,000 new applications. Weekly applications for jobless benefits are considered representative of US layoffs and have mostly bounced around a historically healthy range between 200,000 and 250,000 since COVID-19 throttled the economy five years ago, wiping out millions of jobs. — ASSOCIATED PRESS
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BANKRUPTCY
23andMe's DNA data soars in value with new $305 million bid
Signage at 23andMe headquarters in Sunnyvale, Calif., in 2021.
David Paul Morris/Photographer: David Paul Morris/
Bankrupt genetic analysis company 23andMe will hold a second auction for its cache of DNA data with an opening bid of $305 million from a group led by the company's former chief executive, Anne Wojcicki. The offer is nearly $50 million more than the last bid from Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, which had been declared the winner of the first auction last month, only to have the outcome challenged in court by Wojcicki. The new auction is a compromise between Wojcicki, Regeneron, and 23andMe, all of whom had come to federal court in St. Louis on Wednesday prepared to fight over the best way to set up a new round of bidding. 23andMe had initially proposed limits on the new auction that were questioned by US Bankruptcy Judge Brian Walsh. At the start of the hearing on Wednesday, Walsh asked lawyers for Regeneron and 23andMe to justify the proposed auction rules, including a $10 million breakup fee and a limit to the bidding, which he said may be 'inefficient.' Under the new rules, Wojcicki, who is partnering with a California-based research institute, would make a bid of $305 million, which Regeneron can counter with an offer that must be at least $315 million, company attorney Christopher Hopkins told Walsh. After that, Wojcicki and the research institute can make their final bid. If they do, Regeneron gets the chance to make the last offer of the auction. — BLOOMBERG NEWS
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LEGAL
Mattel settles baby sleeper death suits before start of a trial
Mattel headquarters in El Segundo, Calif.
Bing Guan/Bloomberg
Mattel Inc. and its Fisher-Price unit have settled lawsuits alleging their recalled Rock 'n Play baby sleeper was so defectively designed that it led to the deaths of infants. The agreement, disclosed in a Delaware court filing last week, resolves lawsuits over six death cases and four allegations the faulty design of the Rock 'n Play product led to babies suffering flattened heads when they rolled against the product's side, said Michael Trunk, an attorney representing victims who settled their cases. He declined to provide financial terms. Among the cases settled was a suit filed by Ameena Brown over the death of her son, identified in court filings only as AB. Jury selection in her case was slated to start Thursday in Delaware. There are at least four other such cases pending in Delaware Superior Court. A representative of Mattel declined to comment. Mattel acquired Fisher-Price in 1993 in a deal valued at $1 billion. — BLOOMBERG NEWS
GAMING
Eager fans endure long lines for the Nintendo Switch 2 launch
A Nintendo Switch 2 is sold at the Nintendo store in New York's Rockefeller Center on June 5.
Richard Drew/Associated Press
Eager customers lined up outside electronics stores in Tokyo hours in advance to collect their pre-ordered Nintendo Switch 2 video game consoles. The much anticipated Switch 2, being released around the world Thursday, is an upgrade to its eight-year-old predecessor with new social features meant to draw players into online gaming. Nintendo is counting on the Switch 2 to boost sagging sales. In the United States, a chaotic pre-order process in April left some fans frustrated after the consoles quickly sold out. Still, some eager fans lined up early Thursday at retailers such as Target in hopes of purchasing a unit. 'I'm just rolling the dice here,' said Edgar Huo, who was in a line of about 25 outside of a Target in the Tribeca neighborhood of Manhattan. — ASSOCIATED PRESS
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TOURISM
Where Canadians are traveling this summer now that they're avoiding the US
Canadians are traveling more this summer than they did last year — just not to the United States. According to data from Statistics Canada, the government's data-crunching agency, they have logged 10 percent more flights to overseas countries in the first five months of 2025 than they did in 2024. In that same period, they also curbed their flights to the United States by 20 percent. Car trips across the border have declined by 35 percent, leaving US border towns ravaged. The dominant winner in this behavioral shift are Caribbean countries. According to a May 2025 report from flight and ticketing analytics firm ForwardKeys, summer flight searches to the region have increased by 22 percent from last year, more than to anywhere else. Data shared with Bloomberg by the Caribbean Tourism Organization also shows that at least a half-dozen island nations have so far documented gains in Canadian arrivals, with Bermuda taking the lion's share. Although its weather is more consistent with the mid-Atlantic — with optimal temperatures in the summer — it already saw Canadian visits grow by 34 percent in the first quarter of the year. — BLOOMBERG NEWS
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Hamilton Spectator
an hour ago
- Hamilton Spectator
As his trade war faces legal pushback, Trump has other tariff tools he could deploy
WASHINGTON - U.S. President Donald Trump's tariffs are facing legal headwinds for the first time — but he has other tools he could deploy in his quest to realign global trade. A federal appeals court is still deciding whether there will be a stay on Trump's universal tariffs enacted through the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977, usually referred to by the acronym IEEPA. The U.S. Court of International Trade ruled the duties were unlawful last month. IEEPA is a national security statute that gives the U.S. president authority to control economic transactions after declaring an emergency. It had never previously been used for tariffs. Trump declared emergencies at the United States' northern and southern borders linked to the flow of fentanyl and migrants in order to hit Canada and Mexico with economywide tariffs. He later declared an emergency over trade deficits to impose his retaliatory 'Liberation Day' duties on most nations. The trade court found Trump exceeded presidential powers by using IEEPA to broadly implement the duties. The Trump administration quickly appealed the decision and the White House said it would take the case to the Supreme Court. Following the ruling, White House Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett said he was confident the court ultimately would decide in Trump's favour. Hassett said that if it doesn't, 'we'll have other alternatives that we can pursue as well to make sure that we make American trade fair again.' While the U.S. Constitution gives power over taxes and tariffs to Congress, Greta Peisch, the former general counsel for the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, said it passed laws over the last century that allow the president some control in certain situations. Trump is now looking to use those laws — some of them for the first time. The president may be considering Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930. It allows a president to hit countries with tariffs of up to 50 per cent if the country 'is treating products of the United States disfavourably, compared to products of another foreign country,' said Peisch, a partner at Wiley Rein in Washington, D.C. Section 338 has never been used by a president before and Peisch said it might be difficult for the administration to make a case for it. Trump also might look to Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, which allows a president to take trade actions if an investigation finds a trading partner's policies are unreasonable and discriminatory. Trump used this law during his first administration to impose tariffs on some Chinese imports and European Union goods. But Section 301 requires country-by-country investigations of trade policy before a tariff can be imposed — investigations that could take weeks or months and would include a period for public comment. That certainly would slow down Trump's efforts to target the world with tariffs. If the president is looking for speed, Peisch said, he might try to use Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974 — another law that has never before been used. Section 122 allows a president to implement tariffs of up to 15 per cent to address large and serious United States balance-of-payments deficits. But those duties can only stay in place for a maximum of 150 days before they need Congressional approval to continue. That reduces Trump's leverage if his goal is to pressure countries to sign trade deals — those countries could simply decide to wait the president out. Trump also has said tariffs will help pay down the deficit; the short-term Section 122 power is unlikely to work as a long-term revenue strategy. Ultimately, Peisch said, none of the replacement statutes could easily build Trump's universal tariff wall around the United States. 'Nothing is a great fit without a lot of work,' she said. 'So I think it's potentially going to be a challenge.' This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 7, 2025.
Miami Herald
an hour ago
- Miami Herald
US close to high-speed rail breakthrough
When the great and the good of the American high speed rail industry gathered in Washington, D.C. over May 13-15 for the U.S. High Speed Rail Association's (USHSR) 2025 annual conference, there was tremendous excitement tinged with anxiety. Several attendees told Newsweek they believe the U.S. could be on the verge of a high-speed rail breakthrough, setting the stage for the kind of comprehensive national system enjoyed in the likes of China, Japan and Western Europe. Ray LaHood, a Republican who served as Transportation Secretary under President Obama from 2009 to 2013, said if one of the two high-speed rail lines currently under construction is completed, it will prove 'wildly popular' and boost support for high-speed rail across the nation. Other insiders agreed, but argued permitting reform and more explicit federal support will be needed first. There has been concern over the Trump administration's attitude toward high-speed rail. The conference took place one month after Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy announced $63.9 million in funding for a proposed Dallas to Houston route had been scrapped, and amid rumors that the California High Speed Rail line under construction between Los Angeles and San Francisco could lose federal support. This week, Duffy said there is 'no viable path' to complete California High Speed Rail on time or on budget and warned the federal government could pull billions in funding. State of U.S. high-speed rail At present there aren't any high-speed rail networks — defined by the International Union of Railways (UIC) as operating at a minimum of 250 kilometers per hour (155 miles per hour) along specially built tracks — that are operational in the U.S. This compares unfavorably with the likes of Spain, Japan and France, which have around 2,460 miles, 1,830 miles and 1,740 miles of track respectively currently in use. Most impressively, China, the chief geopolitical rival of the U.S., has gone from having virtually no high-speed rail lines to nearly 30,000 miles over the past couple of decades. Construction is currently underway on two high-speed rail lines in the U.S.-Brightline West, which will connect Las Vegas to Southern California, and California High Speed Rail between Los Angeles and San Francisco. A range of other projects have been proposed around the country, including plans to link Boston, New York and Washington, D.C. in the Northeast; Dallas, Houston and Fort Worth in Texas; and Chicago to East St. Louis in Illinois. Obstacles When asked why the U.S. had failed to build a high-speed network comparable to other advanced economies, industry experts told Newsweek there are major issues with permitting, financing and cross-party political support. California High Speed Rail has sparked particular controversy, with its cost ballooning from $34 billion to over $128 billion, while the completion date has been pushed back. Terry Hynes, an attorney specializing in rail infrastructure projects, argued planning issues in particular have bottled up capital investment. He is currently part of a team investigating how the permitting process could be sped up for USHSR. Addressing Newsweek, he said: 'I've been in the business 46 years, making railroads, and I've been frustrated as hell representing the high-speed just takes forever. And there's private money that could be brought in. Wall Street's got a lot of money looking for infrastructure investments. 'This is a wonderful infrastructure investment, the trouble is they see those permitting times. Eight years for environmental review, then you build for four years and in year 13 you're finally going to see some money. Nobody's going to invest in that.' Hynes added: 'The biggest issue to my mind is this permitting issue. The review period takes so long, the cost goes up and the more expensive it is for people doing a cost-benefit analysis, the analyses looks less beneficial.' Brandon Wheeler, a senior program manager at the North Central Texas Council of Governments, a local government-based voluntary association, said a lack of national leadership has undermined high-speed rail construction across the U.S. Speaking to Newsweek, he said: 'We don't have a national single point of leadership on that single point of leadership it really is a little bit hopscotch and we're making the best we can of it. 'Until there is, like the interstate highway system, there's a national vision to create and you have a vision around the ability to move military and goods and those kinds of things. Until our airports get bad enough, until our roads get bad enough, until people have this massive outcry and we're able to concentrate them on something, we're going to have to find what that single vision is to rally around or we will fall behind the rest of the world.' LaHood agreed, saying: 'I think the success of these projects in Europe and Asia is largely due to the national government making investments but then encouraging the private sector. Once the national government makes a commitment, it's easier for the private sector then — they know it's going to be a stable project, they know their investment is going to be good.' If you build it they will come In 2023, Brightline, the first privately built rail line in the U.S. to open in nearly a century, began operations between Miami and Orlando in Florida and has since seen passenger numbers surge. While Brightline runs below the high-speed standard, LaHood said it showed Americans are ready to embrace new rail networks, and argued one successful project in the U.S. could turbocharge the whole industry. 'If you look at the Brightline project in is wildly popular,' he said. 'They're putting more and more trains on that track every day because people like the idea that they don't have to get on the I95 and they don't have to travel on highways that are crowded with big trucks and cars... 'If you build it they will come, if you build it it will be successful and I think that will be the case with Brightline West, Las Vegas to L.A., and I think it will be true San Francisco to L.A. I think they will be wildly popular. I really believe at this point if you build it they will come and the proof of that is Europe and Asia-their trains are wildly popular.' Speaking to Newsweek, Portland Mayor Keith Wilson, who is advocating for a 'Cascadia' high-speed rail line linking the city to Seattle in Washington and Vancouver in British Columbia, said: 'Our system continues to be compacted and stagnant. 'The great cities from around the world are all tending to go towards high-speed rail and we need an opportunity to unlock our economic renaissance, which is what's missing in our country right now, and high-speed rail would move us forward and get us completing again with the world.' Trust fund A number of industry insiders told Newsweek the formation of a federal government trust fund could provide the financial muscle for a major U.S. high-speed rail expansion. Asked what one development would most speed up U.S. high-speed rail, Jim Derwinski, executive director of Chicago rail system Metra, replied: 'A trust fund so it's national, it's bipartisan so it doesn't change from administration to administration and it can be supported through the states as a national effort. 'If you're going to build something, to compare it to Europe and Asia right now, it's got to have a national campaign right now.' Arthur Sohikian is executive director of High Desert Corridor, a proposed high-speed rail line that would link Brightline West to the California High Speed Rail line. He expressed a similar view to Derwinski, telling Newsweek: 'We have to energize the public to make that been trying to get a trust fund for rail since I started my career, it seems. 'For whatever reason why the politicians won't grab onto that and won't do that, especially when you realize the Highway Trust Fund keeps diminishing as cars get more efficient, we're paying less in gas taxes, that fund is have to invest in this infrastructure as a nation, and until that happens, seriously, we're all going to be trying to do our little pieces.' The U.S. High Speed Rail Association paid travel and hotel expenses for Newsweek reporter James Bickerton to attend its 2025 annual conference. Related Articles Portland Plan To Eliminate Homelessness 'Right On Schedule'Texas High Speed Rail Plan Issued Blow From Trump AdministrationTexas Bill Seeks To Thwart High-Speed RailPossible Northwest High-Speed Rail Route Gets $50 Million Boost 2025 NEWSWEEK DIGITAL LLC.
Miami Herald
an hour ago
- Miami Herald
Trump's China gambit belies rocky road ahead on tariff deals
President Donald Trump has come up short on striking trade deals with most nations with just one month left before his self-imposed tariff deadline, even as he took his first steps in weeks toward engaging with China. Trump secured a much-desired call with Chinese President Xi Jinping, paving the way for a new round of talks on Monday in London - yet the diplomacy was overshadowed by a blowout public fight between Trump and his billionaire onetime ally, Elon Musk. Trump's aides insisted Friday that the president was moving on and focused on his economic agenda. Still, question marks remain over the U.S.'s most consequential trade relationships, with few tangible signs of progress toward interim agreements. India, which the Trump administration has cited as an early deal target, has taken a tougher line in negotiations and challenged Trump's auto tariffs at the World Trade Organization. Japan held another round of talks with the U.S., while also signaling it wants a reprieve from duties on cars and light trucks. The legal fight over Trump's tariffs hangs over everything. A court ruling striking down the country-by-country duties imposed using emergency authorities left partners with no certainty over what Trump's powers are. The next test could come as soon as next week, when a court could rule on the administration's appeal. Trump and his team were eager to draw attention to inroads with China as proof his ways are working. Trump on Friday described talks with Beijing as 'very far advanced' and said Xi had agreed to speed shipments of critical rare-earth minerals that were at the center of recent tension. Unlocking those supplies would spell relief for major American automakers. Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng will visit the U.K. next week, during which he will conduct trade negotiations with the U.S., the Chinese foreign ministry said in a statement late Saturday. The mixed results in the talks so far demonstrate the highs and lows of Trump's mercurial approach to trade, in which he and aides have cast him as the ultimate decision-maker on any deals. Rather than provide a clear-cut victory, Trump's dealings with Xi also show the difficult road ahead with China. The rare-earths dispute revealed how important those supplies, which Beijing dominates, are for the U.S. economy. 'Xi is not letting go of the rare earths. He's got leverage, he's using it,' said Douglas Holtz-Eakin, president of the American Action Forum, a conservative think tank. 'They talked, that's the most important thing. I think they're really far apart.' The clock is ticking for Trump. His 90-day pause on higher tariffs for the European Union and nearly five dozen countries expires July 9 — barring an extension he could do with the flick of a pen — while China's reprieve extends until August. If deals aren't reached, Trump plans to restore tariff rates to the levels he first announced in April, or lower numbers that exceed the current 10% baseline, a White House official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. 'We will have deals. It takes time. Usually it takes months and years; in this administration, it's going to take more like days,' White House trade counselor Peter Navarro said Friday on Fox Business. 'We're on task and on target.' The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative 'looks more like a deli now,' Navarro said, with countries lining up for talks. USTR sent letters this week to trading partners reminding them of the deadline. It's unclear what all the frantic activity has yielded. Xi for months was reluctant to get on the phone with Trump and analysts speculated about what concessions the U.S. president offered to his counterpart in exchange for the call. Trump at least appeared to give some ground on foreign students, saying it would be his 'honor' to welcome Chinese scholars even as his administration cracks down on student visas. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz visited Washington facing demands from his nation's automakers for tariff credits for vehicles they produce in the U.S. But the subject barely came up during the public portion of his meeting with Trump, who spent a large chunk of time unloading on Musk. 'We'll end up hopefully with a trade deal or we'll do something - you know, we'll do the tariffs,' Trump said Thursday alongside Merz. Merz, in his U.S. visit, emphasized the integrated trade ties between countries that are at risk — including by personally driving a BMW built in South Carolina. The German leader said Friday at an industry event the nations should agree on an 'offset rule' that would provide tariff relief for existing U.S. production. Trump's U.K. deal - the lone pact so far — was undercut this week when he plowed ahead with levies on steel and aluminum. The U.K. said the pact included an agreement for zero tariffs on British metals, but Trump's latest order kept a 25% charge on them while negotiations continue and doubled the rate for others. Still, the upcoming Group of Seven summit of leaders from major economies could provide an opportunity for the type of in-person dealmaking Trump craves. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has been discussing terms of a potential interim deal with Trump ahead of the gathering this month near Calgary. One theme is clear: Negotiations over his so-called reciprocal tariffs have grown intertwined with his separate duties on autos and metals, despite previous U.S. signals that the administration considered them separate. 'He's entirely transactional,' Holtz-Eakin said of Trump. 'He will always deal.' Talks are ongoing with the EU, which has previously proposed an agreement with the U.S. to mutually drop auto tariffs to zero as part of a broader trade framework, which the Trump administration rejected. The bloc subsequently suggested working toward zero-for-zero tariffs on cars, other industrial goods and some agricultural imports with tariff-rate quotas as a possible interim measure. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said this week he'd consider some type of 'export credit' on autos, the kind of carve-out sought by Germany on vehicle tariffs. And he predicted there would be a U.S.-India deal in the 'not too distant future.' Lutnick signaled, though, Trump's push for so-called reciprocity comes with caveats. The U.S. wouldn't agree with Vietnam to drop all tariffs, because it believes the Southeast Asian nation is a hub for so-called transshipment of Chinese goods. Talks with South Korea, where Trump spoke with newly elected president Lee Jae-myung, and Japan, which had top trade negotiator Ryosei Akazawa meet with Lutnick, continued this week. In yet another sign of the Trump team's frenetic approach, Nikkei reported that different — and even competing — positions among Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Trade Representative Jamieson Greer and Lutnick had confounded Japanese counterparts. --- (Akayla Gardner, Jennifer A. Dlouhy, Alberto Nardelli, Hadriana Lowenkron, Arne Delfs and Shiyin Chen contributed to this report.) Copyright (C) 2025, Tribune Content Agency, LLC. Portions copyrighted by the respective providers.
