Latest news with #Journal
Hindustan Times
4 hours ago
- Business
- Hindustan Times
Las Vegas compared to ghost town as tourism dips: ‘We're starting to freak out'
Las Vegas, once the crown jewel of American tourism, today seems to be battling a dip in footfall. Visuals shared on social media show the city's once busy roads and glittering casinos sitting virtually empty. Some social media users have even compared the Nevada city to a 'ghost town'. Las Vegas tourism plunging? Social media users report fewer tourists and emptier roads. No tips in Vegas According to a Wall Street Journal report, published July 26, workers in Las Vegas have seen their tips go down by as much as 50%, thanks to declining tourism. This plunge in income from tips comes despite Nevada's recently-passed 'no tax on tips' law. 'No tax on tips, that's a rad thing. But it doesn't really do us much good if there isn't any people to get tips from,' Las Vegas-based tattoo artist Charlie Mungo told the Journal. Mungo said that Canadians used to make up 30% of his clientele. They have now vanished. 'We're all starting to freak out,' he said. Canadians have been boycotting American products and vacations over US President Donald Trump's trade tariffs – he has imposed a 25% tariff on imports of certain Canadian goods. 'Las Vegas is dead' 'WOW! Look at Las Vegas! It's almost like a GHOST TOWN!' wrote one social media users on X, sharing a photograph that shows the roads of the city with only a few cars. X user Alex Cole posted a photograph of what appears to be the lobby of an empty resort and wrote: 'Las Vegas is dead bro…' 'I come to Vegas every year at this same time, and last year these streets were packed,' Cole added in a follow-up post. According to data from the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, the city saw a drop in overall visitor numbers during the first four months of this year. Passenger traffic through Harry Reid International Airport also declined, with domestic travel in the first half of 2025 down 4% compared to the same period last year.
Forbes
11 hours ago
- Business
- Forbes
Interest Rates Are More Complicated Than The Fed And 10-Year Treasury
Man carrying heavy stone with growing interest rate symbol increasing debt. 3D. getty The Wall Street Journal 's editorial board wrote about interest rates this week. They tried to explain that a change by the Federal Reserve in its short-term benchmark federal funds rate on Wednesday wouldn't necessarily improve borrowing costs. They're right to a degree, but the explanation is overly simplified and seems to miss the biggest point: how global markets, not the Fed, are the real force. Interest rates at all levels are always based on fundamental rates with an additional amount for risk. To understand what rates will be, the question is which reference value is in place and how much is added. The Journal noted that expectations are for the part of the Fed that sets rates, the Federal Open Market Committee, to keep the federal funds rate at its current 4.25%–4.5%. What the editorial board called a 'rate-cutting spree' last fall that was 'premature' set off a run-up of yields on the 10-year Treasury Note. The response was unusual; historically, the Treasury yield curve has fallen with the federal funds rate. There was a rebound in unexpected consumer inflation. 'This climb in yields coincided with a rebound in consumer-price inflation that the Fed didn't expect. After flattening through October, the consumer-price index rose 0.3% in November, 0.4% in December, and 0.5% in January. The FOMC hadn't conquered inflation by September as its members had thought. It is good to remember that, at the time, the Journal 's editorial board admonished the Fed: 'The real risk for the Fed is if it embarks on a monetary easing cycle that stops the current disinflation and causes prices to rise again.' It was a risk; they were right. 'That's critical because the rates that matter most to the economy are longer rates, especially the 10-year Treasury,' they wrote. 'Those are rates that most affect corporate borrowing and consumer mortgages.' The Broader View Of Interest Rates The federal funds rate and the yield on the 10-year Treasury Note are both critical to interest rates for commercial and consumer needs. But they aren't the only ones. The federal funds rate range is the set of interest rates that banks charge one another for overnight unsecured loans. The secure overnight financing rate (SOFR) also involves short-term borrowing called repurchase agreements (repo) backed by Treasury securities. SOFR is calculated by ongoing calculations of loan terms, so ultimately controlled by market activity. Put more formally by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, 'The SOFR is calculated as a volume-weighted median of transaction-level tri-party repo data collected from the Bank of New York Mellon as well as GCF Repo transaction data and data on bilateral Treasury repo transactions cleared through FICC's DVP service, which are obtained from the U.S. Department of the Treasury's Office of Financial Research (OFR).' The New York Fed publishes the SOFR on its website at about 8:00 a.m. Eastern time. SOFR is important as a base for adjustable-rate mortgages, private student loans, home equity lines of credit, and many commercial real estate mortgages. While the Fed has indirect influence on it, SOFR is based on market-driven forces. As for the 10-year Treasury, it is also driven by market forces. The Trump administration has known all along how important the 10-year Treasury is. In February, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in an interview on Fox Business, 'In my talks with [the president], he and I are focused on the 10-year Treasury [yield].' But the administration has tried to convince and nudge the banking industry to invest more in 10-year Treasury Notes. The intent was to increase demand that, in turn, would boost price and push down yields, which move inversely to price. And then there is the 5-year Treasury, which is important to banks that are lending on properties or uses that will likely try to refinance within three to five years, like may commercial real estate businesses. It also follows market forces. Interest Rate Complexities Trying to understand how interest rates work and their potential impact on the economy, companies, and individuals is critical to survive financially. What will happen next is impossible to know. As the Journal wrote of Fed monetary policy moves: 'If short rates fall but long rates rise in anticipation of higher inflation, the economic gain Mr. Trump expects won't occur. What the President needs is a Fed that investors believe favors low inflation and a sound and stable dollar. That will yield lower long-bond and mortgage rates over time.' However, the uncertainty and distrust the administration has created globally is likely a reason the 10-year yield stays up. With tariffs still creating concern about their potential impact on inflation and Trump pushing for faster economic growth (which usually means higher inflation), it also seems unlikely that a broad set of investors will assume low inflation is going to be a direct goal.
Yahoo
15 hours ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Trump says Wall Street Journal wants to settle defamation lawsuit
President Trump on Tuesday claimed that the Wall Street Journal wants to settle the defamation lawsuit he filed after the outlet reported on a letter Trump allegedly sent to Jeffrey Epstein. 'It's in the lawyer's hands. I've been treated very unfairly by The Wall Street Journal,' Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One, when asked about his lawyers efforts to expedite a deposition from the Journal's owner, Rupert Murdoch. 'They are talking to us about doing something, but we'll see what happens. Maybe, they would like us to drop that,' Trump said, adding 'they want to settle it.' Trump's suit against the Journal claims that the Epstein story caused 'overwhelming financial and reputational harm' for the president and demands billions in damages. The president has denied writing the letter detailed in the Journal's reporting, an alleged 2003 birthday message to the late sex offender. According to the outlet, the message appears to bear Trump's signature and included a suggestive drawing. The White House last week barred the Journal from taking part in Trump's travels to Scotland amid the tensions, drawing pushback from the White House Correspondents' Association. The judge in the ongoing matter ruled that the lawyers for Murdoch, the billionaire conservative media mogul with whom Trump has feuded in the past, have until Aug. 4 to respond to the request from Trump's team. Trump has snagged settlements against other major news outlets in recent months as his administration feuds with national media. CBS earlier this month settled for $16 million after the president sued over a '60 Minutes' interview with then-Vice President Harris during the 2024 cycle. And late last year, ABC settled for $15 million a defamation lawsuit Trump filed over an anchor's mischaracterization of a jury verdict finding the president liable for sexual abuse. The Hill has reached out to Dow Jones, the parent company of the Wall Street Journal, for comment. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Time Magazine
16 hours ago
- Politics
- Time Magazine
Trump Says Epstein ‘Stole' Young Women Working at Mar-a-Lago
President Donald Trump said on Tuesday that Jeffrey Epstein 'took' young women who were working for him at the Mar-a-Lago spa. Reporters asked Trump for details about his falling out with Epstein on Air Force One following the President's comments the previous day that he ended his years-long friendship with the convicted sex offender after 'he stole people that worked for me.' Trump confirmed that Epstein hired young women who worked in the spa of his private club in Florida. He declined to say how many staffers Epstein hired, saying it was 'many years ago.' 'I have a great spa, one of the best spas in the world in Mar-a-Lago. And people were taken out of the spa. Hired by him. In other words, gone. And other people would come and complain, this guy is taking people from the spa. I didn't know that,' Trump told reporters. 'And then when I heard about it, I told him, I said, listen, we don't want you taking our people, whether it was spa or not spa. I don't want him taking people. And he was fine. And then not too long after that, he did it again. And I said—out of here.' Asked specifically about Virginia Giuffre, a victim of Epstein's sex-trafficking who has alleged she was recruited while working at Mar-a-Lago as a teenager, Trump confirmed he thought she was among the employees Epstein 'stole' from the resort. 'I don't know. I think she worked at the spa. I think so. I think that was one of the people, yeah,' the President said. 'He stole her. And by the way, she had no complaints about us, as you know, none whatsoever.' Trump has faced increased scrutiny over his years-long friendship with Epstein since the Wall Street Journal published an article alleging that he sent a 'bawdy' birthday letter to the now-disgraced billionaire financier in 2003. Trump has denied writing the letter, and filed a lawsuit against the Journal's parent firms, its owner Rupert Murdoch, and the two reporters behind the article. The Journal later reported that the Justice Department informed Trump at a May meeting that his name was among the many in the Epstein files. Epstein has been the subject of attention and conspiracy theories for years, but his case has drawn renewed interest after the Justice Department and FBI released a memo earlier this month, concluding that the disgraced financier didn't have a 'client list' of co-conspirators and that his 2019 death in jail was a suicide. Trump, facing outrage from many of his own supporters, has tried and failed to brush off concerns about the case. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have called on the Administration to release the files related to the Epstein case for transparency. Amid the controversy, Trump instructed Attorney General Pam Bondi to ask a court to release the transcripts of grand jury testimony made against Epstein years ago. A federal judge in Florida rejected one of the requests, but another ruling is pending.
Wall Street Journal
17 hours ago
- Politics
- Wall Street Journal
Trump's Tariff Deals With Japan and the EU, as His Aug. 1 Deadline Nears - Opinion: Potomac Watch
Paul A. Gigot is the editorial page editor and vice president of The Wall Street Journal, a position he has held since 2001. He is responsible for the publication's editorials, op-ed articles and Opinion columnists, book reviews, arts criticism, and other Opinion content such as podcasts, videos and documentaries. He is also the host of the weekly news program, the Journal Editorial Report, on the Fox News Channel. Mr. Gigot joined the Journal in 1980 as a reporter in Chicago, and in 1982 he became the Journal's Asia correspondent, based in Hong Kong. He won an Overseas Press Club award for his reporting on the Philippines. In 1984 he was named the first editorial page editor of The Asian Wall Street Journal, based in Hong Kong. In 1987 he was assigned to Washington, where he contributed editorials and a weekly column on politics, "Potomac Watch," which won the 2000 Pulitzer Prize for commentary. Mr. Gigot is a graduate of Dartmouth College, where he was chairman of the daily student newspaper.
