Category: Business

A Supreme Court decision is being called a win for religious freedom.

CBN News has reported for years about the Kleins, two Oregon bakers who were fined for refusing to make a cake for a gay commitment ceremony.

The case involves bakers Melissa and Aaron Klein who were punished with a $135,000 fine for declining to create a same-sex wedding cake in 2013.

The legal fight over the case went up to the high court on Monday where the justices threw out a previous state court ruling against the Kleins, sending the case back down to that court in Oregon.

The justices say the state court needs to reconsider the case in light of last year’s Supreme Court ruling in favor of a Colorado baker who refused to make a cake for a same-sex wedding. The court had ruled that the Colorado Civil Rights Commission showed anti-religious bias against Christian baker Jack Phillips.

The Oregon appellate court ruling came before the high court’s decision in the Phillips’ case.

Kelley Shackelford, president, CEO, and chief counsel of First Liberty Institute, the non-profit law group which represented the Kleins, called Monday’s Supreme Court decision “a victory for the religious liberty of all Americans.”

“This is a victory for Aaron and Melissa Klein and for religious liberty for all Americans,” Shackelford said. “The Constitution protects speech, popular or not, from condemnation by the government. The message from the Court is clear, government hostility toward religious Americans will not be tolerated.”

Another dispute involving a florist from Washington state who would not create flower arrangements for a same-sex wedding is also headed to the Supreme Court.

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There are a million benefits to owning a dog; companionship, exercise, fun and cuddles, just to name a few. Compared to these puppy pros there are far fewer canine cons; however one of them would have to be the hair. For certain breeds at least shedding can turn your once spotless house into a festival of fur, for which the tidy up just never ends.

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here’s nothing more enjoyable than a delicious cup of tea after a long day. Despite the fact that the tea business and culture is absolutely booming, the traditional design of the tea bag has not changed for many years and it’s definitely time to take a more creative approach at the ordinary tea packaging. Here’s where the Japanese company, Ocean Teabag, comes into the picture with their adorable tea bags that will definitely make you crave for a cup of tea.

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The Senate voted Thursday to block the Trump administration from selling weapons to Saudi Arabia, launching a new challenge to President Trump’s steadfast alliance with the country amid rising tensions in the Middle East.

The resolution passed, 53-45, which is not a veto-proof majority. The legislation would require 67 votes in the Senate to override the veto.

Mr. Trump has promised to veto the legislation. The White House said stopping the sales “would send a message that the United States is abandoning its partners and allies at the very moment when threats to them are increasing.”

The Senate will hold two more votes Thursday on measures to stop the arms sales and these also are expected to pass. While the resolutions are also likely to be approved by the House, supporters of the measures there are well short of having enough support to overcome Mr. Trump’s threatened veto.

The votes came against the backdrop of heightened U.S. tensions with Iran, spurred by the Islamic Republic’s downing of a U.S. drone. Mr. Trump declared Thursday that “Iran made a very big mistake,” and congressional leaders received a closed-door briefing on the situation at the Capitol.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo cited threats from Iran when declaring an emergency to approve the weapons sales in May. The Saudis have recently faced a number of attacks from Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen.

“To reject these sales at this time and under these circumstances is to reward recent Iranian aggression and to encourage further Iranian escalation,” said Sen. Jim Risch of Idaho, the Republican chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Risch added that blocking the sale would also “encourage miscalculation on the part of Iranians which will be disastrous.”

The $8 billion arms sale included precision guided munitions, other bombs and ammunition and aircraft maintenance support.

Opposition in Congress to closer U.S. Saudi ties escalated after the killing last year of U.S.-based columnist Jamal Khashoggi by agents of the kingdom. But a small group of lawmakers has been voicing concern about the Saudi-led coalition’s war in Yemen for years.

Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said the war in Yemen was one reason for his opposition to the arms sales.

“These are bombs that we know have killed thousands of civilians in Yemen, patients in hospitals, children on school buses,” Menendez said.

The conflict in Yemen has killed thousands of civilians and left millions more are on the brink of starvation. Menendez called the humanitarian situation “an incomprehensible moral tragedy.”

Sen. Lindsey Graham, Republican from South Carolina, delivered an impassioned speech from the Senate floor criticizing Saudi Arabia’s behavior as personally “disrespectful.”

“My relationship with Saudi Arabia is forever changed,” he said, accusing Riyadh of taking their relationship with the U.S. “for granted” and caring more about “maintaining power at all costs,” than the alliance.

“You’ve lost me, and that’s too bad,” he said.

Boeing is moving its Space and Launch headquarters to Titusville, Florida ahead of the completion and first launch of its Starliner spacecraft, planned for later this year.

Boeing to Move Space and Launch Headquarters to Florida

Boeing announced today that it was moving the headquarters for is Space and Launch division from Arlington, Virginia to Titusville, Florida, near Kennedy Space Center on the so-called “Space Coast”.

“Looking to the future, this storied Florida space community will be the center of gravity for Boeing’s space programs as we continue to build our company’s leadership beyond gravity,” said Leanne Caret, president and CEO of Boeing Defense, Space & Security. “The time is right for us to locate our space headquarters where so much of our space history was made over the past six decades and where so much history awaits.”

Boeing says that the move will not affect facilities in other states like Texas and California, where Boeing has major operations. The move is necessary though for several reasons, the company said. Boeing has several space projects coming to fruition in the near future, such as the crewed CST-100 Starliner, and its other launch vehicles like the uncrewed X-37B are seeing an increased workload, necessitating the move to the country’s decades-old hub for space related activity.

“Boeing has been a dominant presence on the Space Coast for six decades, and this move represents a continuation of that legacy and future commitment,” said Jim Chilton, Boeing senior vice president of Space and Launch. “Expanding our Boeing presence on the Space Coast brings tremendous value for our commercial and government space programs through focused leadership, strategic investment, customer proximity and additional contributions to the vitality of the region.”

The Michaels Companies, North America’s largest craft retailer, reported a 5.3% slump in sales in the first quarter of 2019, dropping from $1,155.5 million in the first quarter of 2018 to $1,093.7 million in the same time period this year, all but ensuring its full-year sales result will be less than 2018.

The company blames the drop in sales primarily on its closing 36 Pat Catan’s and 94 Aaron Brothers stores over the past year. Michaels also reported $5.6 million of expenses in the first quarter could be attributed to the departure of former CEO Chuck Rubin, who left that role Feb. 28.

“While our first quarter results were within our range of expectations for the quarter, we are not satisfied and are taking steps to improve our performance, said interim CEO Mark Cosby.

Rubin made a sudden but “mutually agreed” exit, according to the company, and board member Cosby stepped up to take the reins for the interim. Fortune notes that the former CEO had not so long ago played down the threat of e-commerce to the chain, and Michaels only launched its own online store in 2014. E-commerce grew last year by 77%, but still only accounted for $210 million of last year’s $5.2 billion in sales — just 4%.

Cosby made improving the company’s e-commerce capabilities a major goal of his work this year. The company’s annual report noted the intention of bringing e-commerce fulfillment in-house in 2019.

But that doesn’t mean the bricks-and-mortar stores are going away any time soon. At the end of March, Michaels had 1,260 retail outlets in operation after opening four new stores, closing two stores and relocating seven stores in the first quarter. By the end of 2019, Michaels expects to open 20 new stores, including as many as 12 former Pat Catan’s retail outlets that will be rebranded and reopened, and relocate 13 Michaels stores.

Michaels also took a $5 million write-off of investment in Darby Smart, a project kit company that shifted to how-to videos, after the company was sold this spring.

The impact of tariffs

In its 2018 annual report, Michaels noted the threat of additional tariffs as a real risk to the business. The Trump administration is pushing to raise taxes on some consumer goods imported to the U.S. from China from 10% to 25%. If that happens, “our costs could increase, and we may be required to raise our prices, which could result in the loss of customers and adversely affect our operating performance,” the company wrote. To mitigate that risk, Michaels might move production outside of China, which would raise costs and disrupt operations.

President Donald Trump is expected to decide his next move after talks with China’s premier later in June. Retailers across the United States are increasingly worried about the impact tariffs would have on the holiday retail season. For most retailers, including Michaels, the fourth quarter is the most important of the year. For the rest of the 2019 fiscal year, Michaels expects total sales to reach $5.19 billion to $5.24 billion, slightly less than 2018.

Donald Trump has accused the European Central Bank (ECB) of unfairly manipulating the euro, further raising the stakes for Washington in its trade and diplomatic disputes around the world.

The US president suggested in a tweet that comments by Mario Draghi, the head of the ECB, had triggered an immediate slide in the value of the euro versus the dollar, “making it unfairly easier for them to compete against the USA”.

Reopening a spat over transatlantic trade with the EU that has repeatedly flared up during Trump’s presidency, he warned Brussels it had been “getting away with this for years, along with China and others”.

Mario Draghi just announced more stimulus could come, which immediately dropped the Euro against the Dollar, making it unfairly easier for them to compete against the USA. They have been getting away with this for years, along with China and others.

Trump’s comments come after Draghi used one of his last major speeches before stepping down as ECB president to say the central bank could act to loosen monetary policy – cutting interest rates or revamping its quantitative easing bond-buying programme – to stimulate the eurozone economy.

Economic growth in the single currency area has struggled to generate momentum in the past 18 months, while inflation across the bloc has stayed below the ECB’s target level of 2%.

Growth in key member states, including Germany, Europe’s largest economy, has come close to stalling, while Italy slid into recession.

“In the absence of improvement, such that the sustained return of inflation to our aim is threatened, additional stimulus will be required,” Draghi said, speaking at the ECB’s annual meeting in Sintra, Portugal.

Donald Trump slams Mario Draghi’s rate cut plans – business live

The euro weakened across the board on foreign exchanges straight after the speech, dropping by 0.3% against the dollar to trade a two-week low of $1.1182 on Tuesday.

With just four months of his eight-year term left, the slowdown in the eurozone may threaten to unpick Draghi’s legacy. The Italian is widely seen as having saved the euro after a promise in 2012 to do “whatever it takes” during the sovereign debt crisis.

Growth in the eurozone has stuttered in recent months in part because of the Trump administration’s trade war with China, which has sapped global trade and cut demand for EU exports.

Draghi warned that trade disputes were among factors affecting growth in his speech advocating potential stimulus. “The risks that have been prominent throughout the past year, in particular geopolitical factors, the rising threat of protectionism and vulnerabilities in emerging markets have not dissipated,” he said.

The US is also approaching a period of weaker growth, after repeated interest rate hikes from the US Federal Reserve served as a headwind, and as support from tax cuts introduced by Trump gradually fades.

Financial market investors believe the Fed could be forced into interest rate cuts this year as a consequence.

SHANGHAI — China reduced its holdings of U.S. government debt again in April even as Beijing’s gold reserves continued to grow, diversifying away from the dollar as ties with Washington fray.

The $7.5 billion dip on the month brought China’s total Treasury stockpile to $1.11 trillion, down $90 billion from the most recent peak in August 2017. This follows a roughly $10 billion decline in March.

The downtrend in recent months parallels the escalation of the trade war between Beijing and Washington, even as the latest data precedes the breakdown in talks last month that led to another round of tariffs. A shrinking current-account surplus has left China with less wherewithal to buy Treasurys, and Beijing appears to have decided that overextending itself to do so is unnecessary given the souring bilateral relationship.

But few other options are available for stashing large amounts of capital, and selling off U.S. government debt too quickly would risk further antagonizing Washington. Such a move also would drive up long-term yields, reducing the value of China’s remaining holdings.

Rather than dumping Treasurys as a way to gain leverage in trade negotiations, Beijing seems to be taking a subtler approach through trimming its holdings by $20 billion or less per month.

Some of this capital is going into gold. China’s gold reserves have grown for six straight months since December, the first time the country increased its holdings of the precious metal in more than two years. Russia has made similar moves, slashing its dollar-denominated assets while purchasing gold as essentially a borderless currency.

China’s Treasury stockpile long stayed above $1.2 trillion, but after the yuan’s sharp depreciation in 2015, Beijing is believed to have sold some of the securities to fund intervention to shore up its currency.

The country’s overall foreign-exchange reserves dropped below $3 trillion, though the bleeding was stemmed by controls aimed at curbing capital flight, including restrictions on overseas acquisitions. Chinese Treasury holdings bottomed out in January 2017 and returned to $1.2 trillion that August.

Jervois Mining Ltd. (ASX: JRV) today completed its previously announced merger with M2 Cobalt Corp. (TSXV: MC) following receipt of approvals from both M2 Cobalt shareholders and the BC Supreme Court.

In light of the merger, Simon Clarke, former CEO and executive director of M2 Cobalt, joins the Jervois board as a non-executive director. He is a qualified CPA and securities lawyer with 25 years of senior management experience in the resource and energy sector with companies like OSUM Oil Sands and RailPower Technologies.

Also at Jervois, Stephen van der Sluys has stepped down as the director and interim CEO for the transition period, while Andy Eldelmeier, former CFO of M2 Cobalt, joins the team as interim CFO. Edelmeier was a partner at Strata Partners, a London-based corporate finance firm, where he advised on private equity financings and cross border M&A.

Earlier this year, Jervois also entered into an at-market merger with eCobalt Solutions Inc., which will require shareholder approval on July 18, 2019. Following the mergers Jervois will be listed on the ASX and TSXV under the symbol JRV.

Acquiring M2 Cobalt gives Jervois access to the historic Kilembe mine and Kasese cobalt refinery in Uganda to support the company’s East African ambitions, the company says.

Written with material from Newsfilecorp.