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Next year might be your best opportunity in over a decade to get a big raise.
According to the Conference Board’s recent Salary Increase Budget Survey, companies are budgeting more for wage increases in 2022 than they have at any point since 2008.
The 240 companies surveyed last month (more than half of which employ over 10,000 people) are planning to spend an average of 3.9% of their total payroll on wage increases next year. In a previous survey in April, companies said they were budgeting 3% of payroll for salary increases — that's a jump of nearly one full percentage point in just seven months.
The United States is in the midst of a major labor shortage, with record numbers of workers quitting their jobs and firms across industries hiking wages and offering incentives to attract and retain workers.
Employers are facing fierce competition to hire and retain good workers — and one way to keep employees is simply paying them more. The Conference Board has found wage growth over the past six to eight months has been especially strong for workers under age 25 and workers who have switched jobs within the past year.
On top of that, data from October showed inflation running at 6.2% on a yearly basis. So even with big increases in salaries, soaring prices may mean that many workers are still falling behind because money doesn't stretch as far as it used to.
The average new car is now selling for well over $5,000 more than it did in 2020. Gas costs some 50% more than it did a year ago too. Grocery prices are up 5.4% on a yearly basis, and household heating costs are soaring as well. Then there are skyrocketing housing prices: In August, data showed that it would take a first time homebuyer roughly seven years and 11 months to save up for a 20% down payment on a house, compared to seven years and one month to reach the same goal in January 2020.
According to the Conference Board’s new survey, 46% of companies plan to spend more on raises next year in part because of climbing wages for new hires, while 39% cited rising inflation as a reason they expect to spend more on wage bumps in 2022.
What to expect for job wages in 2022
“It is likely that severe labor shortages will continue through 2022,” Gad Levanon, head of the Conference Board's Labor Market Institute, wrote in Tuesday’s report. “During that time, overall wage growth is likely to remain well above four percent. Wages for new hires, and workers in blue-collar and manual services jobs will grow faster than average.”
If you’re up for a raise next year, be sure your pay bump is enough to offset the price gains caused by inflation. While meager cost-of-living raises of 2% or 3% may have been common in the past, workers can make a good case that they need to be making at least 5% more next year just to break even.
Wages in certain industries have risen dramatically this year (hourly earnings in the leisure and hospitality industries are up 12.3% over the last year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics), but that’s not the case for all Americans. On the whole, real hourly wages in October were down 1.2% on a yearly basis. That means that for millions of Americans, earnings gains at work haven’t been sufficient to keep up with rising prices.


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Goodman Backpack Drive a Huge Success Madison Credit Union participated a little differently this year…
Children’s Wisconsin Foundation Fundraiser
Chain of Hearts sees record support
This February we raised money for the Children’s Wisconsin Foundation. We combined our chocolates for charity with Children’s Wisconsin’s chain of hearts and raised $477! That’s a lot of love in just 28 days!
Children’s Wisconsin Foundation provides critical care for the sickest kids and babies, research to cure childhood illnesses, and community initiatives designed to keep kids healthy.
Thank you to all who donated and bought chocolates for charity this month. Our chocolate sales will continue to support local charities including our yearly donation of backpacks and school supplies to the Goodman Community Center.

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Food recall notices have been issues in 2018 for everything from eggs, to ham, to Romaine lettuce. Know the risks of food illnesses and how to protect yourself.
Dwight Adams, email@example.com
Bakers, check your pantries.
Hometown Food Company is recalling specific lots of its Pillsbury Unbleached All Purpose Flour because it may be contaminated with salmonella.
The affected flour was sold in Publix and Winn-Dixie stores.
According to a recall notice on Winn-Dixie’s website, “there have been no reports of any illnesses associated with this recall.”
The Publix recall notice says “12,185 cases of impacted Pillsbury Unbleached All Purpose Flour product were distributed through a limited number of retailers and distributors nationwide.”
The lot numbers of the affected bags are 8 292 and 8 293 with best if used by dates of April 19, 2020, and April 20, 2020.
“Consumers who have purchased these products are urged not to consume them,” the Publix recall notice says. “These products should be thrown away or returned to the place of purchase for a refund.”
No other Pillsbury products are impacted by the recall.
Hometown Food Company acquired Pillsbury’s shelf-stable baking and desserts product in September. The portfolio company of Brynwood Partners VII L.P. and Brynwood Partners VIII L.P. owns Hometown, according to the Brynwood Partners website.
Follow Kelly Tyko on Twitter: @KellyTyko
Read or Share this story: https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2019/03/11/pillsbury-flour-recall-salmonella-risk-publix-winn-dixie/3134302002/


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The German travel company Tui has started utilizing ChatGPT in its app to provide holiday suggestions, in the newest signal of conventional businesses racing to harness AI. With August being National Black Business Month, there isn’t any higher time to assist the town’s Black-owned bakeries, eateries, meals vehicles, art galleries, reward outlets, boutiques, and tour companies. It’s with that mentality that the 2023 edition of the information, published in June, was created. FDLE officers beforehand informed NBC News that safety will increase were not because of elevated travel and a presidential campaign and that they have been essential compensations to make up for prior shortcomings. Health officers say you possibly can shield yourself from dengue and other mosquito-borne illnesses through the use of insect repellent.
Flight Disruption In Uk Was Worst In Europe In Recent Months, Says Tui
The record of protected visitors includes dozens of governors from around the country, their households and a few overseas officials. In complete, 190 instances of dengue have been reported in 2023 by Floridians with travel historical past to a dengue-endemic areas, including Brazil, Peru, Mexico, Bolivia and the Dominican Republic. Just within the week ending August 5 alone, 43 instances of dengue had been reported in individuals who had traveled internationally, in accordance with the Florida Department of Health.
Young Individuals Wait Longer For Liver Transplants
When you consent to data collection on AMP pages you’re consenting to permit us to show personalised ads which are related to you if you finish up outside of the UK. For a chance to secure a three-night keep for as a lot as six within the signature “B&Burrow” – full with tunnel entrance – participants ought to go to here and submit particulars of their “innocent travel mishap” earlier Travel & Leasuire News than midnight on August 27th. And one in 5 have missed a train after going to the mistaken platform, whereas 16% have missed a connecting journey due to not leaving themselves enough time. The prospect of generative AI chatbots that may comb by way of big amounts of information in seconds has led to predictions of job cuts as people become too costly.
You may be asked to set these preferences again when you visit non-AMP BBC pages. It additionally emerged that, of those who have needed to cough up the cash to repair their travel blunders, this costs shoppers £143 each time – although some unlucky travellers had to stump up £1,000 or extra. “Despite his greatest intentions, our character Carl the Wombat sometimes doesn’t get it fairly proper. Our analysis reveals plenty of us can relate on some degree – from accidentally getting on the wrong bus, to forgetting our passports for an international flight. In reality, almost half (46%), of the 2,000 holidaymakers polled, admit they have made a travel mistake – with 47% of those being overlooked of pocket in consequence. Other top blunders include one in three having boarded public transport which is travelling in the wrong course, whereas 23% have gone the wrong way after not listening to directions.
Canada Excluded As China Loosens Group Travel Bans
China’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism regulates which countries Chinese tour operators can go to, saying it’s accomplished to safeguard citizens travelling overseas. Canada has been left out as China lifted a restrictions on group tours to a number of countries, including the US and the UK. We use your sign-up to supply content material in methods you’ve consented to and improve our understanding of you. This may embody adverts from us and third parties based mostly on our information of you. But now, Brits might be rewarded for his or her blunders, because of a competition the place you could win a keep at a unusual new B&B – designed to resemble a wombat’s burrow.


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Western Digital Corp. (NYSE: WDC) has laid out its expected savings and other details for its proposed acquisition of SanDisk Corp. (NASDAQ: SNDK). A recent SEC filing showed a pro-forma debt load structure and balance sheet data along with the projected deal synergies. The company also gave some ideas about its long-term expectations for storage Exabyte and revenue growth catalysts.
If investors believe Western Digital at face value, the company expects to deleverage its post-deal balance sheet quickly. One goal would be to get rid of the $3.0 billion bridge loan. Another issue is that it is forecasting to generate enough pro-forma EBITDA to chop down the debt in a number of years.
As Western Digital is now offering more shares for SanDisk, the purchase price of SanDisk is now roughly $16.2 billion. This is after a recent failed investment took place.
What many investors remain concerned about is that Western Digital is planning to offer some $17 billion or so in debt to help pay for the SanDisk buyout. Of that large sum, $3.0 billion will be a bridge loan. The rest is a set of traunches that are secured and unsecured debt. The company also telegraphed that it should be able to tap $4 billion of SanDisk’s cash to repay the bridge.
Western Digital is looking for lower operating and general costs on the combined company, versus the two companies being independent. It has even forecast total post-merger synergies of about $500 million within 18 months after it fully integrates SanDisk. Longer term, by 2020, the company has suggested that its annual savings could be $1.1 billion per year. As for earnings, Western Digital said:
The transaction is expected to be EPS accretive on a non-GAAP basis in Calendar Year 2017. Pending the closing of the transaction, Western Digital expects to continue paying its quarterly dividend and has already suspended its share buyback program.
As far as whether the company can accomplish that, it is worth looking at raw expenses. SanDisk in the year 2015 had expenses of $883 million for research and development and $561 million for selling general and administrative. Western Digital’s expenses are over a year-end from July, but its annual expenses were $ 1.65 billion for R&D and $964 million for SG&A.
The bulk of synergies and savings are projected to be integrating NAND supplies to the legacy solid state drive operations rather than purchasing from Intel. This could save as much as $6750 million by 2020, but that was put at a $200 million rate 18 months or so. The HGST unit could drive another 650 million or so in savings.
It is too soon to expect many analyst reports to chime in here since the latest merger-savings projection.
Merrill Lynch has a Buy rating on Western Digital and the firm kept its price objective at $76.00. That compares to a more recent share price of $46.44. Its investment rationale said:
We believe negative impact to HDD TAM, from a PC down cycle, is already incorporated in investor estimates for Western Digital and that fundamentals have bottomed. Additionally, we still view Western Digital as a net beneficiary of the data storage growth, with demand for capacity enterprise drives, as well as solid-state-drives. Western Digital is also taking share from Seagate in the capacity enterprise market. This should result in expanding margins and EPS, combined with strong FCF generation, making it an attractive story.
If Investor’s Business Daily is correct, then Western Digital shareholders are expected to approve the deal for SanDisk.
Shares of Western Digital were last seen up 2.3% at $47.55. Its consensus analyst price target is $73.00 and its 52-week trading range is $38.64 to $102.07. Western Digital’s market cap is $11.1 billion.
SanDisk’s stock price was up only 0.5% at $76.35. The consensus price target is $76.12. SanDisk’s 52-week range is $44.28 to $87.43, and its market cap is $15.3 billion.
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Apple has agreed to refund “at least” $32.5 million (£19.8 million) to customers who complained that their children were able to run up large bills by making in-app purchases without permission.
The move comes after the company was pursued by America's Federal Trade Commission (FTC) for a lack of clarity on in-app purchases, despite having already agreed to refund any affected customers and make it more clear when a user could be charged. In a leaked memo today Apple chief executive Tim Cook told staff that the news would come as a “surprise” to many.
“Last year, we set out to refund any in-app purchase which may have been made without a parent’s permission,” he said.
“We wanted to reach every customer who might have been affected, so we sent emails to 28 million App Store customers – anyone who had made an in-app purchase in a game designed for kids. When some emails bounced, we mailed the parents postcards. In all, we received 37,000 claims and we will be reimbursing each one as promised.
“A federal judge agreed with our actions as a full settlement and we felt we had made things right for everyone. Then, the FTC got involved and we faced the prospect of a second lawsuit over the very same issue.
“It doesn’t feel right for the FTC to sue over a case that had already been settled. To us, it smacked of double jeopardy. However, the consent decree the FTC proposed does not require us to do anything we weren’t already going to do, so we decided to accept it rather than take on a long and distracting legal fight.”
The FTC complaint hinged around the fact that customers were not told when they entered their password to make an App Store purchase that there was a 15 minute window in which any subsequent purchases would be automatically authorised. This meant that a child could pick up an iPhone within this window and run up a bill using in-app purchases from 99 cents to $99.99 in a range of games. Many parents who allowed their children to use their devices were shocked to later receive huge bills.
An FTC statement released this afternoon said that Apple received “at least tens of thousands of complaints about unauthorised in-app purchases by children” and that it believed the lack of clarity over purchases violated the FTC Act.
“One consumer reported that her daughter had spent $2,600 in the app ‘Tap Pet Hotel’, and other consumers reported unauthorised purchases by children totalling more than $500 in the apps ‘Dragon Story’ and ‘Tiny Zoo Friends’. According to the complaint, consumers have reported millions of dollars in unauthorised charges to Apple.”
The company will now have to change its billing practices to make it more clear when users are about to be charged for an in-app purchase. It will also make “at least” $32.5 million available for refunds, with any unclaimed balance going to the FTC after a year.
Although the existing programme applies only to American customers, Apple provided refunds to some consumers in other countries whose children have run up large bills via in-app purchases prior to updating its system.


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Walmart Apologizes for Store Display That Marketed Guns as Back-to-School Items
Walmart has apologized for a display inside of one of its stores that appeared to showcase a collection of guns as back-to-school items.
The company described the display as “truly awful” and said Wednesday that it is “working diligently” to find out which store featured the display and ensure that it is taken down, according to CNN Money.
A photo showing a glass case full of guns with a sign directly above it reading “Own the school year like a hero” went viral on Reddit before making its way to other social media platforms. On Twitter, users demanded the retailer to “explain this” and asked, “What are you suggesting?”
Walmart initially claimed to have identified the store location but a company spokesman told CNN Money that it was a mistake, and that the company is still searching for the sign.
Walmart faced controversy for another marketing gimmick last year at one of its locations in Panama City, Fla. A photo showed boxes of Coca-Cola stacked up to resemble the World Trade Center in what appeared to be an attempt to commemorate the Sept. 11 attacks.


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In 2009, more men are putting an emphasis on stability and security in their job and are looking for a girlfriend as a potential wife, according to the annual Great Male Survey by askmen.comBut how are women fairing in comparison?Yahoo! Shine asked 19,000 women in the Great Female Survey and found that more women see their career on hold. Fifty-six percent stated that any upward movement in their career is cut off because of the economic crisis while only 24 percent of men saw the same problem.Asked how their unemployment status had changed recently, 28 percent of women said they had to take a pay cut, pay freeze or lost their job altogether – 10 percent more than their male counterparts.Looking ahead, women were split on wether the worst of the crisis was behind them, whereas every second man thought it would get better from here on out.
“Orwell fans, lock your doors,” was the reaction from Amazon user Caffeine Queen after she and others had received notice from Amazon last Friday that their e-book versions of “1984” and “Animal Farm” had been removed from their Kindle device.Amazon explained later that these electronic versions were distributed illegally and that customers were refunded.Amazon’s decision to remotely delete the e-books not only infuriated customers, it sparked a debate on digital ownership.Richard Waters of the Financial Times argues that this episode questions the future of ownership in an electronic age:
“New internet media platforms like this raise a dilemma. Their owners have the power to control information on the client. So if they have a legal responsibility to remove data from their systems – say, after receiving a take-down notice under the DMCA – failing to expunge it may expose them to liability.”
Melissa J. Perenson of PC World asks if you can still call it “owning”:
If, in this digital realm, we’re not truly purchasing content, but rather “borrowing” it at a set price, and according to someone else’s changing rulebook, we as consumers we deserve to know this up front, in clear and obvious language (unlike Amazon’s clear references to “buying” books, and all the assumptions of ownership that go with buying books). If the rules have changed on us, we deserve to know.
On Tuesday, a panel hosted by Reuters and the Society of American Business Editors and Writers discussed the state of the media industry and the challenges it faces from consumers demanding information in new and different ways.How could the industry transform its newsrooms to thrive in this culture?Chrystia Freeland of the Financial Times said the key discipline was to constantly ask what the reader actually wants and not what is technologically possible. “This is going to be different for everyone,” Freeland told the crowd, which included Thomson Reuters Editor-in-Chief David Schlesinger.For the full discussion, watch the video below.The panel includedChrystia Freeland, US managing editor, Financial TimesLarry Ingrassia, business editor, The New York TimesSree Sreenivasan, dean of student affairs & new media professor, Columbia Journalism SchoolLaurel Touby, founder & CEO, Mediabistro.comModerated byBetty Wong, global managing editor, Reuters


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UPAY Gateway and UBB challenge their Facebook fans
03 November 2015
All followers of UBB’s official Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/UnitedBulgarianBank) have now the chance to win special prizes by joining the new cognitive game of UPAY Gateway.
Within 6 days, starting 02 November till 08 November 2015, those who wish may embrace the challenge to dive into UPAY’s website (https://ubbpay.bg/) and share their comments on the gateway’s advantages and new features.
A lottery will nominate six lucky winners among the participants, who are to be given special prizes by UPAY as a reminder that technologies are a fast, convenient and innovative way of bill payment anytime, anywhere.
UPAY payment gateway (https://ubbpay.bg/), launched two years ago, services meanwhile over 40 000 clients monthly, by offering to cardholders convenient and secure payment of utility bills, taxes and credit obligations. Furthermore, to illustrate as user-friendly as possible the gateway’s functionalities, a UPAY-How-To video was designed and presented in mid-October 2015 (https://youtu.be/qEdRp2GBpR8). Additionally, the first game in the social networks marks a step further towards the gateway’s gaining even wider popularity.


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May 04, · The recent price surge for Bitcoin is waking up investors around the globe, including Wallstreet. Aside from investors, publicly traded companies are . Aug 06, · Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies have attracted the attention of Wall Street in recent years, with some of the biggest bitcoin and crypto asset managers reporting massive inflows.. The bitcoin price Author: Billy Bambrough. Nov 25, · Leaked Wall Street report predicts Bitcoin to hit US$k in By 9News Staff pm Nov 25, In just 12 months a single Bitcoin will be potentially be worth an eye-watering US$, (A$,), according to a leaked Citbank report.
When will bitcoin be traded on wall streetBitcoin Finds a Home on Wall Street As Stocks Fail to Rally - Decrypt
The thesis was based on the trend that investors who have been roughed up by turbulence in the traditional fiat markets are looking for somewhere safer to put their money, which in this case, is Bitcoin.
Markets are looking for signs of a quicker recovery to the COVID epidemic and last night pharmaceutical company Moderna responded in kind. Governors across the country are pushing for tighter restrictions to try and contain new outbreaks, dampening investor spirits.
Market watchers are now focusing on the latest US retail sales, industrial production and capacity utilisation figures, due in the next few days. This sponsored article was created by Decrypt Studio. Learn More about partnering with Decrypt Studio. Read on the Decrypt App for the best experience. For the best experience, top crypto news at your fingertips and exclusive features download now.
Another area that could be affected by the interest in Wall Street is regulation. Bitcoin is a strange beast in some ways. Because of the blockchain technology there have been no fraudulent transactions in the entire history of Bitcoin. Regulators could very well bring securities laws that are already on the books to cryptocurrency. If you decide to invest in the Bitcoin stock market or other cryptocurrencies , this potential for new regulation is something to keep in mind.
With regulations comes more scrutiny into how Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies operate. As new cryptos hit the market they often use ICOs to do it. An ICO is a method used by cryptocurrency startups to bypass regulated and rigorous capital raising processes that are required by banks and venture capitalists.
Typically, in an initial coin offering a percentage of the new cryptocurrency is sold to early investors in exchange for Bitcoin or other legal tender. It looks like there will be more of an effect on initial coin offerings when regulators come in to deal with the growing Bitcoin stock market and other cryptocurrency efforts.
And as crypto gets bigger, regulation is more likely to happen. Guide to Bitcoin. Full Bio Follow Linkedin. Follow Twitter.


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Short-term pop-ups change the long-term face of the business
LONGMEADOW – In recent years, a new kind of retail business has emerged in squares and parking lots, selling goods, food and services – but only for a little while. Pop-up businesses are everywhere. In Longmeadow, an ever-changing line of temporary retail establishments provide a perpetually fresh shopping experience.
“We’ve done a lot of pop-ups over the past five years,” including weekly farmers’ markets in the summer, said Melissa Pevay, director of marketing for Longmeadow Shops / Grove Property Fund. Upcoming pop-ups include Speed & Sprocket Cycle Works, which runs a bi-weekly pop-up bike store; the Storrs Library, which will have pop-up storytelling hours on July 22 and, on December 5, there will be a “Holiday Walk” Farmer’s Market selling seasonal produce.
While many pop-ups are up for just a few months, some have long-term deals. Lululemon, for example, will air its pop-up in Longmeadow until January 2022.
“Some of our pop-up parking lots have become permanent residents,” Pevay said. Batch Ice Cream is one such company. He raced an ice cream truck seasonally in the parking lot for two years before making the jump to an indoor pop-up last winter. He now has a permanent home in one of the Longmeadow Shops storefronts.
In a State House News Service article, Mike Kelleher, vice president of specialty leasing at Federal Reality, said about 75% are people looking to try new concepts without committing to a permanent brick location and of mortar.
For Longmeadow stores, Pevay said, pop-ups are used to fill empty storefronts when they’re between two tenants. “Last Christmas we would have had two vacancies,” without the pop-ups, she said. Another benefit is that “it just adds a different excitement. It brings different people to our stores, ”she said.
The mall goes to certain businesses when it sees an opportunity. With the farmers market and the Batch ice cream, she said, “People wanted them right here. It’s always fun when people ask for something and you can make it happen.
While Pevay said the place is open to hosting a wide range of pop-ups, there are general guidelines. A rule, for example, is that the place does not accept pop-ups that would compete with its permanent businesses.
The windows of Longmeadow stores are currently full, but the parking lot still offers opportunities for businesses who want something in the short term.
“When it comes to parking, we’re always looking for something new and different,” Pevay said. Stores can accommodate most parking pop-ups. In the past, the square ran a pipe to a mobile pet grooming van, and food trucks were hooked up to street electricity.
Businesses interested in hosting a pop-up at Longmeadow stores can contact Grove Property Fund’s regional property manager Steve Walker at 567-0098 or [email protected]


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3% growth of the Korean economy is far away…but 1Q growth rate is 0.7% due to frozen consumption and investment
In the first quarter of this year, private consumption and investment in the Korean economy fell sharply, growing only 0.7%. Export companies such as semiconductors performed well, but growth was hampered by a growing economic burden due to the COVID-19 epidemic and the aftermath of the Ukraine war.
On April 26, the Bank of Korea announced that the real gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate in the first quarter (breaking figures) increased by 0.7% from the previous quarter. Analysts say that the quarterly growth rate will fall to the 0% level again for the first time in half a year since the third quarter of last year (0.3%), falling below the 3% growth target (3.1%) set by the government. This means that 2% growth is becoming a reality.
▶ The won-dollar exchange rate is at its highest in more than two years amid fears of a ‘big step’ in the US


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New Survey Shows Seniors Are Eager For Digital Banking––But Worried About Security
By Leor Melamedov
There’s a common stereotype of older people as technophobes––eschewing the conveniences of technology in favor of pen-and-paper or face-to-face interactions. Yet the latest research shows that this is no longer the case. The coronavirus pandemic has only accelerated growing digital and remote trends, forcing unlikely groups, including older people, to interact with technology like never before.
Lightico commissioned a study of 1,329 Americans in July 2020 that found that older customers are just as likely to complete online financial transactions as younger people. Yet compared to their younger cohorts, these consumers voice more concerns about security. This suggests that if banks want older people to have peace of mind, they will need to ensure seamless and effective security measures for online banking transactions.
A Digital Divide Over 65? Don’t Be So Fast to Assume.
The coronavirus has led customers to depend on remote, digital services like never before. 55% of consumers we surveyed say they intend to visit their branch less often, even as restrictions are lifted. Another 26% say they will avoid in-person banking altogether going forward, regardless of safety measures (like mandating mask-wearing and offering hand sanitizer) the bank takes.
Older people are even warier of in-branch banking due to the increased health risk posed by the coronavirus. The results were dramatic: 100% of the older consumers (aged 66-75) we surveyed say they have completed an online financial interaction in the last three to six months. In contrast, a smaller but still very large proportion (93%) of 18 to 39-year-olds have done so.
Given that 79% of all consumers want their bank to offer more all-digital processes in the future, it’s very likely that senior citizens have also gained unprecedented comfort with digital banking due to necessity. Whether in a few months or a year or more, the coronavirus will no longer be a reason to turn to digital. But by then, seniors will have become so accustomed to taking care of their finances online that the thought of going to a physical branch will be an unnecessary hassle.
Banking Security Remains a Concern For Seniors
Despite record-high use of digital banking among senior citizens, lingering fears about online security lurk under the surface acceptance of digital tools. 10% of senior citizen bankers don’t feel online transactions are secure (even larger proportions see them as merely “somewhat secure” — also not a raging endorsement).
When asked to rank their top concerns regarding online security, the majority fear financial loss first (52%), and loss of privacy second (42%). Seniors, who are often on fixed incomes and may already feel financially vulnerable, may be especially worried about the potential monetary loss from online identity theft and the like.
To be sure, the majority of people do trust the security of online banking, including older adults. And it would be natural to ask the question, “If seniors continue to be concerned about the security of online banking, then why do they still engage in it?” It may be that seniors are happy to use digital bank tools for the most rudimentary tasks, such as checking their bank balance. But if seniors are avoiding opening a new account, transferring money, or other more “active” tasks due to security concerns, this represents lost opportunities for the bank.
Transparent Security For Peace of Mind
Banks that want to ensure high digital usage from their senior citizen customers would do well to implement visible security measures. Text passwords, one-time passwords, and biometric fingerprints are commonly used by financial institutions and can provide peace of mind. However, their ease of use varies, which we will speak about soon.
Also, senior citizens (like all customers) should be taught to identify phishing attempts and copycat websites. For example, sending an email with clear explanations and examples of hacking attempts will empower senior citizens to avoid falling prey to schemes. These informational emails should also explain using simple language what steps the bank takes to ensure financial and data security.
Even better, security notices should be provided at the moment of the transaction so the reassurance is instant and contextual. No customer should have to begin a digital process without receiving explicit reassurance of how their data is being protected.
Not Just Any Security––Seamless Security
The best kind of secure online financial transaction is one that doesn’t get in customers’ way. Unfortunately, seniors are especially likely to suffer from access issues involving login, password, or security check difficulties, preventing them from even beginning the online banking task.
Seniors who are frequently asked to change their passwords, complete complicated security checks, or otherwise face security-driven obstacles are at risk of giving up on digital interactions. We found that 12% will ignore the transaction, 8% will abandon the process, and 11% will switch providers.
That’s why banks must add security features that don’t interfere with customers’ ease of use. For example, biometric security and facial recognition are all intuitive processes that can be completed from a single channel and don’t require seniors to remember complicated passwords or complete visually challenging security checks. Yet they remain woefully underused compared to more cumbersome password-based security.
Seniors are best served by seamless digital processes that are predictable and intuitive to use. Photo ID verification and digital signatures are based on sophisticated technology that remains nonintrusive to the end-user. They are part of a larger end-to-end process that keeps seniors within a single seamless digital channel, such as a mobile phone or website.
Happy and Secure Seniors
When Texas-based Happy State Bank first implemented Lightico’s secure digital transaction platform, which includes secure digital signatures, ID verification, and time-stamped forms, they were initially concerned about how their many senior citizen customers would take to the new technology.
When we checked in with Mark Murray, Happy State Bank’s VP Business Systems Liaison, he said, “We were relieved and delighted when seniors actually expressed their preference for the simplicity of Lightico’s technology, which doesn’t require any particular technical know-how on the part of the end-user.”
The presence of visible yet intuitive security features that fit into a wider digital process is just what it will take for banks to gain the trust and continued business of senior citizen customers.
Start Completing at the Speed of Lightico
Instant eSignatures, Payments, Document Collection & More
The most helpful thing about Lightico is the fast turnaround time, The upside is that you are giving your customer an easy way to respond quickly and efficiently. Lightico has cut work and waiting time as you can send customer forms via text and get them back quickly, very convenient for both parties.
"Great Service and Product"
I love the fact that I can send or request documents from a customer and it is easy to get the documents back in a secured site via text message. Our company switched from Docusign to Lightico, as Lightico is easier and more convenient than Docusign, as the customer can choose between receiving a text message or an email.


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Microsoft's support for the Zune HD as a game playing device has been pretty abysmal. Luckily there are hackers, one of which has the beginnings of a serviceable Game Boy Advance emulator working on the device. »5/15/10 12:00pm 5/15/10 12:00pm
Kinja is in read-only mode. We are working to restore service.


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The Halo Report is out for the first quarter of 2013, and covers 207 deals totaling $222 million dollars invested.
Here are some of the key findings:
- Median investment is $680k per angel round. Median angel round sizes reached another five quarter high at $680K in Q1 2013 up from $550K a year ago and $650K last quarter.
- $2.5 million valuation holds. Pre-money valuations in early stage companies remain steady at $2.5M.
- Close to Home: Eighty-one percent of deals were completed in the angel groups’ home state over the past 12 months.
- New York Grows Again. Year over year, companies in the Great Plains region and New York saw the largest increase in angel group deals.


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Apple CEO Tim Cook on Monday sent out a letter to Apple employees, which reveals that the company employees will be eligible for a 50-percent discount on the Apple Watch. The offer’s limited, though.
The significant discount will begin at pre-order and last for 90 days after availability, highlights the letter. Plus, Cook also stated that the Apple Watch App Store, launching this month, received over 1,000 app submissions last week.
Full letter is embedded below.
The day we’ve all been waiting for is almost here: Apple Watch is ready to ship.
Our retail stores are training for a whole new way to engage customers and help them experience Apple’s most personal product yet. On Friday, in over four hundred stores across four continents, we’ll open our doors to people who want to try on Apple Watch for the first time and start deciding which one is right for them.
Tens of millions of people have seen our keynotes and demonstration videos about the watch, and there’s much more to come. Some of the most innovative developers in the world are working on new experiences designed specifically for Apple Watch. More than one thousand apps were submitted in just four days last week when the App Store started accepting them, and the rate of submissions has only been climbing since then.
I know that many of you have been looking forward to choosing an Apple Watch for yourselves, and we want to make it easy for you. Starting Friday, in countries where the watch is available for pre-order, a special Employee Purchase Plan will offer a 50% discount on any Apple Watch or Apple Watch Sport for your personal use.
As we introduce the watch in more countries, the special pricing for employees will be offered in those countries as well. Discounts will begin at pre-order and last for 90 days after availability. AppleWeb has more details, so I invite you to check it out.
Our products enrich people’s lives like no others, and we think Apple Watch is going to delight our customers in ways people can’t yet imagine. We want you to share in that experience right alongside them.
Congratulations to everyone who has worked so hard for years to help this product reach our customers. And thanks in advance to the thousands of retail employees around the world who will start placing it on people’s wrists starting Friday.
VIA / 9To5Mac


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|Bid||0.6100 x 0|
|Ask||1.0100 x 0|
|Day's Range||0.8850 - 0.8850|
|52 Week Range||0.4260 - 2.7400|
|Beta (5Y Monthly)||0.31|
|PE Ratio (TTM)||N/A|
|Earnings Date||Nov 13, 2023 - Nov 17, 2023|
|Forward Dividend & Yield||N/A (N/A)|
|1y Target Est||N/A|
(Reuters) -Micron Technology beat estimates for third-quarter results on Wednesday, powered by demand for its memory chips from the rapidly-growing artificial intelligence sector and an easing supply glut in its traditional PC and smartphone markets. "The recent acceleration in the adoption of generative AI is driving higher-than-expected industry demand for memory and storage for AI servers, while traditional server demand for mainstream data center applications continues to be lackluster," CEO Sanjay Mehrotra said. "We believe the current memory industry inventory correction is now behind us," said Summit Insights Group managing director Kinngai Chan.
The Republican chairmen of two House of Representatives panels on Friday urged President Joe Biden's administration to rally U.S. allies including Japan and South Korea to defeat Chinese "economic aggression" in the wake of Beijing's effective ban on purchases of Micron Technology memory chips. Michael McCaul, who heads the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and Mike Gallagher, chairman of the House select committee on the Chinese Communist Party, sent a letter to U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo urging the administration to take action after China targeted the biggest U.S. memory chip maker.
In the years before China declared U.S. firm Micron Technology's products a national security risk, authorities were already scaling back purchases of its chips, opting instead for domestic or South Korean options, documents showed. A Reuters review of over a hundred public government tenders found that while previously Chinese government authorities regularly put out purchase requests for Micron's chips for use in projects such as tax systems to surveillance networks, such requests dried up dramatically from 2020. Instead, the bulk of memory chip purchases from such entities have gone to domestic firms including Huawei Technologies, server maker Inspur as well as surveillance giants Uniview and Hikvision.


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This week in Europe, London-based open finance platforms Yapily and Ecospend rolled out new initiatives to drive open payment adoption in the UK, and Germany’s Airbank teamed up with Klarna Kosma to secure access to account information from 15,000 banks in 26 countries.
As open banking continues to transform the landscape of European payments, platforms that facilitate seamless account-to-account payments are forging partnerships with a range of businesses to usher in the new age of open finance.
UK Platforms Expand VRP
In the last week, two of the U.K’s foremost open banking solution providers announced new collaborative initiatives that will drive the payments sector forward and help a greater number of institutions realize the full potential of account-to-account connectivity.
On Wednesday, Yapily launched its new Variable Recurring Payments (VRP) solution, Yapily VRP. With VRP, to receive payments, businesses only need to authenticate customers once. After that, customers can make payments quickly and easily without the need for additional authentication.
As part of the launch, Yapily is extending the benefits of VRP by partnering with Ozone API. Together, Yapily and Ozone API have built a complete solution for banks and financial institutions to commercialize their APIs.
The first client to roll out Yapily VRP is Volume, the one-click checkout payments platform, which will offer the service to its UK merchant customers.
With VRP, merchants are able to automatically collect payments of different values from their customers, providing a more flexible and less cumbersome alternative to standing orders and direct debit.
VRP payments are on the rise in the UK, where the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has mandated that the nine largest banks must support VRP for sweeping (me-to-me payments) by July 31, 2022.
Last week, Plaid launched the beta version of its own VRP tool in the country, which has been integrated into the payments app Expensify. Plaid’s VRP solution allows Expensify to automatically pull varying repayments from its customers’ business accounts to settle card balances.
Read more: Plaid Pilots Payments Tool to Streamline Recurring Payments
The latest developments mean that competition is heating up for VRP service provision in the UK Yapily and Plaid now join TrueLayer, which rolled out VRP payment support to its customers in April.
More on this: TrueLayer, Thunes Team on Open Banking Payments in Europe, UK
Ecospend and Klarna Kosma Pick up New Clients
In another boost for the U.K’s open banking ecosystem, the enforcement and debt resolution provider CDER Group has tapped Ecospend to provide seamlessly integrated account-to-account payments thanks to its ‘Pay-by-Bank’ solution.
CDER Group is the holding company for JBW, Phoenix Commercial Collections and Collect Services. Together they provide debt collection and resolution services for UK Government and commercial clients.
CDER’s Pay-by-Bank creates an additional payment channel with which people will be able to make repayments via their own mobile or online banking app without the need to share personal information or card details.
Since May, Ecospend has been owned by Swedish FinTech Trustly, thanks to a deal that allows the two companies to partner on open banking initiatives in the UK and combine their respective experience in account-to-account payments.
See also: Trustly Acquires Ecospend, further strengthening position in the UK
Finally, Klarna Kosma, the FinTech arm of buy now, pay later (BNPL) firm Klarna, this week revealed that it will be supporting the German financial management platform Airbank as it rolls out open banking payments for SMEs. Thanks to the new deal, Airbank will gain secure access to account information from 15,000 banks in 26 countries via Klarna Kosma’s API integration.
Klarna first entered the open banking space when it acquired the German bank-to-bank payment service SOFORT in 2014. Since then, it has continued to grow its in-house open banking capabilities.
The company uses open banking to provide spending insights to millions of shoppers who use the Klarna app and to provide additional, real-time data.
With Klarna Kosma, the company is looking to monetize its proprietary technology by offering the service to third parties.
Related: Klarna Unveils ‘Klarna Kosma’ Open Banking Unit
For all PYMNTS EMEA coverage, subscribe to the daily EMEA Newsletter.


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Submitted by David Stockman via Contra Corner blog,
The world’s official economic institutions are run by people who believe in monetary fairy tales. The 70 words of wisdom below from IMF head Christine Lagarde are par for the course. She asserts that a new jabberwocky expression called “low-flation” is the main obstacle to higher economic growth in Europe and the DM areas generally and that it can be cured by more central bank money printing.
The first obstacle is… the emerging risk of what I call “low-flation,” particularly in the Euro Area. A potentially prolonged period of low inflation can suppress demand and output—and suppress growth and jobs. More monetary easing, including through unconventional measures, is needed in the Euro Area to raise the prospects of achieving the ECB’s price stability objective. The Bank of Japan also should persist with its quantitative easing policy.
Now there is not a shred of credible evidence that prolonged low CPI inflation causes workers to produce less, businesses to invest less or entrepreneurs to invent less. Since these are the fundamental ingredients of economic growth on the free market, the question recurs as to why Keynesian Kool-Aid drinkers like Lagarde (and the huge staff of IMF economists she lip-syncs) apparently believe that eroding the value of savings by say only 1% per year vs. 2% will “suppress demand and output”.
Obviously, even they can’t believe that falling prices alone cause “demand” to falter. After all, the price of flat-screen TVs, iPads and iPhones have plunged during the past several years, but demand has soared. During the past 27 months, for example, Apple’s revenues have surged from $29 billion to $58 billion per quarter.
And its not just tech gadgetry, either. Wal-Mart has been driving down the price of furniture, toasters and house-paint for years now, but it has never once complained that its revenue growth–which has been relentless for decades—-has been impaired because its customers are holding-off for even lower everyday prices next period.
Indeed, at the product and commodity level the “low-flation” notion is positively ridiculous. US auto sales of 17 million annually in 2005 plummeted to about 11 million by 2009, but that was due to falling incomes and impaired credit status among marginal car buyers. During that period auto prices were not falling but steadily rising.
In general, the old rules have not been repealed: demand flows from income; income follows production; rising prices except among the most inelastic commodities tend to discourage demand; and falling prices tend to stimulate it.
Only in the Keynesian world of regression model aggregates do we get a polar-reversal. There, baskets of prices (i.e. price indices like the CPI) which are rising somewhat slower than trend allegedly cause that mysterious ether called “aggregate demand” to falter. Needless to say, the professors have never identified the transmission mechanism whereby the consumer’s logical behavior to buy more goods with falling prices at the micro-level— causes the sum of all consumers to defer spending in the face of weakening inflation at the aggregate level for the entire basket of goods and services.
No time needs be spent on puzzling about this conundrum because the missing link is easy to see. The mysterious Keynesian ether is simply credit expansion in excess of income growth. That happened for about four decades prior to the financial crisis, and it did goose GDP as measured by the ”spending and income” accounts published by the government’s statistical mills.
Designed by primitive Keynesians in the 1930s and 1940s these ledgers were a marvel of aggregation, cross-walks and accounting identities, but, alas, they suffered from a irremediable flaw. Namely, the GDP accounts contained no balance sheets; it was all about flows which meant that there was no history, and that each quarterly accounting period was a fresh start.
As it happened, the US economy fresh-started its way straight up a parabolic debt-to-income curve after the 1970s. The aggregate credit market debt-to-national income ratio had been stable at 1.5X for nearly a century, but climbed nearly continuously to 3.5X by the eve of the financial crisis in late 2007. As I have demonstrated elsewhere, this extra two turns of debt amounts to about $30 trillion of incremental debt burden.
In the household sector, the debt ratchet was equally dramatic. With each new business cycle, household debt climbed to a new plateau. It ultimately rose from 80% of wage and salary income in 1970 to a peak of 210 percent in 2007—before falling back slightly to about 180% at present owing to the liquidation of unsustainable or defaulted mortgage and credit card debt.
The short of it is that we have hit peak debt, and the one-time ratchet to spending based on rising debt ratios is over. The Keynesians never saw this coming because their DSGE models never saw a balance sheet—let alone the de facto LBO which occurred on the nation’s aggregate balance sheet over the past 40 years.
And so they persist in insisting that more of the square peg of debt be pounded into the fully saturated round hole of income. That’s the essence of the mad money printing being undertaken by all of the world’s major central banks.
Keynesian policy-makers at these central banks labor to once again levitate demand in the time-worn manner, but fail to see that the credit transmission channel of monetary policy was a one-time expedient, and that it is now exhausted and done. After nearly five years of failing to achieve “escape velocity”, therefore, they now desperately need an explanation for that failure, and have simply invented one: “low-flation”.
It goes without saying that this particular variant of the Keynesian catechism is especially dangerous. It gives the central banks a license to define and redefine “optimum” inflation—a figure that is already creeping up from 2% toward 3% and even 4% among some of the more aggressive doves. Since the phony inflation numbers published by the government mills–riddled as they are with imputed rents, geometric means and hedonic adjustments— will always fall short of these arbitrary inflation targets, the central bankers have essentially invented a pretext for endless monetary expansion.
Unfortunately, that means that the Wall Street finance channel will be injected with ever more juice for the carry trades until the resulting financial bubbles reach their natural asymptote and come crashing down once again. The scary thing is that the world is being run by central bank, IMF and national government apparatchiks, who, like Christine Lagarde, are clueless about the fact that momentary doctrines such as “low-flation” are simply made-up claptrap.
Too be sure, the Keynesian recipe for the debt elixir was not always this specious. Once upon a time this Keynesian RX was at least quasi-honest because the debt magic was held to operate mainly through fiscal policy. According to the great thinker, the masses had an unfortunate habit of saving too much—-so the solution was for the fiscal authorities to sop-up these fetid pools and cycle them back into the economy through government deficits.
In turn, these fiscal booster shots in the form of transfer payments, public works, war equipment and even holes dug and refilled would generate fiscal multipliers—that is to say, money borrowed from society’s stagnant savings pool and spent by recipients of government outlays would become new income to shovel suppliers and food vendors, who would re-spend their proceeds and fuel a virtuous cycle of growth.
Moreover, this type of prosperity from the issuance of government bonds and bills was to be pursued aggressively until the macro-economy had absorbed every single idle worker and capital resource, and had thereby achieved a Keynesian nirvana called “full employment”. Only then was the borrowing to stop, allowing the budget to swing into full-employment surplus. At that point, the macro-economic bathtub would be full to the brim and the elixir of debt would have done its job.
It didn’t work out that way. Johnson’s “guns and butter” fiscal policies caused the macroeconomic bathtub to flood, unleashing a decade of the Great Inflation. Unemployment dropped below 4% for 40 months running in the late 1960s, giving rise to virulent wage pressures that fueled an inflationary cost spiral.
Likewise, the excess domestic demand feed by the Keynesian doctors of the Kennedy-Johnson White House spilled over into the international market, inducing a massive inflow of imports and current account deficits. Soon there was a monetary crisis. Nixon then pulled the plug on the gold-backed money that J.M. Keynes had designed at Bretton Woods, thereby permitting Milton Friedman’s monetary wise men to run the nation’s central bank by the seat of their pants.
In time, the excess savings hobgoblin disappeared–with the US household savings rate falling from 11 percent to barely 3%, but that didn’t matter. The Keynesian baton had already been passed to the Greenspan era central bankers. As suggested above, the latter proceeded to fuel massive credit-driven expansion until balance sheets were fully exhausted.
At the end of the day, therefore, the grand Keynesian idea of the debt elixir has now been reduced to mindless money printing by the central banks. And the myth of excess savings and under-consumption has been reduced to something even worse—bureaucratic slobbering about “low-flation”.


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Wyre Blockchain Cross-Border Payments Transactions Platform Launches
Cross-Border Payments Platform Launched By Tech Firm ‘Wyre,’ To Make Cross-Border Payment Easy
Cross-border payment now made easy with the newly launched payment platform of Wyre, A Tech Firm. Wyre is a San Francisco-based Tech company that has provides blockchain services for fast and secure cross-border transactions. The name of the new payment platform for cross-border payment is Wyre, named after the firm.
Cross-Border Payment Now Made Easy By Wyre
Cross-border payment now made easy with the newly launched payment platform of Wyre, A Tech Firm. Wyre is a San Francisco-based Tech company that has provides blockchain services for fast and secure cross-border transactions.
The new platform Wyre is tagged as the fastest cross-border money transaction platform in the crypto industry at the moment, by providing a highly competitive rate for companies to transfer payments across borders from country to country.
As the new platform is launched basically to make cross-border payments easy. The company has received a massive boost of $5.8 million in funding from a venture by Chinese firm Amphora Capital, and also two of the biggest names in payments right now in China; 9fBank and Baifoo.com. Other participants of the funding are Draper Associates, Digital Currency Group, and Silicon Valley investors, and a few others. The primary purpose of the new funding is to enhance the expansion of the Wyre project into Europe and Latin America as well.
The project of cross-border transfer is described by Chief financial officer of 9fBank.com, Sam Lin, that “It is estimated that the demand for cross-border payment from Chinese companies and investors could reach USD 1.5 trillion within the next five years. Wyre is well positioned as a market leader to facilitate those transactions faster and at a lower cost. We believe Wyre’s cross-border technology will revolutionize global payment and remittance and have since made a sizable investment into the company,”
Mr. Sam further states that the growth of the company will continue in coming years, even at present an approximate of $35 million of cross-border trade are conducted on a monthly basis via the blockchain, and Wyre takes the role of about 90% of these payments.
The burdensome process of the cross-border transaction has been made easier by Wyre by transforming the former transfer system of 1 to 3 days of time for cross-border transfer and the approximate charge of 1 – 4.5% to less than 6 hours and fewer charges. The innovation has been done using the same day transfer protocol at the most competitive rates.
A new transformation to the cross-border transaction as more expansion is expected to Europe and Latin America to aid the crypto world.


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November 14, 2014 11:24 pm
WASHINGTON – If you have gift cards, items to return or just a hankering to shop the day after Christmas, retailers are ready for you.
Stores are opening as early as 5 a.m. and offering deals in store and online in hopes of getting shoppers back after a day of celebrating with family.
Before you start your post-holiday shopping, check our extensive list of what stores are offering:
We\’ve gathered photos that capture the spirit, and sometimes stress, of this joyful season. Happy Holidays from WTOP.
A look at winter weather news from around the D.C. area.
Before you open a store-bought jar of queso or whip up the same old bean dip, take a look at these dip recipes.


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Amidst heated criticism from warehouse workers over Amazon’s workplace safety lately—(more than ten Amazon facilities across the country have reported COVID-19 cases—Bezos dedicated the first section of his annual letter, released on Thursday, to highlight the many safety measures Amazon has recently implemented to protect warehouse and delivery workers, including distributing face masks, conducting temperature checks, strictly enforcing social distancing and so on.
He then announced an aggressive plan to have all of Amazon employees, including those showing no symptoms, regularly tested for COVID-19 to ensure long-term safety. While it’s a challenging enough idea for Amazon’s 750,000 people workforce, Bezos is already proposing to push it to a global scale so that we can re-open economy while the coronavirus is still out there.
“Regular testing on a global scale, across all industries, would both help keep people safe and help get the economy back up and running,” the Amazon CEO wrote. “For this to work, we as a society would need vastly more testing capacity than is currently available. If every person could be tested regularly, it would make a huge difference in how we fight this virus.”
Leading by example among private-sector players, Bezos said Amazon is moving around manpower to build up its own testing capacity. “A team of Amazonians—from research scientists and program managers to procurement specialists and software engineers—moved from their normal day jobs onto a dedicated team to work on this initiative,” he wrote. “We have begun assembling the equipment we need to build our first lab and hope to start testing small numbers of our frontline employees soon.”
“We are not sure how far we will get in the relevant timeframe,” Bezos added, “but we think it’s worth trying, and we stand ready to share anything we learn.”


text: AP Business Writer LONDON (AP) _ MG Rover Group Ltd. has formed a joint venture to build cars in China, barely two years after losing so much money that its previous owner, Germany's BMW, gave it away. MG Rover and China Brilliance Industrial Holdings said Thursday they have agreed to take equal shares in the venture, which will finance, develop, manufacture and export a new medium-sized car and, later, a smaller model. The deal to manufacture cars for worldwide export is a major step forward for MG Rover, sold by BMW in 2000 for a token 10 pounds ($14) to a group of British businessmen. Rover had been looking for a partner that could help it compete against much larger rivals. China Brilliance has cooperated with several other carmakers _ including General Motors Corp., Renault SA and Toyota Motors Corp. _ and generates annual sales of about $2.8 billion. MG Rover is Britain's last independent manufacturer of cars for the mass market. Known until 2000 as Rover, it proved a sinkhole for $4.1 billion in investment by BMW, which unloaded it that May. MG Rover has since narrowed its losses and expects to break even next year. Its annual sales are about 2 billion pounds ($2.8 billion). Both MG Rover and China Brilliance said their alliance creates the scope for a greater global reach and scale of production. "We have so much in common," MG Rover chief executive Kevin Howe said. "Brilliance has achieved quite outstanding results in a very short space of time and demonstrates world class standards in everything it does. It is clearly the leading automotive manufacturer in the world's fastest growing car market." Howe's counterpart at CBIH, Brian X. Sun, said the companies shared a similar philosophy, ambition and operating style. By combining their resources, they'd be able to increase their purchasing power for components and cut the unit costs of developing new models by spreading them across bigger volumes. "Together we will be a force to be respected in the automotive industry," Sun said. Cardiff University Business School professor Garel Rhys sounded similarly optimistic. "If what they say here is actually put into place, it's very good news indeed," said Rhys, director of Cardiff's center for automotive industry research. "This probably is about the most thoroughgoing joint venture that the motor industry has seen \u2026 In effect, it's a functional merger." For MG Rover, the venture represents the next stage of its effort to creep back from the brink of collapse. "It means you now have a credible product lineup and long-term strategy," Rhys said. CBIH currently focuses on producing a minivan based on the Toyota Hiace but aims to expand into making sedans for the Chinese market. It also is developing a new line of engines together with FEV of Germany, a project that Rhys said could save MG Rover a lot of money. Under their agreement, CBIH would export jointly produced vehicles to most of Asia and Africa, while MG Rover would have rights to sell them in the rest of the world. The partners said they would consider sharing the U.S. market. Rhys argued that MG Rover was unlikely to shift production to China from its plant at Longbridge near Birmingham, central England, just to take advantage of China's lower production costs. Output at Longbridge, currently at more than 150,000 vehicles a year, could even increase if overseas sales grow as the two partners predict.


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If you’re like me, your Thanksgiving holiday was chock full of activities. From a Turkey Trot 5K to cooking and eating to shopping…you were not alone. In fact, whether you knew it or not at the time, this year’s long Thanksgiving weekend proved to be recording-breaking with a total $7.9 billion spent online between Thanksgiving and Black Friday, and an additional $6.59 billion spent on Cyber Monday. This may come as no surprise, as Black Friday deals have been popping up throughout the entire month of November, but the real story is found when looking at the influence mobile had on this year’s sales figures. Now that the virtual dust has settled, let’s dive into the numbers that came out of this year’s record-breaking Black Friday–I have a feeling you’ll see the importance of providing a seamless, mobile experience that customers demand in today’s eCommerce world.
Mobile Is The New Black (Friday)
During the long holiday weekend, 58.4 million consumers shopped exclusively online. This isn’t exactly surprising, as I think we can agree that most of us regularly do our shopping online, but here’s the shocker: 46 percent of all e-commerce traffic came from smartphones (that’s up 15 percent from last year). Breaking down smartphone usage over the holiday weekend leaves us with a few interesting figures to highlight:
- There was a 30 percent increase in mobile page views on Thanksgiving Day
- Mobile devices were used for 54 percent of visits and 37 percent of online revenue on Black Friday
- Mobile Thanksgiving orders were up by more than 50 percent compared to last year on Amazon alone
- On Cyber Monday, 81 million U.S. consumers shopped online, $6.6 billion was spent online, and mobile sales reached $2 billion for the first time in U.S. history
- Apple iOS smartphones had an average order of $127 compared to an average order of $112 on an Android smartphone
So, the numbers show that mobile totally ruled this year’s Black Friday shopping. If the numbers aren’t enough, we’ve got plenty of industry leaders noticing and commenting on the trends, too. Mickey Mericle, Vice President of Marketing and Customer Insights at Adobe, has this to say about the influence of mobile on this year’s Thanksgiving weekend shopping:
“The big story this holiday season is in mobile shopping. Retailers know this is where the audience is now and are delivering better experiences. On both Thanksgiving and Black Friday, the gap between mobile traffic and revenue is closing. Shoppers looking for discounts are getting better at using smartphones to quickly close the deal, and we are seeing better mobile conversion this season at over ten percent growth.”
Here’s Why Mobile Won
Consumers want 24/7 access, effortless usability, and seamless payment options–all things that mobile shopping provides. When mobile shopping experiences are done right, they provide customers with a more convenient, efficient, and painless retail experience. But don’t be fooled, it’s not just the Amazons of the world who need to invest in mobile technology. According to Adobe Analytics, consumers had a 30 percent higher chance of clicking “buy” on a smartphone from a smaller retailer (AKA, any retailer with an annual revenue under $10 million) than from a larger retailer.
From this past Thanksgiving weekend, one thing is clear–mobile shopping is here, and it’s here to stay. Take this historic shopping holiday as a wake-up call to the power of mobile. Brands who don’t provide their customers with convenient, highly-personalized mobile experiences will–at best–be ignored and–at worst–be left behind.


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Consumption of one or all of them on a daily basis may have contributed to his death because of the number of calories they contain, but I thought Elvis fans would like a little bit of a taste of what he fancied when he was alive," said 38-year-old Tommy from West Derby, who has won The Publican's national Beer and Food Combination award in consecutive years.
Whether you dance through a season's worth of high-powered performances, or just gear up periodically for a couple of big ones, you have probably tried every possible food combination to help fuel you past your first entrance.
That said, it's certainly true that extraordinary flavor affinities do exist, and that most of us have had at least a few of those "wow" moments when the wine and food combination was unbelievably good.
In late April, the Torani research and development team set out for a day-long flavor safari to Bay Area restaurants like Auntie April's and Frisco Fried, to find the gold standard of this classic food combination.
According to Oyewole, while many people globally were not eating healthily because of several factors such as lack of food, access to nutrition information will assist in making the best use of the available food, including right food combination approaches.


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Tech giant Motorola China has confirmed that the company is all set to launch a smartphone that will feature a 200MP camera. A teaser has been launched which claims a 200MP camera as the new benchmark for image experience. It is expected to launch sometime in July.
GM of the cell phone department of Lenovo, Chen Jin claims, “New benchmark for imaging experience beyond parameters, opening up the era of 200MP mobile photography. See you in July.”
Motorola has also confirmed that its next foldable smartphone Razr 3 will be powered by Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 as well.
200MP Smartphone expected specs
Reports claim this 200MP camera phone might be powered by Qualcomm Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 chipset and have Samsung’s 200MP ISOCELL HP1 sensor with features like Optical Image Stabilization. Along with a 200MP main camera lens, the device is expected to have a 50MP wide-angle camera and a 12MP telephoto camera. It might also have a 60MP selfie lens.
The image that has been teased by Motorola claims that the phone has a huge camera on its back. The smartphone has been codenamed ‘Frontier’ and might sport a curved 6.67-inch pOLED panel with a refresh rate of 144Hz.
As for the storage options, the 200MP smartphone is said to have 12GB RAM and 128/256GB storage configurations. It is expected to pack a 4500mAh battery with 125W fast charging and 30-50W wireless charging.
Although some believe that this 200MP phone from Motorola might overdo things, surely the device would be worth giving a chance whenever it launches
Motorola Razr 3 Expected & confirmed specs
Motorola has confirmed that its next foldable phone Razr 3 will be powered by the flagship Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 chipset. This is an upgrade as the earlier 2 devices in the Razr series did not feature flagship-level chipsets.
Moto Razr 3 is said to compete against Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4. The folding mechanism is expected to be the same. The leaked images of a foldable device Maven have narrow bezels and a punch-hole primary display instead of curved edges like Razr 2 had.
If this one is the 3rd in the Razr series, then the design is seeing a slight change. The upcoming phone doesn’t have a protruding chin and the fingerprint scanner has been shifted to the right on to the power button.
Tipster Evan Blass claims Razr 3 will have a Full HD+ resolution. Otherwise, it has a dual camera setup at the back, and camera sensors are placed horizontally. There is expected to be a 50MP sensor and a 13MP sensor along with a 32MP selfie camera.
Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 SoC comes with better clock speeds and better specs for faster performance. To know more about it, click here.


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A household Kiwi name has shown its quality to the world. Whittaker’s were crowned Exporter of the Year at the 2021 ExportNZ ASB Wellington Export Awards, in front of a socially distanced and fully vaccinated audience at Te Papa.
“Whittaker’s success, despite a turbulent global environment, and domestic restrictions, shows the best of Wellington’s export community,” said Simon Arcus, Chief Executive of the Wellington Chamber of Commerce, which delivers ExportNZ in Wellington.
“After the past year, it’s more important than ever to acknowledge the contribution exporters make to keeping Wellington’s economy running. They have persevered through lockdowns, closed borders and supply chain shocks,” Arcus added.
“Every one of this year’s finalists deserves recognition for their hard work, and Whittaker’s success in international markets shows just how successful Wellington can be.”
ASB’s Executive General Manager for Corporate Banking Nigel Annett said he was impressed by the calibre of this year’s regional finalists.
“At ASB we’re extremely impressed by all of the 2021 ExportNZ ASB Export Awards winners and finalists. Every business involved this year demonstrated their relentless pursuit of an identified market niche, supported by highly developed product innovation. We’re proud to support the range of diverse companies involved in this year’s awards, all doing a remarkable job representing New Zealand on the global stage.”
The judges found that Whittaker’s were set apart by their ability to reorient their product and use data to adapt to new markets, all while remaining true to their values.
The judges were Chair of Business Central Vaughan Renner, NZTE Customer Director Ann Clifford, and ASB International Trade Consultant Paul Gestro.
Whittaker’s, who also claimed the CentrePort Wellington Best Established Business Award, were not the only successful exporter on the night. Peanut Butter maker Fix & Fogg won the Southeast-Asia CAPE Best Emerging Business Award, as the judges were impressed by their rapid expansion into new markets.
Tube perforator manufacturer Sanpro Industries won the WellingtonNZ Excellence in Innovation Award, as the judges recognised the committed customer support and continuous innovation that has allowed the Petone based company to lead its industry worldwide.
Method Recycling claimed the Toitū Envirocare Excellence in Sustainability Award, recognising both their own commitment to sustainability, and the potential of their product to help others on their journey.
Hutt Valley staple Woolyarns claimed the Wellington School of Business and Government Judge’s Choice Award – recognising their exceptional resilience to in navigating a challenging pandemic.
Full List of Winners & Finalists
SEACAPE Best Emerging Business Award: Fix & Fogg
Finalists: Lazulife, Mana Pacific, WashBar
CentrePort Wellington Best Established Business: Whittaker’s
Finalists: ITL, Woolyarns
Toitū Envirocare Excellence in Sustainability: Method Recycling
Finalists: GIVE Packaging
WellingtonNZ Excellence in Innovation: Sanpro Industries
Finalists: Ackama, InternNZ, Snapper Services
Wellington School of Business & Government Judge’s Choice: Woolyarns
ASB Export of the Year: Whittaker’s


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Nigo needs no introduction, but the latest project involving the Bathing Ape founder and all-around streetwear maven is not exactly what most people might expect from this fashion legend. The new brand, Human Made, is a joint venture between Nigo and enigmatic graphic artist Sk8thing and combines exacting construction standards, impeccable historical accuracy, courtesy of vintage reproduction experts Warehouse, and lighthearted graphic contributions from Sk8thing. By doing so, Human Made is credited as an earnest homage and unique twist on wardrobe staples.
You may not have made it past the high school JV tryouts, but this ring will have you feeling like you're en route to Disney World.
If a size is not listed, it is sold out.


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if you want more return the goods We have good news for you in your life: sony and House brand Announced today at the State of Play showcase, the game is getting a huge 3.0 update in the form of Ascension
The huge new update will introduce a slew of features, including co-op (though we’re still a little unclear on how this will work) and survival mode, as well as new story beats tied to Selene’s cursed existence.
Check out the update trailer below.
“Returnal Ascension adds a co-op mode that lets you share your entire journey through Atropos’ ever-changing labyrinth with other players,” Sony said in a press rele ase.
“This update also adds the Tower of Sisyphus – accessible as long as you unlock the Ikaria Grab. This is an ascending challenge with increasingly dangerous stages, each containing twenty floors. Once inside, eliminate all enemies on each floor and secure access to the next floor. Be prepared for what you may encounter…”
The Ascension update will return on PS5 and PC on March 22, 2022.
Returnal launched last April and was a huge success, as the developers behind Resogun, Nex Machina and Alienation launched a powerful new direction for its game output. In Returnal, you play as Selene, a space pilot whose ship crashes on an alien planet.
Every time she dies, she’s forced to relive those moments, just to witness different changes to the same planet, new room layouts, new enemy variants and new buffs/debuffs. It’s a rogue lite, done differently (and beautifully, we may add).
The game has good reviews, and if you want to know more, you can check out our review of the game here.


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foodbeast.com – During the Sweets and Snacks Expo, OREO showed off three of their upcoming flavors for 2018, one of them being a collab with Disney and the big mouse himself.
Coming along for the 2018 ride will be a Good Humor Strawberry Shortcake flavor, Rocky Road Trip, Peppermint Bark, Pistachio Thins, and Chocolate Peanut Butter Pie, which has been rumored since December, 2017.
All the flavors sound amazing (except maybe the pistachio. Who asked for that?), and those who grew up with strawberry shortcake ice cream bars are probably extra excited to try that one.
The Strawberry shortcake and Rocky Road are expected to release this summer, while the Peppermint Bark are expected to be a holiday season release.
OREO’s Chocolate Peanut Butter Pie and Pistachio will release in 2018, but we don’t really know when, yet.
The Mickey Mouse collab will likely come out around November, as it’s celebrating the 90th anniversary of Mickey’s film debut in Steamboat Willie, back on Nov. 18, 1928.
They can hold the peppermint bark but i’m in on the Rocky Road Trip and the Strawberry Shortcake flavors though


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Fewer choices in the buffet line
Is the time of buffets coming to an end?
This week another all-you-can-eat restaurant in the area closed, one of many lost in recent years.
It’s part of a gradual decline on a national scale for the buffet, according to Technomic, a Chicago-based firm that researches and analyzes the food and food service industries.
“We are showing that the family-casual segment, which is how we categorize buffet-style restaurants, is having a bit of a rough time,” Rachel Royster, a Technomic spokeswoman, wrote in an email.
The firm does not have its 2015 data yet, but for 2014, sales in the segment decreased by 3.5 percent. The number of buffet restaurants in the U.S. also decreased by almost 4 percent in 2014.
The Ryan’s restaurant in Elkhart closed Sunday after its parent company filed for bankruptcy. The buffet-style restaurant, located at 2810 Emerson Drive, closed with little notice to employees and customers.
The restaurant’s parent company, Buffets LLC, stated the bankruptcy filing was prompted by the discovery of alleged liabilities that were not disclosed in negotiations by the former owner of the restaurant chains.
Buffets LLC acquired Ryan’s, Old Country Buffet, Fire Mountain and Tahoe Joe’s in a merger in August for an undisclosed amount. Going into bankruptcy will allow Buffets LLC to “restructure its debts and liabilities, strengthen its operations by closing certain weaker restaurants and recapitalize its business,” according to a news release.
But beyond the “undisclosed liabilities,” the company says the restaurants under its ownership haven’t been performing well. Sales have fallen 22 percent short of the seller’s projections during the acquisition, prompting the closure of 74 stores in recent weeks with another 92 expected this month.
This also isn’t the fist time the company has filed for bankruptcy. In 2008, when it was known as Buffets Inc., the company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, forcing it to close manylocations, which cut its debt by $700 million.
The company returned to bankruptcy in 2012, again forcing it to shed stores to cut its debt.
It’s a financial struggle other buffet restaurants also know. The Ponderosa Steakhouse located at the Town & Country Shopping Centre in Mishawaka closed in early January after almost 46 years in business. The Ponderosa on Indiana 933, north of the Toll Road, is still open, but the Mishawaka store was closed because of declining sales.
“Business isn’t what it used to be,” said Eugene McGarvey Jr., secretary and treasurer of Kokomo-based K&G Enterprises, the franchise owner of area Ponderosas.
The lease for the Town & Country restaurant was coming up for renewal, he said, and with the Ponderosa chain facing a national financial struggle in recent years, the decision was made to close the location.
In 1989 there were 736 Ponderosa Steakhouses worldwide, more than any other steakhouse chain. The restaurant also merged with Bonanza Steakhouse that same year, which was the second largest chain at the time with 579 locations.
The chain continued to fare well until it hit hard times brought by the recession. The parent company, Metromedia Steakhouse Co., now known as Homestyle Dining LLC, filed for bankruptcy in 2008, but emerged in October 2009.
Although exiting bankruptcy in about a year’s time, Ponderosas have largely disappeared. Between 2001 and 2011, the number of Ponderosa and Bonanza restaurants fell by almost two-thirds.
And in 2014, Old Country Buffet, also owned by Buffets LLC, closed in Mishawaka after about 25 years in business at Wilshire Plaza, not to mention the previous closing of Ryan’s Steakhouse on Grape Road in Mishawaka.
A major factor of this decline is the increase in health-conscious consumers, IBISWorld industry analyst Zachary Harris wrote in a market research report. IBISWorld is the world’s largest independent publisher of industry research reports.
“While industry revenue has been negatively affected by low levels of consumer spending, a more lasting threat to the industry has presented itself in the form of increasing health consciousness,” Harris wrote.
According to the report, buffet-style restaurants tend to use lower quality ingredients in order to save costs and keep prices down. Additionally, operating on an all-you-can-eat model encourages overeating.
“Rising health consciousness is anticipated to continue to reduce demand for the buffet restaurants,” Harris wrote.
And Royster with Technomic pointed out that the only restaurant in the buffet segment to see an increase in sales was Souplantation & Sweet Tomatoes, which boasts fresh ingredients and healthy food. The restaurant chain, which is mostly found in the West, had almost a 1 percent sales increase in 2014. Although not large, the company saw an increase when all others in its segment didn’t.
“This is most likely because it has the perception of higher-quality offerings compared to other mainstream buffets,” Royster wrote in an email, “and it promotes its healthy platform and ability to cater to customers with dietary restrictions, particularly vegetarian and vegan.”
Lincoln Wright’s column runs on Wednesdays and Sundays. Contact him at email@example.com or 574-235-6324. You can also talk retail at Facebook.com/thebasket and at Twitter.com/marketbasket.


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Hello and welcome to the Daily Crunch on December 9, 2021! Yes, we’re one day closer to the Christmas holidays for anyone celebrating, so today we’ve released Part 2 of our 2021 Venture Capital Book Recommendation Guide. Part 1 is here. There are a lot of books in there, so be sure to curl up before the year is up and revitalize yourself by reading! –Alexis
The Top 3 TechCrunch
- Italy fines Amazon $ 1.3 billion: The fine is due to the American e-commerce giant having “abused its dominant position in the market and pushed third-party sellers to use the logistics service of the company Fulfillment by Amazon”, reports TechCrunch, citing the AutoritÃ Garante della Concorrenza e del Mercato Italian. Most technical fines are too small to even be noted. This one will sting.
- Build a unicorn with this weird trick: All you have to do, it seems, is tell investors that you are raising capital to launch or bundle e-commerce brands in a particular market and, viola, unicorn status. That’s what we’re getting not only from the coverage of dozens of cycles in the e-commerce stacking market lately and the fact that Merama has gone from zero to a unicorn in less than a year.
- The EU is preparing to change the concert labor market: If your business depends on using contract labor in the European Union, bad news. Things are likely to change in the years to come. By our own Natasha Lomas, “EU lawmakers have officially proposed odd-job economy legislation, they hope it will improve conditions for platform workers across the bloc.”
Startups / VC
Before diving into the mix of events to start the day, another given to chew on. Silicon Valley may be seeing its status as a startup marketplace both at home and abroad, but another market isn’t moving as quickly. Namely the financing landscape for women founders of business-oriented software companies. Considering the size of the startup market share of these companies, the gender gap is staggering. (A little nod to our own Ron miller for his coherent reporting on inequalities in the startup industry, I think.)
- Robotic Research raises nearly a quarter of a billion dollars: $ 228 million, to be clear, which is pretty darn close. What does the company do? As it turns out, Robotic Research has “spent the last two decades developing autonomous on- and off-road vehicles for the Department of Defense.” So, yes, this is another huge round of funding for autonomous vehicles. Hopefully this check is indicative of progress do, instead of progressing anticipated, regarding the huge space issue that the startup is tackling.
- Today in Very Good startups: If you were founding a startup that made underground drilling technology, what would you call it? May be Petra? It would be a good name. And the robot itself? What would you say Swifty? Well, if you thought those would be good names, Petra’s crew would be fine. They just picked up a $ 30 million Series A for their boring, minimally boring job.
- Ledger to launch the encrypted debit card: If you have a lot of crypto, how you actually spend things can be a problem. Ledger is working on a debit card to help the crypto-rich use that IRL wealth. In the meat space, if you will. Coinbase has a similar product, to give an example. Even the Hodl Gang has to pay rent.
- Deed’s Best Corporate Giving Platform Brings $ 10 Million: Many companies have a corporate giving plan in place. Some companies, for example, combine employee charitable giving. Deed wants to help more businesses do more with their donation work. The startup just landed $ 10 million for its efforts.
- Today, in rounds of $ 8.5M to $ 8.7M: Rarely do we see two towers with the same dollar amount below the $ 10 million mark. Today we actually have three. First of all, Bird Buddy raised $ 8.5 million for its smart, no kidding bird feeder technology. Second, Plane raised $ 8.5 million for its developer workflow automation service. And Mio raised $ 8.7 million to help make corporate messaging services like Slack and Teams interoperable.
- And then there was Rho, which sees its business expense product evolving rapidly. So quickly in fact that investors just gave him a $ 75 million Series B.
- Closing today’s start-up notes: Acronyms. Namely the acronyms fintech. What if you take B2B and get deep into BNPL? In addition to creating the simply awful acronym B2BBNPL (B2BNPL? BBNPL? 2BNPL 2FURIOUS?), Affirm Resolve spin-out just raised $ 25 million for its efforts to bring the immediate purchase, subsequent payments and the phenomenon of debt to the business-to-business market.
Usage-based pricing is an enterprise-wide effort
In his latest guest post for TechCrunch +, OpenView Partner Kyle Poyar explains why usage-based pricing “is an enterprise-wide effort” that “requires ditching the old metrics manual. SaaS â.
It’s not a fad: UBP has become mainstream because the SaaS companies that use it experience significantly higher growth and retention rates.
Citing examples from powerhouses like Twilio, Stripe, AWS and others, Poyar explains how UBP companies “share the success of their customers” and reduce their risk of ending up with a CRM filled “with a lot of unprofitable customers.”
(TechCrunch + is our membership program, which helps startup founders and teams get ahead. You can register here.)
Big Tech Inc.
- Spotify and relax: Sure, ‘hanging out’ to watch ‘Netflix’ may have become a marginally coded phrase in English lately, but with Tinder’s partnership with Spotify to allow users to ‘hear a looping preview of 30 seconds of the chosen song of a potential match while checking out their profile, “we’re curious how soon a variation of the theme will hit the market.
- Netflix Tackles SEO Spam With New Website: The American streaming giant has released a new website called ‘Tudum’, which, if you say it out loud, looks pretty much like the sound the Netflix logo makes when you launch its app on your TV, watching another night. at home thanks to COVID-19. Tudum! Anyhoo’s website “will host consumer news on renewals and release dates,” TechCrunch reports. Which means those articles on “What to watch on Netflix on November 28, 2021” may lose some of their SEO juice.
- GM locks down supplies to build home EV technology: Deciding to build electric vehicles is one step in a longer journey that involves delicate procurement work. Getting your hands on the raw materials needed to produce batteries is no easy task. The work GM has recently undertaken to “lock in a national source of rare earth minerals, alloys and magnets for electric motors” is also not.
- And, finally, for today’s news summary, Meta rolled out new tools for Facebook Live users.
TechCrunch wants you to recommend growth marketers who have expertise in SEO, social, content writing, and more! If you are a growth marketer, skip this survey with your customers; we would like to know why they liked working with you.
If you’re curious about how these surveys shape our coverage, check out this article on TechCrunch + by Lucy Heskins, âHow to Acquire Customer Research That Shapes Your Marketing Strategyâ.


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How Small Businesses Can Stay Safe Against Cyberattacks
Today’s cyber thieves aren’t lone hackers working from their basements. Cybercrime increasingly has become full-fledged enterprises, complete with CFOs, HR teams and research and development budgets—and this “professionalization” of cybercrime presents a growing risk for small businesses, Microsoft Canada’s National Security Officer warns.
Data from the Insurance Bureau of Canada found that 41 per cent of small businesses that experienced a cyber attack had losses greater than $100,000. And Microsoft’s John Hewie says the target on smaller organizations is only getting bigger.
“Over the last few years, we’ve seen a whole new ecosystem of criminal players in this space,” says Hewie. “It’s become easier and more cost effective for attackers to target small businesses.”
Leaving the loot unguarded
Many small businesses really embraced digital during Covid to stay afloat, Hewie says, but they may not have considered how to do with security in mind.
“Smaller organizations are typically focused on their core business which is their passion,” Hewie says. “They’re making beer. Running a retail store, a legal practice or a dental practice. Traditionally they haven’t had to focus on these types of things, so they don’t have cybersecurity professionals on staff, they don’t have a lot of knowledge about cybersecurity best practices. They typically haven’t invested a lot of their time into securing their accounts or implementing great backup strategies.”
But staying safe doesn’t have to mean bringing on a team of expensive in-house IT experts. According to the Canadian Small Business Cybersecurity Survival Guide, which Hewie authored in partnership with the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, businesses can protect against 98 per cent of cyber attacks simply by putting some best practices in place.
“There are a lot of things smaller organizations can do,” says Hewie.
Thieves don’t break in, they log in
“The important thing to know,” says Hewie, “is that attackers typically don’t have to break in—they can simply log in.”
What Hewie means is that most cybercriminals exploit common weaknesses—things like easy-to-guess passwords or use deceptive phishing emails—to obtain employees’ legitimate login credentials and gain access to businesses’ networks.
“Once they have a foothold in the organization and the right level of access, they’ll use different extortion models,” Hewie says.
Ransomware scams, in which thieves hold a company’s data captive unless they pay a large sum of money, are becoming an increasingly common tactic. “We’ve seen a number of patterns criminals are using to increase the victim’s motivation to pay. This includes not only encrypting a victim’s data and demanding a ransom for the decryption key, but also threatening to leak or sell your sensitive data,” says Hewie.
Another common scam is business email compromise. “This is where someone within the organization falls victim to a phishing attack and inadvertently gives away their login credentials which compromises the account. The adversary then uses that account to target other employees. This might involve sending an email from the compromised user’s account to the finance team to change the banking information for a legitimate supplier, so the next invoice payment goes to the criminal’s bank account. Or if they succeed in compromising an account of a senior manager, they’ll might send an email to a subordinate requesting that employee ‘Go buy gift cards for a marketing event and send me the codes.’ Business Email Compromise is one of the most financially impactful scams we see impacting small and medium businesses,” Hewie says.
Security by default
The good news is it’s also getting easier for small businesses to protect themselves without a huge security investment. For starters, Hewie recommends using multi-factor authentication (MFA) to make it much more difficult for criminals to gain access to accounts using usernames and passwords alone. “That’s the number one recommendation,” he says. “Protecting your important accounts using strong and unique passwords along with MFA prevents most account compromises.”
To that effect, Microsoft is continually investing to make security more intuitive by implementing best practices within the native settings of its solutions. “We make every effort to ensure the most secure configurations are employed by default. Using Windows Hello to logon to your laptop using facial recognition is a good example of improved security with a simpler user experience. Our cloud solutions also are designed to guide users towards secure configurations.” Hewie says. And while he acknowledges that cybercrime isn’t going away anytime soon, “when small businesses invest in the best practices outlined in the Canadian Small Business Cybersecurity Survival Guide, they have a much greater chance of staying safe.”


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Whereas 4.2m Covid-19 deaths have been reported to the World Well being Group, a research by economist Ariel Karlinsky of Hebrew College of Jerusalem and analysis scientist Dmitry Kobak on the College of Tübingen, estimates there have been over 1m extra deaths than reported by official loss of life counts.
New York Metropolis would require proof of vaccination for a range of indoor actions from eating to well being golf equipment and live shows, mayor Invoice de Blasio introduced on Tuesday. The town is believed to be the primary within the nation to introduce such restrictions because it battles Covid-19’s extra infectious Delta variant.
Ron DeSantis, Florida’s governor, mentioned “hospital admissions have slowed” and may peak quickly, after the most recent information present document ranges.The quantity of Covid-19 sufferers within the populous Miami-Dade and Jacksonville areas had been “about half what they had been throughout final summer time’s wave,” he mentioned.
Chicago has added 5 extra states, together with Georgia and Hawaii, to its journey advisory checklist owing to their excessive charges of coronavirus infections. The advisory requests unvaccinated travellers to acquire a unfavourable Covid-19 check not more than 72 hours earlier than arrival or undertake 10 days of quarantine.
Sweaty Betty, the British womenswear firm that grew to become a wardrobe favorite through the pandemic, has been offered to a US-based shoemaker. New York-listed Wolverine World Vast, a shoe specialist that owns Hush Puppies, mentioned on Tuesday it had acquired the corporate in a deal value $410m.
American and European shoppers swapping out stay-at-home outfits for polo shirts and attire helped enhance Ralph Lauren’s quarterly outcomes. Revenues on the retailer rose to $1.4bn in its fiscal first quarter ended June 26, from $487.5m a 12 months in the past, when gross sales plunged throughout lockdowns.
Microsoft adopted Google in requiring employees and visitors coming to its places of work within the US to be vaccinated beginning in September. Vaccine mandates from the massive expertise corporations search to guard employees from publicity to Covid-19 however danger scary a backlash from some staff.
Clorox predicted weaker gross sales within the 12 months forward, as pandemic-fuelled demand for bleach and disinfectants subsides amid vaccinations towards Covid-19. The corporate forecast that gross sales will drop 2 to six per cent in fiscal 2022. That was worse than the 1 per cent drop that analysts estimated.