Month: August 2018

Iran Oil Minister: France’s Oil Giant Total Pulls Out of Iran

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Iran’s oil minister says France’s oil giant Total SA has pulled out of Iran after cancelling its $5 billion, 20-year agreement to develop the country’s massive South Pars offshore natural gas field over renewed U.S. sanctions.

The parliament’s website ICANA.ir quoted Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh as saying on Monday that since Total first announced its decision a while ago, Iran has been in the process of “looking for an alternative” to Total. He didn’t elaborate.

 

There was no immediate comment from TotaI.

 

Earlier this month, Iran said China’s state-owned petroleum corporation took a majority 80 percent share of the project. CNPC originally had some 30 percent of shares in the project.

 

The renewed U.S. sanctions took effect in August, after America’s pullout from the nuclear deal in May.

 

 
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Vietnam Control Inflation, Avoid Broader Economic Fallout

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Vietnam is trying to get a grip on inflation that might otherwise threaten its quick economic growth again as it did a decade ago, analysts and domestic media say.

Consumer prices in June were 4.67 percent higher than in the same month last year following an increase of 3.29 percent in the first half of 2018, the Vietnamese General Statistics Office said. The legislature had set a target of no more than 4 percent.

Prices of commodities, including crude oil, are contributing heavily to inflation, and a fuel tax proposed for October would exacerbate it, the VnExpress International news website said. Currency weakness, a rising middle class and credit growth are further raising prices.

“I think generally the trend has been upward and that’s just a result of increased spending power on behalf of Vietnamese people,” said Maxfield Brown, senior associate with the business consultancy Dezan Shira & Associates in Ho Chi Minh City.

Inflation of more than 20 percent in 2008 throttled Vietnamese economic growth over the following three years. The target of 4 percent inflation is aimed at stopping a repeat.

“It’s something to watch,” Brown said. “Obviously, if things go way, way high, then that’s a problem. But that’s not what’s happening right now.”

Noticeable change in prices

Consumers notice the higher fuel prices when pumping gas for cars and scooters. Some also found that rice prices didn’t fall as expected after a 10 percent hike before the major annual Tet holiday in February this year, said Vietnamese consumer Phuong Hong, communications director with a tech firm in Ho Chi Minh City.

Electricity costs more every year, she added, while salaries do not necessarily help common people afford the increases.

“Normally the rate of price rising is always too much and always higher than the rate we’ve got from salary support,” she said.

Vietnam raised its minimum wage 6.5 percent this year with plans for another 5.3 percent in 2019. About a third of the 93 million Vietnamese will be middle-class or above by 2020, the Boston Consulting Group estimates. Rising wealth reflects creation of jobs, a function of economic growth driven by manufacturing.

The country faces pressure to keep wages in check as low labor costs drive foreign investors to the country from around Asia, as well as a few giant American firms.

Vietnam’s GDP in the first half of this year grew about 7 percent after several years near 6 percent. The Asian Development Bank estimates 7.1 percent growth for the full year.

Risk of fallout, government follow-up

Last year “marked a breakthrough” in government work to manage prices of electricity, fuel, formula milk and healthcare fees, VnExpress International said.

Government agencies “should closely monitor price movements,” take a lead in readying goods for Tet so prices stay controlled and “set out rational measures” to stabilize the market, the Communist Party of Vietnam’s website Nhan Dan said. Last month legislators were reexamining the fuel tax.

Officials are on guard for a relapse of inflation in 2008, which followed an influx of foreign currency into the export-reliant country due to the demand for imports, analysts say. Inflation then rippled into the broader economy until 2011.

Prices have been rising now since 2015.

The inflation of 2008 prompted hundreds of wildcat labor strikes by workers who wanted more pay. Prices, strikes and a devalued Vietnamese currency then took the annual economic growth rate down to 5.3 percent before it began to rebound.

Those pressures sparked a fall in pledges for foreign direct investment – the likes of factories that make garments, furniture and car parts. Pledges fell in 2011 to $14.7 billion, from $19.9 billion in 2010, and the amount of actual foreign direct investment plummeted 35 percent that year.

Vietnam’s growth is one of the fastest in Asia today.

Analysts expect Vietnam to weather the current price hikes without the blowup of 10 years ago but warn against currency deflation that has swept other parts of Asia – partly because of the Sino-U.S. trade war. Weaker currencies usually push prices up.

“At the moment we don’t expect really a ramp-up of inflationary pressure,” said Marie Diron, managing director with Moody’s Investors Service in Singapore. But, she said, “with the weakening of the currency, inflation is likely to go up a bit further in Vietnam and other countries.”
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Australian PM Scraps Plan to Legalize Carbon Emissions Cuts

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Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has abandoned plans to enshrine the nation’s targeted limits of greenhouse gas emissions into law in the face of an angry revolt by his party’s staunch conservatives.

Australia set a target to cut carbon emissions by 26 percent below 2005 by the year 2030, as part of the 2015 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, commonly known as the Paris Agreement.

Turnbull sought to include the targets in the government’s National Energy Guarantee, but he conceded Monday that he could not get the legislation through the House of Representatives, where his Liberal Party holds a fragile one-seat majority. The conservative opposition, led by former Prime Minister Tony Abbott, argue that the government should be focused on cutting soaring electricity prices. 

The internal revolt has led to speculation that Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton will challenge Turnbull for leadership of the Liberal Party, which both men have denied. It also comes amid a new voter survey showing the government trailing the opposition Labor Party 55 percent to 45 percent. The next national elections are scheduled to be held next May. 
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Euro Fund: Greece Has Officially Exited Bailout Program

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“For the first time since early 2010, Greece can stand on its own feet,” the European Stability Mechanism (ESM) rescue fund said as Athens exited its final, three-year international bailout program on Monday.

The ESM allocated about $71 billion over the past three years, after an agreement was reached in August 2015 to help the country cope with fallout from an ongoing debt crisis.

“Today we can safely conclude the ESM program with no more follow-up rescue programs,” Mario Centeno, the chairman of the ESM’s board of governors, said in a statement. “This was possible thanks to the extraordinary effort of the Greek people, the good cooperation with the current Greek government and the support of European partners through loans and debt relief.”

In 2010, Greece was declared at risk of default after struggling with massive debt, loss of investment and huge unemployment. Overall, nearly $300 billion in emergency loans were provided in three consecutive bailout packages from a European Union bailout fund and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). In exchange, Athens was required to put in place severe austerity-based measures and reforms.

The completion of the loan program is a major accomplishment for Greece, but the country still faces an uphill battle to regain its economic stability.

 

The office of Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras described the final bailout loan last week as the “last act in the drama. Now a new page of progress, justice and growth can be turned.”

“Greece has managed to stand on her feet again,” his office said.

 

Economic growth in Greece is slowly growing again, tourism is up nearly 17 percent in Athens this year, and once-record levels of joblessness are finally receding.

 

However, the country still faces massive challenges, including weak banks, the highest debt load in the European Union at 180 percent of GDP, and the loss of about a half-million mostly younger Greeks to Europe’s wealthier neighbors. Greece will also need to continue to repay its international loans until 2060.

The country’s three international bailouts took Europe to the brink of crisis.

 

The financial troubles exposed dangers in the European Union’s common currency and threatened to break the bloc apart. The large debt that remains in Greece and an even larger debt in Italy continue to be a financial danger to the EU.

The bailouts also led to regular and sometimes violent demonstrations in Athens by citizens angry at the government’s budget measures required by international lenders in return for the bailouts.

 

While Greece has begun to make economic progress, economics say the bulk of the austerity measures will likely need to remain in place for many years for the country to tackle its massive debt.

Some international economists have called for part of Greece’s loans to be written off in order for Greece to keep its ballooning debt payments in check. However, any kind of loan forgiveness would be a tough sell in Germany where the initially bailouts were unpopular.

The austerity measures included massive tax hikes as high as 70 percent of earned income and pension cuts that pushed nearly half of Greece’s elderly population below the poverty line.

Pensioner Yorgos Vagelakos, 81, told Reuters that five years ago he would go to his local market with 20 euros in his pocket, while today, he has just 2 euros. He says for him, the bailout will never end.

“It’s very often that just like today, I struggle, because I see all the produce on display at the market and I want to buy things, but when I don’t have even a cent in my pocket, I get really sad,” Vagelakos said.
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Aretha Franklin Celebrated at Sunday Service at Father’s Baptist Church

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Fans and worshippers celebrated the life of Aretha Franklin at her father’s Baptist church in Detroit on Sunday, with her powerful voice again ringing out within its walls in tribute to her spectacular career.

Civil rights activist Jesse Jackson, greeted by a standing ovation, sent the several hundred parishioners into raptures with his eulogy and rousing prayers for his old friend, the “Queen of Soul.”

The New Bethel Baptist Church — located in a down-at-heel, quiet neighborhood of Detroit — has been the focus of tributes to Franklin, who passed away from advanced pancreatic cancer on Thursday at age 76.

“On Thursday morning, Earth lost her music. Heaven gained her music,” Jackson told the congregation.

“Right now, the gospel choir in heaven has a lead singer. Detroit lost something, but heaven gained something.”

Franklin’s recording of “Precious Lord (Take My Hand)” — one of Martin Luther King Jr.’s favorite gospel tracks which she sang at his funeral in 1968 — filled the church as a woman dressed in black and red danced.

The high-energy service was packed with music belted out by chief Pastor Robert Smith Jr.

“We are sad that Aretha has gone,” Smith said. “We’re happy that she’s free from the shackles of time.”

In his lengthy address, the now frail Jackson recounted Franklin’s life in the context of the civil rights movement, from her birth into the segregation of the American south to singing at Barack Obama’s inauguration.

Jackson, a Baptist minister and former Democratic presidential candidate, told the church that during the year of Franklin’s birth “in a shack on the Mississippi River” in Tennessee, “225 blacks were lynched.”

Her father, C.L. Franklin, was a prominent Baptist preacher and civil rights activist, who in June 1963 helped King organize the Walk to Freedom through downtown Detroit, only two months before King’s historic March on Washington and “I Have a Dream” speech.

“I remember one time Dr King was facing bankruptcy… and Aretha did an 11-city tour and gave all the money to Dr King,” said Jackson, who was a close aide to the slain activist.

“She was a rose that grew tall in a garden of weeds,” he said.

‘A mighty tribute to the Queen’

Franklin recorded the album “One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism” at the church, where she performed over the years, and also served dinners to worshippers and the homeless at Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Talking about his final visit with Franklin last Wednesday, Jackson told the church that he walked into the room calling out “Re, Re, Re.”

“She opened her eyes and pressed my arms, and we began to pray,” he said.

His eulogy had worshippers on their feet. Smartly dressed women raised their arms into the air and swayed to the music, as a few wiped away tears, with Jackson leading them in prayers and song.

Worshippers spilled out of the service, invigorated by what they called a celebration of the music icon’s life and legacy.

“It was beautiful and it spoke to all of us,” said Denise Redmon, a 57-year-old Indiana bus driver on a weekend coach trip to Detroit.

“I thought it was excellent. A mighty tribute to the Queen,” agreed Esther Birden, 60, on the same two-day “Aretha Franklin soul weekend, joining in all the festivities and being a part of history.”

“I remember listening to Aretha when I was eight years old and dancing to her music,” she said.

“We have nothing to be sad about because she gave us so much. She gave us secular, she gave us gospel, she gave us opera… and you don’t find too many that can fit in every arena like that.”

‘Freedom fighter’

Ralph Godbee, a former Detroit police chief turned pastor, led the congregation in a rousing hand clap for Franklin.

He recalled how she had once called to complain about a relative who had been mistreated by the police department, telling him that no one — regardless of their family — should be treated in such a way.

“There’s something about when the queen calls,” he said, hailing her as a “freedom fighter” and “demanding justice for everybody from the back row to the front pew.”

He said the revival of the Motor City — the home of the US auto industry that has turned a corner after years of economic depression and high crime — was “on the back of the spirit of the Queen of Soul.”

Outside the pale brick church, mourners have left helium balloons, bouquets of flowers, teddy bears and hand-written tributes.

“Aretha Will Always be My Queen. Nothing But Respect!!” read one home-made poster adored with cut-out, black-and-white newspaper pictures of the musical icon in her prime.

“You will always be in my heart,” said another. “Your voice will always ring in my heart and soul. I hear it all of the time, soothing me.”
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Maryland Summer Camp Encourages Young Girls to Pursue STEM Careers

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Women still lag far behind men when it comes to careers in the fastest growing technology fields. Recent studies show fewer than 20 percent of women will pursue careers in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics or STEM for short. Two sisters in Maryland have started their own summer camp to get more women interested in STEM careers. Cristina Caicedo Smit reports.
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Largest Collection of Iconic Tiffany Glass Housed in NY Warehouse

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Tucked away in an industrial block in the New York City borough of Queens is an ordinary-looking warehouse containing an extraordinary treasure: a quarter-million sheets, shards and pieces of multicolored and iridescent glass that together make up the largest collection of Tiffany glass, The Neustadt Tiffany Glass Archive.

​Magnificent windows

While stained glass has been produced since ancient times, the colorful cathedral windows created during the 15th century of the Renaissance period are perhaps the best known. But the art was transformed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries by Louis Comfort Tiffany, an American artist and designer who used his unique talent to essentially create paintings out of glass.

Lindsy Parrott, executive director and curator of the collection, holds up a medium-sized piece of glass as she explains its uniqueness. 

“This is called dichroic, rippled glass and so it’s one color — this greenish color — in reflected light. But then look at this,” she says, as she holds it up to the window. “When you illuminate it, it becomes a wonderful reddish-yellow glass.”

And that’s what is significant bout The Neustadt Tiffany Glass Archive, she says. “It documents this unbelievable chapter in the history of stained glass, by introducing all of these incredible colors and textures, various patterns, different opacities of glass.”

​Distinctive style of glass

Tiffany glass derives its name from the distinctive style of glass produced by Tiffany and his team of designers from 1878 to 1933. Working out of the Tiffany Studios in New York, Tiffany became famous for the color-infused, leaded glass lampshades and stained glass windows that have come to define his name.

The Neustadt Collection was founded in 1969 by collector Egon Neustadt and his wife, Hildegard, who discovered their first Tiffany lamp in 1935. That $12.50 purchase inspired a lifelong passion.

“This one wonderful daffodil lamp kicked off an entire collection,” Parrott says. The Neustadts became deeply passionate about Tiffany lamps after that initial purchase, transfixed by their beauty, and spent the rest of their life building a massive collection.

A passion for Tiffany glass

The couple would eventually amass more than 200 Tiffany lamps, each one unique, including the purchase in 1967 of a huge cache of Tiffany glass left when the company’s furnaces finally closed in 1937.

“Tiffany’s furnaces were originally located in Corona, Queens, and so much of the glass that you see here was made here in New York City,” Parrott says.

The collection represents a variety of forms of glass, from drapery glass meant to mimic a flowing robe, rippled glass meant to represent water, and pressed glass jewels and 3D glass jewels to adorn lamps, mosaics and windows, all carefully sorted and ordered by color, size, texture and type.

The warehouse containing the Tiffany Glass Archive will open to the public for exclusive monthly tours later this year. And The Neustadt will provide a sneak preview of some of these glass treasures in a new exhibition in their dedicated gallery at the Queens Museum, opening October 7.
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Largest Collection of Tiffany Glass Housed in NY Warehouse

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About 250,000 pieces of multicolored and iridescent glass sit in a warehouse on an industrial block in Long Island City, Queens, which houses the largest collection of Tiffany glass. It’s a welcome tribute to Louis Tiffany, an American artist who many believe transformed the history of stained glass with his unique artistry — essentially creating paintings out of glass. VOA’s Julie Taboh has more.
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Maduro Unveils New Banknote, Other Economic Reforms

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Uncertainty reigned in Venezuela Saturday after President Nicolas Maduro unveiled a major economic reform plan aimed at halting the spiraling hyperinflation that has thrown the oil-rich, cash-poor South American country into chaos.

Ahead of a major currency overhaul Monday, when Caracas will start issuing new banknotes after slashing five zeroes off the crippled bolivar, Maduro detailed other measures he hopes will pull Venezuela out of crisis.

Those measures include a massive minimum wage hike, the fifth so far this year.

But analysts say the radical overhaul could only serve to make matters worse.

“There will be a lot of confusion in the next few days, for consumers and the private sector,” said the director of the Ecoanalitica consultancy, Asdrubal Oliveros. “It’s a chaotic scenario.”

​‘Pure lie’

The embattled Maduro, a former bus driver and union leader, said the country needed to show “fiscal discipline” and stop the excessive money printing that has been regular practice in recent years.

The new currency, the sovereign bolivar — to distinguish from the current, and ironically named, strong bolivar — will be anchored to the country’s widely discredited cryptocurrency, the petro.

Each petro will be worth about $60, based on the price of a barrel of Venezuela’s oil. In the new currency, that will be 3,600 sovereign bolivars, signaling a massive devaluation.

In turn, the minimum wage will be fixed at half a petro (1,800 sovereign bolivars), starting Monday. That is about $28, more than 34 times the previous level of less than a dollar at the prevailing black market rate.

Maduro also said the country would have one fluctuating official exchange rate, also anchored to the petro, without saying what the starting level would be.

As it stands, the monthly minimum wage, devastated by inflation and the aggressive devaluation of the bolivar, is still not enough to buy a kilo of meat.

In the capital Caracas, residents were skeptical about the new measures.

“Everything will stay the same, prices will continue to rise,” 39-year-old Bruno Choy, who runs a street food stand, told AFP.

Angel Arias, a 67-year-old retiree, dubbed the new currency a “pure lie!”

1 million percent inflation

The International Monetary Fund predicts inflation will hit a staggering 1 million percent this year in Venezuela, now in a fourth year of recession, hamstrung by shortages of basic goods and crippled by paralyzed public services.

Maduro blames the country’s financial woes on opposition plots and American sanctions, but admits that the government will “learn as we go along” when it comes to the currency redenomination.

His government pushed back Saturday against criticism of the economic reform plan.

“Don’t pay attention to naysayers,” Information Minister Jorge Rodriguez said. “With oil income, with taxes and income from gasoline price hikes … we’ll be able to fund our program.”

Electronic transactions are set to be suspended from Sunday to facilitate the introduction of the new notes.

Economy in turmoil

Oil production accounts for 96 percent of Venezuela’s revenue, but that has slumped to a 30-year low of 1.4 million barrels a day, compared to its record high of 3.2 million 10 years ago.

The fiscal deficit is almost 20 percent of GDP while Venezuela struggles with an external debt of $150 billion.

Venezuela launched the petro in a bid for liquidity to try to circumvent US sanctions that have all but stamped out international financing.

But there’s a good reason the redenomination hasn’t generated renewed hope or investor confidence: Venezuela has done this before.

Maduro’s predecessor Hugo Chavez stripped three zeroes off the bolivar in 2008, but that failed to prevent hyperinflation.

Also, Cryptocurrency rating site ICOindex.com has branded the petro a scam, and the U.S. has banned its nationals from trading in it.
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Kabul IT Company Designs Buber, the City’s Own Online Taxi App

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People in big cities around the world typically enjoy a wide range of public transportation options. Those who own smartphones also have the choice of using some of the increasingly popular ride sharing services such as Uber and Lyft. And now, Kabul residents in Afghanistan can, too. VOA’s Haseeb Maudoodi takes a look at Kabul’s newest online taxi service called Buber, which means ‘take me’ in Dari. Bezhan Hamdard narrates.
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Dragonfly, Privacy Issues Keep Google in the Headlines

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Google has been in the headlines recently, and the news was not good. The technology company left the Chinese market eight years ago to protest Beijing’s censorship, but now appears ready to return with a new search engine. But the project is shrouded in secrecy, even as Google’s employees demand transparency. Meanwhile, the company tries to defend itself against accusations it has been invading user’s privacy, despite claiming it doesn’t. Faiza Elmasry has the story. Faith Lapidus narrates.
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Scientists Extract Uranium Powder from Seawater with Yarn

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The world’s oceans are filled with trace amounts of uranium, the primary fuel for nuclear power reactors. The trick is extracting it from the seawater. Now, scientists in the U.S. say they have done that using yarn, and extracted 5 grams of the powdered form of uranium used to produce reactor fuel. Faith Lapidus reports.
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Turkey’s Economic Crisis Rattles Global Markets

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A budding trade war between the U.S. and Turkey over a detained American pastor is having global consequences. A sharp drop in Turkey’s lira, inflation and the threat of loan defaults, could drag down other economies, particularly in emerging markets. Turkey’s troubles are causing ripple effects in countries as far away as Argentina and Indonesia, while weighing on Asian currency rates and triggering currency fluctuations. VOA’s Diplomatic Correspondent Cindy Saine reports from Washington.
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Technology Addiction Grows as World Increasingly Depends on Devices

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Some medical experts are warning that technology addiction is a growing problem as people’s daily lives increasingly revolve around their devices. Companies and governments are working to alleviate the problem. VOA’s Jill Craig has more.
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Tech Companies Struggle With How to Curtail Offensive Speech

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Tech companies like Google’s YouTube, Facebook and Twitter have long been global platforms for free expression but are increasingly facing calls to respond to offensive and abusive comments on their sites. Michelle Quinn reports this is an issue both in the U.S. and throughout the world.
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Economic Fears Grip Turkey

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Turkey’s currency this month has suffered heavy falls triggered by U.S.-Turkish tensions over the ongoing detention of an American pastor. Washington’s threat to impose new economic sanctions sparked another steep currency drop Friday. Dorian Jones reports on the economic fall out for people in Istanbul.
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Aretha Franklin’s Funeral to be in Detroit

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Relatives of the late singer Aretha Franklin say her funeral will be August 31 in her hometown of Detroit.

There will be a two-day public viewing before the funeral at the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit, a publicist for the family, Gwendolyn Quinn, said, to allow fans to mourn.

The funeral will take place at Greater Grace Temple, which seats about 4,000 people and will be limited to family, friends and invited guests, which are expected to include dignitaries and music royalty from around the world.

Following the funeral, Franklin is to be buried with other members of her family at Woodlawn Cemetery.

Franklin died Thursday at her home in Detroit at the age of 76 from pancreatic cancer.

The Grammy-winning vocalist was born in Memphis, Tennessee, but grew up in Detroit after moving there as a youngster with her family.

Her talent was recognized at a young age as she played piano and sang hymns at the church where her father, C.L. Franklin, was a popular preacher.

Franklin moved into pop and jazz music at age 18 on the Columbia Records label. But her real breakthrough came in 1967 on Atlantic Records, which allowed her to sing with her natural gospel intensity for the first time.

She rocketed to national fame that year with a series of hit singles, including “Chain of Fools,” “(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman,” and her most famous song, “R-E-S-P-E-C-T,” her first No. 1 hit on the Billboard Hot 100.

Franklin eventually racked up more than 110 entries on Billboard magazine’s charts, the most by any woman in the magazine’s history. In 1987, she became the first woman to be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
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Miss America: Leadership Bullied, Manipulated, Silenced Me

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The reigning Miss America says she has been bullied, manipulated and silenced by the pageant’s current leadership, including Gretchen Carlson.

In a letter sent Friday to former Miss Americas, Cara Mund says she decided to speak out despite the risk of punishment.

Her letter is reminiscent of the movie Mean Girls, in which characters Gretchen and Regina bully the heroine and make her life miserable. That’s what happened to her in real life, Mund wrote. Carlson is chairwoman of the Miss America Organization; Regina Hopper is its CEO.

Her letter exponentially increased the turmoil surrounding the pageant three weeks before the next Miss America is to be crowned in Atlantic City.

“Let me be blunt: I strongly believe that my voice is not heard nor wanted by our current leadership; nor do they have any interest in knowing who I am and how my experiences relate to positioning the organization for the future,” Mund wrote. “Our chair and CEO have systematically silenced me, reduced me, marginalized me, and essentially erased me in my role as Miss America in subtle and not-so-subtle ways on a daily basis. After a while, the patterns have clearly emerged, and the sheer accumulation of the disrespect, passive-aggressive behavior, belittlement, and outright exclusion has taken a serious toll.”

Mund said she’s been left out of interviews, not invited to meetings and called the wrong name. When she obliquely hinted at trouble with pageant leadership in an interview earlier this month with The Press of Atlantic City, Mund said she was swiftly punished by having her televised farewell speech cut to 30 seconds, and was told a dress she had been approved to wear in the traditional “show us your shoes” parade cannot be worn.

This year’s competition will not include swimsuits, and pageant officials from at least 19 states have called for the current leadership to resign.

There was no immediate response from The Miss America Organization or from Carlson and Hopper, who were singled out in Mund’s letter.

Mund said she was given three talking points to be made in every appearance: “Miss America is relevant. The #MeToo movement started with a Miss America, Gretchen Carlson. Gretchen Carlson went to Stanford.” (Mund said she was allowed to mention that she went to Brown to show that both women were highly educated.)

“Right away, the new leadership delivered an important message: There will be only one Miss America at a time, and she isn’t me,” Mund wrote.

Mund, who was Miss North Dakota and won the crown on a platform of increasing the number of women elected to political office, said she was treated better by the previous Miss America leadership that was forced from power after sending emails ridiculing the appearance, intellect and sex lives of former Miss Americas.

She cites examples of mistreatment including being excluded from the nationally televised announcement that swimsuits were being eliminated — even though she was with Carlson at the TV studio where it was made. She says pageant handlers ridiculed her clothing choices and chided her for wearing the same outfits too often. When she reached out to former Miss Americas to see if they had been treated similarly, “I was reprimanded by Regina who told me that problems and concerns had to be kept ‘in the family.'”
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Tesla Stock Drops; Musk Under Fire

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Tesla shares dropped nearly 9 percent in value Friday, amid reports of CEO and co-founder Elon Musk meeting with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Musk wrote on Twitter last week of his plans to take the company private for a price of $420 per share, writing that he had “funding secured.” On Monday, in a blog post, Musk admitted that was not true, as he was still waiting on a finalized deal with his investors, a Saudi Arabian foreign investment fund.

“I continue to have discussions with the Saudi fund, and I also am having discussions with a number of other investors, which is something that I always planned to do since I would like for Tesla to continue to have a broad investor base,” Musk wrote.

Since Musk’s original tweet, the company’s shares have dropped 12 percent overall, and reports of subpoenas being issued by the SEC have sent the company into turmoil.

In a New York Times interview Thursday, Musk said, “This past year has been the most difficult and painful year of my career.” The Times also reported that members of Tesla’s board are concerned with Musk’s drug use, notably his use of the sleep aid Ambien, which some believe have contributed to Musk’s controversial Twitter statements.

Last month, Musk came under fire for calling one of the cave divers who rescued 12 Thai soccer players and their coach a pedophile, citing no evidence. He later apologized for that remark.
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Stocks Jump as Hopes Rise for Progress on China Trade Talks

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Stocks rose late in the day Friday as investors welcomed signs of progress in resolving the trade dispute between the U.S. and China. The Wall Street Journal reported that the countries hope to have a resolution by November.

Industrial, health care and basic materials companies made some of the biggest gains. The report came a day after China said it will send an envoy to Washington for the first talks between the countries since early June.

Marina Severinovsky, an investment strategist at Schroders, said stocks could jump if the U.S. and China make real progress toward a trade agreement. But stocks in emerging markets might make even bigger gains.

“The rally that could come, if there is a better outcome, would be in emerging markets,” she said. “China has suffered pretty greatly … the U.S. has held up pretty well.”

The late gains came in spite of weak results for several chipmakers. Electric car maker Tesla took its biggest drop in two years on reports of a wider government investigation into the company and concerns about CEO Elon Musk’s health.

The S&P 500 index rose 9.44 points, or 0.3 percent, at 2,850.13. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 110.59 points, or 0.4 percent, to 25,669.32. The Nasdaq composite edged up 9.81 points, or 0.1 percent, to 7,816.33. The Russell 2000 index of smaller-company stocks gained 7.19 points, or 0.4 percent, to 1,692.95.

The Wall Street Journal cited officials in both the U.S. and China as it said negotiators want to end the trade war before U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping meet at multilateral events in November.

Industrial companies made some of the biggest gains after agricultural equipment maker Deere posted stronger than expected sales. Its stock rose 2.4 percent to $140.59.

Construction equipment maker Caterpillar rose 2.3 percent to $139.34 and engine maker Paccar added 2.3 percent to $67.16.

Chipmakers fell after two companies gave weaker forecasts for the third quarter. Nvidia said it no longer expects much revenue from products used in mining digital currencies, and its stock fell 4.9 percent to $244.82. Applied Materials slumped 7.7 percent to $43.77.

While big names like Netflix, Facebook and Amazon slipped, Apple led technology companies slightly higher overall. Apple stock rose 2 percent to $217.58.

Nordstrom jumped 13.2 percent to $59.18 after raising its annual profit and sales forecasts and posting better earnings and sales than analysts expected. It’s been a mostly difficult week for department stores as Macy’s and J.C. Penney both plunged after issuing their quarterly reports.

The S&P 500 finished this week with a solid gain of 0.6 percent, but it took a difficult path to get there. Stocks fell early this week due to worries about Turkey’s currency crisis, and later investors fretted about China’s economic growth.

The recovery started Thursday as investors hoped the upcoming talks between the U.S. and China will help end the impasse that has resulted in higher tariffs from both countries.

The Hang Seng index in Hong Kong has fallen 13 percent since early June as the dispute has dragged on, and other emerging market indexes have also taken a hit. The S&P 500 has risen over that time.

Tesla was hit with a series of reports that concerned shareholders. The Wall Street Journal reported that the Securities and Exchange Commission started investigating the electric car maker last year to determine if it made false statements about production of its Model 3 sedan.

The SEC is also reportedly looking into CEO Elon Musk’s comment on Twitter about possibly taking the company private.

Tesla stock rose from about $345 a share to about $380 following Musk’s tweet last week, which said Tesla could go private for $420 a share. On Friday it dropped 8.9 percent to $305.50.

Musk also gave an emotional interview to the New York Times, published Friday, about the stress he’s experienced as the company tries to ramp up production. He said this year has been “excruciating” and described working up 120 hours a week, raising concerns about his health.

Bond prices rose. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note fell to 2.86 percent from 2.87 percent.

U.S. crude picked up 0.7 percent to $65.91 a barrel in New York. Brent crude, the standard for international oil prices, added 0.6 percent to $71.83 per barrel in London.

Wholesale gasoline dipped 0.3 percent to $1.98 a gallon. Heating oil inched up 0.1 percent to $2.10 a gallon. Natural gas rose 1.3 percent to $2.95 per 1,000 cubic feet.

Gold was little changed at $1,184.20 an ounce. Silver fell 0.6 percent to $14.63 an ounce. Copper added 0.5 percent to $2.63 a pound.

The dollar dipped to 110.60 yen from 110.88 yen. The euro rose to $1.1443 from $1.1365.

The German DAX lost 0.2 percent and France’s CAC 40 fell 0.1 percent. The FTSE 100 in Britain was little changed.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 index added 0.4 percent and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng gained 0.4 percent. In South Korea, the Kospi gained 0.3 percent.
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