Category: ESTA News

State Secretary Tahesha Way has been appointed as New Jersey’s new lieutenant governor.

New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy announced on the 8th that he would appoint Director of State Wei as the successor to Lieutenant Governor Sheila Oliver, who passed away on the 1st of last month.

New Vice Governor Wei took the oath of office today and began her duties as Deputy Governor. Lieutenant Governor Way, 51 years old, became the second black woman to become New Jersey Lieutenant Governor, following former Lieutenant Governor Oliver.

She graduated from Brown University and served as Lieutenant Governor Wei. She served as a Passaic County Freeholder and Administrative Court Judge until she was selected by Governor Murphy to serve as Director of State.

As Secretary of State, she was praised for skilfully running the presidential primary and main elections even amid the COVID-19 crisis in 2020. She said, “Former Deputy Governor Oliver was more than a trusted colleague to me. “I am honoured to continue his legacy,” she said of her inauguration.

As the heat wave rages throughout most of the United States until early September, schools are temporarily closing or moving up their dismissal times.

According to NBC, CBS, and local media on the 5th, several school districts in Pennsylvania and Michigan decided to close schools and replace them with online classes due to concerns about the health of students due to the extreme heat this week. Additionally, several school districts in New Jersey announced that they would hold classes until noon this week and send students home early, and some public schools in Detroit, Michigan also announced that they would dismiss students earlier than usual.

Seventy schools in the Philadelphia School District also announced that they would send students home three hours earlier than usual due to the heat wave for two days until the 6th. The school district said these schools either have no air conditioning or do not have proper cooling systems.

In the United States, a heat wave has continued for several months in the southwestern part, as well as the central and northeastern parts. Approximately 50 million people in areas including Texas, northern Oklahoma, Minnesota, Michigan, Virginia, and Maryland are under heat wave warnings and advisories.

The highest temperature by region on this day was 102 degrees Fahrenheit (39 degrees Celsius) in Dallas, Texas, 97 degrees Fahrenheit (36 degrees Celsius) in Kansas City, 94 degrees Celsius (34 degrees Celsius) in Philadelphia, and 99 degrees Celsius (37 degrees Celsius) in Washington DC.

Experts believe that summer heat waves are becoming longer due to climate change. The National Weather Service (NWS) predicted that the heat in the Midwest and Northeast will ease somewhat this weekend, but in the South, the heat wave is expected to continue for some time.

The New York stock market rose ahead of key indicators as Treasury yields showed a downward trend.

At the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) on the 29th (US Eastern time), the Dow Jones 30 Industrial Average finished trading at 34,852.67, up 292.69 points (0.85%) from the battlefield. The Standard & Poor’s (S&P) 500 index closed at 4,497.63, up 64.32 points (1.45%) from the battlefield, and the Nasdaq index closed at 13,943.76, up 238.63 points (1.74%) from the battlefield.

Investors have been paying attention to the downward trend in government bond yields ahead of the release of the Personal Consumption Expenditure (PCE) Price Index and Employment Report coming out this week.

It will be interesting to see if the PCE price index and employment reports coming out this week will confirm trends in inflation and employment.

However, the fact that the government bond interest rate fell as the job announcement and the consumer confidence index showed a downward trend gave relief to the stock price.

The Conference Board’s consumer confidence index for August, which shows consumer confidence in the US, was 106.1, far below the market’s expectation of 116.0 and below the previous revision of 114.0.

Job postings in July were 8.82 million, down significantly from 9.2 million the previous month, and a new low in 28 months. Market expectations were 9.5 million. The number of voluntary retirees showing confidence in the labor market was 3.54 million, down 253,000 from the previous month. This is the lowest level in two and a half years, suggesting that the tightness of the job market is easing.

The 10-year Treasury bond yield fell to around 4.11%, down 8bp from the previous day, and the 2-year Treasury bond yield was traded around 4.91%, about 15bp behind.

Recently, the sharp rise in government bond yields, reflecting concerns about further tightening by the Fed, has put a burden on the stock market.

Nvidia and Tesla’s shares rose more than 4% and 7%, respectively, leading to the rise of technology stocks.

The rise of risky assets such as Bitcoin and Ethereum also had a positive effect on stock prices.

On this day, a U.S. court issued a ruling overturning the decision of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to reject an application to convert Grayscale’s bitcoin trust to an exchange-traded fund (ETF), which will allow a spot bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) to be approved. The road is open.

Bitcoin rose more than 7% and Ethereum more than 5% on the news. Shares of Coinbase, a virtual currency exchange, also rose by about 15%. Meanwhile, U.S. home prices showed an upward trend.

According to S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller, the June home price index rose 0.7% month-on-month on a seasonally adjusted basis. Home prices in the 10 major cities and 20 major cities both rose 0.9% month-on-month on a seasonally adjusted basis.

All 12 sectors in the S&P 500 index rose. Telecommunications, consumer discretionary, and technology stocks rose more than 2%, leading the rise.

Best Buy shares rose more than 3% on the news that the quarterly results were better than expected.

Shares of AT&T and Verizon, telecommunications companies, rose 4% and 3%, respectively, on the news that Citi upgraded their investment opinions from ‘neutral’ to ‘buy’.

Oracle’s share price also rose more than 3% as UBS upgraded its rating from ‘neutral’ to ‘buy’.

New York stock market experts said that the market is digesting the materials that have been released so far in the absence of materials.

“The market is getting a little bit of a pull back from its year-to-date highs and is getting a lot going,” Chris Barto, investment analyst at Fort Pete Capital, told MarketWatch. We are reallocating our investments,” he said.

HSBC’s Max Ketner, multi-asset strategist, told CNBC that the cooldown in today’s data suggests that it’s a strategically good time to enter risky assets, especially equities.

According to the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) FedWatch, at the close of the Federal Funds (FF) interest rate futures market, the probability that the Fed will keep rates unchanged at its September meeting is 86.5%, and the probability of raising them by 0.25 percentage points reached 13.5%. The probability of raising interest rates by more than 0.25 percentage point by the November meeting is 47.9%, down from 62.3% the day before.

The New York State Legislature is pushing forward a bill to provide free menstrual products to private schools.

The bill, which was introduced in March by New York State Senator Iwen Chu and Assemblywoman Linda Rosenthal and recently passed both the House of Representatives, would require 6th-12th grade students to use sanitary products in the restrooms of private schools in New York State.

Assemblyman Rosenthal said, “All students, regardless of the type or type of school they attend, should be able to live in an environment where sanitary products are easily accessible. It will help you focus,” he said.

If the bill is signed by the governor, it will be implemented from July next year, and it will be distributed to each school in earnest from the 2024-25 semester soon. Meanwhile, in 2016, New York City became the first state in the nation to provide free sanitary products in public schools, homeless shelters, and prisons.

Health experts warned that a second case of ticks, which carry diseases like mosquitoes, occurred in Washington state last month after last year, requiring attention.

The mite, which carries a bacterial pathogen called Anaplasmosis, first infected a woman in her 80s in Whatcom County in Washington State last year, before attacking a woman in her 40s in Puyallup last month.

The Whatcom County senior was discharged after receiving hospitalization.
The Puyallup woman was hospitalized for 10 days after being bitten by a tick in the nearby woods earlier last month with symptoms including fever, lethargy, muscle aches and vomiting, and is now recovering at her home, the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department said.

Her state authorities are investigating the forests of Puyallup and Eatonville where she went. Experts said that although anaplasmosis occurs mostly in the southern regions of the United States, it tends to gradually spread to the north due to global warming.

An academic study published early last year said the disease is widespread in northern California and has likely already invaded neighbouring Oregon and Washington states.

Anaplasmosis, which is spread by black-legged ticks, is unfamiliar in Northwest America, but has been known for a long time in the Midwest and Northeast, said experts, explaining that wild animals, such as deer, which are the main hosts of these ticks, are moving around their habitats due to climate change.

Experts said it is almost certain that the elderly Whatcom County and the Puyallup woman are not the first victims of anaphylaxis in Washington State. Dogs infected with Anaplasmosis are found every year in Northwestern America, evidence that ticks already live in the region, they said.

Former President Donald Trump, the leading Republican presidential candidate, has been further charged with attempting to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election and spreading claims of election fraud.

A federal grand jury decided to indict former President Trump on the 1st by applying four charges, including attempting to overturn the results of the presidential election. As a result, former President Trump was indicted three times for violations of federal law, including the illegal leakage and storage of classified documents.

This prosecution related to the 1/6 congressional intrusion is evaluated as a significant variable that will affect the course of former President Trump’s future presidential election.

The grand jury submitted an investigative report to the court based on the testimony of 75 witnesses in January, and observations have been raised that the report would have recommended an indictment of former President Trump.

White House Council of Economic Advisors (CEA) Chairman Jared Bernstein said on the 23rd regarding the US economy, “There is a lot of reason to believe that the current positive trend will continue.”

Chairman Bernstein appeared on Fox News that day and said, “Bidenomics (the Biden government’s economic policy) will continue this trend in the right direction.”

As for economic performance, he said that “wage growth is outpacing inflation,” and after mentioning real wage growth over the past year, he emphasized that consumers’ expectations for the US economy will rise over time.

“We’ve seen these investments grow across the country,” he said, referring to the expansion of electric vehicle investments under the Inflation Reduction Act. “I like the momentum we have now.”

Regarding the relatively low approval rating for the Biden government’s economic policies, he also said, “It takes time for people’s sentiments about the economy as a whole to catch up with new economic trends.” He emphasized, “President Biden has been working with a low attitude to help households and businesses escape the crisis and return to a sound and sound economy.”

In various opinion polls, President Biden’s approval rating for state affairs is around 40%, and positive evaluations of economic policies, such as countering inflation, remain at a similar level. For example, in a recent Monmouth University poll, 47% rated the Biden government’s job policy positively and 48% negatively, and only 34% supported the inflation policy, reported The Hill, a media outlet specializing in Congress.

Recently, a video of a significant amount of milk being dumped at the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewage Treatment Plant was posted on social media, causing shock.

A spokesperson for the sewage treatment plant acknowledged the waste of milk but declined to comment on the amount of milk discarded. Not only here. According to Milkweed, a dairy media outlet in Wisconsin, overproduction of milk in the state is 50 trailers a day, and the amount of milk that can be transported in one trailer reaches 6,000 to 7,000 gallons.

The dairy industry, which supplies fresh milk to Americans, is facing the limit of discarding milk. Due to the high production supply compared to the demand for milk consumption and delays in milk processing at dairy processing companies, there is not enough space to store milk, leading to a situation where milk is dumped down the drain.

Recently, Bloomberg News reported that the dairy industry, especially in the Midwest, was in a situation where they were dumping unconsumed milk from milk supply production. The large-scale disposal of milk by dairy farmers was a special case that occurred when the balance between supply and demand collapsed due to the closure of large consumers such as schools and restaurants as the economic shutdown was implemented in the early stages of the COVID-19 outbreak.

The waste of raw milk in the Midwest milk regions is due to oversupply. According to the USDA, milk production reached an all-time high in May. In Texas, the fourth-largest milk producer in the United States, 28,000 cows were added last year, resulting in a significant increase in milk production, up 15% from 2021. Consumption decreased compared to milk production.

Private milk consumption is down, and the production scale of the processors that process milk is also at a standstill. 90% of Wisconsin’s milk is processed into cheese, but processors are saturated and can no longer afford to process milk. Added to this is the shortage of manpower, further exacerbating the situation of oversupply of milk.

Milk prices are also falling. The futures price of benchmark Class III milk used to make cheese is at its lowest level since 2020.

The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on the 10th that the popularity of Disney World, the representative amusement park in the United States, has recently faded.

According to Touring Plans, a company that tracks waiting times at major amusement parks, the average wait time at Magic Kingdom Park in Orlando, Florida on the 4^th of July was 27 minutes. Compared to 2019 with a 47-minute wait time, it has almost halved.

Disney World annual visitor Jamie Brown has visited the resort three times in the past week and has used all four parks. Popular rides have hardly had a long wait time, and restaurant reservations have been much easier. Brown said, “There weren’t too many people to believe,” and said it seemed to be much less crowded than in 2021, which was during Corona 19.

The WSJ pointed out that Disney’s policy of raising admission fees and eliminating free amenities in recent years may have been a factor in turning visitors away. In October of last year, Disney raised the price of a two-day pass from $255 to $285 for adults, a 9% increase.

Stephanie Oprea, head of marketing for Fixit Travel, a travel agency specializing in Disney resort travel products, said, “People can get a little tired of price hikes in the current economy,” and consider a cruise or beach trip instead of Disney World.

The heat wave that hit Florida this summer is also considered one of the factors that reduced Disney World visitors. Last week, the highest daytime temperature around Disney World approached 38 degrees Celsius. In addition, the fact that Disney World has no new rides or attractions other than the reconstruction of Splash Mountain was pointed out as a factor that lowered its competitiveness compared to other amusement parks.

Feeling a sense of crisis, Disney decided to give annual pass holders discounts on revisits and up to 40% discounts on hotel rooms during the peak season this winter. In addition, the once-popular meal prepayment program, which was abolished, plans to revive next year.

In the downtown area of Chicago, where Lake Michigan and the Chicago River meet, 16 people have been found drowned after disappearing over the past year, raising concerns about the possibility of a ‘serial murder’.

According to Chicago NBC Broadcasting, New York Post and Daily Mail on the 29th, the bodies of 10 men and 6 women who were reported missing in the Chicago River and Lake Michigan in downtown Chicago from March last year until recently were found drowned.

Tracy Walder, who served as an intelligence agent for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), raised the possibility of a serial killer, saying, “Similar incidents are frequent and there is a certain pattern to the incidents.”

He said that many of the causes of death were judged to be ‘accidental drowning’ and many remain ‘indeterminate’, that the bodies were found at a distance from the place where the victims were last seen, and that a large number of victims occurred in a short period of time. As a basis, he said, “If there are so many similar patterns overall, it can no longer be seen as a ‘coincidence’. He added, “Serial killers tend to follow a certain pattern. In addition, if the victim is thrown into the water after the murder, much of the forensic evidence will disappear, so you can aim for the perfect crime.”

In this regard, John Jay College Criminal Justice Professor Joseph Giakalon, who was a former New York Police Department (NYDP), said, “I was taught that all deaths should be regarded as murder and investigated until a clear cause of death is confirmed.

Noah Innos (26), a victim of a recent incident, went missing on the 12th after watching a rock concert at a concert hall along the Chicago River with his co-workers. On the 17th, five days later, he was found drowned in the Chicago River, one block away from the concert hall. The judicial authorities have yet to determine the direct cause of Enos’ death, and his family claims ‘murder’.

In December of last year, Kristof Schubert (21), who came to Chicago for work training in Poland, stopped by a bar with his colleagues and disappeared on the way home. A few days later, Peter Salvino (25), a doctoral student at Northwestern University, went missing while returning home after attending a party held in Lincoln Park, north of the city.

Alcohol may be a factor in both cases according to police. Chicago police have not commented on the possibility of a serial killer.