Wall Street Journal 30 08 2021

For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
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Business & Finance
M
 Catalent was expected to
announce Monday that it has
agreed to buy closely held
Bettera, a maker of gummy,
soft-chew and lozenge forms
of vitamins and supplements, for $1 billion. B4
 Huarong, China’s top
manager of distressed assets, confirmed it had a
net loss of roughly $16 billion last year, and warned
investors that it fell short
of regulatory requirements
on financial strength. B9
 A brewing economic
slowdown is testing China’s
will to sustain reductions in
steel output ordered by
economic officials that had
burnished the government’s
climate credentials. B9
Private Citizens Rescue Afghans
Zach Van Meter, a privateequity investor from Naples,
Fla., phoned the government
of Somaliland last week, askBy Ben Kesling in Abu
Dhabi and Michael M.
Phillips in Washington
ing if it would host thousands
of Afghan refugees.
“He just called me out of
Investors
Signal
Cautious
Outlook
 Hurricane Ida made
landfall and battered New
Orleans and much of southeast Louisiana, knocking
out power, downing trees
and causing havoc as the
region’s most severe storm
since Hurricane Katrina exactly 16 years earlier. A1, A4
 North Korea appears to
have resumed operation of
its plutonium-producing
reactor at Yongbyon in a
move that could enable
the country to expand its
nuclear weapons arsenal,
the United Nations atomic
agency said. A9
 The European Union is
set to recommend halting
nonessential travel from the
U.S. because of the spread of
Covid-19, diplomats said. A9
 Israeli planes struck
Hamas targets in the Gaza
Strip, hours after violent
clashes between Palestinian protesters and troops
along the border. A8
 Died: Ed Asner, 91, actor
who played TV’s Lou Grant. A5
Opinion.............. A15-17
Outlook....................... A2
Personal Journal A11-12
Sports....................... A14
U.S. News............. A2-5
Weather................... A14
World News......... A6-9
>
Some of the hottest stocks
in the U.S. are pointing to an
economic cool-down.
Utilities and healthcare are
among the best-performing
groups in the S&P 500 so far
this quarter, with gains of 7.8%
and 6.6%, respectively, compared with a 4.9% rise in the
broad stock index. Big winners
include utility NextEra Energy
Inc., which is up 14% this
quarter, while shares of medical company Danaher Corp.
are up 19%.
The gains are noteworthy
because investors typically pile
into those types of stocks when
they are expecting the outlook
to darken. Visits to the doctor
and electricity use are less apt
to decline in a pinch than
spending on vacations or new
furniture. Goldman Sachs this
month cut its third-quarter U.S.
economic growth forecast to
5.5% from 9%, citing slowing
consumer spending in the face
of renewed Covid-19 outbreaks.
A drop in economic growth
from its mid-2021 pace hardly
presages a recession, which is
the development that often
spells the end of stocks’ adPlease turn to page A2
 Revenue rises for most of
S&P 500........................................ B1
INSIDE
SCOTT BARBOUR/EPA/SHUTTERSTOCK
 The U.S. said it launched
a drone strike targeting
suspected suicide bombers
near the Kabul airport as
America’s 20-year war in
Afghanistan wound down.
The strike was the second
such attack following a
deadly blast at the airport
last week. A1, A6-A8
 The remains of 13 service members killed in the
suicide bombing in Afghanistan last week arrived at
Dover Air Force Base in
Delaware, where Biden
participated in a transfer
ritual and met with families of the fallen troops. A6
s 2021 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
President Biden and first lady Jill Biden as the remains of 13 U.S. troops killed in Kabul arrived at Dover Air Force Base. A6
BY KAREN LANGLEY
World-Wide
CONTENTS
Arts in Review... A13
Business & Finance B2
Business News... B3-4
Crossword.............. A14
Heard on Street... B10
Markets...................... B9
BY VIVIAN SALAMA
AND NANCY A. YOUSSEF
SPORTS
The U.S. Open is
missing stars as the
tournament begins
Monday. A14
BUSINESS & FINANCE
At Theranos trial,
Holmes may allege
abusive relationship in
her defense. B1
the blue,” said Bashir Goth,
the Washington representative
for a region of Somalia seeking independence.
Two days later, on Aug. 25,
Somaliland’s acting foreign
minister signed a tentative accord with charities working
with Mr. Van Meter, agreeing
to temporarily house as many
as 10,000 Afghan evacuees in
Berbera, a port on the Gulf of
Aden. It was part of an on-thefly effort that Mr. Van Meter
said has helped about 5,000
Afghans escape their country
in the past two weeks, in one
of the most successful known
private efforts to extract Afghans.
From the Peacock Lounge, a
conference room at the Willard InterContinental hotel in
Washington, Mr. Van Meter
and an ad hoc collection of
war veterans, Afghan diplomats, wealthy donors, defense
contractors, nonprofit workers
and off-duty U.S. officials conducted a global military-style
rescue operation.
The self-named Commercial
Task Force dispatched former
commandos to Kabul to retrieve evacuees, said Mr. Van
Please turn to page A8
WASHINGTON—The U.S.
said it launched a drone strike
targeting suspected suicide
bombers near the Kabul airport
as America’s 20-year war in Afghanistan wound down to its
final hours.
The drone strike on Sunday
was the second such attack following the explosion that killed
13 U.S. service members and
more than 200 Afghan civilians
at the Hamid Karzai International Airport last week. It
came as the U.S. scrambled to
have its military and diplomatic
personnel out of the country by
Tuesday, the deadline previPlease turn to page A6
 Americans back withdrawal,
lament chaotic exit................ A6
 Opposition resists pressure
from Taliban............................... A7
 New leaders order halt to
opium production.................... A7
Hurricane Ida Pummels Louisiana
NEW ORLEANS—Hurricane
Ida made landfall on Sunday
and battered this city and
much of southeast Louisiana,
knocking out power, downing
trees and causing havoc as the
By Kris Maher,
Rachel Wolfe
and Steve Garbarino
region’s most severe storm
since Hurricane Katrina exactly
16 years earlier.
Ida arrived at Port Fourchon, 60 miles south of New
Orleans, at midday Sunday as a
Category 4 hurricane, the second-highest storm classification. It brought pounding rain,
sustained winds of 150 miles an
hour and dangerous sea surges.
All of New Orleans had lost
power by Sunday night, an Entergy spokesman confirmed.
Nearly a million customers
statewide were without power,
according to data from poweroutage.us. Earlier in the day,
the Sewerage and Water Board
of New Orleans advised people
not to run dishwashers or
washing machines to minimize
wastewater, because sewage
pump stations had been
knocked out by power outages.
The first death from the
storm was reported by the As-
ERIC GAY/ASSOCIATED PRESS
 A surge of Covid-19
cases in Malaysia, a littleknown but critical link in
the semiconductor supply
chain, has opened a new
front in the battle to fix
manufacturing woes that
have rippled across industries during a global shortage of computing chips. B1
YEN 109.85
Drone strike comes
before exit deadline, as
remains of 13 American
troops arrive home
SAUL LOEB/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES
 Baxter International is
in advanced talks to buy
medical-equipment maker
Hill-Rom for around $10
billion, according to people familiar with the matter. The talks follow an
earlier bid from Baxter
that Hill-Rom rebuffed. B1
EURO $1.1797
U.S. Hits
Suspected
Suicide
Bombers
In Kabul
What’s
News
ore than three-quarters of the largest
U.S. companies reported
higher revenue than before Covid-19, according to
a Wall Street Journal analysis, indicating that many
have adapted to changing
business conditions caused
by the pandemic. B1
HHHH $4.00
A man passed by part of a roof blown off of a building in the French Quarter of New Orleans Sunday.
cension Parish Sheriff’s Office,
which said deputies responded
Sunday night to reports of a
person injured by a fallen tree
and arrived to find the victim
deceased.
Storm trackers said that
even after several hours, Ida re-
Election Melodrama—Starring
Matthew Modine, Fran Drescher
i
i
i
Accusations fly fast in Tinseltown’s
SAG-AFTRA union showdown
BY JOE FLINT
porting role as a widow in a
Christmas movie that aired
The upcoming California last year on the Lifetime cable
election has it all. Heated network.
rhetoric. Mudslinging. A last“Unfortunately many of our
minute celebrity candidate members are more impressed
who shakes up the field.
by a candidate’s IMDB page
This isn’t the gubernatorial than they are by a candidate’s
recall. It’s the race to become position on union issues,” says
president of powactress Anne-Marie
erful Hollywood laJohnson, a supbor union SAG-AFporter of Mr. MoTRA.
dine.
The contest pits
SAG-AFTRA repactor Matthew Moresents
160,000
dine, whose credits
performers—ranginclude the Netflix
ing from movie
hit
“Stranger
stars to background
Things,” against
actors and stunt
onetime
sitcom
performers—and
star Fran Drescher.
both
candidates
Mr. Modine’s camp
have recognizable
Vote for me.
casts him as unnames in their corderdog to the bigger name, ners, according to public statethough Ms. Drescher is best ments of support. Ms.
known for her role in “The Drescher, 63, was endorsed by
Nanny,” which aired its final actors including Tom Hanks
season in 1999. Her most re- and Rosie O’Donnell. Mr. Mocent acting credit was a supPlease turn to page A10
mained as strong as when it
made landfall, though by Sunday evening it was downgraded
to a Category 3.
Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards said this would be one of
the strongest storms the state
has experienced since at least
the 1850s. Twenty-three Louisiana shelters housed about
1,500 people on Sunday, and
those numbers were expected
to increase as people discover
that their homes are no longer
habitable, Mr. Edwards said.
Please turn to page A4
Pandemic Stokes
Exurbs Boom
Remote work, lower costs draw newcomers
BY CAMERON MCWHIRTER
AND PAUL OVERBERG
MURFREESBORO, Tenn.—
This bucolic town 30 miles
southeast of Nashville, Tenn.,
was once best known for its
nearby Civil War battlefield
and state college. Now it is
one of the fastest-growing
places in the country.
Surging housing costs and
remote work are sending
droves of people to live in
new, fast-growing exurbs of
metropolitan areas in the
Southeast where suburban
living has long been concentrated closer to the city.
Nashville, Charlotte, N.C.,
Charleston, S.C., and Jacksonville, Fla., are among the
places getting the type of
outer-ring residential development once found only
around the country’s largest
cities.
In 2020, net migration
into a large group of exurban
counties rose 37%, according
to an analysis of U.S. Postal
Service permanent changeof-address data by The Wall
Street Journal. Nearly twothirds of the flow came from
large cities and their close-in
suburbs.
Exurban areas, which include 240 counties as defined by the Brookings Institution, grew at almost twice
the national rate over the
past decade, a shift that began before the pandemic.
There are signs it is accelerating this year as Americans
prepare for an expected
post-pandemic landscape
where increased working
from home reduces the need
to commute.
Researchers differ in defining exurbs, but they genPlease turn to page A10
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A2 | Monday, August 30, 2021
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
U.S. NEWS
THE OUTLOOK | By David Harrison
Congestion Pricing Picks Up Speed
In 2003,
London
started charging drivers a
fee to drive on
the city center’s narrow streets. In the
years since, studies have documented reduced traffic congestion, better bus service,
fewer accidents and an improved overall quality of life.
Jonathan Leape, a professor at the London School of
Economics, has called the
system “a triumph of economics.”
The experiment has
caught on. New York plans
to implement a similar congestion charge south of 60th
Street in Manhattan. San
Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle and other U.S. cities are
considering it.
Economists have been
promoting congestion
charges for years, said Matthew Turner, an economist
at Brown University, especially now that the widespread adoption of transponders and GPS systems has
removed some of the technological obstacles.
“The technology has gotten better and we’ve gotten
more experienced with it, so
now it’s a pretty natural
thing to do,” Mr. Turner
said.
Another boost came in the
form of a $250 million con-
gestion-relief grant program
in the infrastructure bill
passed by the Senate with
bipartisan support and now
before the House of Representatives. The legislation
specifically says the money
can be used to develop congestion-pricing programs
like the one now being considered in New York. The
money can be used both for
studies and for implementation.
I
f the programs are new,
the economic rationale
behind them is not. As
far back as 1920, British
economist Arthur Pigou
noted that each driver on a
road imposes costs on other
drivers. Those costs are
borne by all drivers in the
form of traffic congestion.
The better way, Mr. Pigou
argued, is to charge each
driver a toll for the burden
he or she places on all the
other drivers, which economists call “negative externalities.” The toll would have to
be high enough that it would
discourage many people
from driving and hold down
congestion. The remaining
drivers would then pay the
real value of driving in freeflowing traffic.
“There’s not a lot of economists’ division on this principle,” said Edward Glaeser,
a Harvard University econo-
Average taxi speeds in
Manhattan’s central
business district
10.0 miles per hour
7.5
5.0
2.5
0
2010
'15
'20
Note: The central business district
encompasses the area south of 60th Street.
Source: New York City Department of
Transportation
mist. “The basic idea that
you get to the right outcomes only if you charge
people for the externalities
they create, that’s pretty canonical within the profession.”
That doesn’t mean it’s
easy to put into practice.
New York’s plan has attracted vociferous opposition, particularly from New
Jersey politicians, many of
whose constituents commute
to New York City by car.
In April, Reps. Josh Gottheimer and Bill Pascrell Jr.,
both New Jersey Democrats,
wrote to Transportation Sec-
retary Pete Buttigieg opposing New York’s congestion
charge proposal, saying that
New Jersey commuters already pay tolls to cross the
bridges and tunnels into
New York. The fee, they
wrote, would “damage the
regional economy at a precarious moment.”
New York state lawmakers
signed off on the city’s congestion charge in 2019 and
the federal Department of
Transportation recently gave
its permission to begin an
environmental study of the
congestion charge. The city’s
public transit agency, which
would run the program, estimates the study would take
about 16 months, after which
it could take almost a year
to set up the program.
E
conomists say congestion charge programs
need to be carefully
administered to avoid harming lower-income commuters
more than higher-income
ones. In London, for instance, where lower-income
households tend to not have
cars, city officials ramped up
bus service at the same time
as the charge was imposed.
“You’re saying to people
you have an alternative
which we’d like you to use,”
said Christina Calderato,
head of strategy and planning for London’s transpor-
tation agency. “Doing one
before the other doesn’t give
people much of a choice.”
In New York, revenue
from the charge would go toward maintaining and expanding the transit system,
but it is unclear whether bus
and subway service would
expand when the charge is
put in place.
“You want to make sure
that the money that’s being
paid is going to be going to
things that offset the downsides of congestion pricing
for the most vulnerable,” Mr.
Glaeser said.
That’s easier to do in cities with well-developed transit systems.
“The situation becomes
more difficult in places
where everybody drives, rich
and poor alike,” he said.
“New York is an easier test
case for that than, let’s say,
Houston.”
Another question is how
the pandemic will reshape
long-term travel patterns. If
downtown workers stay
home in large numbers, it
could hold down congestion
levels without resorting to
fees.
So far, there’s little evidence of that happening.
Traffic entering New York
City through crossings operated by the Port Authority of
New York and New Jersey is
back to pre-pandemic levels.
ECONOMIC
CALENDAR
Tuesday: China’s factory activity is forecast to expand at its
slowest pace in a year and a half
in August after extreme weather
and a resurgence of Covid-19
cases weighed on business activity. Economists expect the country’s official purchasing managers
index to reflect record rainfall in
central China at the end of July—
which wreaked havoc on the region’s economy and tangled supply chains—and sporadic virus
outbreaks that caused strict lockdowns in some cities.
Wednesday: The Institute for
Supply Management’s survey of
purchasing managers at U.S.
factories is expected to show activity expanded at a slower pace
in August than in July. The Delta
variant of Covid-19 has dented
demand for some goods and services, while bottlenecks in global
supply chains and trouble finding
workers have snarled production.
Thursday: The U.S. trade deficit likely narrowed in July as
American consumers shifted
spending toward in-person services and away from goods. Already, preliminary data for the
month showed imports of consumer goods declining as demand
softened.
Friday: The U.S. unemployment rate is expected to hit the
lowest level since the pandemic
started in the country, as employers likely added jobs at a solid
pace in August. Demand for labor
has been strong, though economists caution that a resurgence
of Covid-19 cases is an emerging
risk for the economic outlook and
their forecasts.
Fed Grapples With Rates and Maximum Employment
BY NICK TIMIRAOS
Federal Reserve officials are
talking more about how to define a fuzzy concept—maximum
employment—that will heavily
influence their thinking around
how much longer to keep interest rates near zero.
Favorable hiring conditions,
as seen in record levels of job
openings and job quitting, suggest “job seekers should help
the economy cover the considerable remaining ground to
reach maximum employment,”
Fed Chairman Jerome Powell
said in a speech Friday at the
Kansas City Fed’s annual economic policy symposium.
Assessing maximum employment, often described as the unemployment rate consistent
with stable inflation, will be a
delicate task for the Fed because officials concluded, in retrospect, that they overestimated it during the previous
expansion and possibly raised
interest rates too soon.
Their deliberations figure to
be more difficult now because
of how the Covid-19 pandemic
has upended normal economic
activity—for example, by making it harder to determine how
many people who left the labor
force last year will return.
“You still have the same challenge as last decade—in fact, a
greater challenge—of determining what maximum employment
looks like because of the immense disruption in the labor
market,” said Julia Coronado,
an economist who participated
in Friday’s virtual presentations,
where labor market dynamics
were a major focus.
Fed officials, investors and
others will closely parse a Labor
Department report to be released this week for details on
workforce growth, unemployment and hiring in August,
when the fast-spreading Delta
variant of the Covid-19 virus
cast new uncertainty over the
economic outlook.
For decades, Fed officials
were guided by a model that
said inflation would rise as unemployment fell below a certain
level, and as unemployment
rates approached those estimates, they raised interest rates
to pre-empt inflation.
At the Fed conference one
year ago, Mr. Powell unveiled a
new strategy designed to guard
against repeating the Fed’s earlier mistake by calling for the
central bank to allow unemployment to fall as low as possible
so long as prices didn’t rise too
far above the Fed’s 2% inflation
goal. To reinforce its new approach last year, the Fed laid
out three tests that would need
to be met before raising rates.
CORRECTIONS  AMPLIFICATIONS
Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois is a Republican. The
“Word on the Street” column in
Review on Saturday incorrectly
identified him as a Democrat.
In some editions Saturday,
a photo caption with an Afghanistan Crisis article about
U.S. military personnel who
were killed in Thursday’s Kabul airport attack misspelled
Marine Corps Lance Cpl. Kareem Nikoui’s surname as
Nikou. Also, in some editions
the last name of Regi Stone,
who spoke about Marine
Lance Cpl. Rylee McCollum,
was incorrectly given as
Strong in one reference.
Notice to readers
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84%
Share of adults 25 to 54 years old
who are working or seeking jobs is
rebounding but remains below its
pre-pandemic level.
83
82
81
80
2002
'05
'10
'15
'20
0
Total Nonfarm Payroll
Unemployment Rate
150 million
15 %
145
10
140
5
135
130
2007
0
'10
'15
'20
2007
'10
'15
'20
Note: Seasonally adjusted.
Sources: Labor Department via St. Louis Fed (labor force participation rate, payroll);
Labor Department (unemployment rate)
First, inflation would need to
rise to 2%. Second, inflation
would need to be expected to
run moderately above 2%.
Third, the labor market would
Investors
Signal
Caution
Continued from Page One
vance. But rallies in these socalled defensive sectors can
presage broader market retreats, investors said, potentially spelling out a fresh test
for a market whose post-pandemic rise has surprised many
stock-market bulls.
“When those sectors are doing well, as they’re doing now,
that tells you that the market is
bracing for either a slowdown
in the economy or some sort of
a correction in the broad market,” said Phil Orlando, chief
equity-market strategist at asset manager Federated Hermes.
The market has powered to
new highs through the pandemic, bolstered by aggressive
central-bank interventions, government stimulus and a vigorous earnings recovery. The U.S.
economy exceeded its pre-pandemic size in the second quarter of 2021, with S&P 500 companies’ profits rising 92% from
a year earlier, according to analyst projections on FactSet.
But as the second autumn of
the pandemic approaches with
no end in sight, questions
about the markets’ resilience
are coming to the fore.
need to approach conditions
consistent with maximum employment.
Prices surged this summer
due to disrupted supply chains,
shortages and a rebound in
travel, easily satisfying the Fed’s
first condition, and officials are
increasingly confident that they
will achieve the second.
Most of them had expected it
would take years rather than
months to meet the two inflation tests and didn’t expect to
be discussing what maximum
employment looks like so soon.
Mr. Powell said last month
the central bank considers a
wide range of data in determining what constitutes maximum
employment, including unemployment rates between different age groups and workforce
participation rates.
Several Fed officials, including Fed Vice Chairman Richard
Clarida, have said they think the
U.S. could reach maximum employment by next year. Treasury
Secretary Janet Yellen, a former
Fed chair, has a similar forecast.
Mr. Powell said earlier this
year the economy should be
able to return to the unemployment rates that prevailed before
the crisis, but he has shied away
recently from suggesting that
the U.S. can also return to the
labor-force participation rates it
achieved before the crisis.
Several Fed officials have
cautioned in recent weeks that
it may be difficult to return to
pre-pandemic labor market conditions. Dallas Fed President
S&P 500 sector performance
since the end of June
7.8%
Utilities
6.6
Healthcare
S&P 500
4.9
Source: FactSet
The S&P 500 has advanced
20% this year and set 52 record
closes—its highest number of
records in a calendar year
through the end of August, according to Dow Jones Market
Data. Valuations have edged
lower this year as earnings
soared but remain at historically high levels.
And the S&P 500 hasn’t experienced a 5% pullback since
October, the longest such respite since a stretch from June
2016 to early February 2018.
When the market has declined,
investors have seen it as a buying opportunity.
“Economic and earnings
growth will likely be very good
for the third quarter, but less
than the second and maybe a
little less than was expected,”
said Bob Doll, chief investment
officer at Crossmark Global Investments, which manages
about $5.8 billion.
Crossmark in recent months
bought shares of utilities and
healthcare stocks and trimmed
positions in consumer-discretionary and materials companies, he said.
The shift to defensive sectors in part reflects a retreat in
expectations for economic reopening. Recent surveys suggest the U.S. economic expansion slowed in August as the
spread of the Delta variant
drove up infections. Hospitalizations for Covid-19 in the U.S.
Rallies in so-called
defensive sectors
can presage broader
market retreats.
recently surpassed 100,000 for
the first time since January.
The shift in sentiment has
helped propel stocks such as
utility American Water Works
Co., healthcare operator HCA
Healthcare Inc. and grocery
chain Kroger Co. to doubledigit percentage gains in July
and August.
Healthcare stocks have relatively attractive valuations,
some investors said. The sec-
Robert Kaplan, in a recent interview, said he thinks the U.S.
has “lost somewhere between 4
or 4.5 million workers” due to
retirements or caregiving.
Mr. Kaplan thinks that could
lead to more persistent price
pressures as midsize and small
businesses, in particular, pass
along rising wages.
A separate group of Fed officials say it is too early to conclude that the pandemic will
fundamentally alter the labor
market. The current debates are
similar to those that followed
the 2007-09 recession, in which
many economists argued that
workers had lost skills and
weren’t likely to return to the
labor force, said San Francisco
Fed President Mary Daly in an
interview earlier this month.
Those people worried that
falling unemployment would
cause inflation to rise too much,
and said the Fed should raise interest rates to prevent that from
happening. Instead, as the labor
market tightened, many people
rejoined the workforce and inflation remained below 2%.
There were “a lot of theories
about why…we had reached full
employment, even though we
know now, in hindsight, that
that was completely false,” Ms.
Daly said.
—Charity L. Scott
contributed to this article.
tor traded late last week at
about 18 times its projected
earnings over the next 12
months, compared with about
21 times for the S&P 500, according to FactSet.
The utilities group, meanwhile, traded at 20 times projected earnings, a more modest
discount to the broad market,
but boasts a dividend yield of
3%—more than double that of
the S&P 500.
The recovery since last
year’s market low has been
marked by sharp rotations
among favored groups of
stocks. The energy sector was
once hot. Now, it has lost
ground this quarter, dropping
9.4% as oil prices retreated.
Early in the year, expectations for a powerful economic
rebound helped propel value
stocks to their largest lead over
technology and other growth
stocks in two decades. Then,
the spread of the Delta variant
and lackluster economic data
caused some investors to second-guess those wagers, and
big tech once again moved to
the top of the market.
Now, the economy is continuing to grow but at a slower
pace than some had anticipated, leading to the move into
defensive holdings.
“I think the market is going
to continue to plow forward,”
said Stephanie Lang, chief investment officer at wealth-management firm Homrich Berg.
“Investors are going to continue
to come in and buy the dip.”
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
Monday, August 30, 2021 | A3
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
U.S. NEWS
Former Coal Mine Shifts to Lavender
A West Virginia firm
cultivates the plant as
part of state effort to
reimagine its economy
ASHFORD, W.Va.—Charles
Bowman’s hands used to be
stained black with coal after
work. Now, they smell like lavender.
He is one of about 85 employees at Appalachian Botanical, a company that cultivates
lavender on a former surface
mine. Instead of coal, the company produces essential oils
and other scented products
and is part of a growing effort
in West Virginia to reimagine
an economy that is not dependent on coal.
Mr. Bowman, 54, said he
once made $37.50 an hour as
an electrician in an underground mine. Those jobs are
mostly gone. Now he makes
$11.50 an hour. Despite the pay
cut, working on a farm that has
doubled its acreage in the past
year makes him hopeful.
“A year ago I heard nothing
about lavender. Now it’s everywhere,” he said, standing on a
plateau surrounded by misty
ridges. “I think it’s going to get
competitive.”
Amid coal’s steady decline,
efforts are growing to repurpose former mines and lead
the way to diversifying the
state’s economy, creating jobs
and cleaning up the environment, while helping to revive
coalfield communities.
Other former surface mines
in southern West Virginia are
being used by a solar-installation company, a company that
uses aquaponics technology to
produce lettuce and tilapia,
and one building cabins for
tourists who visit ATV trails.
The infrastructure bill in
KRISTIAN THACKER FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
BY KRIS MAHER
Appalachian Botanical cultivates lavender on a former surface mine in Ashford, W.Va., to be used in essential oils and other scented products.
Congress currently would authorize $11.3 billion to pay for
the reclamation of abandoned
mine lands, with a significant
portion of that heading to
West Virginia.
“We could emerge five or 10
years from now with a diversified economy that supports
small towns in regions that
were supported solely by coal,”
said Evan Hansen, a Democratic state lawmaker and president of Downstream Strategies,
a
West
Virginia
environmental and economic
development consulting firm.
An estimated 550 square
miles of West Virginia have
been strip-mined, and less than
2% of that land has been redeveloped, according to Downstream Strategies. The sites of-
fer flat land and typically have
roads and access to water but
can also be remote.
Diversifying an economy
once powered by coal—by
turning mountains flattened by
mining into an economic
driver—is a tall order in a region that has been losing population and is still plagued by
the opioid epidemic.
Boone County, where Appalachian Botanical is located,
has lost nearly 15% of its population during the past decade.
In 2019, mines in the county
employed 775 workers, down
from 4,092 workers in 2010,
according to the latest available state records.
Since 2010, the county’s tax
revenue from coal has fallen
94%. County officials are now
focused on keeping the courthouse running, said Brett
Kuhn, a county commissioner
who teaches history at a local
high school. The county employs 74 people, half as many
as five years ago.
Jocelyn Sheppard, 61, president of Appalachian Botanical,
said the idea for the company
came from a 2017 demonstration project with funding from
the Appalachian Regional Commission and other groups to
see if lavender would grow on
a former mine.
Ms. Sheppard joined the
project as a grant writer. When
the plants flourished she saw
the commercial possibilities.
She asked the land company
involved in the project to identify another mine, and she got
support from the coal company
that had been reclaiming the
new site.
Despite having no farming
experience, Ms. Sheppard
signed a 15-year agricultural
lease and launched the company in 2018 with a seven-figure investment from a single
investor. When the Boone
County Economic Development
Corp. kicked in $5,000, she said
it was an important sign of local support.
She pays royalties to the
land company, while the coal
company, White Forest Resources, is saving money because it no longer has to plant
trees under its obligations with
the state to return the site to
productive use.
Jeff Wilson, president and
CEO of the coal company, said
he expects the lavender farm
to keep expanding. Access to
rail and electrical infrastructure could make other projects,
including manufacturing, attractive on former mines in the
state, he said.
Last year, U.S. coal production fell to 535 million tons, the
lowest level since 1965. Brandon Dennison, CEO of Coalfield
Development Corp., a nonprofit
aimed at diversifying the economy in southern West Virginia,
said he sees greater acknowledgment in the state that mining won’t return to past levels.
“When I started in 2010 nobody was talking about the end
of the coal industry,” Mr. Dennison said. “It’s a 180 from that
in the past few years.”
Crypto Firms’ Bid
To Tap Fed System
Meets Resistance
TARA ROSE WESTON FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
BY ANDREW ACKERMAN
Juel Burnette, who runs the Sioux Falls branch of 1st Tribal Lending, outside a home on Rosebud Reservation that the lender helped get.
Mortgages on Tribal Land Hard to Come By
BY BEN EISEN
SIOUX FALLS, S.D.—It usually takes a few months to write
a mortgage. It once took Juel
Burnette four years.
Mr. Burnette runs the Sioux
Falls branch of 1st Tribal Lending, one of the few firms that
specialize in making home
loans on Native American reservations. The byzantine process
winds through two federal
agencies and tribal governments before it even reaches
the banking system. Most lenders don’t even attempt it.
Mr. Burnette tells aspiring
homeowners to buckle up. “We
talk through the hurdles with
them,” he said.
America’s tribal lands, home
to more than a million people,
are often credit deserts, lacking
the access to capital necessary
to make homeownership a reality for the Native Americans
who desire to live on them.
Traditional mortgages in the
U.S. are secured by two valuable pieces of collateral: the
home itself and the land on
which it sits. But in Indian
Country, swaths of land are
held in trust, preventing lenders from staking a claim if the
homeowner stops paying.
There is a workaround, but it
is complicated. Obtaining the
necessary approvals can take
years, even for borrowers working with experienced lenders
like Mr. Burnette. It is one reason Native Americans are less
likely to be homeowners: Some
57% of Native Americans owned
homes in 2019, versus 72% of
whites, according to the Minneapolis Fed’s Center for Indian
Most Renters
Are Eager to Buy
Indian Country needs tens
of billions of dollars of new
housing, according to the Center for Indian Country
Development. As a result,
overcrowding is common and
homes are sometimes in poor
condition.
A recent survey showed
most of the renters on tribal
land would like to own their
own homes. Housing counselors say younger residents are
most eager to buy.
Country Development.
“When it’s easier to violate
indigenous people’s rights by
building pipelines through our
land, by mining uranium on our
land, than it is to get a mortgage, you know something is
wrong,” said Nick Tilsen, a
member of the Oglala Lakota
Nation and president of NDN
Collective, a nonprofit that does
grass-roots organizing and
makes grants and loans to indigenous-led organizations.
The U.S. financial system has
built a well-oiled machine for
extending credit to high-earning Americans with conventional finances. The machine
sputters when confronted with
borrowers on the margins,
making it tougher to attain
homeownership and its wealthbuilding potential.
Still, there is some optimism
in Indian Country that change
is afoot. Deb Haaland this year
The Lakota Federal Credit
Union, based on the Pine Ridge
Reservation to the west of
Rosebud, started making home
loans in the past year. The
credit union has made four so
far, with interest rates ranging
from 6% to 8%.
Tawney Brunsch, who chartered the credit union through
her nonprofit lender, Lakota
Funds, hopes that its roughly
$6 million in deposits will give it
firepower to make more loans.
“We’re creating all of our
own options because that’s
what we have to do,” said Ms.
Brunsch, a member of the
Oglala Lakota Nation.
became the first Native American to lead the U.S. Department
of Interior, which oversees the
Bureau of Indian Affairs. Marcia
Fudge, the secretary of Housing
and Urban Development, spoke
about mortgage access on reservations during her confirmation hearing. Two senators introduced legislation in June to
expand mortgage credit on reservations through the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Getting credit flowing is a
tall task. Last year, lenders
packaged up and sold less than
$900 million of loans through
the federal program that supports American Indian home
buyers, a tiny fraction of the $4
trillion-plus U.S. mortgage market, according to industry research firm Inside Mortgage Finance.
The Section 184 Indian Home
Loan Guarantee Program, administered by HUD, was estab-
lished in the 1990s to jumpstart the flow of mortgage
capital to American Indian communities.
“We put significant priority
on strengthening the [Section
184] program resources while
working across HUD and Ginnie
Mae, along with other federal
agencies to advance this work,”
a HUD spokeswoman said. A
Department of Interior spokesman declined to comment.
The program allows a loan to
be made against land leased
from the trust. (It can also be
used by American Indians on
nontrust land.) Obtaining that
ground lease requires permission from both the tribal leadership on the reservation and
the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
Both parties also must approve
the sale of an owner-occupied
house on leased land.
It took more than a year for
T.J. Plenty Chief to get a lease
to build a home on North Dakota’s Fort Berthold Reservation. He spent about four
months obtaining the various
approvals from the Bureau of
Indian Affairs and his tribes,
the Mandan, Hidatsa and
Arikara Nation.
But then he learned the lease
wasn’t written in a way that
would be acceptable for a federal guarantee on his loan from
HUD. He had to go back through
the approval process again,
which finished late last year.
Though he is now ready to
take on the mortgage from 1st
Tribal, the cost of lumber and
other materials has risen so
much that Mr. Plenty Chief
fears he can no longer afford to
build. The project is on hold.
Cryptocurrency companies
want to tap into the Federal
Reserve payments systems that
traditional banks use to move
money around quickly. The
banks are pushing back.
The companies include
Avanti Bank, which aims to
provide custody services for
institutional investors in cryptocurrencies, and Kraken, a
cryptocurrency exchange platform. They say direct access to
the Fed’s payment systems
would allow them to more
quickly and cheaply process orders from customers buying
and selling digital assets. Currently they must partner with
traditional banks that have accounts with the Fed.
Traditional banks say the
newer financial firms are supervised relatively lightly and
lack the internal controls
needed to ensure against
money laundering and other illicit activities—concerns that
regulators have expressed
about the crypto industry more
broadly. And they say the firms
are riskier because they aren’t
insured by the Federal Deposit
Insurance Corp.
“It is reasonable to expect
that such applicants will pose
heightened risks regarding
matters of anti-money-laundering, cybersecurity and consumer protection, as well as
safety and soundness,” the
Bank Policy Institute, which
represents large banks, and the
Independent Community Bankers of America wrote in a letter
to the Fed last month.
Avanti and Kraken, which
both have “special purpose”
bank charters in Wyoming, say
they have all the same compliance, controls and supervisory
requirements of traditional
banks. The only U.S. bank regulator that has a supervisory
exam manual for crypto is in
Wyoming, they say.
If they have their way on access to the Fed’s payment systems, that could encourage
more firms to follow their example, introducing more competition for banks.
“It has the potential to reduce banks’ traditional role as
gatekeepers and toll collectors
for payment flows that are
likely to grow over time,” said
Jonah Crane, a partner at Klaros Group, an advisory and investment firm.
Last year, the central bank
processed about $900 trillion
in payments on its systems.
These ranged from small bankto-bank payments such as direct deposits or automatic bill
payments to large wire transfers between financial institutions.
The struggle over access to
the Fed’s payment systems also
reflects incumbent banks’ concerns about potential competition from larger tech companies, such as Facebook Inc. and
Google parent Alphabet Inc.,
which don’t face the same level
of federal bank regulation.
“They have some reason to
be paranoid,” said Eugene Ludwig, a former comptroller of
the currency, who was responsible for the regulation of large
national banks.
Caitlin Long, chief executive
of Avanti, said granting direct
access to the Fed’s payment
systems to banks that cater to
Traditional banks,
newer firms struggle
over access to Fed’s
payment systems.
the digital asset sector should
be welcomed because doing so
would bring them under the
watchful eyes of regulators.
“The absence of action to
open a direct path has pushed
much of the U.S. dollar banking
of the digital asset industry
into the ‘shadow’ banking system, which means risks cannot
be readily monitored,” she
wrote in a July comment letter.
Kraken describes itself as
just as safe as an FDIC-insured
bank because it doesn’t lend
out depositors’ money and
holds 100% of their cash at a
correspondent bank or at the
Fed, via its correspondent institution.
“I agree these banks need to
have a bank-grade supervisory
and oversight program,” said
David Kinitsky, chief executive
of Kraken Bank, a wholly
owned unit of Kraken. “We do.”
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
A4 | Monday, August 30, 2021
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THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
*****
U.S. NEWS
BY ROBBIE WHELAN
were drawn by sky-high pay
and the chance to help hardhit communities like New York
City. Others left the profession
after long months treating
critically ill patients.
Fueled by intense demand,
and paid for in part with federal emergency funding to hospitals, travel-nurse pay has
skyrocketed. In December 2019,
average gross weekly wages for
a travel nurse were around
$1,600 a week, according to
data from Vivian Health, a
healthcare recruiting company.
One year later, average pay
was more than $3,500 a week.
After declining from a winter peak, pay is rising again as
the Delta variant rages through
states with lower vaccination
rates. Average weekly gross
wages for a registered nurse
working on a travel contract in
the U.S. rose to $2,597 in early
August, the highest rates since
February, Vivian Health said.
High crisis pay is exacerbating a chronic shortage of
permanent medical staff
across the country, which predates the pandemic and extends to all parts of the
healthcare system. Hospital
Before the coronavirus pandemic, Ivette Palomeque made
$45 an hour on a flexible schedule as a staff intensive-care
nurse at Memorial Hermann
Health System in Houston.
Today, she earns $120 an
hour working in an ICU in
McAllen, Texas, the latest in a
string of “travel nurse” jobs
she has held over the past 16
months. The journey has taken
her from Miami to New York
City and back to Texas.
She plans to work high-paid
crisis contracts as long as she
can. Nursing pay may never be
this good again, she said, and
persistent understaffing means
that working conditions for
staff nurses aren’t likely to improve.
“Going back to a staff job is
just not an option,” said Ms.
Palomeque, 45 years old. “Absolutely not.”
The pandemic has altered
the labor market for nurses
and other medical staff. As
Covid-19 spread in spring
2020 and filled emergency
rooms with sick patients,
thousands of hospital staffers
Hurricane
Ida Slams
Louisiana
Ivette Palomeque more than doubled her pay when she left her staff position for travel-nurse jobs.
permanent reset of wages for
all nurses, said April Kapu,
president of the American Association of Nurse Practitioners.
“This pandemic has highlighted how important nurses
are to the workforce, so bringing their pay in alignment with
the market is more important
than ever,” Ms. Kapu said.
Rachel Norton, a registered
nurse from Albany, N.Y., took a
temporary travel assignment in
Denver in mid-2019. When the
pandemic hit, the hospital in
Denver offered her a $1,000
weekly bonus to extend the assignment, and she accepted.
How the 133-mile Greater New Orleans
storm-risk reduction system has been fortified
since hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005
Lake Pontchartrain
ST. CHARLES PARISH
Since then she has taken crisis
assignments in Arizona and
California as well, and doesn’t
plan to return to the East Coast.
“Once nurses are done with
a crisis contract, they don’t
want to go back to the bedside
where they know they’re going
to be short-staffed and underpaid,” Ms. Norton said.
Some hospitals are offering
once unheard-of signing bonuses for nurses who accept
longer assignments: $40,000 at
Monument Health’s hospital in
Rapid City, S.D., $20,000 at
Temple University Hospital in
Philadelphia, and $10,000 at St.
Charles Health in Bend, Ore.,
according to the hospitals.
Allegheny Health Network
in Pittsburgh is offering
$15,000 bonuses to nurses
who sign long-term contracts.
Chief Nurse Executive Claire
Zangerle said the system and
many other hospitals can’t
match the pay and benefits,
such as vacation time, that
some staffing agencies offer.
“Most of us are not-forprofit, and these labor costs are
not in our budgets,” she said.
“We’re desperate for nurses.”
—Melanie Evans
contributed to this article.
Levees
Floodwalls
Pumping stations
Major breaches during
Hurricane Katrina
Outfall canals
Surge barriers
A new system allows storm water to
leave the city's drainage canals while
blocking lake water from entering.
Two major projects totaling about
$1.5 billion now protect against
storm surge from nearby lakes.
Seabrook
Floodgate
Complex
Louis
Armstrong
New Orleans
Airport
Lake
Borgne
Surge
Barrier
Wall
JEFFERSON PARISH
NEW ORLEANS
Mississippi R.
Lake Borgne
Lower
Ninth Ward
French
Quarter
ST. BERNARD PARISH
3 miles
3 km
Pumping stations
West Closure Complex
An $85 million
overhaul has improved
equipment and
increased staffing.
The nearly $1 billion facility includes the
world’s largest drainage pump system and
provides the first line of defense from storm
surge entering canals to the city’s south.
Levee and floodwall upgrades
In addition to widening and raising many of the
structures, the Army Corps has installed grass,
large rocks and other measures to reduce erosion,
a primary cause of levee failure.
Source: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
Potential storm surge flooding
Expected feet of water through Thursday
3 feet
6
9
Leveed areas
MISSISSIPPI
LOUISIANA
Baton Rouge
MARK FELIX/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES
Continued from Page One
“For most of the state, current weather conditions are
only the very beginning of
what’s to come,” he wrote in a
tweet Sunday afternoon.
Katrina, which made landfall
on Aug. 29, 2005, as a Category 3 hurricane, killed more
than 1,800 people and caused
more than $100 billion in property damage, largely because
of the failure of levees that led
to catastrophic flooding.
A major concern of Ida was
whether a $14.6 billion hurricane risk-reduction system put
in place since Katrina would
withstand the storm’s surges.
Mr. Edwards, a Democrat, said
there would be some overtopping of levees but that levee
failures weren’t expected.
Still, even damage less severe than a full breach could
have devastating effects, said
Andy Horowitz, an associate
professor of history at Tulane
University in New Orleans and
author of “Katrina: A History,
1915-2015.” “Many people may
die from flooding and drown in
their homes if the system is
overtopped even if the walls
don’t fall down,” he said.
The hurricane comes as Louisiana hospitals are already
burdened with Covid-19 patients. Cases from the highly
contagious Delta variant have
surged in the state, and officials cautioned that any casualties from the storm would further strain the system. Some
residents cited that risk as an
additional reason for evacuating.
Speaking at the headquarters
of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, President Biden also urged residents to take
precautions. He said the federal
government was working to
open dozens of shelters and
was prepared to distribute 2.5
million meals and 3 million liters of water. He signed emergency declarations for Louisiana and Mississippi.
In New Orleans, with many
locals gone when the storm arrived, shops and restaurants in
the famed French Quarter were
boarded up as wind gusts buffeted the city. The Mississippi
River near Jackson Square was
roiling. Winds coming from the
Gulf reversed the river’s direction, which officials said wasn’t
uncommon for a storm of this
magnitude.
Zach Harrison, 25 years old,
a Tulane’s School of Social
Work student, said he decided
to shelter in place with two
friends in Mid-City but now regretted the decision. They
cooked 5 pounds of shrimp and
listened to Van Morrison until
the power went out Sunday afternoon.
“I’m worried about the wind
blowing the roof off. I’m also
worried about extreme flooding,” Mr. Harrison said. “I
stayed because of indecisiveness. By the time you realize
it’s really, really bad, it’s Sun-
leaders expect their labor
crunch to persist long after
the pandemic has calmed.
At Harris Health System in
Houston, vacancy across 2,200
bedside nursing positions is
about 22%, up from 8% before
the pandemic. Harris Health
said in mid-August that it
would raise pay for all emergency-department and adultICU nurses to $140 an hour
until staffing levels stabilize.
“The hospital is not going
to be able to survive on hiring
travel nurses in perpetuity,”
said Maureen Padilla, Harris
Health’s senior vice president
for nursing services.
Shortages have created a
skills gap at Harris Health, Ms.
Padilla said: Inexperienced
nurses are helping with more
complex care, leading to
higher risk of mistakes.
Hospitals have reported
chronic nurse shortages for
several years. The National Institutes of Health estimates
that there was a shortage of
about one million nurses in
the U.S. in 2020.
The added pressure from the
pandemic and high pay rates
for travel nurses could spur a
VERÓNICA G. CÁRDENAS FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
High Pay for Nurses
Fuels Staffing Woes
New Orleans
Gulf of Mexico
A firefighter walks in the rain on a road in Bourg, La., as Hurricane Ida passes through Sunday.
Source: NOAA
day already.”
Ida had intensified early
Sunday to a Category 4 hurricane, after crossing the warmest and deepest part of the Gulf
of Mexico, the National
Weather Service in New Orleans said.
The region was expected to
see rainfall of as much as 20
inches or more. A surge of 12
feet to 16 feet was expected between Port Fourchon and the
mouth of the Mississippi River.
Tornadoes were possible from
Louisiana to the Florida panhandle.
The weather service also issued an extreme wind warning
for areas near New Orleans on
Sunday.
“If you are under a mandatory evacuation…LEAVE NOW!”
the weather service in New Orleans warned Saturday evening.
“You do not want to play
expected to get 10 feet of
storm surge, Howard Russell,
65, said he was planning to
stay home Sunday, even though
his daughter Gabrielle Russell,
a 23-year-old nursing student,
evacuated from New Orleans to
Kingwood, Texas.
Ms. Russell said she was
worried about her father staying in the house where she
grew up because there is a lake
beyond their backyard. “We’ll
be experiencing quite a few
feet of water. You just never
know how much rain can build
up,” she said.
Her father boarded up its
front door and planned to
watch the news Sunday. He
said he had enough gas to run
his generator for a week and
supplies to last a month. But
he was still hoping that the
storm would pass and that he
would be able to drive to work
around with your life, and it is
not worth it to stay if you have
the means to leave.”
Restaurants, bars and other
businesses in and around New
Orleans had been closed since
Saturday afternoon. Many were
boarded up and fortified with
sandbags as early as Saturday.
Even 24-7 dive bars such as
Ms. Mae’s and Brothers 3
closed Saturday morning. Only
a Walmart, a Winn-Dixie and a
few other stores were open
Saturday in the city’s uptown
neighborhood.
Many people in low-lying areas had moved their cars to
higher ground. By Saturday
night, only a few people
strolled down Bourbon Street
in the normally packed French
Quarter.
Austin Lane, 38, who owns a
Mexican restaurant called El
Cucuy, planned to ride out the
storm Sunday just to the north
in Carriere, Miss. He drove out
of New Orleans on Saturday afternoon with his girlfriend,
Meghan Ackerman, 40, their
four dogs, two cats and two
chickens.
Most of his 19 employees
also evacuated, some to Houston and one to as far away as
Missouri, he said.
The couple brought a generator, headlamps, candles, sausage and two crates of water.
As the hurricane pounded their
shelter, they brought the chickens inside and cracked open a
bottle of bourbon.
“By no means is it a supersafe destination,” Mr. Lane
said. “It’s still in the path of
the hurricane. It’s just the best
I could do after I got my people
out and could lock the place
up.”
In Houma, La., which was
Monday morning.
“It’s not my first rodeo,” Dr.
Russell said. “My biggest fears
are all my shingles coming off
my roof.”
Ida’s path made it a threat
to the vast oil-refining and petrochemical complex along the
Gulf Coast, which produces
some 4.4 million barrels a day
of refining capacity, almost a
quarter of the nation’s total.
Oil companies in the Gulf of
Mexico account for about 17%
of U.S. oil production and 5% of
natural gas output.
As of Sunday, Gulf offshore
producers had shut about 96%
of their oil production and 94%
of gas output, according to the
Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement.
Before the storm reached
the Louisiana coast, oil refiners
in the region had also reduced
refining capacity.
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THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
Monday, August 30, 2021 | A5
OBITUARY
CALIFORNIA
Ed Asner, Lou Grant
On TV, Dies at 91
Caldor Fire Moves
Toward Lake Tahoe
Ed Asner, the burly and prolific character actor who became
a star in middle age as the gruff
but lovable newsman Lou Grant,
first in the hit comedy “The
Mary Tyler Moore Show” and
later in the drama “Lou Grant,”
died Sunday. He was 91.
Mr. Asner’s representative
confirmed the actor’s death. Mr.
Asner’s official Twitter account
included a note from his children: “We are sorry to say that
our beloved patriarch passed
away this morning peacefully.”
The balding Mr. Asner was a
journeyman actor in films and
TV when he was hired in 1970
to play Lou Grant on “The Mary
Tyler Moore Show.” For seven
seasons he was the rumpled
boss to Ms. Moore’s ebullient
Mary Richards at the fictional
Minneapolis TV newsroom
where both worked. Later, he
would play the role for five
years on “Lou Grant.”
The part brought Mr. Asner
three best supporting actor Emmys on “Mary Tyler Moore” and
two best actor awards on “Lou
Grant.” He also won Emmys for
his roles in the miniseries “Rich
Man, Poor Man” and “Roots.”
He had more than 300 acting
credits and remained active
throughout his 70s and 80s in a
variety of film and TV roles.
As Screen Actors Guild president, the liberal Mr. Asner was
caught up in a political controversy in 1982 when he spoke
out against U.S. involvement
with repressive governments in
Latin America.
Mr. Asner remained politically
active for the rest of his life and
in 2017 published the book “The
Grouchy Historian: An Old-Time
Lefty Defends Our Constitution
Against Right-Wing Hypocrites
and Nutjobs.”
—Associated Press
Rising temperatures and increasing winds on Sunday added
to the challenges faced by firefighters battling blazes across
Northern California, including one
that continued its march toward
the Lake Tahoe resort region.
“It is going to be the hottest
day so far since the fire began,
and unfortunately, probably the
driest,” said Isaac Lake, a
spokesman for crews battling
the two-week-old Caldor Fire.
Flames churned through
mountains just a few miles
southwest of the Tahoe Basin,
where thick smoke sent tourists
packing at a time when summer
vacations would be in full swing.
Triple-digit temperatures
were possible and the extreme
heat was expected to last several days, Mr. Lake said. A redflag warning for critical fire conditions was issued for Monday
and Tuesday across the Northern Sierra.
Crews working in rugged terrain worked to douse spot fires
caused by erratic winds.
The blaze that broke out Aug.
14 was 19% contained after
burning nearly 245 square
miles—an area larger than Chicago. More than 600 structures
have been destroyed and at least
18,000 more were under threat.
Meanwhile, California’s Dixie
Fire, the second-largest in state
history at 1,193 square miles,
was 48% contained in the SierraCascades region. Nearly 700
homes were among almost
1,300 buildings that have been
destroyed since the fire began in
early July.
—Associated Press
EVERETT COLLECTION
U.S. WATCH
Ed Asner in 1977. He played Lou Grant on two shows and won five of his seven Emmys for the role.
OUR
NEW
KENTUCKY
HOME
CAPE CANAVERAL
SpaceX Launches
Shipment to Station
A SpaceX shipment of ants,
avocados and a human-size robotic arm rocketed toward the
International Space Station on
Sunday.
The delivery—due to arrive
Monday—is the company’s 23rd
for NASA in just under a decade.
A recycled Falcon rocket
blasted into the predawn sky
from NASA’s Kennedy Space
Center. After hoisting the
Dragon capsule, the first-stage
booster landed upright on
SpaceX’s newest ocean platform.
The Dragon is carrying more
than 4,800 pounds of supplies
and experiments, and fresh food
including avocados, lemons and
even ice cream for the space
station’s seven astronauts.
The Girl Scouts are sending
up ants, brine shrimp and plants
as test subjects, while University
of Wisconsin-Madison scientists
are flying up seeds from mouseear cress, a small flowering
weed used in genetic research.
—Associated Press
PRATT INDUSTRIES
announces its new $400M
100% recycled Paper Mill
in Kentucky
WISCONSIN
Man Shot by Police
Hopes to Walk Again
A Black man who was left
paralyzed from the waist down
after he was shot by a white police officer in Wisconsin expects
to be walking soon, an accomplishment he says is tempered
by fears of it happening again.
Jacob Blake Jr. was shot
seven times by a Kenosha police
officer in August 2020.
Mr. Blake told CNN he was
able to take a few steps during
his son’s birthday celebration
this past week, which he compared with sliding his legs
through a woodchipper.
“Yeah, I’m here, and yeah I’m
about to be walking, but I really
don’t feel like I have survived
because it could happen to me
again,” Mr. Blake told the network. “I have not survived until
something has changed.”
Mr. Blake was shot by Kenosha police Officer Rusten Sheskey after he and two other Kenosha officers tried to arrest
Blake on an outstanding warrant. A pocketknife fell from Mr.
Blake’s pants during a scuffle.
He said he picked it up before
heading to a vehicle to drive
away with two of his children in
the back seat. He said he was
prepared to surrender once he
put the knife in the vehicle. Officer Sheskey, who wasn’t
charged, told investigators that
he feared for his own safety.
The shooting touched off
chaotic protests in the Kenosha
area, during which time an Illinois teenager allegedly shot and
killed two demonstrators and
wounded another.
—Associated Press
Sketch of our State-of-the-Art
450,000-square-foot
Paper Mill in Henderson, Kentucky.
Thank You
Governor Andy Beshear
www.prattindustries.com
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
A6 | Monday, August 30, 2021
* ***
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
THE AFGHANISTAN CRISIS
Americans Uneasy on Exit
Most back withdrawal
after 20 years of war,
but split on how much
blame Biden deserves
By Catherine Lucey in
Philadelphia and
Joshua Jamerson in St.
Marys, Ga.
Ms. Garcia, a 49-year-old
customer-service
manager
from South Philadelphia who
voted for Mr. Biden, said the
president “got stuck with a lot
of it” and “did the best with
the information he had.” Mr.
Montani, 60, a retired financial
adviser from Valley Forge who
didn’t cast a vote for president
in 2020, said Mr. Biden “hasn’t
come out and explained or defended or taken responsibility
for what appears to be a logistical disaster.”
Their comments reflect the
mixed feelings of many Americans as they follow what has
quickly become the greatest
foreign-policy challenge of Mr.
Biden’s presidency. Interviews
conducted both before and after Thursday’s deadly bombing
with more than two dozen
Americans in Georgia and
Pennsylvania, two states pivotal to Mr. Biden’s election victory, captured broad support
for leaving Afghanistan, but
more mixed views on the exit
itself. Many of the responses
fell along party lines.
A CBS News/YouGov survey
taken Aug. 18-20 found that
while 63% of adults backed the
decision to withdraw troops
from Afghanistan, 70% thought
the removal should have been
handled better.
An ABC News/Ipsos poll
BY ALEX LEARY
AND NANCY A. YOUSSEF
WAKIL KOHSAR/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES
Daniella Garcia and Robert
Montani both think it is past
time for U.S. troops to withdraw from Afghanistan. But
the two Pennsylvanians diverge on how much blame to
put on President Biden for the
messy exit.
Troops’ Remains
Return Home
A Taliban fighter stood guard at the site of Thursday’s deadly attack at the Kabul airport.
conducted Aug. 27-28, after
the bombing, found that 84%
of adults believed U.S. troops
should stay in Afghanistan until all Americans have been
evacuated, and 71% said troops
should remain until all Afghans
who aided the U.S. have been
evacuated. The survey found
59% of adults disapproved of
Mr. Biden’s handling of Afghanistan while 38% approved—down from 55% who
approved in a late July poll.
The Afghanistan exit comes
as Mr. Biden’s administration
is already battling with rising
Covid-19 cases and has drawn
criticism of his judgment and
leadership from Republicans
and some fellow Democrats.
Some people said they
weren’t following the situation
closely, and others made clear
that Afghanistan wasn’t their
top priority. “I’m not worried
about it. I’m trying to get the
U.S. going—and out of Covid,”
said Jackie Strong of St.
Marys, Ga. A retired teacher’s
aide, Ms. Strong said Mr. Biden, whom she supports, was
“doing the best he can do” in
Afghanistan.
Since his 2020 campaign,
Mr. Biden has pitched himself
as an experienced and empathetic leader, seeking to present a steady contrast to the
unpredictable policy-making of
former President Donald
Trump. The deadly Afghanistan exit poses a threat to that
image, political operatives in
both parties say, and could distract from his priorities: battling a new wave of Covid-19
infections and advancing new
spending proposals to address
infrastructure and poverty.
The president’s advisers argue that leaving Afghanistan is
broadly popular, and Democrats maintain that the economy and Covid-19 will be the
leading issues in next year’s
midterm elections. Democrats
hold a narrow majority in the
House and control the evenly
divided Senate, putting Mr. Biden’s party at risk of losing
legislative power in next year’s
elections.
Mr. Biden spoke from the
White House on Thursday to
address the suicide bombing at
the airport in Kabul that killed
13 Americans and almost 200
Afghans. He again defended his
decision to exit, saying it was
“time to end a 20-year war.”
White House spokesman
Andrew Bates said the public
agrees “with the president’s
decision that it would have
been unjust and not in our interest to commit American
troops to more intense fighting.”
Some Americans interviewed said the president’s
handling of Afghanistan hadn’t
changed their views on his
leadership abilities.
“He’s still just an empathetic person,” said Serena
Sunflowers, a server and gigeconomy worker in St. Marys,
who added that she thought
Mr. Biden was showing that he
identified with families of
troops who hopefully would
get to come home. “If my husband was there right now, and
just got pulled out, I’d be so
happy about it,” said Ms. Sunflowers, a Democrat.
Joseph Ferrell, 32, a real-estate agent from Springfield,
Pa., who voted for Mr. Trump,
said the situation in Afghanistan was “horrible.”
“There should be an exit,
but you have to come up with
a plan,” he said.
The remains of 13 service
members killed in the suicide
bombing in Afghanistan last
week arrived at Dover Air
Force Base in Delaware on
Sunday, in a somber moment
that highlighted the human
toll of a nearly 20-year war
nearing its tumultuous end.
President Biden participated in a dignified transfer
ritual and met with families
of the fallen troops, whose
remains were carried off an
aircraft in flag-draped transfer cases.
The 13 service members
were remembered as brave
and committed by those who
knew them. Mr. Biden on Saturday called them “heroes
who made the ultimate sacrifice in service of our highest
American ideals and while
saving the lives of others.”
Joining Mr. Biden was first
lady Jill Biden and a large
group of officials including
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin; Army Gen. Mark Milley,
chairman of the Joint Chiefs
of Staff; Gen. David Berger,
the Marine Corps commandant; and Secretary of State
Antony Blinken.
Eleven of the transfers
were witnessed by reporters,
with the two others conducted in privacy at request
of family members. Sobbing
was audible to reporters as
the families looked on.
The president and others
walked to the ramp of a C-17
Globemaster that carried the
remains and held for a
prayer. Mr. Biden, wearing a
black mask, held a hand to
his heart as “present arms”
was called with each transfer
case and he occasionally lowered his head and closed his
eyes.
Troops in military fatigues,
wearing white gloves, carried
the cases to vans.
Some of the family members have been critical of Mr.
Biden’s withdrawal plan,
which has raised questions
from lawmakers in both parties. The president has
pushed for a withdrawal by
Aug. 31, saying the U.S.
shouldn’t risk more loss in a
nearly 20-year war.
The oldest of the service
members killed was 31 and
the most common age among
them was 20. Some of the
Americans killed were infants
on Sept. 11, 2001, when al
Qaeda operatives hijacked
four planes and attacked New
York and the Pentagon, killing
citizens there as well as in
Pennsylvania and leading to
the U.S. invasion into Afghan-
The 13 fallen service
members were
remembered as
brave and committed.
istan a month later.
The 13 service members
and nearly 200 Afghans were
killed Thursday when a suicide bomber detonated himself outside Abbey Gate at
Hamid Karzai International
Airport, where troops were
checking Afghans trying to
get a flight out of the country. The bombing was followed by gunfire from suspected militants, and Afghans
said some were killed by U.S.
military gunfire after the
bombing.
Another 20 troops and 300
Afghans were injured. It was
the deadliest attack on U.S.
troops in Afghanistan in a decade and the first U.S. military combat fatalities in Afghanistan since February
2020.
Continued from Page One
ously agreed upon by the Taliban before they would take
control of the airport in Kabul.
The drone took aim at a vehicle carrying suspected suicide bombers, the Pentagon
said. The U.S. believed it successfully struck the vehicle,
but couldn’t say how many
bombers were hit.
A senior Afghan health official who also worked with the
U.S.-backed government said
the strike killed five civilians
and hit a house. In a statement, U.S. Central Command,
which is responsible for military operations in Afghanistan, said it was aware of reports of civilian deaths from
the strike and is “still assessing the results of this strike.”
The Biden administration
said it remained committed to
Afghanistan, even as the U.S.
presence faded fast amid
mounting security concerns.
The U.S.’s final exit from Afghanistan raises the prospect
that thousands of Afghans who
worked alongside U.S. forces,
diplomats and humanitarian
groups could be left behind. It
also compromises the international community’s ability to
protect women and girls and
certain religious minorities,
which are considered particularly vulnerable to persecution
by the Taliban regime.
On Sunday, President Biden
and first lady Jill Biden met
with the grieving Gold Star
families of the 13 service members lost in a suicide bombing
outside the airport last week.
Later in the day, at a briefing on Hurricane Ida at FEMA
headquarters, Mr. Biden spoke
briefly about the deceased and
their families. “While we’re
praying for the best in Louisiana, let’s keep them in our
prayers as well,” said Mr. Biden, a Democrat. He declined to
take questions on Afghanistan.
Early Saturday, the U.S.
conducted airstrikes against
ISIS-K, the group that claimed
responsibility for Thursday’s
attack, killing two people
whom the Pentagon described
as a planner and a facilitator.
Mr. Biden warned on Saturday that another attack was
highly likely and said he or-
EPA/SHUTTERSTOCK
Drones
Target
Bombers
Smoke billowed near Kabul’s Hamid Karzai International Airport Sunday after U.S. drone strikes that targeted suspected suicide bombers ahead of the U.S. deadline to withdraw.
dered his military commanders
to “take every possible measure
to prioritize force protection.”
Almost all the remaining U.S.
Embassy staffers had already
packed up and left Kabul by
Sunday, to allow enough time
for thousands of U.S. personnel
and equipment to be sent home,
essentially bringing to an end
the potential for further mass
evacuations, a U.S. official said.
Fewer than half a dozen
consular-services people will
remain on a temporary basis
but their role in evacuating
any remaining applicants will
be limited, the official said.
On Sunday, Secretary of
State Antony Blinken all but
ruled out a U.S. diplomatic
presence in Afghanistan after
Tuesday. “That’s not likely to
happen,” he said on NBC, adding that the U.S. is committed
to helping people leave the
country before or after the
U.S. withdrawal.
In a joint statement on Sunday, the U.S. and nearly 100
countries declared their commitment “to ensuring that our
citizens, nationals and residents, employees, Afghans
who have worked with us and
those who are at risk can continue to travel freely to destinations outside Afghanistan.”
“We have received assurances from the Taliban that all
foreign nationals and any Afghan citizen with travel authorization from our countries
will be allowed to proceed in a
safe and orderly manner to
points of departure and travel
outside the country,” the
statement said.
President Emmanuel Macron of France said his administration is drafting a plan to
create a safe zone in Kabul
monitored by the United Nations that would allow evacuations and humanitarian operations to continue after
Tuesday’s deadline.
France and the U.K. are
planning to submit the plan to
the United Nations Security
Council when it meets on Monday, Mr. Macron said in an interview with the French publication Le Journal du Dimanche.
As of Sunday morning,
about 2,900 people were evacuated from Kabul over the previous 24-hour period, according to figures released by the
White House. Since Aug. 14,
the U.S. evacuated and facilitated the evacuation of around
114,400 people, including
nearly 5,500 U.S. citizens.
About 250 Americans have informed the administration that
they are still trying to leave
the country as of Sunday, the
State Department said.
In a new security alert issued early Sunday in Kabul,
the State Department advised
all U.S. citizens to immediately
leave three of the airport’s
gates and avoid traveling to
the airport, citing a “specific,
credible threat.” Hours later,
the Pentagon said it launched
a new set of attacks.
On Saturday, the Pentagon
released the names of the 13
Americans—11 Marines, a Navy
corpsman and an Army soldier—killed on Thursday in
Kabul when a suicide bomb
detonated outside the airport
gates. Another 20 service
members were wounded in the
attack that also killed more
than 200 Afghans.
The attack raised concern
about whether the Taliban
would work to prevent Afghanistan from once again becoming a haven for extremist
groups such as ISIS-K, which
in recent years had significantly increased in strength,
force size and capabilities by
obtaining supplies and recruits
through smuggling routes on
the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, despite the U.S. presence
in the country.
Since the fall of Kabul to
the Taliban on Aug. 15, which
happened faster than the administration or any U.S. intelligence assessments had predicted, the U.S. has been
forced to rely on the Taliban
to review paperwork, manage
crowds and help to handle security around the airport.
White House officials said
there was no evidence signaling
that the Taliban colluded with
ISIS-K perpetrators in Thurs-
day’s attack, but they remain
wary of possible collaboration.
“No one here trusts the Taliban. No one here is counting
on any words the Taliban offer,” Mr. Biden’s national-security adviser, Jake Sullivan, told
CNN on Sunday. “What we are
focused on is actions.”
Republicans have criticized
the Biden administration’s
handling of the U.S. pullout.
Sen. Mitch McConnell of
Kentucky, the chamber’s GOP
leader, said on Fox News on
Sunday that Afghanistan could
be “much worse” than the 1975
fall of Saigon “because after we
left Saigon, there weren’t Vietnamese terrorists who were
planning on attacking us here
at home.” “This is one of the
worst foreign-policy decisions
in American history,” he said.
Mr. Blinken said the U.S.
will retain the capacity “to
find and to take strikes
against terrorists who want to
do us harm.”
—Gordon Lubold, Alex Leary
and Andrew Ackerman
contributed to this article.
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THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
Monday, August 30, 2021 | A7
* *
THE AFGHANISTAN CRISIS
Opposition Resists Pressure From Taliban
Islamists urge leaders
in final outpost to join
new government, but
militias gird for battle
Taliban forces are closing in
on the one part of Afghanistan
they don’t control: the Panjshir Valley, near the imposing
Hindu Kush mountain range
north of Kabul. The Islamist
group is pressing opposition
leaders there to join a new
government, threatening a
military assault if they don’t.
Politicians in Panjshir—who
say they are backed by a militia of several thousand men,
bolstered by the remnants of
the Afghan army, and with military hardware such as helicopters—say they have rebuffed
Taliban overtures, which they
say fall short of the promises
of autonomy they want.
On Sunday, Taliban and
rebel forces skirmished just
outside the valley, a resistance
leader said. Families of valley
residents said the Taliban also
cut telephone and internet
connections to the valley. At
the same time, talks between
the two sides continued, officials in both camps said.
“The problem is that they
are unwilling to make any concessions. And we’re unwilling
to accept any type of political
system that isn’t inclusive,”
said Ali Nazary, head of foreign affairs for the rebels, who
call themselves the National
Resistance Front.
The standoff is a test of the
Taliban’s claim that, after seizing power, they seek an inclusive government that represents all the major groups in
Afghanistan. Several key government officials, including
Vice President Amrullah Saleh,
fled to Panjshir after the Taliban seized Kabul on Aug. 15.
Panjshir is home to the country’s Tajik ethnic minority.
The Taliban are offering
leaders in the valley “a position
in the emirate of the Taliban.
That’s all they’re offering,” said
JALALUDDIN SEKANDAR/ASSOCIATED PRESS
BY SAEED SHAH
AND EHSANULLAH AMIRI
Militia fighters loyal to Ahmad Massoud, son of the late mujahedeen commander Ahmad Shah Massoud, trained Sunday in Panjshir province, northeastern Afghanistan,
Ahmad Wali Massoud, a former
Afghan ambassador to London.
“That will not be good for Afghanistan at all.”
Mr. Massoud is also the
brother of the late Ahmad
Shah Massoud, who commanded a mujahedeen guerrilla
force that held out in his native
Panjshir against both the Taliban regime of the 1990s and
Soviet troops in the 1980s. The
guerrilla leader was assassinated by al Qaeda in 2001.
Armed resistance in the valley is now being led by Ahmad
Massoud, son of Ahmad Shah
Massoud. He doesn’t have
fighting experience but does
have veteran military commanders with him.
The Panjshir-based opposition says it is seeking a decentralization of power and a
meaningful inclusion of all of
Afghanistan’s ethnic groups.
The Taliban haven’t announced the form of the country’s new government. The Islamic Emirate that the Taliban
proclaimed in 1996, and in
whose name they rule now, had
a strongly centralized nature.
Almost all leadership positions
were held by ethnic Pashtuns,
Afghanistan’s biggest ethnic
group.
Relatives and aides of the
resistance trying to reach
them from outside Panjshir
Sunday said they weren’t able
to connect because phone and
internet links were down.
Habibi Samangani, a Taliban spokesman, said he wasn’t
aware of the communications
cutoff.
“The Panjshir Valley today is
not only a valley, it’s the center
and a safe haven and the capital for all of those that fear
[for] their lives, who are fearing Taliban terrorists and trying to get to somewhere to feel
safe,” Mr. Saleh told Fox News
on Friday.
Mr. Saleh, who proclaimed
himself a rightful president after President Ashraf Ghani fled
the country Aug. 15, is operating separately from the rebels
led by Mr. Massoud.
The mountains surrounding
the Panjshir Valley pose a challenge for would-be invaders. A
new road that enters a widened
mouth of the valley, however,
could make it harder to defend
than in the 1980s and 1990s.
Unlike that period, Panjshir
doesn’t have a supply route to
an international border and its
rebels lack outside support.
Russia’s ambassador in Kabul, Dmitry Zhirnov, said on
Saturday that the Taliban
could easily conquer Panjshir.
“The balance of military
forces is such that they could
take Panjshir in a day, maybe
even in a few hours, but they
don’t do this to avoid bloodshed,” Mr. Zhirnov said, according to Russian state news
agency TASS.
But Mr. Nazary said that
while the Taliban appeared
dominant, they were actually
stretched thin having to secure the whole country, including cities that are much
bigger than when the group
ruled in the 1990s. He said the
Taliban were stronger when
they came to power in 1996
than now, while Panjshir was
in a weaker position back then
but still managed to hold out.
“We’re confident that we
can resist them,” said Mr. Nazary. “If the Taliban do make
any provocative moves, then
the resistance is going to
spread, it’s not going to stay
just in Panjshir.”
Seeking Recognition, New Leaders Cash Crunch Looms
Amid a Brain Drain
Order Halt to Opium Production
Taliban leaders, seeking international acceptance after
seizing power in Afghanistan,
have told farmers to stop cultivating opium poppies, residents of some major poppygrowing areas say. This has
caused raw opium prices to
soar across the country.
Afghanistan’s new Taliban
administration faces an economic challenge that could
pose a threat to its rule, as
leaders struggle to keep the
lights on in a state that has
been gutted by four decades of
war, a fresh exodus of government officials and professionals, and the recent disconnection from the global financial
system.
By Sune Engel
Rasmussen,
Zamir Saar and James
Marson
Heroin use in Kabul. The Taliban are banning cultivation of poppies, the raw material for the narcotic.
same could undermine public
support for the group and deprive its new administration
of an important source of revenue at a time when Afghanistan is cut off from the global
financial system and foreign
aid.
An opium farmer in Kandahar, who attended a recent
meeting between villagers
and the Taliban, said in a
phone interview that farmers
were unhappy but would have
no choice but to obey if the
Taliban move to enforce the
prohibition.
“We can’t oppose the Taliban’s decision,” he said. “They
are the government.” The
farmer said the Taliban have
told people to grow other
crops, such as saffron.
“They’ve told us that when
we ban poppies, we’ll make
sure you have an alternative
crop.”
With Afghanistan’s rutted
roads, poor storage infrastructure and few export outlets, poppies are one of the
few cash crops available to local farmers. Saffron—which
used to be a key element of
U.S. counternarcotics efforts
in Afghanistan—is another,
but it is nowhere near as lucrative or as easy to sell.
“If the Taliban prohibit the
cultivation of poppy, people
will die from starvation, especially when international aid
stops,” a poppy farmer in the
Chora district of Uruzgan said
in a phone interview. “We still
hope they will let us grow
poppies. Nothing can compensate for the income we get
from growing poppies.”
When the Taliban were in
power before the 2001 U.S. invasion,
they
also
initially banned opium production, but later punished only
the consumption of drugs, not
their cultivation and trading.
The Taliban did, however,
dramatically crack down on
opium cultivation in 2000,
when they sought international acceptance for their regime.
After 2001, the U.S. spent
some $9 billion over 20 years
trying to prevent Afghanistan
from supplying the world
with heroin, to no avail.
Washington gave up on
eradication by 2010, partly
because the effort pushed
large parts of the rural population to join the Taliban. The
U.S. Agency for International
Development worked to persuade Afghan farmers to grow
saffron, pistachios or pomegranates instead. But export
opportunities for those products were scarce.
Last year, Afghan farmers
grew poppies on land four
times the size of what they
did in 2002. A new Taliban
opium prohibition could win
them a degree of gratitude
from foreign governments,
particularly in Europe, Russia
and Iran, the main markets
for Afghan heroin.
It could also be a political
risk for the group. The Taliban would need to contend
with potential discontent
caused by the country’s economic crisis.
With a U.S. freeze on central-bank assets and billions
of dollars in foreign aid drying up, the new Taliban authorities in Kabul are hard
pressed to stave off economic
collapse. Prices of basic commodities like cooking oil have
already surged, while imports
are growing scarce.
When banks in Kabul on
Sunday opened for the first
time since the Taliban takeover,
customers lined up before dawn
to withdraw cash, but said they
were told that they could only
take out $200 a week per customer. The central bank has
also ordered Afghan banks to
limit withdrawals from automated-teller machines outside
the country to $150 a day, a
branch manager of a private
bank in the capital said.
The Taliban last week appointed Haji Mohammad Idris,
who is said to have no formal
financial training but has acted
in senior financial positions in
the movement, as the new
governor of the central bank.
The former central bank
chief, Ajmal Ahmady, fled
when the Taliban rolled into
Kabul on Aug. 15. Mr. Ahmady
said the Taliban can access
only 0.1% to 0.2% of the cen-
AAMIR QURESHI/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES
PAULA BRONSTEIN FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
In recent days, Taliban representatives began telling
gatherings of villagers in the
southern province of Kandahar, one of the main opiumproducing regions, that the
crop—a crucial part of the local economy—would now be
banned.
This followed a statement
by Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid at an Aug. 18
news conference in Kabul that
the country’s new rulers
won’t permit the drug
trade. Mr. Mujahid at the time
didn’t offer details of how the
Islamist group intends to enforce the ban.
Local farmers in Kandahar,
Uruzgan and Helman provinces said raw opium prices
have tripled, from about $70
to about $200 per kilogram,
due to uncertainty about future production. In the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif, the
opium price has doubled, residents there said. Raw opium
is processed into heroin.
The Taliban have long been
one of the narcotics industry’s top beneficiaries, using
taxation of the drug business
to finance their 20-year insurgency, Western governments
say. Afghanistan accounts for
some 80% of the world’s illicit
opiates exports, and the
poppy-planting season starts
in about a month.
Two decades of U.S. attempts to curb Afghanistan’s
drug business have failed,
partly due to the huge political cost of alienating Afghan
farmers who depend on the
poppy crops for their livelihoods.
Taliban attempts to do the
By Sune Engel
Rasmussen,
Jalaluddin Nazari
and Nancy A. Youssef
tral bank’s reserves of $9 billion, as most of the bank’s assets are held in the U.S.
About 75% of the previous
government’s expenses were
footed by international partners, chiefly the U.S. The
World Bank and the International Monetary Fund suspended operations in Afghanistan after the Taliban toppled
the republic on Aug. 15. Prices
for food staples and fuel have
soared.
Since taking power, the Taliban have sought to persuade
technocrats and officials to
stay in their positions. Some,
including the mayor of Kabul,
remained in their jobs.
But many public servants
appear reluctant to return to
work. Public servants account
for a large share of the 110,000
people flown out of Afghanistan over the past two weeks.
“The whole system collapsed and many government
employees fled to other countries,” said Qasem, an employee of the ministry of commerce and industry in the
northern city of Mazar-eSharif who asked to be quoted
by his first name only.
“Out of 15 or 20 employees
in each department, I see two
or three of them present at
work. I personally go to work
and sign the attendance sheet
and leave because there is no
work to do and, more importantly, I don’t feel secure in
terms of my life and my financial situation,” he said.
Account holders gathered outside a closed Kabul bank on Saturday.
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
A8 | Monday, August 30, 2021
* ***
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
THE AFGHANISTAN CRISIS
Continued from Page One
Meter, president of New Standard Holdings, a private equity
company, and others affiliated
with the group. It made a deal
with the United Arab Emirates
that allowed an airlift to carry
Afghans from Kabul’s Hamid
Karzai International Airport to
temporary shelter in Abu
Dhabi where many of the
5,000 evacuees await permission to travel. The group is
talking with officials from Albania, Ukraine and other countries, hoping to find them
places to settle.
With the U.S. withdrawal
facing a deadline Tuesday after 20 years of war, private
citizens said they volunteered
time and money in the ambitious civilian effort to help
patch up an American evacuation they see as inadequate.
Jim Linder, a retired major
general, former commander of
special-operations units in Afghanistan and part of Mr. Van
Meter’s group, said former Afghan comrades who felt abandoned by the U.S. government
appealed to him for help.
“This is not who we are as a
people,” he said. He is president of Tenax Aerospace, a
Madison, Miss., company that
provides governments with
special-mission
reconnaissance and other aircraft, and
his connections helped the
group charter planes for rescue flights.
On a white board in the
Washington hotel’s Peacock
Lounge, the group listed airport entry points. Toward the
end of last week, someone
A group of private
citizens conducted a
global military-style
rescue operation.
wrote “CLOSED” next to all
but one. An Islamic State suicide attack killed 13 U.S.
troops Thursday, as well as
nearly 200 Afghans crowding
around the airport.
Early Sunday, the group focused on evacuating people
via land routes or helicopter,
and finding places to resettle
the Afghans already out of the
country, Mr. Van Meter said.
The Defense Department
declined to comment on the
group and other private rescue
operations.
The U.S. government said
that since Aug. 14 it has airlifted or helped in evacuating
some 114,400 people from Afghanistan. That includes
American citizens, green cardholders and Afghans whose
service to the fallen Kabul
government or the U.S.-led
ELIZABETH FRANTZ FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL (2)
Citizens
Join in
Rescue
Afghanistan’s deputy
ambassador to the U.S., Abdul
Hadi Nejrabi, left, and Alex
Cornell du Houx, center, at the
Willard Hotel in Washington,
working on rescue plans.
war effort leaves them vulnerable to Taliban retribution.
Against the clock
Mr. Van Meter was in
Washington staying at the
Willard Hotel for business and
decided on Aug. 22 to rent the
hotel’s Peacock Lounge, a
small carpeted conference
room with a few tables and
TVs. “I put it on my American
Express and told my wife it’s
what we needed to do,” he
said. He said he was spurred
to action by a business associate, who was a former U.S.
Army commando.
Sean, the commando, contacted Mr. Van Meter two
weeks ago and said he knew of
3,500 children, many of them
orphans, stranded in Kabul. He
needed help getting them out.
Mr. Van Meter knew next to
nothing about military operations, he said, but he had business and personal ties to the
United Arab Emirates.
He reached a senior Emirati
diplomat and introduced him
to Sean. “Time is absolutely of
the essence,” Sean wrote the
diplomat in an Aug. 14 email
viewed by The Wall Street
Journal. “We are working
against the clock and a closing
window of opportunity.”
The diplomat passed on his
government’s tentative approval “to begin accepting
some of the evacuees” and referred Sean to an Emirati general, according to email communications between the men.
Sean flew to Abu Dhabi to
meet with the general.
The general agreed to provide a C-17 military transport
plane, an aircrew and a platoon of soldiers for a trial run
into Kabul. The Emirati general couldn't be reached for
comment.
The U.A.E. agreed to provide the evacuees temporary
shelter, but they had to first
reach the Kabul airport and
board the transport plane.
Sean was banking on a small
network of former commandos
in Kabul to help the operation
run smoothly—including picking up evacuees and escorting
them to the airport.
On Aug. 20, Sean changed
out of a blue blazer into military-style gear for the flight to
Kabul. He and another special
operations veteran carried
body armor, bottles of Excedrin and a sack of 5-Hour Energy drinks. They went for a
briefing at the Emirati Armed
Forces Officers Club & Hotel, a
military-only facility in Abu
Dhabi.
A sign in the room read
“Fars al-Sham,” which translates to “Knights of the Levant,” the U.A.E.’s code name
for the rescue operation. Emirati officers told Sean and his
companion that the promised
C-17, which could hold around
180 people, had been fitted
with separate toilets and medical teams for men and women
returning on the three-hour
flight from Kabul.
“We want to use minimum
force, no bullets.” one of the
Emirati officers said.
Once the plane arrived in
Kabul, Sean and his colleague
had 45 minutes to find and
board the evacuees, a group of
Afghans they had previously
identified as being in danger
from the Taliban. Sean had
contacted the evacuees about
the plan through Afghan
sources outside the airport
and U.S. military contacts inside.
When the plane landed, the
Afghans were waiting at the
airport. The plane lifted off
with nearly two dozen evacuees, far short of the plane’s capacity. But the trip proved the
system worked.
The Emirati general authorized more rescue flights, said
Sean, who remained in Kabul
for nearly a week to coordinate operations. He said the
U.S. military gave him access
to a hanger and a ramp that
became known as the Commercial Task Force ramp. He
was given a call sign to use for
arriving flights so military airtraffic controllers could distinguish the group’s planes.
The group has since pulled
its team from Kabul.
The U.A.E. government
wouldn’t comment on the operation. It said that as of
Thursday, the country had
played a role in evacuating
36,500 people from Afghanistan. By Friday, it said it was
hosting 8,500 evacuees but
didn’t specify if the tally included those from Mr. Van
Meter’s group.
Escape route
Last week, volunteers took
shifts at the hotel’s Peacock
Lounge, fielding requests for
help and working their contacts to get Afghans and
Americans into the Kabul airport and out of Afghanistan.
One volunteer, Barakat Rahmati, was the No. 2 official at
the Afghan embassy in Qatar.
He was on a trip to Washington when Kabul fell and his
government ceased to exist.
Mr. Rahmati was trying to
help 322 Afghan commandos,
elite troops trained by U.S.
Special Forces, who had managed to escape to Abu Dhabi,
he said. The soldiers had
tossed their identification papers to elude Taliban militants. The former official was
trying to issue them new documents so they could travel to
countries that would let them
settle.
Alex Cornell du Houx, who
served in the Marine Corps in
Iraq, was trying to maneuver a
convoy of female judges past
the Taliban checkpoints surrounding the airport. As of
Sunday morning in Kabul, he
hadn’t gotten word.
After Thursday’s suicide
bombing, the volunteers
watched the grisly videos,
while trying to figure out how
to get their last evacuees out
of the country.
“Do we know where the orphans are yet?” Mr. Van Meter
shouted to the volunteers.
They didn’t.
The children and their
chaperones—some 300 in total—had managed to get onto
the grounds of the Kabul airport earlier in the week but
were turned back. As far as
Mr. Van Meter knew, they had
last been seen 400 yards from
the gate where the suicide attacks later took place.
The
volunteers
later
learned the children were back
at a safe house. As of Saturday, they still hadn’t made it
back into the airport, Mr. Van
Meter said.
Brian Kinsella, a former
Army captain who worked in
relief operations after the
2010 Haiti earthquake, was in
charge of condensing hundreds of pleas and referrals
into lists topped by U.S. citizens, green cardholders and
high-risk Afghans. His phone
filled with photos of families
and passports and Google
maps showing where people
were hiding.
On Friday, Mr. Kinsella
talked to an American citizen
who was booked on a plane
with her 11-year-old, but she
decided not to go without
other family members who
didn’t have U.S. paperwork.
During one call with the
woman this week, Mr. Kinsella
could hear gunfire.
“We’re trying to help,” he
said. “We can’t in some cases.”
With the last routes out of
Afghanistan apparently closing, the volunteers are looking
mostly to where they can find
homes for those who have escaped. One group is working
on the plan to set up and manage a shelter for the Afghans
in Somaliland.
“We’re not giving up,” said
Emily King, a former Pentagon
adviser who has been using
her Albanian contacts to secure a haven. “We’ll keep pivoting to find a way.”
At 3 a.m. Sunday, the last of
the group left the Peacock
Lounge for good and moved
their work elsewhere.
—Justin Scheck contributed
to this article.
WORLD WATCH
YEMEN
A missile and drone attack
on a key military base in Yemen’s south on Sunday killed at
least 30 troops, a Yemeni military spokesman said. It was one
of the deadliest attacks in the
civil war in recent years.
Mohammed al-Naqib, spokesman for Yemen’s southern
forces, said the attack on AlAnad Air Base in the province of
Lahj wounded at least 65 people. He said the toll could rise
since rescue teams were still
clearing the site.
Yemeni officials reported at
least three explosions at the
base, which is held by the internationally recognized government. No one claimed responsibility for the attack.
Yemen has been embroiled in
a civil war since 2014, when
Houthi rebels swept across
much of the north and seized
the capital, San’a, forcing the internationally recognized government into exile. The Saudi-led
coalition entered the war the
following year on the side of the
government.
A ballistic missile landed in
the base’s training area, where
dozens of troops were doing
morning exercises, officials said.
The officials blamed the Houthis
for the attack on the base, once
the site of U.S. intelligence operations against al Qaeda’s powerful Yemeni affiliate.
—Associated Press
MORTEN RASCH/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Missile, Drone Attack
On Air Base Kills 30
A view of a recently discovered island believed to be the northernmost point of land on Earth.
GAZA STRIP
Israeli Warplanes
Strike Hamas Targets
Israeli planes struck Hamas
targets in the Gaza Strip on Sunday, hours after violent clashes
between Palestinian protesters
and troops along the border.
The Israeli military said that
planes bombed a Hamas militant
facility in the Gaza Strip in response to the launching of incendiary balloons into southern Israel
and violent protests staged for a
second consecutive week.
Israeli Prime Minister Naftali
Bennett spoke to reporters in
Washington before he boarded a
flight to Israel, wrapping up a
state visit that culminated with a
meeting with President Biden.
“We will operate in Gaza according to our interests,” he said.
On Saturday, hundreds of
Hamas-backed activists staged a
nighttime protest along the Israeli
border, throwing explosives toward Israeli forces who responded with live fire.
Gaza health officials said three
people were injured by Israeli fire.
Additional protests are planned
through the week. Organizers
said the protests are meant to
increase pressure on Israel to lift
its blockade of the Palestinian
territory.
—Associated Press
GREENLAND
Researchers Discover
Northernmost Island
A team of Arctic researchers
from Denmark say they accidentally discovered what they believe
is the world’s northernmost island
located off Greenland’s coast.
The scientists from the University of Copenhagen initially
thought they had arrived at
Oodaaq, an island discovered by
a Danish survey team in 1978, to
collect samples during an expedition that was conducted in July.
They wound up on an undiscovered island further north.
“We were convinced that the
island we were standing on was
Oodaaq, which until then was
registered as the world’s northernmost island,” said expedition
leader Morten Rasch of the university’s department of geosciences and natural resource management.
“But when I posted photos of
the island and its coordinates on
social media, a number of American island hunters went crazy
and said that it couldn’t be true,”
he said.
“Island hunters” are adventurers whose hobby is to search for
unknown islands.
The yet-to-be-named island is
780 meters, or about 850 yards,
north of Oodaaq, an island off
Cape Morris Jesup, the northernmost point of Greenland and
one of the most northerly points
of land on Earth.
The tiny island, apparently
discovered as a result of shifting
pack ice, is about 30 by 60
meters, or about 100 by 200
feet, in size and rises to about
three to four meters, or 10 to 13
feet, above sea level, the university said.
The research team doesn’t
consider the discovery to be a
result of climate change.
The island consists primarily
of small mounds of silt and
gravel, according to Mr. Rasch.
He said it may be the result of a
major storm that, with the help
of the sea, gradually pushed material from the seabed together
until an island formed. The island isn’t expected to exist a
long time, researchers say.
—Associated Press
HAITI
U.S. Airlifts Aid
To Quake Victims
U.S. military aircraft are ferrying food, tarps and other material into southern Haiti amid a
shift in the international relief
effort to focus on helping people
in the areas hardest hit by the
recent earthquake to make it
through the hurricane season.
Aircraft flying out of the capital, Port-au-Prince, arrived
throughout the day Saturday in
the mostly rural, mountainous
southern peninsula that was the
epicenter of the Aug. 14 earthquake. In Jeremie, people waved
and cheered as a Marine Corps
unit from North Carolina descended in a tilt-rotor Osprey
with pallets of rice, tarps and
other supplies.
Most of the supplies, however, were not destined for Jeremie. They were for distribution
to remote mountain communities where landslides destroyed
homes and the plots of the subsistence farmers in the area,
said Patrick Tiné of Haiti Bible
Mission, one of several groups
coordinating the delivery of aid.
At the request of the Haitian
government, getting as much
help to such people as fast as
possible is now the focus of the
$32 million U.S. relief effort, said
Tim Callahan, a disaster response leader for the Agency for
International Development. The
magnitude-7.2 earthquake killed
more than 2,200 people.
—Associated Press
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
Monday, August 30, 2021 | A9
* *
WORLD NEWS
Seeks
Pyongyang Restarts Reactor, U.N. Says EU
To Block
BY MICHAEL R. GORDON
AND LAURENCE NORMAN
Some U.S.
Travelers
BY LAURENCE NORMAN
The IAEA said signs the Yongbyon reactor is operational coincide with indications a nearby lab is being used to isolate plutonium.
Trump’s 2019 meeting with
North Korean leader Kim Jong
Un in Hanoi, the North Korean
side offered to shut its Yongbyon complex, encompassing
the reactor and other facilities, in return for major sanctions relief. The Trump administration rejected that offer as
insufficient.
“The recent inactivity of
key facilities at Yongbyon
seems related to Kim Jong
Un’s offer at the Hanoi summit
to shut down Yongbyon,” said
Robert Einhorn, a former senior State Department official
who negotiated with North
Korea. “Resumed operations at
the reactor and reprocessing
facility may be an indication
that he sees little prospect of
a nuclear deal.”
In June, IAEA Director-General Rafael Grossi said the
agency was seeing indications
of possible reprocessing work
to separate plutonium from
spent nuclear fuel. However, at
the time there was no indication that the reactor plant at
Yongbyon was operating.
In January, North Korea’s
leader laid out a plan to modernize its nuclear technology,
including developing miniaturized nuclear weapons and nuclear-powered submarines.
Mr. Kim is encountering
growing troubles at home, acknowledging food shortages
over the summer for the country, which faces tight international sanctions and closed its
borders last year to stymie the
spread of coronavirus.
The Biden administration’s
North Korean envoy said last
Monday, during a trip to South
Korea, that he was ready to
meet North Korean counterparts at any time.
ly
with North Korea has been a
less-urgent matter for Mr. Biden than seeking a way to revive the Iran nuclear deal,
dealing with the fallout over
leaving Afghanistan and continuing arms-control discussions with Russia.
“The activities at Yongbyon
show that North Korea’s nuclear-weapons program can’t
be ignored and needs to be a
higher priority for the Biden
administration,” said Joel Wit,
a former State Department official, now a fellow at the
Stimson Center, a think tank.
Siegfried Hecker, former director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory and an expert
on North Korea’s nuclear program, has estimated that the
country may have 20 to 60 nuclear weapons using plutonium
and highly enriched uranium.
During
then-President
co Fo
m rp
m er
er s
ci on
al a
l
us ,
e
on
Crown Center for Middle East
Studies at Brandeis University.
“While North Korea already
has a significant stockpile of
nuclear weapons, this suggests
it is moving to expand its current arsenal,” added Mr.
Samore, a former National Security Council expert on weapons of mass destruction.
The Biden administration
has said it is set to engage in
talks with Pyongyang over its
nuclear-weapons program, but
North Korea hasn’t taken
Washington up on its offer.
In explaining its approach,
the White House has said it is
pursuing a calibrated strategy
that would attempt to steer a
middle course between former
President Donald Trump’s toplevel summitry and the Obama
administration’s patient stance.
Former officials have said,
however, that pursuing talks
OFFERS
EVENTS
INSIGHTS
no
n-
EXPERIENCES
The European Union is set to
recommend halting nonessential travel from the U.S. because
of the spread of Covid-19, diplomats said on Sunday.
European officials have been
considering the move for much
of the past month, with the average U.S. infection rate now
above that of the EU.
The Slovenian presidency of
the EU recommended removing
the U.S. and five other countries from a list of nations allowed nonessential travel. A final decision is due Monday.
Two diplomats said they
weren’t aware of any objections
so far.
The EU travel list, which is
reviewed every two weeks, isn’t
binding on member states, but
it has generally set the pattern
over the past few months for
who can visit the bloc. Some
countries may decide to keep
permitting U.S. tourists if they
can prove they have been vaccinated.
Pressure to remove the U.S.
from the travel list has also increased because Washington
has maintained a ban on European nonessential travel to the
U.S. In early August, European
Commission President Ursula
von der Leyen said the EU
wouldn’t allow the lack of reciprocity to “drag on for weeks.”
German Chancellor Angela
Merkel also raised the issue
during her visit to Washington
last month.
A number of EU countries
were eager to keep doors open
during the summer tourist season to bring in revenue that
has become all the more vital
in the economic recession triggered by the pandemic.
The EU decision in June to
allow U.S. travelers to visit was
one of a number of actions in
Washington and Europe to reset relations after tensions under the Trump administration.
.
MAXAR TECHNOLOGIES/ASSOCIATED PRESS
North Korea appears to
have resumed operation of its
plutonium-producing reactor
at Yongbyon in a move that
could enable the reclusive
country to expand its nuclearweapons arsenal, the United
Nations atomic agency said.
The development, disclosed
in the agency’s annual report
on North Korea’s nuclear activities, adds a new challenge to
President Biden’s foreign-policy agenda, alongside the dangerous U.S. withdrawal from
Afghanistan and stalemated
talks on restoring the 2015 deal
on Iran’s nuclear program.
“Since early July, there
have been indications, including the discharge of cooling
water, consistent with the operation of the reactor,” said
the report by the International
Atomic Energy Agency.
The Yongbyon reactor appeared to have been inactive
from December 2018 until the
beginning of July 2021, the report noted. It added that signs
that the reactor is now being
operated coincide with indications that North Korea is also
using a nearby laboratory to
separate plutonium from spent
fuel previously removed from
the reactor.
The agency, whose inspectors were kicked out of North
Korea in 2009, described the
twin developments as “deeply
troubling” and a clear violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions.
A senior Biden administration official said the U.S.
agrees that the disclosure is
troubling. “This report underscores the urgent need for dialogue and diplomacy so we
can achieve the complete denuclearization of the Korean
Peninsula,” the official said.
The North Korean Mission
to the United Nations didn’t
respond to a request for comment.
“It appears to indicate
North Korea has resumed producing plutonium for its nuclear-weapons program,” said
Gary Samore, director of the
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A10 | Monday, August 30, 2021
* ****
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
FROM PAGE ONE
Above, Denise and Spencer Carter unpack their new home in Murfreesboro, Tenn. Below, Arkan Muhammed with his employees and his son.
n-
she was abducted by aliens as
a child.
In a written response to
questions, Ms. Drescher
stood by her 5G concerns. “It
behooves us to question why
we get sick and how to boost
our immune systems,” she
wrote.
Regarding extraterrestrials,
she wrote, “I won’t dignify the
alien question with an answer.
I’m surprised at you!”
As
qualifications,
Ms.
Drescher cites her experience
as founder of the nonprofit
Cancer Schmancer and describes herself as an actionoriented outsider. “I want our
more famous members, more
‘glamorous’ if you will, to be
more directly involved and excited by the union, to integrate their expertise and compassion for common goals,”
she wrote.
As she put it in a campaign
video: “I’m a celebrity that
goes to the mat over and over
again for the greater good.”
The latest controversy is an
August interview of Ms. Fisher
by a Los Angeles television
station. Current SAG leadership determined it violated
campaign rules because the
opposing camp didn’t receive
equal time (the interviewer
said on-air that Ms. Drescher’s
side was welcome to appear).
In an Aug. 26 email to
union members, Ms. Drescher
wrote, in reference to the interview, that Mr. Modine and
his ticket “think it’s okay to violate the law and that the
rules don’t apply to them.”
Mr. Modine responded the
same evening during a virtual
town hall that he was
“ashamed of Fran Drescher.”
Her email was “slanderous and
hateful and hurtful, not just to
myself in my life, but to my
career,” Mr. Modine wrote.
The race isn’t polled, and
it’s unclear who is favored.
Voting began earlier this
month and a winner will be
announced on September 2. In
2019, only 21% of eligible
members voted, according to
union data.
Behind the sniping are
some serious issues. SAG-AFTRA was formed after the
2012 merger between the
Screen Actors Guild and the
American Federation of Television and Radio Artists. The organization negotiates with
several factions of the entertainment industry, including
the Alliance of Motion Pictures and Television Producers, which makes deals on behalf of studios, networks and
streaming services.
Mr. Modine, who is making
his second run for union
president, wants to overhaul
the organization. He says it
has become too soft, particularly in regard with new
forms of media, with the industry that employs most of
its members.
Mr. Modine says the union
was wrong to accept a deal
that lowered payments to
members for television reruns
by $70 million over the next
three years. “You don’t give
away things you own unless
they are going to give you
something that is better,” Mr.
Modine says.
The next administration
will also have to contend with
a recent restructuring of the
union’s healthcare plan. Some
12,000 members—mostly senior citizens—lost coverage,
leading to lawsuits alleging
age discrimination. The union
says the changes were driven
by pandemic-related budget
cuts.
While the acrimony between the two presidential
tickets is thick, some candidates lower down on the ballot treat the contest with less
gravity. “Curb Your Enthusiasm” co-star Jeff Garlin, running for vice president of the
Los Angeles union chapter,
lists his official candidate
statement as: “A vote for me is
a vote for Jeff Garlin.”
.
away from their lifelong home
in suburban Chicago, unhappy
about property taxes and
weather. Last year they moved
with their two toddlers to a
subdivision in Murfreesboro
after spending only a few days
in the area.
Ms. O’Meara works from
home in accounting. Real-estate company Zillow Group
Inc. recently declared the
Nashville metro area the No. 1
U.S. location for these types of
workers, known as “digital nomads.” Stephen O’Meara
works in the automotive industry and knew he would
quickly find a job.
As they worked with a realestate agent, “she would send
me listings and we’d see these
houses and they would be
gone in a day,” said Ms.
O’Meara, 43.
“If we had waited another
six months, we might not have
been able to afford it.” she
added. “People are going all
over where it’s warmer and
cheaper.”
Denise Carter, 50, a real-estate agent from a suburb of
Sacramento, Calif., and her
husband, a general contractor,
wanted to move away from
ly
hammed, 37, who grew up in
Nashville. The Kurdish-American owner of two cellphone
stores recently moved his family from the city to a subdivision in Rutherford County because he wanted better
schools and less traffic and
crime.
South Carolina’s
Berkeley County saw
its population grow
29% in 10 years.
“We wish we had done this
a long time ago,” he said.
Throughout the county,
there are help-wanted signs at
retail businesses, factories and
transportation operations. The
county unemployment rate for
June was 4.5%, compared with
the national rate of 5.9% for
the same month.
Companies expanding in the
area include German auto supplier Mahle AG, which said
last summer that its filter systems facility in Murfreesboro
would add at least 300 jobs.
VALERIE MACON/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
Hollywood
Stages New
Melodrama
Continued from Page One
dine, 62, boasts backing from
Whoopi Goldberg and Diane
Keaton, as well as former “The
Nanny” co-stars Charles
Shaughnessy and Madeline
Zima. The Baldwins are split;
Alec favors Ms. Drescher,
while younger brother Billy is
behind Mr. Modine.
The candidates are vying to
succeed Gabrielle Carteris,
who played brainy high school
newspaper editor Andrea on
the 1990s hit “Beverly Hills
90210.” Ms. Carteris, who has
led the organization since
2016, urged Ms. Drescher to
run, according to the latter.
The post has a storied history—Ronald Reagan got his
start in politics as SAG president.
After qualifying for the race
last month in the final hours
before eligibility ended, Ms.
Drescher immediately stole
the spotlight. Two days later,
Vanity Fair published an article headlined, “Fran Drescher
Amazon.com Inc., which is
building a hub in downtown
Nashville for retail operations
and plans to hire as many as
5,000 people, said last summer
it was opening a sorting center and delivery station in La
Vergne in northern Rutherford
County.
Educational institutions are
tailoring programs to industry
needs. Middle Tennessee State
University in Murfreesboro
had around 12,000 students
about two decades ago.
Today it has 21,000, many
earning degrees in areas such
as aerospace, specialized engineering, healthcare and construction management. The
school is building a new center
to house its concrete and construction management program, which averages at least
seven job offers per graduate,
according to a university
spokesman.
Interstate 24 through
Murfreesboro is often backed
up on weekday afternoons.
Cleared land and construction
machinery are common sights
in Rutherford County.
New
arrivals
Nicole
O’Meara and her husband
talked for years about moving
California’s high prices and
taxes for years and decided to
take a trip to Tennessee,
which doesn’t have a state income tax.
Her father told her one of
her ancestors was a Union soldier wounded in a Civil War
battle just outside Murfreesboro. The Carters drove
through in February and
bought the first home they
saw, a large old historic house,
for about $1.3 million.
They plan to fix it up and
rent it out until they can move
in with their three children,
Ms. Carter said. “It seems like
this is where we belong.”
Homes, particularly those
in the $300,000 to $400,000
range, are in such demand the
county planning department
has a monthslong backlog for
building-related
permits.
County planning director
Doug Demosi says he needs
more staff to handle the workload.
The county school system,
with 47,500 students, opened
a new $70 million high school
in a growing part of the
county three years ago and it
is already at capacity, said Bill
Spurlock, director of county
schools.
Mariah Phillips, 44, moved
with her husband to Murfreesboro in 2006. Their home was
near a trailhead, and their five
children grew up playing in
fields and forests.
Now land is getting rezoned
for development. She ran unsuccessfully for Congress in
2018 in part on a platform of
preserving green space.
Some homeowners, tired of
the growing traffic and other
issues, are weighing the same
solution that brought them to
Rutherford County: Moving
away.
Ms. Phillips said friends are
talking a lot about the next
county to the south.
“A lot of people are considering Bedford County, because
of the affordability of the
homes,” she said.
co Fo
m rp
m er
er s
ci on
al a
l
us ,
e
on
later cut down the tree.
Mr. Sanders estimated the
tree was centuries old. Green
space “is being destroyed,” he
said.
South Carolina’s Lancaster
County, over the state line
from Charlotte, grew 25% in
the past decade. More than
half of commuters traveled a
half an hour or more to work
in 2019, up from around a
third in 2010, according to the
U.S. Census.
Florida’s Nassau County
near Jacksonville, which grew
23% during the past decade,
has seen a surge in traffic citations, according to the Florida
Department of Highway Safety
and Motor Vehicles.
U.S. population growth
slowed sharply in the past decade, and even some exurbs
faded as more millennials
opted for city living. However,
exurban counties in the Southeast grew 15%, twice the U.S.
rate.
Rutherford County, Tenn.,
where Murfreesboro is the
county seat, grew even faster.
Its population reached 341,000
just before the pandemic, up
30% from 2010. The county
had a net gain in 2020 over
2019 of more than 2,600
households, the largest in the
13-county Nashville region, a
Journal analysis of Postal Service permanent change-of-address data found. The Nashville metro area’s core,
Davidson County, lost more
than 10,000 households during
the same period.
Rising housing costs in
Nashville, caused in part by an
influx of wealthy out-of-towners, have pushed many longtime residents to look for lessexpensive homes away from
the city. The average housing
budget for families moving to
Nashville is nearly $720,000,
or 48% higher than that of local buyers, according to a recent study by brokerage Redfin Corp.
“I wanted a better life for
my kids,” said Arkan Mu-
no
Continued from Page One
erally include the fast-growing
outer fringes of large metro
areas where single-family
homes mix with farms and
many workers have traditionally commuted a significant
distance to the core of the
metro area.
An analysis of building-permit data by the National Association of Home Builders
found that for the year ended
in March, exurban counties
outside large metro areas saw
construction of single-family
homes rise 20% from the
year-earlier period. That was
more than twice the rate for
core counties in those metro
areas.
“Clearly, it will transform
the South,” Susan Wachter, a
professor of real estate at the
Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, said of
exurban growth. The region is
benefiting from lower costs
that are drawing tech companies and other businesses
looking for cheaper locations.
Those underlying drivers
make this boom in exurban
living different from one that
started during the early
2000s, when exurbs were concentrated in California, the
priciest pockets of the Northeast and a handful of other
top metro areas. The U.S. population is growing more slowly
than it was two decades ago,
and cities are likely to feel the
loss of residents more acutely
as stores and employers follow
transplants to the fringe.
In the Southeast, the influx
to exurban areas is driving up
real-estate prices, crowding
schools, worsening traffic and
straining government services.
It is sparking debates over
whether to raise taxes, increase regulations and protect
green spaces.
South Carolina’s Berkeley
County, about 30 miles northeast of downtown Charleston,
saw its population grow 29%
during the past decade as the
once-rural area began absorbing tens of thousands of completed and planned housing
units. Berkeley County officials predict the county’s population, currently 230,000,
will reach at least 350,000
over the next two decades.
There are signs the growth
is making the area wealthier.
The percentage of the county’s
population living below the
poverty line was 11.9% in 2019,
down from 14.5% five years
earlier, according to the U.S.
Census Bureau.
Sammy Sanders, 60, a developer and former construction-site manager, fought with
Berkeley County officials for
years over their plans to cut
down a large live oak tree on a
state-owned right of way next
to his property as part of a
road expansion. Last year he
started camping in the tree
during the day to keep the
county from removing it, and
by February, he was spending
days and nights there. He
came down briefly that month,
and law officers blocked him
from going back up. Workers
WILLIAM DESHAZER FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL (2)
Pandemic
Swells U.S.
Exurbs
Matthew Modine’s credits include Netflix’s hit ’Stranger Things.’
Will Run to Form a More Perfect and Glamorous Union.”
The article asked, referring to
Ms. Drescher and her running
mate, actor Anthony Rapp:
“Why are they running to lead
SAG and not the White
House?”
Those opposed to Ms.
Drescher’s candidacy point to
the ticket’s lack of experience
with the union. “They have
never been in the [SAG-AFTRA] building,” says actress
Joely Fisher, running to be
secretary-treasurer under Mr.
Modine.
Ms. Drescher has also been
on the defensive for public remarks suggesting that 5G
wireless service causes cancer
and spreads Covid-19, and that
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PERSONAL JOURNAL.
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THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
Monday, August 30, 2021 | A11
Young Workers
Quit Jobs to
Plot New Paths
With hiring on rise, some opt to take a breather
AT WORK
KRITHIKA
VARAGUR
just being friendly, not staring at a
computer screen.”
Ms. Raden is using her free
hours to complete a graduate certificate in education policy and
hopes eventually to transition into
hey launched careers in
public education. She notes she
the years after the
probably wouldn’t have been able
2007-09 recession and
to afford such a break in her lessonly recently hit their
flush 20s. But for now, she has
stride in earning power.
enough savings to cover her rent,
Now some young profesand bartending covers her other
sionals are quitting their jobs with
expenses. “I think I can hang on to
no Plan B.
this structure for a couple more
With several years in the workmonths,” she says. “I’m trying to
force and some savings in the
plan a little less.”
bank, they are taking a breather to
U.S. workers are quitting their
learn new skills, network and dejobs at some of the highest rates
velop their creative potential bein years, a sign of great appetite
fore locking into another career
for change and confidence in betpath. These workers, now in their
ter prospects down the line. The
late 20s and early 30s, are both
share of people leaving jobs
chastened by pandemic-era
reached 2.7% in June, acburnout and optimistic
cording to the Labor Deabout a rebounding
partment, just shy of
job market. While
April’s 2.8% rate, the
many of their
highest level since
peers are jumping
the government
immediately to
began tracking
better-paying or
quit rates two demore well-suited
cades ago.
jobs, they are leanA Prudential Fiing into an early
nancial survey of
career break instead.
2,000 American
Tessa Raden, 33,
workers in the spring
was so burned out by refound that millennials—
mote work that in July
those between the ages
she quit what she had
of 25 and 40—were
considered her
antsier than other
dream job—progenerations to
gram director at
make a change:
the Dramatists
More than a third
Guild Foundaof that demotion—with no set
graphic said they
backup plan. She
planned to look for
goofed off for a coua new job post-panple of weeks, then
demic, compared with
picked up a bartending
about a quarter of
job, about five evening
workers overall.
shifts a week, at BrookSome of these workEvelyn Danciger and
land’s Finest Bar &
ers don’t want to jump
Andrew Hibschman
Kitchen in her Washinginto another role until
resigned from jobs
ton, D.C., neighborhood.
to pursue new goals. they find one more
“I was just so tired
aligned with their longof pushing, and I had
term career goals.
totally lost my passion,” says Ms.
“Earlier this year I was hoping
Raden, who has a master’s degree
to switch jobs and scrolling through
in arts management. On paper, her
tons of postings, but I eventually
job overseeing programming and
realized the only way I could make
supporting writers was everything
a successful career transition was
she had worked toward in her
to quit,” says 33-year-old Andrew
adult life. But the pandemic elimiHibschman, who was a program
nated live performances, a part of
lead and assistant professor at La
her job she loved, and she found it
Salle University in Philadelphia unhard to focus and stay motivated
til he quit this month. “I didn’t have
sitting at home on her computer.
the time or energy to devote myself
“I love that I don’t have to take
to the search the way I wanted to,”
my work home with me,” she says
he says.
of her new lifestyle. “And I love
He started out mainly teaching
that the majority of my job now is
English and, over the course of the
Feeling burned out by remote work, Tessa Raden recently quit her dream job at an arts organization and now is
bartending in Washington, D.C., with time to study for an advanced degree and garden at home.
decade, became more involved in
admissions and other academicsupport programs. But his longerterm goal is to work in education
technology or learning development. To that end, he spends two
to three hours a day taking online
classes to brush up on topics such
as diversity-and-inclusion programming, and at least another
hour a day on networking and the
job search.
“This is the first time since I
was 14 that I don’t have a job,
which is somewhat terrifying,” Mr.
Hibschman says. “But I do feel optimistic because there are so many
jobs out there.”
Getting married in May has
eased the transition. In addition to
lending emotional support, his
husband also is working to get him
onto his health-insurance plan.
Figuring out health insurance
can be one of the thorniest issues
for those leaving a full-time job
with benefits. Most options leave a
lot to be desired, says Laura
Briggs, a coach for freelance workers based in Springfield, Ill. Many
join a partner’s plan if that’s in the
cards, she says, and another option is a high-deductible plan with
relatively low premiums that covers worst-case scenarios like surgeries and accidents. Another
short-term option is to use Cobra,
a federal law that permits workers
who leave their jobs to temporarily continue a former employer’s
health benefits, though that can be
expensive.
Ms. Briggs also suggests that
those planning to leave a job with
benefits meet with a financial adviser. “You should be proactive
about figuring out how much you
can and should set aside every
month, especially if you no longer
have employer-matching contributions to your retirement plan,”
she says.
Evelyn Danciger, 27, says she is
relying on several years of savings
and looking into Cobra options as
she makes a transition to full-time
writing. She resigned in July from
the Sid Lee creative agency, where
she was a senior manager. She had
dreamed of becoming a writer
since she was in third grade, she
says, but fell into marketing in
2016 after graduating from Loyola
Marymount University in Los Angeles, where she majored in
screenwriting.
As she took on bigger projects
at the firm, the time she usually
set aside to write slowly disappeared. The heavier workload left
her “stress-crying” and feeling intense burnout. “I wasn’t doing
anything creative, and my job had
turned into mostly client management,” she says.
Now that her days are free, she
can write more, plus do more inperson networking in Los Angeles,
where she lives.
“I’m so excited to call up my industry contacts and go out for
lunch and coffee again,” she says.
“I don’t have to cram it all into a
weekend now.”
Surviving the
‘Obligation
Vacation’
BY ANNE MARIE CHAKER
GETTY IMAGES
F
or many families, summer vacation 2021 was anything but
relaxing.
As travel picked up again, extended families reunited. Grandparents hugged grandchildren, adult
siblings caught up in person, and
long-separated cousins played together on beaches and in playgrounds.
For families coming together
again after more than 18 months of
the pandemic, though, those reunions are often emotionally heightened events. Call it the obligation
vacation: relatives reuniting while
emotionally depleted.
Aging parents are eager for adult
children to help with overdue homeimprovement tasks. An aunt wants
to see the baby. Siblings recall old
rivalries. It isn’t a relaxing break—
and lately it’s been happening as
the Delta variant gains footing.
Travel has picked up: So far in
August, nearly two million passengers have passed through Transportation Security Administration
checkpoints each day on average—
more than twice the rate a year
earlier, but still below 2019 levels.
Often, those trips mean a family
visit. Some 63% of U.S. adults say
they visited family this summer, according to an online survey of more
than 2,700 respondents by Pittsburgh consumer-research firm CivicScience. Of those, 54% say it has
been one to two years since they
last saw their relatives.
Linda Hall says that when her
daughter, 35-year-old Allison Hanlon, came off the plane at Los Angeles International Airport last
month with her husband and two
sons, she felt elated. “We could
FROM TOP: FARRAH SKEIKY FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL; EVELYN DANCIGER; REDFIELD PHOTOGRAPHY
T
Summer vacation 2021 brought more stress than relaxation for some, as travel picked up and families reunited.
have been a Kleenex commercial,”
the 67-year-old Ms. Hall says.
Ms. Hanlon, a stay-at-home mom
in Silver Spring, Md., had envisioned
a relaxing vacation, she says, but after a few days the pressure to see
extended family—while getting her
children settled into a new environment and three-hour time difference—proved overwhelming.
Ms. Hanlon recalls ending up in
tears one afternoon at the beach
with her mom, husband Matt Hanlon,
and her two boys. She says she was
torn between getting baby Dylan
home for his nap but also wanting to
see other family members who were
arriving later, all while making sure
Mr. Hanlon, an IT program manager,
felt like he wasn’t being pulled away.
“I was trying to please everyone except myself,” she says. Not having
seen those family members for so
long because of Covid-19 heightened
the feeling of obligation.
“I haven’t had to deal with that
family dynamic in so long, and I’m
also exhausted,” she says.
(“She has that stress because she
is such a great, loving person,” says
Ms. Hanlon’s mother, Ms. Hall.)
Therapists say we are out of
practice in the art of social negotiation, diplomacy and even sharing
space. Reuniting can already be
emotional and sometimes difficult.
“Family dynamics don’t really
change,” says Pauline Wallin, a psy-
chologist in Camp Hill, Pa., who specializes in family relations. “But in
the past two years, we’ve changed.
We’ve been through a lot.” Reuniting can initially feel like time never
passed. “We assume other people
are where they left off, but the
stress of the last two years has
magnified people’s difficulties with
coping,” she says.
Families’ desire to reunite has
never been greater. An affiliate of
Dallas-based Campbell Travel that
specializes in family celebrations reports that sales in July 2021 rose to
$82,000 compared with zero in July
2020 and $12,000 in July 2019.
Hilary Martin, a 51-year-old publicrelations consultant in Tucson, Ariz.,
says her visit to her mother and
stepfather, Nancy and Rick Barrett,
both retired and in their 70s, felt like
a series of home-repair projects at
their home in Harding Township, N.J.
“When I showed up in May for the
first time in 18 months, there were
all these herculean tasks on the todo list,” she says. Ms. Martin, along
with her brother Glenn, a 49-year-old
software developer, moved heavy
furniture up a hill, power washed the
dock and changed light bulbs in hardto-reach heights. It wasn’t relaxing,
she says, though they shared laughs.
“It was ridiculous,” she says. “A long
barrage of tasks that can be overwhelming to people in their 70s.”
Mr. Barrett, 77, a retired banker,
says of the visit: “It’s hard to get
good help, particularly free help.”
Christopher Lopez, a 49-year-old
Navy veteran in Palm Desert, Calif.,
says events of the past two years
exacerbated divisions in his family
over politics and Covid-19. He found
that a trip last month to mend
fences didn’t go as planned.
“I don’t think tensions have
cooled,” he says. “They’ve only gotten worse with all the politics and
the feelings of isolation.”
The visit was supposed to last for
a week, but he left on the second
day. He says he felt a loss of allegiance from his sister, Susan La
Gioia. She says she didn’t feel she
could take sides. “I see the political
part, the people that are afraid of
Covid and those who don’t believe in
it,” says Ms. La Gioia, a 45-year-old
nurse. “And I have to remain neutral.”
She also didn’t want her 11-year-old
daughter to witness disagreements.
Mr. Lopez is taking some time out.
“I’m not talking to anybody,” he says.
“I still love them, but I have to love
them from a distance for a while.”
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
A12 | Monday, August 30, 2021
PERSONAL JOURNAL.
Distance Yourself
BONDS
ELIZABETH
BERNSTEIN
Sometimes we become so entrenched in a stressful situation,
we lose sight of anything else.
Language can help us see the bigger picture. This is called linguistic
distancing.
Dr. Kross recommends talking
to yourself as another person
would, addressing yourself in the
third person to create distance.
(“Elizabeth, you’re going through a
hard time, but you’re going to be
OK.”) This lets you give yourself
the advice you would give a friend.
“We make wiser judgments
when we think about others’ circumstances rather than our own,”
Dr. Kross says.
Reconnect With Values
Dr. Walser suggests this quick exercise: Close your eyes and think
of a sweet memory. Picture it
clearly: the sights and sounds, the
people who were there. Then ask
yourself what was meaningful for
you in that event. And give it a
name. (When Dr. Walser walked
me through this exercise, I pictured swimming with my 10-yearold niece recently and quickly realized “connection” was the value.)
Now take inspiration from the
value you recognized and take action right away. (I called my niece
and had a fun chat.)
Try a Sunset Mode of Mind
How to Deal With Stress
In Your Life: Embrace It
What strategies can help us focus on acceptance? Here’s advice
from the experts:
Slow Down
Too often, we careen from one
task to the next. This can create
chronic stress that keeps our
body’s fight-or-flight response activated.
Pause when you finish a task to
take three big breaths. Focus your
attention on the present. This
calms your physiological stress response. And it helps clear out the
mental noise.
“The point of slowing down is
to introduce patience into your experience,” says Robyn D. Walser,
an assistant clinical professor in
psychology at the University of
California, Berkeley, who teaches
ACT to students and other therapists. “And patience gives you a
choice. It allows you to be more
deliberate and intentional.”
Create a Mantra
Research shows that thinking of a
word or phrase that affirms our
values and silently repeating it
leads to a widespread reduction in
activity across the brain, primarily
in the area responsible for self-
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judgment and rumination.
“When the brain is spiraling or
deluding itself, a mantra gives it
something else to focus on,” says
Brad Stulberg, an executive coach
in Asheville, N.C., and author of
“The Practice of Groundedness.”
Mr. Stulberg suggests you pick
a mantra that reminds you to slow
down and accept what’s going on
without trying to fix it or push
your feelings away. For instance:
“This is what’s happening. I might as
well do the best I can.” Dr. Walser
suggests: “Be here now.” And you already know what my Uncle Sidney
would say.
Hawaii
Travelers
Weigh
Their Plans
BY ALLISON POHLE
H
I first learned of this tip from psychologist Steven C. Hayes, the codeveloper of ACT and the author of
“A Liberated Mind: How to Pivot Toward What Matters.” It’s one of my
all-time favorite pieces of advice.
When we witness a beautiful
sunset, we typically feel joy, awe, a
sense of calm or peace. Yet even
as we experience these lovely
things, we know that a sunset is
also bittersweet. It’s fleeting. It
will never happen exactly the same
way again.
A sunset mode is a mind-set
that allows us to take all of life’s
emotions in, just as we would a
sunset. I’ve been practicing it a lot
lately, as I spend time with my father, who had a devastating stroke
a few years ago. It’s heartbreaking
to me that he isn’t well. But he is
here. He still has his sense of humor. And we have a relationship,
even if it is much different.
“There is beauty and sadness in
life,” says Dr. Hayes, a psychology
professor at the University of Nevada, Reno. “A sunset mode allows
you to show up to the whole of it.”
refund on a rental car. The
couple also list their Denver
home on Airbnb when they go
on vacation and hesitate to
cancel those bookings.
They plan to keep monitoring the situation. “We
want to do the right thing,
and with the governor speaking up, it does add a new
layer to this dynamic,” Mr.
Shannon says.
Travel agents say they
have been inundated with
questions from would-be vacationers. Bruce Fisher, owner
of Hawaii Aloha Travel in Ho-
Covid-19 cases are among
nonresident travelers, with
most infections attributed to
community spread.
Brooks Baehr, a pandemicresponse administrative assistant for the health department, says there are more
nonresident travel-related
cases than the data reflect.
That is because some travelers—even those with symptoms—don’t get tested for
Covid-19, out of fear of being
put into quarantine, he says.
In October Hawaii required
U.S. travelers to present a
awaii’s governor last
week made a blunt plea
to tourists: Stay away
from the islands now and
visit later.
That leaves would-be travelers reconsidering their vacations as Covid-19 cases
rise. Many are also contending with nonrefundable bookings, which can make canceling harder to stomach.
Gov. David Ige said “now is
not the time to visit the islands,” as hospitals are reaching capacity and intensivecare units are filling up. He
asked travelers to curtail
trips voluntarily through the
end of October.
After shutting down to
tourists earlier in the pandemic, Hawaii has had a
surge in visitors this summer
as many airlines added nonstop routes there. The recent
rebound has nearly matched
Hawaii’s governor has asked tourists to stay away for now.
record levels in 2019, when
more than 10 million people
traveled to the state.
nolulu, has seen a small num- negative test taken within 72
ber of cancellations at his
After eloping during the
hours of departure to bypass
agency since the governor’s
pandemic, Eric Shannon, a
a mandatory quarantine. In
announcement. But he hasn’t
project manager for an enearly July, the state said fully
noticed a mass rush to call
ergy company, and his wife
vaccinated travelers from the
off trips just yet.
waited to book their honeyU.S. and its territories didn’t
“It all depends on what
moon until Covid-19 condineed to show a negative test,
additional restrictions are
tions seemed to be improvand those who are unvaccigoing to come
ing. The pair,
nated could bypass the 10down,” he says.
who are fully
day quarantine by submitting
“If they decide
vaccinated, took
a negative test taken within
‘It felt wrong to to close
advantage of a
72 hours of departure.
beaches and
Southwest Airgo,’ says Jessie
Jessie Daley and her husparks, that’s go- band, who live in the Denver
lines flash sale
Daley, who
ing to be even
in June and
area, were scheduled to debooked a twocanceled a trip. more of a
part for Hawaii on Saturday.
game-changer.”
week trip to HaMs. Daley had been watchEarlier in Auwaii for miding the rising Covid-19 cases
gust, the state
September.
and grew concerned about
limited indoor capacity in bars, traveling with their 1-year-old
Mr. Shannon was monitoring rising Covid-19 cases in the restaurants and gyms to 50%.
daughter. Then came headlines
Starting last week, all large
state and had looked into posfrom Gov. Ige’s news confergatherings on Oahu were limsible refunds even before the
ence. “That was our point
ited to 10 people indoors and
governor’s news conference.
where we were like, ‘Oh, we
25 people outdoors.
He estimates that if they canshould not go,’” Ms. Daley says.
Many vacationers and
celed, they would lose about
The family doesn’t plan to
travel agents point to data
$3,500, which includes the
reschedule the trip anytime
from the Hawaii Department
costs of a nonrefundable
soon. “It felt wrong to go, and
of Health that show about 1% our biggest concern is our
Airbnb in Maui, some preof the recent positive
booked activities and a partial
daughter’s safety,” she says.
KENT NISHIMURA/LOS ANGELES TIMES/GETTY IMAGES
ILLUSTRATION BY CAROLE HÉNAFF
M
y Uncle Sidney, a
retired U.S. Navy
physician and Vietnam veteran, has a
military phrase he
uses as advice for
what to do when life is lousy:
Embrace the Suck.
He’s dispensed this colorful
guidance to me in several
stressful situations—when
I’ve been anxious on deadline, dealing with a difficult
family member, and, most
recently, struggling through
the pandemic.
“The point is, when you’re
stuck, surrounded or suffering,
you need to assess where you
are, learn to live with it, and try
to advance,’’ Uncle Sidney says.
Pretty good advice for our
times.
We’re still dealing with the
whiplash of uncertainty and the
emotions it provokes: frustration,
anxiety, anger and fear. To help us
through, psychologists recommend
an approach similar to Uncle Sidney’s, which they call acceptance.
They define it as the ability to
see reality clearly and embrace all
our emotions, both pleasant and
unpleasant. It’s a focus of a widely
used and studied therapeutic approach called Acceptance and
Commitment Therapy (ACT),
which a large body of research
shows helps people feel less anxious and depressed and more resilient and hopeful.
When we practice acceptance—
and believe me, it does take practice—we don’t suppress our difficult emotions or bury them in a
front of forced positivity. We don’t
attempt to control the situation by
trying to fix the unfixable. And we
don’t fall down a rabbit hole of despair. Instead, we deal clearheadedly with our situation, and we remember that even in life’s
toughest moments there is often
some good, even if it’s simply a
lesson to be learned.
“Acceptance is the opposite of
getting stuck,” says Ethan Kross,
an experimental psychologist and
neuroscientist at the University of
Michigan and author of “Chatter:
The Voice in Our Head, Why it
Matters, and How to Harness It.”
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
ESTATE OF ROY LICHTENSTEIN/PARRISH ART MUSEUM (5)
ARTS IN REVIEW
Monday, August 30, 2021 | A13
ART REVIEW
Clockwise from top:
Roy Lichtenstein’s
“The Cannon”
(1948), “Untitled”
(c. 1955) and ”Bugs
Bunny” (c. 1958)
Before Lichtenstein’s
Career Popped
BY RICHARD B. WOODWARD
W
Watermill, N.Y.
hen scholars examine a famous
artist’s early
work, the temptation is to search
for portents—to
find in classroom studies any nascent motifs that point to future
prowess and foretell mastery as inevitable.
One of the refreshing aspects of
“Roy Lichtenstein: History in the
Making, 1948-1960” at the Parrish
Art Museum is that the curators haven’t surrounded this period with
an aura of destiny. One walks
through the three
rooms and sees the
artist testing out a
bewildering variety
of styles and subjects without ever
settling on one. Not
until 1960, when he
was in his late 30s,
did he discover the
formula—figures
lifted from American
comic books, outlined in black, filled
in with bright primary colors and abstracted by Ben-day
dots—that became a
defining signature of Pop Art.
Until then, as the show succinctly documents, Lichtenstein
roamed blithely through the annals
of art and illustration. He painted
tank-like figures that recall the
Surrealism of Max Ernst and the
eccentric classicism of John Graham (“The Diver,” c. 1948-49). He
made tapered sculptures in wood
and metal that invoke African and
Northwest American Indian art
(“King,” c. 1951). He satirized U.S.
history painting (“Washington
Crossing the Delaware,” c. 1951) by
flattening the heroic figures of
Emanuel Leutze’s panoramic canvas in the manner of Picasso’s
“Three Musicians.”
Elements of his later style are
visible but not yet synthesized. Images of cartoon animals from about
1958—installed in a section of the
show titled “Glimmers of Pop”—
lack the flat-toned audacity of his
post-1960 paintings. A brush-andink drawing of a reclining Bugs
Bunny renders his buck-toothed
head as if he were a hallucination
or perhaps one of De Kooning’s
“Woman” paintings. Two drawings
of Mickey Mouse are more disturbing than droll.
Several of these works were in
the 1994 and 2012 traveling retrospectives. But many more of the approximately 90 paintings, drawings,
sculptures, watercolors and prints
have not been seen before. Elizabeth Finch, chief curator at the
Colby College Museum of Art, and
Marshall N. Price, chief curator of
modern and contemporary art at
the Nasher Museum of Art at
Duke University, are the co-organizers of the show and editors of
the superb catalog. The exhibition will travel to both places, as
well as to the Columbus Museum
of Art in Ohio; it has been ably
installed here by Alicia G. Longwell, chief curator at the Parrish.
Lichtenstein (1923-1997) was a
well-trained artist. Born in New
York, he studied art at Ohio State
University where—after three
years in the U.S. Army during and
after World War II—he then resumed his studies and earned a
master of fine arts degree in
1949. He often credited a
teacher there, Hoyt L. Sherman, as an influence on his
entire career. The 1950s
were less fulfilling. He
worked as a draftsman
for a window decorator in
Cleveland and taught art in upstate
New York and in New Jersey.
The upbeat, impish side of
Lichtenstein was irrepressible,
however, and pervades the show.
Exposed to Modernism in New
York and during his military service in Europe, he used the Cubism of Picasso and the whimsy of
Miró to parody whatever caught
his fancy, from French classical
painting to the Charge of the
Light Brigade.
The absence of anything religious, mystical, risqué or polemical
is also striking. There are no pure
landscapes or nudes. Figures are
set in the American West and Midwest rather than Lichtenstein’s
birthplace in the urbanized East.
There are no city scenes, although
the social realist painter Reginald
Marsh was one of his teachers during his New York youth.
Lichtenstein demonstrated more
curiosity about engineering than
spiritualism. A series from the
mid-’50s depicts in a Cubist fashion the gears and levers of various
machines: “Shaper Feed Mechanism,” “Motion Picture Projector,”
“Device With Crank,” “Ratchet and
Pawl Mechanism.” A woodblock
print titled “The Heavier-Than-Air
Machine” (1953) may have Ohio associations. Columbus isn’t far from
Dayton, where the Wright brothers
had their headquarters.
Lichtenstein’s Abstract Expressionist phase (mid-’50s) was brief
and devoid of angst. His apparently unique technique for applying multiple stripes of color simultaneously with a rag did not result
in great paintings, but it did, as
the curators note, presage his
later brushstroke sculptures, one
of which stands in front of the
Parrish.
After his emergence as a Pop
Art star, Lichtenstein told an interviewer in 1963: “I have always had this interest in a
purely American mythological
subject matter.” The sentiment
is confirmed here by a drawing
from the early ’40s of Paul Bunyan cutting down a tree, as
well as by the cowboys and Indians who appeared regularly
during the ’50s when he was
mocking 19th-century Western painters such as Alfred
Jacob Miller.
Not that Lichtenstein
ever seemed less than optimistic about his country or himself. Despite the diverse and sometimes incongruous art on display
here, everything in the show exudes a buoyant confidence, as if
this most light-hearted of the Pop
artists suspected that one day he
would become what he became.
Roy Lichtenstein: History in the
Making, 1948-1960
The Parrish Art Museum, through
Oct. 24
Mr. Woodward is an arts writer in
New York
“Mechanism, Cross Section” (c. 1954), left, and “Self-Portrait at an
Easel” (c. 1951–52), above
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
A14 | Monday, August 30, 2021
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
SPORTS
U.S. Open Is Missing Some Big Stars
Serena Williams, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer won’t be playing, while Novak Djokovic seeks to complete a Grand Slam
The announcements came one
by one, like a list of ailments from
a middle-aged rec league. Balky
knee. Long-term foot pain. A hamstring tear that just won’t heal.
Only these belonged to three of
the greatest tennis players of all
time, Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal,
and Serena Williams.
All three of them withdrew
from the U.S. Open in the space of
two weeks. And with their exits
came a sobering realization for the
sport: when the tournament begins on Monday, the U.S. Open will
be the first Slam held without at
least one of them this century. The
end of an era is coming.
“We all miss them. We’d all love
them to play forever,” said men’s
world No. 4 Alexander Zverev. “At
some point they will have to retire.”
It’s the hard truth that tennis
fans have been doing their best to
ignore for nearly a decade. But it’s
already impossible to miss the legend-shaped holes in the men’s and
women’s draws in New York. That
trio alone represents more than a
third of all major tournament wins
since 2000. So in the grand
scheme of tennis history, this
could go down as the Slam that
turned the page on the RogerRafa-Serena epoch of tennis.
Especially if a certain Novak
Djokovic does what most people
expect him to and wins the whole
thing.
Not only would he complete the
first men’s calendar-year Slam
since Rod Laver in 1969—something neither Federer or Nadal has
ever managed. He would also
claim an unprecedented 21st major
men’s title, taking the lead in the
three-player race for history for
the first time in his career.
Should Djokovic pull it off, it’s
very possible that neither Federer
or Nadal will ever catch him. Djokovic is still at the height of powers. Federer, who hasn’t won a major since the 2018 Australian Open,
has no horizon for returning to the
game. And Nadal’s best shot of
adding to his tally comes just once
a year at the French Open.
“My participation here, without
Rafa and Roger participating, I feel
it,” Djokovic said of his status as a
prohibitive favorite in Queens. “I
know there’s a lot of people who
are going to be watching my
matches and expecting me to do
well and fight for a Slam.”
While he trains his sights on
No. 21, the people he shared the
stage with for so long are asking
themselves big questions not just
about whether they can win anymore Slams, but about whether
they can play at a high level at
all.
A decision on retirement now
feels like it could come at any moment, particularly for Federer and
CHARLES SYKES/ASSOCIATED PRESS
BY JOSHUA ROBINSON
Serena Williams, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer appeared together during Arthur Ashe Kids’ Day at the 2013 U.S. Open. All three stars will miss this year’s event.
How and when to call it
a career is trickier in
tennis than in most
sports.
years. They felt that it was more
important to manage their appearances and pick their spots carefully, because they could no longer
take the pounding of four Slams
on three surfaces. But if their results have proven anything, it’s
that the surgical approach, which
Weather
pains early tournaments, he still
moves at 34 as if he’s made of rubber and grinds down opponents
like no one else.
Djokovic’s field of would-be
challengers in Flushing includes
three men ranked in the world’s
top five—No. 2 Daniil Medvedev,
No. 3 Stefanos Tsitsipas, and No. 4
Alexander Zverev. But while they
give him a run for his money at
lesser tournaments on the circuit,
none of them has ever beaten him
in the majors’ best-of-five format.
Keeping pace with Djokovic at all
is hard enough. Doing it for four
or five hours is near impossible.
Djokovic has only lost one five-setter in the past three years.
“I really wish for me to maybe
one day be at that level of consistency and be able to dominate
Grand Slams at such a level,” Tsitsipas said. “I think he has learned
throughout the years how to preserve his best strengths and kind
of expose them at the right moment, at the right time.”
The WSJ Daily Crossword | Edited by Mike Shenk
Shown are today’s noon positions of weather systems and precipitation. Temperature bands are highs for the day.
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Edmonton
Vancouver
60s
costs them rhythm and match fitness, is no way to build a season.
“I can understand that Roger,
Rafa and Serena, myself are not
that young anymore,” Djokovic
said. “The new generation obviously can play probably more tournaments in a season. The bodies
can sustain that effort and that
beating in a way. We have to be, I
guess, a little bit more selective.”
Djokovic was being generous.
There is nothing selective about
his calendar: he has missed just
one Slam since 2005. And this season, he squeezed in the Olympic
singles tournament halfway
around the world in Japan, where
he decided it might be a good idea
to tack on the mixed doubles as
well. (He left without an Olympic
medal.)
As much as his unparalleled defense and his superhuman grit,
Djokovic’s place in the record
books will be down to his body’s
apparent unbreakability. Though
he often complains of aches and
turn into absences and absences
snowball into rankings slides, because players are no longer amassing points on the circuit. When
they return, they are seeded lower
and face better opponents early in
tournaments.
Williams, Nadal, and Federer
have accepted that fate in recent
Williams, who will both be 40 by
the end of September. Both have
said that they will see out their recoveries, yet neither has offered
any kind of timeline. For Federer,
who is undergoing a third knee
surgery in the space of 18 months,
even the 2022 Australian Open is
likely off the table.
Williams, meanwhile, is approaching five years since she last
won a Grand Slam and 18 months
since she last won a tournament of
any kind. The possibility that she
will one day match Margaret
Court’s record of 24 majors now
seems remote.
“We’ve done everything we
could,” Williams’ coach Patrick
Moratoglou said. “It is heartbreaking, but this is the only possible
decision.”
How and when to call it quits is
trickier in tennis than in most
sports.
The simple nature of the tennis
tour means that a decline can be
drawn out and painful. Injuries
0s
Calgaryy
Winnipeg
Seattle
70s
60s
Portland
80s
Helena
70s
Boise
70s
70s
90s
Albanyy
70s
Cheyenne
Sacramento
San Francisco
Denver
Colorado
Springs
Las
Vegas
100s
100s
70s
Los Angeles
Phoenix
San Diego
Omaha
Tucson
Santa Fe
Albuquerque
Oklahoma City
Ft. Worth
90s
40s
50s
Anchorage
60s
90s
Little Rock
Dallas
IDA
Austin
San Antonio
Honolulu
70s
U.S. Forecasts
Raleigh
Charlotte
Columbia
Warm
Rain
Cold
T-storms
Stationary
Snow
Showers
Flurries
Tampa
Miami
100s
Ice
Today
Tomorrow
City
Hi Lo W Hi Lo W
Omaha
83 67 t
78 64 t
Orlando
93 75 pc 92 76 pc
Philadelphia
89 72 t
87 68 pc
Phoenix
105 83 pc 101 78 t
Pittsburgh
81 67 t
77 64 t
Portland, Maine 83 66 t
81 62 c
Portland, Ore.
70 53 pc 72 52 c
Sacramento
95 56 s
89 53 s
St. Louis
88 72 t
82 67 t
Salt Lake City
96 69 s
94 72 pc
San Francisco
71 56 s
70 55 s
Santa Fe
87 58 pc 88 60 pc
Seattle
65 51 pc 68 50 pc
Sioux Falls
78 63 t
76 62 pc
Wash., D.C.
92 75 t
89 73 t
International
City
Amsterdam
Athens
Baghdad
Bangkok
Beijing
Berlin
Brussels
Buenos Aires
Dubai
Dublin
Edinburgh
Hi
70
90
116
90
82
65
70
67
109
61
60
Today
Lo
55
74
84
78
69
57
54
62
88
53
47
Tomorrow
W Hi Lo W
c
69 56 sh
s
89 72 s
pc 116 82 pc
t
90 78 t
c
79 67 pc
r
66 52 r
c
71 51 c
s
71 63 c
s 105 88 s
pc 59 51 c
pc 62 48 c
City
Frankfurt
Geneva
Havana
Hong Kong
Istanbul
Jakarta
Jerusalem
Johannesburg
London
Madrid
Manila
Melbourne
Mexico City
Milan
Moscow
Mumbai
Paris
Rio de Janeiro
Riyadh
Rome
San Juan
Seoul
Shanghai
Singapore
Sydney
Taipei City
Tokyo
Toronto
Vancouver
Warsaw
Zurich
Hi
70
71
90
90
81
89
83
66
68
88
90
61
72
79
79
85
72
74
112
82
89
81
94
85
66
98
88
85
65
60
64
Today
Tomorrow
Lo W Hi Lo W
54 c
70 52 c
54 pc 71 54 s
73 t
89 72 t
81 t
87 81 sh
73 t
83 70 s
77 sh 90 77 t
69 s
86 69 s
46 s
73 48 s
56 pc 67 55 c
62 pc 91 66 pc
78 t
90 78 t
52 pc 67 48 c
57 pc 70 59 t
58 sh 81 62 pc
59 pc 78 61 c
79 c
82 78 t
57 pc 73 54 pc
67 pc 73 67 r
86 s 112 84 s
62 s
82 63 s
77 pc 89 76 pc
69 pc 75 68 t
82 pc 94 81 pc
78 t
84 77 pc
49 pc 72 54 s
81 pc 98 80 pc
78 pc 84 74 t
65 pc 81 63 pc
52 pc 65 53 pc
54 r
65 56 t
52 r
66 49 pc
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
Solve this puzzle online and discuss it at WSJ.com/Puzzles.
s
s...sunny; pc... partly cloudy; c...cloudy; sh...showers;
t...t’storms; r...rain; sf...snow flurries; sn...snow; i...ice
Today
Tomorrow
City
Hi Lo W Hi Lo W
Anchorage
64 51 pc 64 52 pc
Atlanta
89 73 c
80 72 t
Austin
93 74 t
94 73 pc
Baltimore
93 73 t
89 71 t
Boise
92 55 s
82 50 s
Boston
87 70 t
85 70 pc
Burlington
85 65 t
81 61 pc
Charlotte
96 71 pc 93 73 pc
Chicago
84 67 pc 81 67 pc
Cleveland
82 65 c
78 65 pc
Dallas
92 75 pc 96 76 pc
Denver
94 64 pc 96 65 pc
Detroit
84 65 c
79 63 pc
Honolulu
87 73 pc 87 74 pc
Houston
96 78 pc 95 77 t
Indianapolis
84 70 t
76 65 t
Kansas City
86 69 t
81 66 t
Las Vegas
106 84 s 103 76 t
Little Rock
83 72 t
89 71 pc
Los Angeles
85 66 s
80 65 s
Miami
90 77 t
90 78 t
Milwaukee
83 66 s
78 65 pc
Minneapolis
79 61 pc 78 60 s
Nashville
85 72 t
77 69 r
New Orleans
84 77 r
87 77 t
New York City
86 73 t
86 70 pc
Oklahoma City
87 69 t
92 70 s
90s
100+
Richmond
Jacksonville
Orlando
Houston
70s
80s
Washington D.C.
Atlanta
Birmingham
Jackson
Mobile
60s
Philadelphia
70s
New Orleans
80s
Cleveland
Indianapolis Pittsburgh
Memphis
50s
Boston
Hartford
New York
Buffalo
Springfield
Charleston
Topeka
80s
Kansas
St. Louis
Louisville
Wichita
City
Nashville
80s
El Paso
Milwaukee Detroit
Des Moines Chicago
40s
Augusta
Toronto
Mpls./St. Paul
Salt Lake City
30s
Ottawa
Pierre Sioux Falls
Reno
20s
Montreal
Bismarck
Billings
Eugene
10s
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63 Fashion
34
Assimilate again
64
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home
14
15
16
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35 Uttered
17
18
19
36 You could wait
1 Scattered
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20
21
22
23
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37 Fill with passion
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24
25
26
38 “Walden” writer
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27
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30
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31
32
33
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34
35 36 37
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42 Helping for
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39
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8 Honeydew kin
40
41 42 43
44
45 46 47
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9 Branching horn
43 Chobani product
48
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50 51
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45 Zero,
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52
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11 Looked all right
55
56
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12 Creator of Tigger
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59
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47 Pathetic group
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62
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18 Like three men of
51 Welles of
R&B | By Andrea Carla Michaels &
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22 Inventor Whitney
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31 Guy of “Diners,
10 Birthright seller
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58
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28 Little piggy
52 Taxing org.
14 Card over a deuce 30 Princess who
53 Near, poetically
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For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
OPINION
A Lesson From a Howler Monkey
I miss travel,
though I definitely don’t
miss airports.
But slow security lines
and
overINSIDE
priced
paVIEW
ninis will be
By Andy
worth
it
Kessler
again soon,
because great
life lessons emerge in the
oddest places. Way back, my
family took a trip to Costa
Rica. They have beaches, volcanoes, rafting, ziplines,
horseback riding, hikes,
hanging bridges. What’s not
to like?
Early in the trip, my wife
and I, along with our four
sons, stayed at an “eco-hotel.” The rooms had little
cardboard placards bragging
about how much water and
carbon they didn’t use, and
there were plenty of vegan
choices at the buffet breakfast, next to the eggs and bacon. I asked the front desk
what “eco-hotel” meant and
was told that it was just
branding to get Americans
and Germans to stay there—
they weren’t doing anything
different than before they
adopted the moniker.
On our first morning, our
guide, Alberto, picked us up
in his van and unloaded us at
some important rainforest,
grabbing a tripod-mounted
Swarovski spotting scope. He
marched us maybe 50 yards
in, stopped to set up the
scope, and launched into a
long-winded description of
the very rare and elusive
three-wattled bellbird, a favorite of birdwatchers because of its clanging metallic
voice. He stared into the
telescope, spun it around,
huffing and puffing and
searching so long that I began to suspect the bellbird
was extinct.
The rest of us were bored
to tears. After 20 minutes,
my eldest started flicking
something at No. 2. Yes,
sometimes it is just easier to
number them. He didn’t like
having things flicked at him,
but his older brother was
bigger, so he started poking
at No. 3, who started screaming, “Don’t touch me because
I don’t like being touched.”
Then No. 3 started picking on
our youngest, pushing in the
back of his knees so he
couldn’t stay standing up.
Alberto kept droning on
about mating habits and migratory patterns. As my youngest kept getting bullied, he
started sobbing to my wife.
This went on for a while until
she turned to me and told me
to do something about it. I
didn’t think she was actually
paying attention to Alberto or
even interested in the mythical three-wattled bellbird.
None of us were. She just
wanted the bickering to stop.
So what did I do? I reprimanded my eldest for starting the chain reaction. It
didn’t matter; within minutes
the flicking, touching, sobbing
and “do something about
this” pleading continued. Ah,
the circle of dominance and
submission.
Alberto finally found the
dumb bird, and we all looked
in the field scope at some
fuzzy white-and-brown thing
that sounded like the banging exhaust pipes of a Ford
Pinto. I quietly sidled up to
Alberto and suggested we
move on. We walked another
50 yards and stopped so Alberto could point out a tree
When my four sons
act out, I ask if they
remember a violent
rainforest episode.
with roots that doubled as a
nesting ground for some rodent or carpenter ants or
something. I can’t quite remember, because I was too
busy thinking ill thoughts
about Alberto to listen.
We heard rustling above
us. And then screeching. Way
up in the canopy there
seemed to be some sort of
tussle. All the flicking, poking and sobbing immediately
stopped as we all looked up
to check out a tribe of
Howler monkeys having their
own family issues. It became
clear that two of them
weren’t getting along. We
watched through the maze of
branches 40 to 50 feet up as
one of the monkeys, the alpha male, picked up another
monkey and threw him to the
forest floor. We watched in
stunned silence as this nonalpha male—I won’t insult
my son in calling him No. 2—
fell and tried to slow his fall
by grabbing for branches or
anything to slow his descent.
He landed not 10 feet from
us with a thud that shook
the ground. He got up,
looked at us, probably in embarrassment, and hobbled
off.
We all looked at each
other with a “Did we just see
that?” kind of amazement.
Even Alberto’s jaw dropped,
and he eventually said, “I’ve
never seen anything like that
in my life.” Another family
came strolling over, and one
asked, “Did you guys see the
three-wattled bellbird like we
just did? It was so cool.” We
all just sort of chuckled, nodded and moved on for the
rest of our rainforest sightseeing.
Life lessons galore. Any
time our sons start squabbling, which happens constantly, I only have to ask if
they remember that time in
the Costa Rican rainforest
and boom, it stops. Maybe
the fond family travel memories end the conflict. Or
maybe my sons are too busy
considering our species’ evolution from primal toxic masculinity. More likely they
think I’m threatening to
throw them from the high
branches of tall trees. Hey,
whatever works.
Write to kessler@wsj.com.
Dollars for Duds in Latin America
Nicaraguan
dictator Daniel Ortega is
jailing, killing
and
disappearing his
AMERICAS political opponents. He
By Mary
has
taken
Anastasia
control of the
O’Grady
Supreme
Court and the
electoral council and has
gagged the press by making it
a crime to report “false
news.” As he “runs” for a
fourth term in November, his
most serious rivals are under
arrest.
Mr. Ortega’s Nicaragua is a
police state. For advocates of
peace and freedom, this
makes him persona non grata.
At the International Monetary
Fund, he’s a valued member.
So too are the governments of socialist, deadbeat
Argentina and of El Salvador,
which every day slips further
into arbitrary, authoritarian
rule.
These are some of the bad
actors in the Western Hemisphere who received more
“special drawing rights” from
the IMF on Aug. 23 as part of
a new $650 billion general allocation. They don’t play by
the rules of the international
community, but suddenly hundreds of millions of dollars at
rock-bottom rates are falling
into their coffers.
SDRs are created out of
thin air but can be converted,
on demand, into hard currency. If a member wants dollars, the U.S. is obliged to provide them by borrowing in the
capital markets.
Treasury Secretary Janet
Yellen, who led the charge for
this new round of SDRs,
claims the transaction is costfree assistance to the needy.
But if that is true, why limit
the issuance?
In fact, the conversion of
SDRs to dollars is a subsidized, perpetual loan. For
poor countries the subsidy is
above 90% of the loan value.
Each of the 190 members
has received a new allotment
of SDRs, according to its
quota in the fund, no matter
the nation’s commitment to
minority rights, institutions or
the rule of law. This implies
another cost, borne by the
poor, whom Ms. Yellen and
her friends at the IMF say
they are trying to help. The
oppressors will get a windfall,
no questions asked.
Cuba isn’t a member of the
IMF, and Venezuela can’t access its SDRs because the government is not recognized by a
simple majority of voting
shares held by members. But
Nicaragua has been credited
with 249 million SDRs, equivalent to nearly $354 million at
the current exchange rate of
one SDR to $1.42. El Salvador’s
take is 275 million SDRs valued at $390 million. Argentina
received nearly 3.1 billion
SDRs, worth about $4.4 billion.
The payola to the corrupt
Mr. Ortega, who owns and
runs the country as Anastasio
Somoza did in the 1970s, is a
scandal. It’s a slap in the face
to a nation that needs international support as it bravely
confronts a regime that guns
down dissidents in the
streets.
The case for the SDRs as a
means to help the poor is
equally weak in Argentina.
The country owes the IMF
some $46 billion with low
prospects to repay. The two
sides have been negotiating
what would be effectively a
debt rescheduling for months,
but have made no progress.
The problem is the socialist
government’s economic model
of populist spending, high
taxes, capital controls and inflation running above 50% annually. Argentina can no longer access capital markets
A new round of IMF
assistance rewards
bad policy and
criminal governments.
and investment has plummeted. As measured by the
JPMorgan Emerging Markets
Bond Index, country risk is a
sky-high 1,500-plus basis
points.
To stay current with the
fund, Argentina must make
two payments of principal and
interest, totaling about $4.5
billion, before the end of the
year. That’s where Ms. Yellen’s
contribution to the poor is going. It will allow the government to get through midterm
elections in November without a crisis and without making the reforms necessary to
recover growth. “A clear example of a counter productive
effect of an unconditional SDR
allocation,” Argentine economist Pablo Guidotti tweeted in
July.
Without an agreement and
without access to the capital
markets by next year, Argentina’s only option will be to
fall into arrears as it must
make payments to the IMF of
$19 billion in both 2022 and
2023.
El Salvador’s President
Nayib Bukele intimidates entrepreneurs and judges who
don’t share his politics. When
his
country’s
Congress
wouldn’t rubber-stamp his
agenda last year, he brought
armed soldiers into the chamber and sat in the speaker’s
chair.
Starting Sep. 7 El Salvador
will adopt bitcoin as a legal
currency. But this is not currency competition. As monetary scholar George Selgin explained in June on the Cato
Institute’s Alt-M website, the
new law “compels” merchants
to accept it as payment.
IMF managing director
Kristalina Georgieva has criticized the law, noting that bitcoin is a “volatile asset” that
will make planning at all economic levels difficult. In June
ratings agency Fitch said the
new law increases “risks, including the potential of violating international antimoney
laundering
and
terrorist financing standards.”
Last week, Mr. Bukele’s handpicked Supreme Court rejected a U.S. request for the
extradition of a gang member.
There’s a reason the Salvadoran economy is sputtering,
and it isn’t entirely the fault
of Covid-19.
There was a time when
large multilateral handouts
were conditioned on attempts
at good governance. Those
days are gone.
Write to O’Grady@wsj.com.
Keep the ‘Pineapple Express’ Rolling
By Bing West
And Paul Wolfowitz
A
n emotional President
Biden pledged Thursday
to evacuate American
citizens from Afghanistan as
well as the Afghans who had
supported our hastily abandoned mission. “We will not
be deterred by terrorists. . . .
We will rescue the Americans
who are there. We will get
our Afghan allies out, and . . .
continue to execute this mission with courage and honor.”
Unfortunately the president’s self-imposed Aug. 31
deadline means that many of
the people to whom he made
that promise will still be
trapped in Afghanistan after
evacuation flights end. To keep
at least part of his promise,
the president needs to authorize clandestine exfiltrations
by declaring to the relevant
congressional committees that
continuing the evacuation is in
the national interest.
Such a declaration, commonly called a “finding,” is
delivered to the congressional committees with oversight of covert operations. It
would create and formally
authorize a clandestine program, bringing with it resources, manpower, money
and congressional buy-in, so
that the Central Intelligence
Agency and others can
achieve the declared objective of evacuating Americans
and Afghan allies.
How to rescue more
Afghans after Biden’s
deadline expires.
Weeks before the president’s public promise, scores
if not hundreds of U.S. veterans volunteered to rescue
their countrymen trapped in
Afghanistan as well as those
Afghans who fought with and
for us. Frustrated “that our
own government didn’t do
this,” one of the volunteers
told ABC News, “we did what
we should do, as Americans.”
Gripping accounts are
emerging of the so-called
Pineapple Express, a remarkable testament to the values
and courage of the men and
women who make up our volunteer military and the civilians who support them. ABC
reported that as of Aug. 26,
the effort had saved more
than 500 at-risk Afghans by
getting them inside the Kabul
airport.
That required the escapees
to make their way at night—
sometimes through sewers
and often along dangerous
streets—to get to their appropriate entry point at the airport. Hundreds of people,
many in the U.S., constructed
routes in real time using the
Global Positioning System and
guided those in Kabul with
secure communications on
Signal. Former Green Beret
Capt. Zac Lois, the “engineer”
for this clandestine railroad,
consciously modeled his tactics for evading the Taliban
on those employed by the
American heroine Harriet
Tubman.
Today’s remarkable volunteers are determined to get
out “just one more” right up
to the last minute of the last
day. A “finding” could help
them do that and more. It
would also guard against the
administration pulling the
plug on those left behind once
public anger wanes. Despite
the heroic volunteer efforts,
there are likely to be people
who will still need help to escape, weeks and months from
now. The president needs to
do more to keep his word.
Mr. West, a former assistant defense secretary and
combat Marine, has written
four books about the Afghanistan war. Mr. Wolfowitz, a
former deputy defense secretary (2001-05), is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a member
of the advisory board of No
One Left Behind, a nonprofit
that assists Afghans who used
to work for the U.S. military.
Monday, August 30, 2021 | A15
BOOKSHELF | By Naomi Schaefer Riley
Back to School,
Back to Screens
Baby, Unplugged
By Sophie Brickman
(HarperOne, 326 pages, $27.99)
A
s children return to school this fall, their parents’
attitudes toward technology may well shift. The 18
months of the pandemic and lockdown have revealed
both the astonishing ability of computers to connect us
and their troubling inability to teach children, especially
younger ones, much of anything. For many older children—
even if they were indeed able to learn something on
Zoom—the substitution of screens for in-person socializing
seems to have led to mental-health problems.
Journalist Sophie Brickman was on the verge of completing
her examination of technology’s effects on children and childrearing when the pandemic hit. Fortunately, the unusual
circumstances didn’t shake her from her well-researched
and unvarnished conclusions. As the months stretched on
in self-quarantine, she writes in “Baby, Unplugged,” she
found herself grateful for “researchers who’ve hammered
home that for young children, particularly the preschool
set, free play and imagination
and even boredom are the
best activities to fill the day.”
Ms. Brickman acknowledges
that working parents—really,
most parents—must occasionally make use of screens.
But she doesn’t allow herself
(the book’s subtitle is “One
Mother’s Search for Balance,
Reason, and Sanity in the
Digital Age”) or any of her
parent-readers to give up on
the task of setting screen limits
simply because they are stuck
in an apartment or house all
day with small, needy children.
Early in her narrative, Ms. Brickman describes herself
as the Luddite in her own marriage. Her husband is
perpetually bringing home new gadgets. Little wonder
that a man who judges the previous night’s sleep based on
messages from his wristwatch has no problem with using
technology to monitor and entertain the children. But Ms.
Brickman begins to wonder why she suddenly finds herself
eager to measure her newborn’s weight, feeding habits
and sleep schedule with a slew of apps and devices.
Maybe there’s some evolutionary drive to gather information, she thinks, but she is disturbed to see how obsessive
she has become: She wants to know, for instance, whether
her left breast or right breast produces more milk. There is
merchandise on offer for people who are thinking in this
way, she notes: changing tables that measure a baby’s
weight with each new diaper, “smart socks” that keep track
of a baby’s vital signs when he is asleep. Ms. Brickman
concludes that, far from aiding in the rearing of a child,
such products will only serve to make parents crazy.
Ms. Brickman offers reports from pediatricians who
explain that if a child really needed such a precise level of
monitoring, he would probably be in a hospital. She draws
a similarly skeptical conclusion about the many other
products that parents can now choose from, products that,
quite apart from monitoring and measuring, will supposedly
make their children happier and healthier. Each is designed
in ways that, it is claimed, will improve a baby’s habits or
make life easier for parents—from the Wi-Fi-enabled
FormulaPro, which can be programmed by a smartphone to
prepare bottles, to a $1,300 smart bassinet, “which adjusts
its rocking and white noise to soothe fussy babies.” One
psychologist, adding some perspective on the wide array
of products, tells Ms. Brickman: “Appreciate that good
enough is almost always good enough.”
Are educational apps really going to improve a
child’s academic skills or, with their busy images
and graphics, are they closer to a videogame?
The questions that most parents fret over, though, are
the ones that involve giving children screens, and here
Ms. Brickman has truly done her homework. She tries to
discern whether educational apps are really going to
improve a child’s academic skills or whether, in their busy
graphics and flashing images, they’re no different from
Mario Bros. or any other videogame entertainment. Even
well-meaning designers of educational apps, she notes,
seem caught between wanting to keep the attention of
children with endless clicking opportunities and giving
them a chance to explore fairly simple and quiet worlds.
Sandra Boynton, the author of the bestselling board
book “Moo, Baa, La La La!”—showing animals and describing the sounds they make—tells Ms. Brickman that she has
mixed feelings about the way her work has been turned
into e-books with buttons and features everywhere. She fears
that computer devices “shanghai a young child’s brain. . . .
It’s not normal for a young child to be undistractible.”
Reading physical books to children, Ms. Brickman concludes,
is not just an exercise in nostalgia. She quotes an expert saying
that “it’s probably the only unhurried time during the day.”
Still, Ms. Brickman concedes that it is not at all easy
these days to ensure that children have this unhurried
time, and the natural range of emotions that children
experience—including frustration, excitement and
boredom—has always been taxing to parents. Thus it is
hard to resist the temptation to just give kids a screen
whenever things seem to be going south. Ms. Brickman
advises parents to understand that the “friction” of parenting is beneficial to both adult and child. “Embrace the
middle-of-the-night wake-ups,” she writes, “the tantrums,
the fourteen minutes it takes to choose a sock, and you’ll
become the kind of parent who really knows your child.”
Like many other recent books on child-rearing, “Baby,
Unplugged” offers passages in which we are told that
things would be better if we all lived in Scandinavia.
According to Ms. Brickman, the political solutions to the
stress of parenting include, among much else, longer mandatory parental leave and universal day care. When experts
tell her that educational television is actually meant for
children to watch with a parent, she notes that it is easier
to accomplish this task in a socialist society. Such political
commentary feels dropped in, and it is the least researched
element of the advice and analysis she provides. One can’t
help thinking that, if raising children well means (as she
suggests) embracing the parent-child friction of everyday
life, then handing young children off to professional caretakers for much of the day might be self-defeating.
Ms. Riley, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise
Institute, is the author of “Be the Parent, Please: Stop Banning
Seesaws and Start Banning Snapchat.”
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
A16 | Monday, August 30, 2021
OPINION
T
REVIEW & OUTLOOK
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Powell Takes a Victory Lap
President Biden Failed U.S. Troops in Kabul
The chairman also had a rosy view of inflahe verdict may be out on Jerome Powell
as a central banker, but the Federal Re- tion even as it soars above the Fed’s 2% target
serve chairman is a first-rate politician. and has been stickier than the central bank’s
legion of economists preHis much-awaited (virtual)
The Fed chairman says dicted. Mr. Powell couldn’t,
speech at the Jackson Hole
and didn’t, deny that fact.
monetary conference on Frieverything the White
But he dismissed the fastday offered a sunny view of
House wants to hear.
est runup in prices in years
the economic horizon and an
as “so far largely the product
extended apologia for the
of a relatively narrow group
Fed’s performance on his
watch. You might think he’s running for office of goods and services that have been directly
. . . oh, wait, he is hoping for a second four-year affected by the pandemic and the reopening
term as chairman, and President Biden will of the economy.” In other words, don’t blame
the Fed.
make his decision soon.
Mr. Powell argued that all of this price unThe main headline from the speech is that
on present course the Fed will begin to taper pleasantness will soon pass as supply conits extraordinary monthly bond purchases this straints ease. He didn’t mention that the burst
year. But in case anyone thought this means of inflation so far this year has swamped wage
monetary tightening, Mr. Powell quickly noted gains for seven months in a row, that the White
that the Fed isn’t about to shrink its balance House last week raised its estimate for inflation
sheet, now up to $8.3 trillion, or raise interest in the fourth quarter to 4.8% above a year earlier, and that the New York Fed’s July survey
rates for a very long time.
The message is that the Fed will remain su- of consumer inflation expectations for the next
per-accommodative, even as nominal GDP year was 4.8%. Well anchored?
Mr. Powell offered the usual concern about
could grow 10% this year. Investors, who love
the Fed’s support for asset prices, bid up stocks the struggles of “lower-wage workers,” but we
on the news. This won’t hurt Mr. Powell’s re- wish he or someone at the Fed would acknowledge the central bank’s contribution to income
nomination chances at the White House.
Mr. Powell justified the Fed’s continued and inequality. The Fed's quantitative-easing bond
historic policy ease on grounds that while the purchases are intended to lift asset prices,
outlook for the job market is excellent, the la- which helps the relatively well off who own asbor market recovery has been uneven. But then sets, while renewed inflation robs low- and
it always is after a recession. Mr. Powell’s case middle-income workers of real wage gains. The
is that the 5.4% unemployment rate “under- resulting increase in inequality then becomes
another political excuse for higher taxes and
states the amount of labor market slack.”
He could be right, though one reason for any more income redistribution.
The good news for Mr. Powell is that Presislack is that the government welfare and jobless benefits that Mr. Powell cheered on earlier dent Biden will have to make his decision on
this year are paying people more not to work reappointment before we know if the chairman
than if they take a job. No mention of that in is right that inflation isn’t a problem. Meantime, he gives a great campaign speech.
his remarks.
P
The Best of America
resident Biden and his wife paid their re- den’s Afghan withdrawal turned to chaos.
Lance Cpl. Rylee McCollum, of Jackson,
spects Sunday at Dover Air Force Base
in Delaware to the 13 Americans who Wyo., was “bound and determined” to join the
Marines, said Cheyenne Mcdied at Kabul airport last
The 13 men and women Collum, one of his three older
week, and well they should.
according to the JourWe are learning more about
who died in Kabul were sisters,
nal. “He knew it from the time
these young men and woman,
on a rescue mission.
he was 4.”
and their deaths are all the
McCollum signed his enmore painful because they
listment papers on his 18th
were sent on a selfless rescue
birthday at Summit Innovations School, in
mission.
They range in age from 20 to 31, represent a Jackson, where he had been on the wrestling
mix of ethnic groups, and hail from the middle- team. He deployed to Jordan in April after getclass, patriotic families who always bear the ting married, and his wife Gigi is expecting a
worst burden of war. Their family members say baby in weeks.
Marine Cpl. Hunter Lopez, of Indio, Calif.,
most of them joined the military out of individual
purpose and national pride. They are the volun- was the son of two Riverside County Sheriff’s
teers who follow orders and man the ramparts Department employees. He had shared with his
mother a photo of himself and a young Afghan
no matter the risk or ill-advised war plan.
Nicole Gee, recently promoted to Marine boy. “My son called me and told me that the
Sergeant, was from Sacramento and married to photo of him and the little boy, he scooped up
a fellow Marine, Jarod Gee. Only days before the boy and carried him on his shoulders for
her death she posted on Instagram a now fa- five miles to safety. He told me, ‘mama we are
mous photo of herself cradling a young Afghan so resourceful. We hot-wired a car and got back
baby. “I love my job,” she wrote. She was 23 to base to be safe,’” his mother, Alicia Lopez,
told CNN on Saturday. He was 22.
years old.
Every death in war is heartbreaking, and esLance Cpl. Jared Schmitz, 20, always
wanted to be Marine. His “entire world was pecially when the mission that killed them
the US Marine Corps,” his father Mark didn’t have to happen the way it did. But their
Schmitz wrote, according to CNN. “Ever since service is also reassuring for showing that milhe committed himself to the Marines in high lions of young Americans are still willing to sacschool, he wanted to join. He showed a level rifice to defend their country and its principles.
of dedication that I haven’t seen.” Schmitz, of We’ll wager that they didn’t wait in the locker
Wentzville, Mo., had been posted to Jordan room when the national anthem was played.
and was among those sent to Kabul as Mr. Bi- They represent the best of America.
P
The ‘Clean Power Plan’ Returns
Now Democrats plan to conscript utilities inolitical attention on Bernie Sanders’s
spending plan is focused on the $3.5 tril- stead. But make no mistake: Their plan would
lion cost, and understandably so. It’s un- require the two dozen or so GOP-led states that
don't have renewable manprecedented. But more imporThe Democratic budget dates to adopt them. It would
tant are the enormous policy
force states to premachanges that will be buried in
bill will be loaded with also
turely shut down fossil-fuel
the fine print and that the memajor policy changes. plants that provide reliable
dia will barely notice.
baseload power and stick their
One example emerged last
citizens with the costs.
week as Senate Majority
Democrats claim the plan gives utilities flexiLeader Chuck Schumer told Democrats that the
bill will include a “Clean Electricity Payment bility since hydropower, nuclear and carbon
Program.” He said this will “put our country on capture would count toward renewable quotas.
the path to meet President Biden’s climate But they know new hydropower dams, nuclear
change goals of 80 percent clean electricity and plants and carbon capture aren’t currently fea50 percent economy-wide carbon emission re- sible. See Southern Company’s Vogtle nuclear
facilities in Georgia and its Kemper carbon-capduction by 2030.”
This is a national renewable-energy mandate ture fossil fuel plant.
Democrats also say government payments to
on the sly. Utilities would have to buy or generate a certain amount of renewable energy each utilities will offset the cost of renewables. “To
year. Those that don’t meet their quotas would protect electricity customers, performance paybe fined while those that exceed targets would ments (coupled with clean electricity tax credits
receive payments from the feds that they must for generators) shift the cost of this once-in-aspend on increasing renewable energy or reduc- generation transition to the more progressive
federal tax base,” a plan fact sheet says.
ing electricity prices.
Translation: Democrats will raise taxes to fiAn honest national renewables mandate
would run afoul of budget reconciliation rules. nance the new green grid and then give some
But the liberal outfit ThirdWay says the Clean companies tax credits for investing in renewElectricity Payment Program “is a purely bud- able energy. Coerce with mandates and taxes
getary proposal (involving only spending and and subsidize politically favored behavior.
The more utilities rely on renewables, the
revenue) as opposed to a regulatory approach”
and “the enforcement mechanism is simply pay- more backup power they need from fossil fuels
ments and fees.” Therefore it can dodge a Sen- to keep the grid stable. To prevent rolling blackouts this summer, California has approved five
ate filibuster.
The idea resembles the Obama Environmen- new natural-gas plants and hefty payments to
tal Protection Agency’s Clean Power Plan, which businesses to run on their fossil-fuel backup
required states to reduce CO2 grid emissions generators when electricity supply is tight.
Dow Inc. CEO Jim Fitterling warned last
by shutting down coal plants and using more
renewables. The Supreme Court blocked the week that the Democrats’ plan could raise enEPA rule in 2016 after states argued it violated ergy costs, especially for manufacturers, and
the Clean Air Act and unconstitutionally con- render the grid less reliable. He’s right, and all
Americans will pay.
scripted them.
“The Kabul Airport Massacre” (Review & Outlook, Aug. 27) is a tragedy resulting from incompetence.
“The buck stops with me,” President
Biden read from the teleprompter at
his press conference, and then he
promptly blamed everyone else for
his mistakes. He blamed former President Trump for making a deal with
the Taliban that resulted in no U.S.
casualties for 18 months. Mr. Biden
didn’t explain why he chose not to
overturn such a bad deal while overturning so many of his predecessor’s
other initiatives.
Mr. Biden blamed his generals for
recommending that we abandon Bagram Air Base in favor of the insecure Kabul airport. If that’s true,
then the generals responsible should
be fired immediately.
He blamed U.S. citizens stranded
in Afghanistan for not wanting to
leave. It might be safer for them to
stay rather than risk getting killed
on the way to the airport.
He blames ISIS for the killings
and threatens to track down and kill
its members, but he trusts the Taliban to act as TSA agents providing
safe passage to the airport. Maybe
he forgot that Islamic terrorists, no
matter how they are labeled, are
committed to killing Americans.
Ultimately, voters are to blame
for electing this president. America
deserves better.
ROGER ALEXANDER
Miramar Beach, Fla.
Those Marines died proudly doing
their duty—serving America and
saving American lives. It’s what we
do. Every Marine signs up to serve
our country. We know we risk death
and injury every time we go into
harm’s way. Yet, we go—semper fidelis. It’s an honor. It’s a privilege.
We race to the sound of gunfire. We
go to serve America and we go to
save Americans, wherever they may
be. All we ask is for good, supportive leadership.
Well, our nation’s top leadership—from the president to his entire national-security team—failed
those Marines. The leaders’ bungling led our Marines (and soldiers
and airmen) to be placed in a most
difficult tactical environment, which
they didn’t deserve.
LT. COL. MARK CHANDLER, USMC (RET.)
Coastal Carolina University
Myrtle Beach, S.C.
Medicare Advantage Shows the Path Forward
In “The Danger of Expanding Medicare” (op-ed, Aug. 26), former Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal could have
added that shifting seniors from traditional, fee-for-service Medicare to
Medicare Advantage managed care
generates substantial healthcare cost
reductions. The fiscal savings spill
over into traditional Medicare and
even into the nonelderly, commercially insured market.
Harvard’s Katherine Baicker, Michael Chernew and Jacob Robbins
have showed that as penetration of
Medicare Advantage increases in different counties, hospital costs and
length-of-stays decline not only for
seniors enrolled in Medicare managed
care plans, but also for beneficiaries
still on the traditional program. For
every 10% increase in the uptake of
Medicare Advantage, inpatient spending among fee-for-service Medicare
seniors falls by 5% to 10%. Similar
findings are also observed among
commercially-insured people under
65 in regions with rapid diffusion of
Medicare Advantage.
Why is this the case? Medicare Advantage plans receive a fixed lumpsum from the government for each
senior they enroll. They then pass
along that incentive to doctors and
hospitals, encouraging them to deliver efficient, coordinated care. Since
healthcare providers typically treat
all three beneficiary groups—traditional Medicare, Medicare Advantage
and other privately insured patients—
any changes in treatment and practice patterns fostered by Medicare
Advantage spread to the care delivered to all patients.
Promoting competition and managed care in the Medicare program is
the appropriate prescription for curbing healthcare cost growth.
NATHAN PUNWANI, M.D.
Cedars-Sinai Medical Center
Los Angeles
Arguing Won’t Resolve the Vaccine Argument
In his op-ed “A Better Way to Encourage Vaccination” (Aug. 23), Dr.
Richard Menger describes a powerful
shift in perspective that draws on 40
years of studies showing that arguing
with someone is not an effective way
to build motivation. The more you
oppose someone, the more she will
dig in to her position.
Developed at the University of California, San Francisco Center for Excellence in Primary Care, the Hear
Technique is a simple way to respectfully engage with people who are
skeptical or have strong emotions
about the vaccine. “Hear” is an acronym that stands for: hear, express appreciation, ask about pros and cons,
and respond.
Hear. Use an open-ended question
to invite the person to share more
about her perspective. Or use reflective listening to show the person that
she has been heard.
Express appreciation. It is a gift
when someone shares her reasoning
for not following your recommendation. Showing gratitude lets the person
know that you respect her and will engage in nonjudgmental conversation.
The Taliban and the Second
Amendment: Anachronisms?
Regarding Anthony Gill’s op-ed
“Economists Explain the Taliban”
(Aug. 26): A few weeks ago (although
it seems like years), President Biden
mocked Second Amendment supporters who maintain that the right to
bear arms is necessary to mitigate
government overreach. Mr. Biden remarked that anyone resisting the government would need jets and nuclear
weapons—otherwise, he implied, they
were doomed to fail in the face of a
hypothetical government onslaught.
But history has taught us over and
over again that a determined foe can
outlast a technologically superior
force through sheer human will, and
often with terror. The Viet Cong, Mujahedeen and Taliban are only the
more recent examples.
Mr. Gill’s article is a reminder that
we often underestimate people we
don’t understand, with immense consequences. It is easy to denigrate and
lampoon the Taliban as a ragtag
anachronism. But that anachronism
just beat the world’s leading superpower.
RICK MILLER
Wallingford, Pa.
Letters intended for publication should
be emailed to wsj.ltrs@wsj.com. Please
include your city, state and telephone
number. All letters are subject to
editing, and unpublished letters cannot
be acknowledged.
Ask about pros and cons. Most
people have arguments on each side
of the question. Understanding personal motivations can open doors to
more discussion.
Respond. Share new information to
address any concerns the person has
brought up and validate or build on
the reasons she would like to be vaccinated.
If a person agrees to hear new information about the vaccine, that is a
win. You now have an opportunity to
share accurate information that can
be used in a decision-making process.
ALICIA DIGIAMMARINO
San Francisco
Pursuing Values at the Cost
Of Our Shareholder Value
In an Aug. 24 letter to the editor
(“Stakeholder Capitalism Is Slowly
Advancing”), Ira M. Millstein states
that “stakeholder values, such as
wages, working conditions, the environment” and inequality are slowly
being advanced by consumers as
well as institutional investors, the
Laurence Finks and BlackRocks of
the world. In his final paragraph,
Mr. Millstein refers to the “mounting public and institutional pressures to begin to address these
problems, perhaps at some sacrifice
of immediate shareholder value”
(emphasis added).
Well, as a fairly small individual
investor who risks his own money—
unlike some Wall Street managers—
I’m glad to know that my shareholder value will be sacrificed in
favor of Prof. Millstein’s personal
values.
OSCAR M. SCHIFF
Houston
Pepper ...
And Salt
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
“Now that we’ve rounded up
enough investors, we can start
buying some cattle.”
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
Monday, August 30, 2021 | A17
OPINION
How the Census Misleads on Race
T
he most common reaction
to the release of the 2020
census was summed up in
the headline “Census Data
show the number of white
people fell.” The data show the number of whites declining by 8.6%. This
observation was often coupled with
a political projection: that while gerrymandering could benefit Republicans in 2022, the political future belongs to the Democratic Party, which
commands large majorities among
minorities.
But these conclusions about race
and politics rely on misleading census results. Contrary to Democratic
hopes and right-wing anxieties,
America’s white population didn’t
shrink much between 2010 and 2020
and might actually have grown.
A new ‘diversity index’
and a subtle change in a
question have resulted in
an undercount of whites.
“Races” are defined not by biology but by cultural convention. As
late as the early 20th century, many
Anglo-Americans didn’t identify
Southern or Eastern Europeans as
“white.” In 1918, 33-year-old Harry S.
Truman, while visiting New York
City, wrote his cousin: “This town
has 8,000,000 people. 7,500,000 of
’em are of Israelish extraction.
(400,000 wops and the rest are
white people.)” After World War II,
Jews and Italians became identified
as “white.”
Something similar seems to be
happening to many Americans of
Hispanic and Asian origin. About 3 in
10 Hispanics and Asians intermarry,
usually to a white spouse. According
to a 2016 study by economists Brian
Duncan and Stephen J. Trejo, 35%
of third-generation Hispanics of
mixed parentage no longer identify as Hispanic; and 55% of thirdgeneration Asian-Americans of
mixed parentage no longer identify as Asian. A 2017 Pew report
found that among Americans of
Hispanic origin who don’t identify
themselves as Hispanic, 59% said
that they were seen by others as
white.
The racial identity of Hispanics
is especially confusing because
the census asks about “Hispanic,
Latino or Spanish origin” separately from race. In the 2010 census, 53% of those who said they
were of Hispanic origin checked
off only “white,” a 58% increase in
numbers from 2000. That rise in
white Hispanics helped account
for the increase in the number of
whites from the prior census. But
in the 2020 census, a mere 20.3%
of Hispanics checked off only
“white,” contributing to the 8.6% decline in the total number of people
identifying only as white.
That dramatic change probably
stemmed not from a shift in social
consciousness or demographics, but
from a subtle change in the 2020
question about race. In 2010 the
census asked respondents to check
off whether they were white, black
or African-American, American Indian or Alaska Native, various varieties of Asian or Pacific Islander,
and “some other race.” They may
check off as many race boxes as are
applicable.
But in 2020 the census asked respondents who checked off “white”
to specify their nationality: “Print,
for example, German, Irish, Italian,
Lebanese, Egyptian, etc.” No Spanish-speaking nationality was listed.
That likely created the impression
that Hispanic was another race, notwithstanding the previous question’s
disclaimer that “Hispanic origins are
not races.”
interest and values. If later-generation Hispanics and Asian-Americans still vote Democratic, it
probably won’t be out of ethnic
identification. There was some
evidence of that in the 2016 and
2020 elections, in rising support
among these groups for Donald
Trump and other Republicans.
By contrast, many AfricanAmericans, whose ancestors were
forcibly brought here, haven’t followed the path of European immigrants. Black Americans are less
likely to intermarry than Asians
or Hispanics, and when they do,
their children are likely to identify as African-American. According to a 2015 Pew survey, mixedrace African-Americans are more
likely than other groups to complain of racial discrimination.
More telling, in a 2018 study,
Mr. Alba and sociologists Brenden
Beck and Duygu Basaran Sahin
found that while Asians and Hispanics who intermarry are likely to
enjoy a significantly higher standard
of living than unmixed Hispanic and
Asian couples, African-Americans
who marry whites have a standard of
living only very slightly higher than
unmixed African-American couples.
“The distinctiveness of black ancestry
among mixed whites reveal the continuing power of anti-black racism in
the United States,” Mr. Alba writes.
That sorry fact is obscured by the
census’s diversity indexes and by the
use of terms like “people of color” or
“nonwhite,” which suggest a commonality between African-Americans
living in poverty in Chicago’s South
Side and the Indian-American CEOs
of Microsoft and Alphabet. The census may help with reapportionment
and redistricting, but it doesn’t paint
an accurate picture of America and
its politics.
DAVID KLEIN
By John B. Judis
Thus, many Hispanics who would
have checked off white alone in 2010
may have checked “white” and
“some other race” in 2020. The number of Hispanics checking two or
more boxes increased by 567% from
2010 and make up about two-thirds
of those who checked both boxes.
Seventy-one percent of the population checked white in 2020, either
alone or with one or more other
boxes—an increase of 1.9% from
2010. It is very possible that if the
census hadn’t changed the race
question in 2020, the number of
“whites” might not have declined at
all or declined only slightly. The
number certainly wouldn’t have
fallen 8.6%.
Over time, social mobility and
intermarriage will likely further
weaken the distinction between
Americans identified as white and
those with Asian and Hispanic ancestry. As sociologist Richard Alba
has argued, census projections that
the U.S. will become a “majority
minority” nation by 2045 are likely
to prove false.
To confuse matters more, the census introduced in 2020 a “diversity
index” that filtered out Hispanics
who considered themselves “white”
by creating a quasiracial category of
57.8% “non-Hispanic whites.” This
was the percentage most commentators reported as “whites.” It eliminated the 20.3% of people of Hispanic origin who still checked off
only “white.” The authors of the census appear determined to fuel nativist fears that whites are being “replaced” and liberal hopes of a
growing minority-based Democratic
majority.
As for politics, Democrats may
become the majority party, but not
through demographics alone. Like
earlier first- and second-generation
Americans, many Hispanics and
Asians initially found a home in the
Democratic Party, but later (like the
Irish or Poles) have begun making
their political choices based on class,
Mr. Judis is author of “The Politics of Our Time: Populism, Nationalism, Socialism.”
Beefed-Up Sanctions Could Limit the Damage in Afghanistan
By Matthew Zweig
And Richard Goldberg
‘O
ur only vital national interest in Afghanistan,”
President Biden said two
weeks ago, “remains today what it
has always been: preventing a terrorist attack on American homeland.” To prevent such an attack,
Mr. Biden and Congress should
swiftly work to deprive the Taliban
and their al Qaeda allies of the resources required for attacks on the
U.S. homeland.
While the Taliban have been subject to American terrorism sanctions for years, the group’s newfound control of Afghanistan’s
government institutions and domestic resources will significantly increase its wealth and influence. If
the new Taliban government’s central bank, ministries and agencies
are not explicitly subjected to U.S.
sanctions, the Taliban will be better
able to use that money as it wishes.
According to a 2020 United Nations
Security Council report, before their
takeover of Afghanistan, the Taliban
operated a sophisticated financial
network that generated between
$300 million and $1.5 billion a year,
primarily from illicit mining, narcotics production and trafficking,
and taxation in areas they controlled. All these sources of income
are likely to grow enormously as
the Taliban consolidate control of
nearly the entire country.
Al Qaeda remains intricately tied
to the Taliban, so the new regime’s
resources will be available to committed international terrorists. The
U.S. military is now warning that al
Qaeda’s operational capabilities are
rapidly increasing. This should come
as no surprise given that one of the
Taliban’s deputy emirs, Sirajuddin
Haqqani, is a longstanding al Qaeda
ally and the head of the Haqqani
network, an American-designated
terrorist organization.
U.S. laws and regulations governing money laundering and illicit finance have come a long way since
9/11. Congress and successive administrations have developed sophisticated financial sanctions targeting
terror-sponsoring regimes like Iran,
Syria and North Korea. Washington
should apply what it has learned to
isolate the Taliban government and
its terrorist allies.
Declaring the new Afghan government a state sponsor of terrorism
would impose restrictive measures
on trade and allow Americans
harmed by Taliban-aided terrorists
to pursue legal action against the regime. The State Department should
The Taliban’s control
of the government will
significantly increase their
wealth and influence.
also designate the Taliban a Foreign
Terrorist Organization. While the
Taliban is currently subject to financial sanctions under Treasury Department counterterrorism authorities, an FTO designation would
further chill any interaction with
Taliban-affiliated entities and expose
anyone providing them support to
extraterritorial criminal prosecution
and civil liability.
President Biden should impose
sanctions on Taliban officials, narcotics traffickers and mining operations—particularly rare earth metals.
The Treasury Department should
work to expand the guidelines and
recommendations of the Financial
Action Task Force—the international
standard-setter for anti-money-laundering measures—to warn the global
banking community further about
the risks of terror and drug finance
in a Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.
And the State Department should assure Congress it can prevent the Taliban from diverting U.S. taxpayerfunded humanitarian aid before such
assistance continues.
The Biden administration should
also not back down on the important
steps it has already taken to cut off
Taliban financing. It should continue
its freeze on Afghan Central Bank assets in the U.S.—more than $7 billion
including $1.2 billion in gold reserves—and rebuff any request to
repatriate them to the Taliban.
The administration should also
continue to object to the disbursement of multilateral funds to Afghanistan, including through the International Monetary Fund and the
World Bank. As part of the IMF response to the Covid-19-induced economic crisis, Afghanistan was supposed to receive hundreds of
millions of dollars this month—a
transfer now on hold, presumably
based on objections from Washington or European member governments. The IMF should never allow
the Taliban to access any funds or
financing. Nor should the World
Bank, which last week suspended
more than $2 billion in Afghanistan
project funding.
These are all steps Mr. Biden and
his administration have the power
to execute quickly. If they demur,
Congress can force them to act by
legislation.
Twenty years after 9/11, the Taliban and their al Qaeda allies have
retaken control of most of Afghanistan, putting themselves in a position to launch another attack. Targeting the Taliban’s financial
networks is a critical first step to
preventing one.
Mr. Zweig is a senior fellow and Mr.
Goldberg a senior adviser at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
You Are Living in the Golden Age of Stupidity
By Lance Morrow
‘S
tupidity,” Jean Cocteau remarked, “is always amazing,
no matter how used to it you
become.”
We live in a golden age of stupidity. It is everywhere. President Biden’s conduct of the withdrawal
from Afghanistan will be remembered as a defining stupidity of our
time—one of many. The refusal of
tens of millions of people to be vaccinated against the novel coronavirus will be analyzed as a textbook
case of stupidity en masse. Stupid is
as stupid does, or, in the case of vaccination, as it doesn’t do. Stupidity
and irresponsibility are evil twins.
The slow-motion zombies’ assault on the Capitol on Jan. 6 was
a fittingly stupid finale to the
Trump years, which offered dueling
stupidities: Buy one, get one free.
The political parties became locked
in a four-year drama of hysteria
and mutually demeaning abuse. Every buffoonery of the president and
his people was answered by an idiocy from the other side, which in
its own style was just as sinister
and just as clownish.
Cable news provided the Greek
chorus. American government and
politics became cartoons. The Democrats, all unknowing, played Wile E.
Coyote to Mr. Trump’s Road Runner.
Twice, the Democrats’ Acme Impeachment Committee rigged up the
big bomb (heh heh), lit the fuse and
held its ears. Both times, the Road
Runner sped away. Beep beep!
“Trump is crazy!” “Trump is Hitler!” “Trump is a Russian agent!”
“Bob Mueller has the goods!” Beep
beep!
Stupidity has been in the air for
quite some time. And alas, Mr.
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Trump isn’t going away soon; neither are Jerrold Nadler, Adam Schiff
or Mazie Hirono—each a paragon of
the phenomenon.
Stupidity is one of life’s big mysteries, like evil, like love, an ineffable thing. You cannot exactly define
it, but you know it when you see it,
as Justice Potter Stewart said of
pornography. It takes many forms.
Stupidity is entitled to no moral
standing whatever, and yet it sits in
a place of honor at the tables of the
mighty; it blows in their ears and
whispers promises.
Stupidity reappears as a perennial theme of literature and history:
King Lear breaking up his kingdom
in the first act, or the entirety of
World War I, from Sarajevo to Versailles. In her 1984 book, “The
March of Folly,” Barbara Tuchman
examined four grand stupidities: the
Trojans’ decision to accept the
Greeks’ big wooden horse and move
it inside the walls of the city (an illustrative myth), the Renaissance
popes’ failure to deal with the complaints of Martin Luther and others
that led to the Reformation, England’s boneheaded policies under
George III that lost it the American
colonies, and the Americans’ mishandled intervention in Vietnam.
I have always thought that the
1960s, besides being the gaudiest
and noisiest and most entertaining
decade, was one of the stupidest,
with its stupid war and stupid ideas
(morons smoking banana peels
about summed it up). The grown-ups
had made a stupid mess in Vietnam;
the young swarmed onstage, too numerous for their own good, and, being on the whole vastly inexperienced in the business of life, made
stupid messes of their own. The
counterculture became the culture. A
lot of the music was great. Today
many baby boomers are starry-eyed
about the days of their youth. The
’60s set forth a paradox: It’s possible
for a decade to be filled with tragedy and ideals, and at the same time
to be essentially stupid.
The convergence of many
seemingly unrelated
elements has produced an
explosion of brainlessness.
In that thought, one approaches
the core of the mystery. Most of the
tragedies of that time, in fact, were
stupid: the war, the murders of John
and Robert Kennedy, to name three
essentially meaningless phenomena
that have, in time, passed over into
what Thucydides called “the country
of myth.” Is it possible that stupidity—far from being a shallow, comic
thing—is at the heart of historic
tragedy?
I’ve been working on a Unified
Field Theory of Stupidity. My hypothesis: Stupidity dominates in our
time because of the convergence of
many seemingly unrelated elements
that—mixed together at one moment, in one cultural beaker—have
produced a fatal explosion of brainlessness. What are those ingredients? You will have your own list, of
course.
My nominees will seem eccentric
at first. The subversion of manners
and authority (two great casualties
of the 1960s) prepared the way for
the death of privacy, which would
eventually be ensured by the stupendously intrusive capabilities of Big
Tech in the 21st century. Manners
(and in a different way, authority)
depend on respect for the privacy of
others, as well as one’s own. Manners depend on reticence, even mystery. When those ingrained regulations, those protections of the
individual mind, are gone, then you
may open the floodgates to (among
many other things) pornography,
which is a massively lucrative assault on individual dignity and collective decorum—an assault on the
manners of a society and, if you will
forgive my saying so, on the divinity
of the individual.
The death of manners and privacy, I argue, are profoundly political facts that, combined with other
facts, lead, eventually, to an entire
civilization of stupidity. It’s a short
ride from stupidity to madness.
Soon people aren’t quite people anymore; they are cartoons and categories. And “identities.” The media
grow feral. Genitals became weirdly
public issues; the sexes subdivide
into 100 genders. Ideologues extract
sunbeams from cucumbers. They engage in what amounts to an Oedipal
rebellion against reality itself.
At the Tower of Babel, the Lord—
whatever his reasons—confounded
the languages of the peoples of the
world. I suspect he has found he can
achieve the same effect by making
everyone stupid.
Mr. Morrow is a senior fellow at
the Ethics and Public Policy Center.
His latest book is “God and Mammon: Chronicles of American
Money.”
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Revenue Rises at Most of S&P 500 Baxter
Nears
BY KYLE KIM
Second-quarter revenues compared with pre-pandemic levels
Continued growth
Roughly a third of the S&P
500 index have seen steady or
rapid growth during the pandemic. Semiconductor, retail
and pharmaceutical companies
fared the best compared with
other sectors.
Companies in biotech saw
some of the largest revenue
percentage growth in pharmaceuticals, biotechnology and
life sciences. Moderna Inc.
had the largest revenue increase among the entire S&P
500. The company’s revenue
increased 33,187% from the
second quarter of 2019 to
2021—a figure too large to include in our charts.
Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc.’s revenue jumped
165.7% in the second quarter
Please turn to page B8
2019 TO 2020 PERCENTAGE CHANGE
–150
300
–100
–50
0%
Caesars
Entertainment
BOUNCED
BACK
50
100
150
CONTINUED
GROWTH
200
More than three-quarters
of the S&P 500 have
reported higher revenue
than in 2019, but a fifth
remain below those levels.
Etsy
Regeneron
Pharmaceuticals
Advanced
Micro Devices
150
100
Pioneer Natural
Resources
Tesla
Amazon.com
Truist
Financial
Electronic
Arts
Diamondback
Energy
50
Goldman
Sachs
Twitter
CarMax
Take-Two
Interactive
Activision
Blizzard
Lowe's
0%
Disney
Citigroup
Biogen
Ford
–50
American Airlines
Delta Air Lines
United Airlines
Las Vegas Sands
SLOWER
TO RECOVER
Live Nation
–100
Norwegian
Cruise Line
$10 Billion
Purchase
BY CARA LOMBARDO
AND DANA CIMILLUCA
250
2019 TO 2021 PERCENTAGE CHANGE
More than three-quarters of
the largest U.S. companies reported higher revenue than
before Covid-19, according to a
Wall Street Journal analysis,
indicating that many have
adapted to changing business
conditions caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
Among the companies in
the S&P 500, 213 have reported revenue for the calendar year’s second quarter
above 2019 levels after a drop
in 2020. Another 153 have
had second-quarter revenue in
each of the past two years
that exceeded 2019.
Meanwhile, 101 companies
remain below their 2019 figures, and 10 saw a drop this
year after a rise last year.
The numbers are based on a
Journal analysis of FactSet
data for the 477 S&P 500 companies that have reported results for the second quarter
through Friday.
UP THEN
DOWN
Carnival
Note: Moderna is excluded. Its second-quarter revenue percentage change since 2019 was 407.3% in 2020 and 33,187% in 2021.
Source: FactSet
Kyle Kim/THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
Baxter International Inc. is
in advanced talks to buy medical-equipment maker Hill-Rom
Holdings Inc. for around $10
billion, according to people familiar with the matter.
A deal that values Hill-Rom
at around $150 a share could
be reached by midweek, assuming the talks don’t fall
apart, the people said.
The talks follow an earlier
bid from Baxter valued at $144
a share that Hill-Rom rebuffed.
Hill-Rom shares jumped in late
July on news of that bid and
have remained elevated, closing Friday at $132.90. HillRom has a market capitalization of nearly $9 billion.
Baxter’s is around $37 billion.
Chicago-based Hill-Rom,
founded in 1915, makes medical gear such as hospital beds
and patient-monitoring devices.
Baxter is a medical-technology company based in Deerfield, Ill., that focuses on areas
Please turn to page B2
GM Recall
Of Bolt
Clouds
EV Push
BY MIKE COLIAS
BEN FOLDY
AND
Theranos’s Holmes Might Allege Abuse
BY SARA RANDAZZO
AND CHRISTOPHER WEAVER
Theranos Inc. founder Elizabeth Holmes could argue at
her coming criminal fraud trial
that she was in a decadelong
abusive relationship with former
Theranos
President
Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani that
left her under his control during the period in which the
government alleges the two
blood-testing executives committed a massive fraud, newly
revealed court records show.
Ms. Holmes says the abuse
by her former business and romantic partner was psychological, emotional and sexual, according to the documents.
Ms. Holmes accused Mr.
Balwani of controlling what
she ate, when she slept and
how she dressed, throwing
sharp objects at her and monitoring her text messages and
emails, among other things,
according to one of the filings.
Mr. Balwani “unequivocally
denies that he engaged in any
abuse at any time,” according
to one of the newly unsealed
filings. His lawyer, Jeffrey
Coopersmith, argued this week
that the filings should remain
under seal so that Mr. Balwani’s trial, scheduled for
early next year, can be fair. Mr.
Coopersmith didn’t respond to
a request for comment after
the filings became public.
The revelations, days before
her trial is set to begin, shed
light for the first time on how
Ms. Holmes’s lawyers might
mount a mental-health defense as well as on a judge’s
decision to separate the trials
of Ms. Holmes and Mr. Balwani, who were jointly
charged with wire fraud and
conspiracy to commit wire
fraud in June 2018. Both have
pleaded not guilty.
Attorneys for Ms. Holmes
didn’t respond to a request for
comment Ms. Holmes isn’t
bound to pursue the mentalhealth defense and can change
her defense strategy at any
point in the trial.
The newly released documents were filed in court under seal between late 2019 and
mid-2020. They became public
after U.S. District Judge Edward Davila ruled last week in
favor of a legal challenge by
Dow Jones & Co., the publisher of The Wall Street Journal.
Jury selection begins Tuesday in Ms. Holmes’s trial in
San Jose, Calif., where prosecutors will seek to prove she
misled investors and patients
about the nature of Theranos’s
blood-testing technology.
The once-hot Silicon Valley
startup claimed to be able to
test for a range of health conditions using just a few drops
of blood from a finger prick.
Please turn to page B4
Andrew Krupowicz was relieved last month to end the
lease on his 2019 Chevrolet
Bolt electric car, which had
been recalled for the risk of a
battery fire. He replaced it with
a new, larger Bolt model that
wasn’t subject to the safety
callback.
“I thought, ‘Great, I’m out of
the woods,’” he said. But two
weeks later, General Motors
Co. expanded its recall to include every Bolt it has built, including his own vehicle. The
chartered accountant from Toronto is keeping the car but
adding a networked fire alarm
in case it catches fire.
Please turn to page B2
Covid-19 in Malaysia Concerts Change as Pandemic Lingers
Imperils Chip Output
BY FELIZ SOLOMON
SINGAPORE—A surge of
Covid-19 cases in Malaysia, a
little-known but critical link in
the semiconductor supply
chain, has opened a new front
in the battle to fix manufacturing woes that have rippled
across industries during a
global shortage of computing
chips.
The Southeast Asian nation
is one of the world’s top destinations for assembly and testing of the devices that control
smartphones, car engines and
medical equipment. Disruptions
in Malaysia threaten to prolong
uncertainty over chip supply
well into next year, dashing
hopes of relief in the second
half of 2021.
The supply crunch in Malaysia, caused primarily by staff
shortages linked to virus-control measures combined with a
surge in global demand, poses a
new problem for the auto industry. For the first half of this
year,
shortages
largely
stemmed from companies miscalculating the pace of economic recoveries and not ordering enough parts. Now they
Please turn to page B2
QILAI SHEN/BLOOMBERG NEWS
INSIDE
BUSINESS NEWS
Cargo planes are filled
to their limit as some
goods are shifted away
from ships. B3
COMMODITIES
After reining in steel
production, China is
tested by economic
slowdown. B9
Concerts’ long-anticipated
comeback this fall is stumbling, as more big-name artists cancel their tours and
other musicians are coping
with the complexities and expense of doing live shows
amid concerns about resurgent Covid-19 cases.
The lingering pandemic has
artist teams navigating a
patchwork of safety protocols
that vary by city and venue,
looking to create “bubbles”
around acts on the road, contending with higher logistical
costs and appealing to eager
fan bases to get vaccinated.
Veteran music manager Irving Azoff has several major
acts on the road this fall—including the Eagles, Dead &
Company, Harry Styles and
Maroon 5—whose dates were
rescheduled, some of them
twice. “We got into this euphoria here for a moment
when the CDC said if you’re
vaccinated you don’t have to
be masked,” he said. “That
moment gave us a false start,
and then we were committed.”
Foo Fighters and Fall Out
Boy have pulled out of shows
because of infections in their
camps, while Garth Brooks,
Florida Georgia Line, Nine
Inch Nails, Stevie Nicks and
Limp Bizkit canceled tours.
Despite the cancellations,
concert executives insist the
shows going on are doing
GETTY IMAGES FOR IHEARTRADIO
BY ANNE STEELE
Harry Styles’s tour will require proof of vaccination or a negative test, as well as wearing a mask.
well—selling out and selling
quickly. Mr. Azoff added that
merchandise sales are up 40%
to 50% from pre-pandemic levels. In all, global revenue from
live shows rose to $26.1 billion
in 2019 before tumbling 75%
to $6.5 billion in 2020, according to Midia Research, an industry data provider.
Over the past week, concert
executives have focused more
on vaccination. The Eagles recently added another tour stop
in Seattle that will admit only
vaccinated fans, and Mr. Azoff
said new dates for his acts will
require vaccination for entry.
Live Nation Entertainment
Inc., the world’s largest concert promoter, will require
proof of vaccination or a negative Covid-19 test for entry at
all of its owned venues and
festivals, and allow artists to
make those requirements at
any shows it promotes, beginning in October.
“We know people are eager
to return to live events, and we
hope these measures encourage
even more people to get vacci-
nated,” Live Nation Chief Executive Michael Rapino said in an
internal memo this month. The
company said 90% of Lollapalooza’s 400,000 attendees
showed up fully vaccinated,
with 12% of those fans reporting the festival was their motivation for getting vaccinated.
Anschutz Entertainment
Group’s AEG Presents will require proof of vaccination for
entry into its owned and operated clubs, theaters and festivals, starting in October, and
Please turn to page B2
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
B2 | Monday, August 30, 2021
* *
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
BUSINESS & FINANCE
INDEX TO BUSINESSES
These indexes cite notable references to most parent companies and businesspeople
in today’s edition. Articles on regional page inserts aren’t cited in these indexes.
D
Danaher.......................A1
Deutsche Lufthansa...B3
Downstream Strategies
A3
B
Baowu Steel Group .... B9
Baxter Intl...................B1
Bettera Holdings ........ B4
Boeing ......................... B3
C
Caesars Entertainment
B8
Catalent.......................B4
China Huarong Asset
Management.............B9
Colonial Pipeline.........A4
CVS Health..................B3
E-F
Expedia Group.............B4
Ford Motor..................B2
G
General Motors ..... B1,B2
Globetronics Technology
Bhd............................B2
H
HCA Healthcare..........A2
Hill-Rom Hldgs ........... B1
K
Korean Air Lines.........B3
Kroger..........................A2
L
Live Nation
Entertainment..........B1
M
Mahle........................A10
Meituan.....................B10
Moderna......................B1
N
NextEra Energy .......... A1
Nissan Motor..............B2
P
Peloton Interactive.....B4
Pinduoduo ................. B10
R
Regeneron
Pharmaceuticals.......B1
T
Tencent Holdings......B10
Tesla............................B8
Theranos......................B1
Toyota Motor..............B2
Twitter ........................ B8
W
Walgreens Boots
Alliance.....................B3
Walmart.................B3,B4
REBECCA COOK/REUTERS
A
Airbus SE....................B3
Air France-KLM...........B3
Alibaba Group Holding
B10
Alphabet......................B8
American Water Works
A2
Anschutz Entertainment
Group.........................B1
INDEX TO PEOPLE
B
Balwani, Ramesh
“Sunny”.....................B1
Burnette, Juel.............A3
C
Chiminski, John .......... B2
D
Doll, Bob ..................... A2
Duckworth, Ken..........B3
H
Horwitt, Jeff...............A6
L
R
Roof, Jason.................B4
Lang, Stephanie..........A2
S
M
Shen Bin......................B9
Sheppard, Jocelyn ...... A3
McNulty, Cara.............B3
Mechanic, Mindy.........B4
Myllyvirta, Lauri.........B9
V
Vijayaraghavan, Ravi..B2
P
W
Phil Orlando................A2
Wang Xing ................ B10
Plans for
Concerts
Change
TERRY WYATT/GETTY IMAGES
Continued from page B1
will accommodate artists’
wishes where it can.
“If you don’t want to get
vaccinated—not can’t, don’t
want to—we would prefer you
stay home,” AEG Presents
Chief Executive Jay Marciano
said. “I know that sounds drastic, but this is a drastic situation again, and we don’t want
to have to go back to where we
were six months ago.”
Ticketmaster, the world’s
largest ticketing provider, said
it expects over five million
fans to attend events this
week. “We are seeing two major trends: event activity is
strong as attendance at concerts, festivals and games increases week over week, and
health checks are now the
norm with major event operators now requiring Covid vaccination or negative test for
entry,” Ticketmaster President
Mark Yovich said.
Neil Young, in a post on his
website Monday, slammed the
fall return of concerts, calling
them super-spreader events
and wondering why more artists weren’t canceling shows.
He said big concert promoters
should pump the brakes and
added that he pulled himself
from the September lineup of
Willie Nelson’s Farm Aid festival “for fear that unprotected
children may become infected
with Covid by folks who went
to the show, caught the virus,
had no symptoms and returned home to hug their kids
or someone else’s kids.”
Mr. Marciano said the biggest challenge moving forward
is dealing with various state
and local mandates.
“Some markets don’t allow
us to ask for proof of vaccination. In others, municipalities
now require it. Same with
mask mandates. And new
mandates come out every
day,” he said. “The lesson
we’ve learned is ramping back
up has been just as logistically
difficult as pulling things
down was, if not more so.”
Concerts operate in a fragile
economic environment, where
an act needs to play a critical
mass
of
dates—typically
around 40 for a domestic
tour—to a near full house to be
profitable. Executives say they
have been able to deal with
spot cancellations, as most
acts have more available places
they can sell tickets than dates
they have available to play.
Most major acts are taking
a similar tack to Harry Styles’s
tour, which kicks off next week
in Las Vegas and said ticket
holders must provide proof of
vaccination or a negative test,
in addition to wearing a mask.
Florida Georgia Line was among the acts that canceled tours.
Baxter Near
$10 Billion
Purchase
Continued from page B1
including critical care, nutrition and surgical products.
There has been a boom in
healthcare merger activity this
year as companies in the industry jockey for scale and
other benefits that deals
bring, in many cases taking
advantage of elevated stock
prices used as currency.
They have struck $399 billion of takeover deals in the
U.S. this year, more than dou-
ble last year’s pace, according
to Dealogic.
In June, a group of privateequity firms reached a deal to
acquire Medline Industries
Inc. that values that closely
held medical-supply company
at more than $30 billion.
If completed, it would be
the largest leveraged buyout
since the 2008-09 financial
crisis.
Then, earlier this month,
healthcare-software firm Inovalon Holdings Inc. agreed to
be sold to a group of privateequity firms for over $6 billion.
Overall U.S. deal activity
has roughly tripled this year
to nearly $2 trillion as the
economy bounces back from
the pandemic-triggered slowdown.
GM confirmed five fires and recalled about 69,000 Bolts from 2017 and 2018 models and some from 2019. A Bolt being assembled in 2018.
GM Effort
On EVs Hit
By Recall
Continued from page B1
GM this month expanded
the Bolt safety recall for the
second time, calling back the
roughly 142,000 models built
since it went on sale five years
ago.
The Detroit auto maker also
paused production of all new
Bolts. The safety action on its
lone U.S. electric car will cost
GM an estimated $1.8 billion,
or around $12,700 per car,
among its costliest recalls.
The safety problems underscore the risks for traditional
auto makers as many take a
sharp turn toward electric vehicles.
The high cost of energydense lithium-ion battery cells
means replacement expenses
can spiral when defects occur.
Ford Motor Co., Hyundai Motor
Co. and other car companies
have been hit with huge costs
to fix relatively small numbers
of electric cars.
For GM, the recent troubles
come as it tries to convince
consumers and investors that it
is ready to lead the car industry’s transition to electrics.
While the cars have been recalled, GM and battery-cell
supplier LG Energy Solution
still don’t have a fix.
GM has confirmed 10 fires
linked to the problem and is
aware of some complaints of
smoke inhalation but no
deaths. It is advising owners to
avoid fully charging their cars
and warning them to not
charge them in their garages.
“I am experiencing problems
sleeping at night, due to the
fact that I have a potential fire
risk sitting outside of my
home,” one Bolt owner wrote to
the National Highway Traffic
Safety Administration in a complaint published on the agency’s
website. NHTSA has received
dozens of complaints about the
vehicle from Bolt owners since
it warned them last month not
to park or charge their cars indoors, its website shows.
A GM spokesman declined
to comment on specific consumer complaints. He said hundreds of employees from GM
and LG are working to solve
the problem.
“We’re not going to begin
the recall repairs in vehicles
until we’re confident that LG is
building defect-free products
for us,” he said. “We’re working around the clock to get to
that point.”
The auto maker has said it is
working with LG to reimburse
costs associated with the recall.
An LG spokeswoman didn’t
return requests for comment.
The companies have formed
a joint venture that is spending
around $4.5 billion on two new
U.S. battery factories to supply
future GM electric cars. GM has
said those batteries will use a
different chemistry than the
ones in the Bolt.
“The lessons learned from
this entire experience are really
going to benefit the industry
and the importance of the
manufacturing processes,” GM
Chief Executive Mary Barra
told Bloomberg TV last week.
GM has cited a manufacturing flaw that can result in two
defects in the same battery
cell. Those defects can lead to
a short circuit, which can
cause a fire.
The cost of replacing a battery pack can range from
around $5,000 for smaller, lessexpensive cars to more than
$30,000 for those used in highperformance models, said
Malaysia
Output
Imperiled
Continued from page B1
can’t always get the parts they
need because Covid-19 outbreaks are denting factory output.
“It’s a bit like a game of
whack-a-mole,” said Ravi Vijayaraghavan, a Singaporebased partner at the consulting
firm Bain & Co. specializing in
semiconductors. “We think we
have supply sorted out, and
then a problem suddenly pops
up somewhere else.”
Some of the world’s leading
car makers including Toyota
Motor Corp., Ford Motor Co.,
General Motors Co. and Nissan Motor Co. have disclosed
major production cuts due
largely to chip shortages from
factories in Malaysia.
Ford suspended work for
about a week at an F-150 plant
in the Kansas City, Mo., area
and a Fiesta factory in Cologne,
Germany, because of missing
parts, while Toyota said it
would cut global production by
around 40% in September.
General Motors expects to
make 100,000 fewer vehicles in
North America in the second
half of the year.
The problems in Malaysia
stem from the worst Covid-19
surge the country has seen
since the start of the pandemic.
The nation of around 32 million
people has had more than 1.6
million reported cases and
15,000 deaths, more than half
of them this summer.
In June, Malaysian chip
maker Globetronics Technology Bhd., which assembles sensors for a U.S. smartphone
maker as well as basic car components, voluntarily closed two
of its factories for several days
after three workers tested positive for Covid-19.
It took about four weeks to
normalize deliveries, according
to Chief Executive Heng Huck
Lee, who had back-to-back calls
with customers as he and his
team tried to shuffle around orders.
—Chester Tay in Kuala
Lumpur, Malaysia, and Jon
Emont in Singapore
contributed to this article.
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James Davies, chief executive
of analytics company We Predict. He said manufacturing defects in battery cells often lead
to full replacement of the battery pack, because it can be
difficult to pinpoint which cells
are bad.
“If you get it right, electric
vehicles last longer and cost
less to own” than gas-powered
cars, he said. “But if you get it
wrong, there are going to be
huge costs.”
One of the first fires that
drew regulators’ attention occurred on St. Patrick’s Day in
2019, when a Bolt owner in Belmont, Mass., plugged in to
charge in the driveway. About
an hour later, smoke began billowing from the vehicle’s underside. It took firefighters
three hours to extinguish the
fire, according to a fire department report.
By November, GM said it
had confirmed five fires and recalled about 69,000 Bolts from
model years 2017 and 2018,
along with some 2019 models.
Analysts say battery-related
fires are still rare, but incidents
will likely multiply as more
electric cars hit the road. Researchers have said fire risks in
electric vehicles are comparable
to those of gas-powered cars.
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
Monday, August 30, 2021 | B3
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
BUSINESS NEWS
Snarled Supply Chains Send Goods to Air
Cargo planes fly at
almost 90% capacity
as peak season starts;
car tires ride in cabins
The global air cargo sector
is flying planes at almost 90%
of capacity as record amounts
of goods crisscross the globe,
bound for free-spending consumers and parts-hungry manufacturers.
Packed planes pose a challenge for shippers, airlines and
airports entering the traditional peak U.S. season for
moving goods, when demand
increases for consumer electronics, household items and
clothing ahead of the holidayshopping spree.
Pinch points include overflowing airport cargo warehouses, spilling goods into offsite facilities and exacerbating
the shortage of staff to sort,
load and unload jets. Airlines
have responded by expanding
cargo flights beyond the big-
YONHAP/EPA/SHUTTERSTOCK
BY DOUG CAMERON
Korean Air Lines is among the carriers that have expanded cargo service as the economy rebounds.
gest gateways to such cities as
Columbus, Ohio, and Tampa,
Fla., to avoid congestion.
Sometimes the cabins of repurposed passenger planes are
used for cargo.
“We are at the limit,” said
Bernhard Kindelbacher, head
of cargo operations in the U.S.
and Canada for Deutsche Lufthansa AG, one of the world’s
largest airfreight carriers.
Charles Goodwin, opera-
tions director at the Columbus
Regional Airport Authority,
said car tires packed between
the seats of repurposed passenger jets are among the
cargo now being flown that
once traveled by sea. “The entire supply chain seems to be
full,” Mr. Goodwin said.
Flying goods by air is the
last—and priciest—option for
many manufacturers and retailers to move products
through a global supply chain
already snarled by pandemicdriven closures of Chinese seaports and widespread labor
shortages.
Airfreight accounts for less
than 1% of global trade by
weight but more than 30% by
value, according to the International Air Transport Association, a trade group.
The share of global airline
industry revenue for freight
traffic has doubled to around
30% from pre-pandemic levels,
according to IATA. Soaring
shipping prices have made
freight a profit center for many
airlines, offsetting some of the
airline industry losses, which
the trade group estimates will
top $48 billion this year.
“It is cargo demand that is
determining where we fly,” Pieter Bootsma, chief revenue
officer at Air France-KLM SA,
said in April.
The near shutdown of many
airlines in spring 2020 removed most of the 50% of
global air cargo capacity that
is usually in the bellies of passenger jets. Cargo carriers
pulled idled jets from desert
storage, and passenger planes
were repurposed to carry
goods in cabins to help meet
demand for personal protective equipment. More than
half of the orders for widebody jets secured by Boeing
Co. this year are for cargo aircraft, and both Boeing and rival Airbus SE are exploring
new freighter planes.
International
passenger
flight capacity is still down
more than 50% from pre-pandemic levels, according to
IATA, leaving dedicated cargo
aircraft and repurposed passenger planes to pick up the
slack, just as many industrial
economies roar back from
pandemic-induced slowdowns.
The summer is traditionally
a relative lull for air cargo as
factories close for staff vacations and maintenance. IATA,
however, said cargo jets are
flying fuller this summer than
at any time since it started
keeping records in 1990. The
combination of inventory restocking and ocean-cargo logjams boosted the appeal of airfreight, according to the group,
even though pricing is 80%
above pre-pandemic levels.
In Columbus, traffic at Rickenbacker International Airport
is up 50% from a year earlier
as carriers including Korean
Air Lines Co. have added
cargo service. The airport has
benefited in part from the
spillover of cargo business
from congested gateways including Chicago.
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CVS Health earlier this year stationed therapists at 13 of its stores, and is expanding the program.
Mental-Health Counseling
Comes to Retail Locations
BY SHARON TERLEP
CVS Health Corp. is betting
Americans will get therapy at
the same place they buy their
snacks, soda and prescription
drugs.
The pharmacy company is
among several retailers, including Walmart Inc. and Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc.,
that are experimenting with
offering counseling services in
or near stores. They see potential as the Covid-19 pandemic
has prompted more people to
seek help for addiction, depression and other issues, according to federal data.
“It’s creative and we certainly need the help,” said Ken
Duckworth, medical director of
the National Alliance on Mental Illness. “It’s an interesting
idea to post a mental-health
resource at a place where people already are at.”
CVS earlier this year
started stationing mentalhealth providers, typically a licensed clinical social worker
trained in cognitive behavioral
therapy, at 13 locations in
Houston, Philadelphia and
Tampa, Fla., as a pilot program. The company said it
saw a surprisingly high return
rate for customers who had an
initial consultation, and is now
expanding the program to 34
locations in those areas.
Some healthcare providers
question how many people are
comfortable seeking therapy in
such a public setting, despite a
growing acceptance and understanding of mental-health issues. CVS says other customers
would have no way of knowing
that a person is getting mentalhealth help, given that the
stores offer a range of wellness
services. Mental-health services are advertised inside the
Tech Assists Rising
Demand for Therapy
Projects to offer mentalhealth therapy in stores come
in addition to teletherapy models offered by retailers, healthcare organizations and other
private companies that surged
in popularity when much of the
country was locked down by
pandemic restrictions during
stores, where an area designated for medical services includes a private room for counseling sessions.
“We’re not putting up a big
neon sign: ‘Getting therapy
here,’ ” said Cara McNulty,
president of behavioral health
for CVS-owned Aetna Inc.
A mental-health assessment
costs $129; a 30-minute counseling session is $69. Based on
the assessment results, a customer could return for a few
therapy sessions, or they
might get a referral for extensive services from a family
doctor, psychiatrist or another
local resource. People without
insurance are referred to a
community organization that
helps the uninsured, CVS said.
“We’re dealing with a system that is broken and confusing,” said Aetna’s Ms. McNulty.
“Often people don’t know
where to go, who to see and
what they need to be seen for.
When you really democratize
access to care by putting mental-health support in a retail
setting, it makes access easier
for people.”
Retail pharmacies have
been pushing deeper into
healthcare to offset rising
competition from online retailers and slower profit growth
from prescription drugs. At
the same time, more for-profit
companies are looking to upend traditional mental-health
models. Last year, there was a
record level of investments
from venture-capital firms
into therapy startups such as
Talkspace and Calm, according
to market researcher CB Insights.
CVS, with its Aetna insurance business, stands to benefit as both a seller of services
and as a payer, given that seeing a counselor at one of the
stores costs less than alternatives such as an emergencyroom visit. An in-store therapist wouldn’t provide longterm therapy or treatment for
disorders that require more
than five or six visits.
Walmart is adding in-person counseling via its Walmart
Health locations, which are
medical centers attached to
Walmart Supercenters. The retailer offers in-person counseling at Walmart Health sites in
Arkansas and Georgia and
plans to expand to Illinois and
Florida this year. An initial 60minute visit costs $60, according to Walmart’s website.
Walgreens is adding mental-health offerings as part of
a deal with primary-care provider VillageMD to attach doctor’s offices to hundreds of
drugstores.
Some mental-health experts
say they are concerned about
potential pitfalls in mixing retail and therapy. Adding another entity to what they say
is an already convoluted system could complicate care,
they say. Retailers also will
need to ensure that there is no
incentive to push a customer
toward psychiatric medication,
said Dr. Duckworth of the
mental-illness alliance.
Mental-health advocates
generally say they welcome
any system that will provide
easy and visible access to
services.
parts of last year.
Emergency rooms, family
doctors and therapists say they
are seeing a sharp increase in
substance abuse, suicide attempts and people suffering
with mood disorders such as
anxiety and depression. Along
with mounting stress, mentalhealth experts say that more
people are open to getting help,
as celebrities from singer Demi
Lovato to gymnast Simone Biles
go public with their struggles.
From August 2020 to February 2021, the percentage of
adults with recent symptoms
of an anxiety or depressive disorder increased to 41.5% from
36.4%, according to a joint survey by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
and U.S. Census Bureau. Emergency-room visits for mentalhealth crises among 12- to 17year-olds increased 31%
between 2019 and 2020, the
CDC reported in June.
The pandemic has
led many to seek
help for depression
and other woes.
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(800) 366-3975
For more information visit:
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All Rights Reserved.
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B4 | Monday, August 30, 2021
* *
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
BUSINESS NEWS
Holmes
May Claim
Abuse
BY JARED S. HOPKINS
KATE MUNSCH/REUTERS
Continued from page B1
In reality, as the Journal reported in 2015, Theranos’s
proprietary technology was
unreliable and the company
ran many of its tests on commercial analyzers, including
some that it modified to work
with smaller blood samples.
Ms. Holmes met Mr. Balwani, a veteran tech executive
about 20 years her senior,
when she was a student at
Stanford University, and he
later joined her at Theranos as
its president and chief operating officer.
The pair kept their romantic relationship secret from investors, board members and
company employees for years,
according to depositions of
former directors and staff
members taken in civil cases
brought by disgruntled investors and reviewed by the Journal.
Mr. Balwani used his personal wealth, gained from his
work at an earlier tech
startup, to help prop up Theranos, including putting his
own money up as collateral for
a loan in 2009 and later investing in the company, according to the deposition of
Theranos’s former corporate
controller.
Ms. Holmes and Mr. Balwani worked closely together
until he departed in 2016 as
the company faced a raft of
regulatory, legal and public relations challenges.
The newly public court documents include filings by Ms.
Holmes indicating she could
bring a mental-health or mental-defect defense, based on
what she called the psychological impact of the relationship
with Mr. Balwani and abusive
tactics that allowed him to exert control over her.
This line of defense could
also include testimony that
Ms. Holmes suffers from posttraumatic stress disorder, the
filings show, from the relationship with Mr. Balwani and a
Catalent
Expands
Vitamin
Business
Elizabeth Holmes says the abuse by her former business and romantic partner was psychological, emotional and sexual.
second event that remains redacted in the court record.
The filings show Ms.
Holmes could argue that “she
lacked the intent to deceive
because, as a result of her deference to Mr. Balwani, she believed that various representations were true.”
Jason Roof, a forensic psychiatrist and professor at University of California, Davis,
said defenses rooted in PTSD
can help explain situations
where brief, acute episodes severely impaired a defendant’s
behavior but could be more
challenging in cases like Ms.
Holmes’s.
“Given the complexity of a
white-collar crime over the
span of a great deal of years,
making the case that a person
throughout each of those dealings was unable to understand
the nature and quality of what
they were doing is going to be
difficult,” said Dr. Roof, who
conducts psychiatric evaluations in criminal cases but
isn’t involved in Ms. Holmes’s.
People close to Ms. Holmes
during Theranos’s rise and fall
said they observed that Mr.
Balwani was typically deferential to Ms. Holmes in public
and that Ms. Holmes seemed
to be in full control of decisions made at the company.
Also unsealed were motions
made by Mr. Balwani and Ms.
The defense could
also testify that
Elizabeth Holmes
suffers from PTSD.
Holmes asking the court to
separate their trials, citing her
allegations against him.
Mr. Balwani requested a
separate trial from Ms.
Holmes in December 2019, arguing that there would be
“devastating prejudice” if she
raised her allegations against
him at a joint trial. “In the
minds of nearly any potential
juror this Court finds, this
case will be against a sexual
predator,” rather than a tech
executive, Mr. Coopersmith argued in a motion.
Judge Davila scheduled Mr.
Balwani’s trial second when
granting the motion to split
the proceedings in March
2020. It is expected to begin
early next year.
In Ms. Holmes’s request for
separate trials, her lawyers argued that the physical presence of Mr. Balwani in the
same courtroom could be an
emotional and psychological
trigger that could make it hard
for her to concentrate during
her case.
One of Ms. Holmes’s lawyers told the judge it “was
highly likely Holmes would
testify” about Mr. Balwani’s
abuse, an unsealed court order
shows, shedding light on the
question of whether jurors
would hear from her directly.
Ms. Holmes’s attorneys
have said they could call
Mindy Mechanic as an expert
witness tied to the mentalhealth defense. The newly unsealed documents show Dr.
Mechanic would testify about
intimate partner abuse, its
psychological effects during
and after the relationship and
whether Ms. Holmes and Mr.
Balwani’s relationship fits that
definition.
Portions of the filings remained redacted under the order by Judge Davila. The filings indicate Ms. Holmes may
have been especially susceptible to being controlled by an
abusive partner, but details
about this suggestion remain
redacted. The unsealed records show Dr. Mechanic’s testimony could address how survivors of past sexual abuse are
susceptible to being victimized
again.
Ms. Holmes also had told
confidantes over the years
that she was a past survivor of
sexual assault before meeting
Mr. Balwani, people who were
close to her said in interviews.
Contract drug manufacturer
Catalent Inc. is expected to announce Monday that it has
agreed to buy closely held Bettera Holdings LLC for $1 billion, according to people familiar with the matter, the latest
deal involving nutritional supplement companies.
The all-cash deal, which is
expected to be announced Monday morning, would expand
Catalent’s manufacturing capabilities for vitamins, minerals
and supplements to make them
in the high-growth gummy
form, the people said. The
transaction is expected to close
by the end of the fourth quarter.
Bettera, based in Plano,
Texas, and backed by privateequity firm Highlander Partners LP, manufactures gummy,
soft-chew and lozenge forms of
vitamins and supplements. Bettera has about 500 employees.
Bettera’s sales last year totaled about $150 million, according to the people, and are
forecast to grow by at least
20% annually in the short term.
Gummy vitamins and supplements, initially created and
marketed for children, are increasingly popular among
adults, especially younger demographics. The global gummy
vitamins market is projected to
reach $9.3 billion by 2026,
compared with $5.7 billion in
2018, according to an Allied
Market Research report released last year.
Catalent, of Somerset, N.J.,
has
helped
manufacture
Covid-19 vaccines and treatments for several companies.
Shares of the company have
more than doubled since health
authorities declared the pandemic in March 2020, closing
at nearly $130 on Friday.
Catalent develops and manufactures drugs for pharmaceutical companies.
The Wall
Street
Journal CEO
Council Summit
September 28, 2021, 3:00 p.m.—6:30 p.m. HKT | 8:00 a.m.—11:30 a.m. BST
Online Event
FEATURED SPEAKERS
OVERVIEW
Kai-Fu Lee
On September 28, The Wall Street Journal will gather global business
leaders for a meeting of the CEO Council. As countries around the world
wrestle with the challenges of the Covid-19 Delta variant, we will dig into
the health challenges, the uneven global recovery, the risk of inflation and
frothy markets, and how geopolitical tensions and the virus have affected
trade. We will explore how companies are emerging from the pandemic with
new ways of working and how technology continues to reshape business and
society. Through news-breaking interviews, panel discussions, off-the-record
breakouts and networking, we will probe the areas CEOs need to understand
as they adapt to today’s fast-changing world.
CEO, Sinovation Ventures
Adar Poonawalla
CEO, Serum Institute of India
Jes Staley
Group CEO, Barclays
Jane Sun
CEO, Trip.com Group
Anthony Tan
Group CEO and Co-Founder, Grab
Presenting Sponsors
Supporting Sponsors
© 2021 Dow Jones & Co., Inc. All rights reserved. 6DJ8541
Membership is by invitation: CEOCouncil@wsj.com. Learn more at CEOCouncil.wsj.com/inquire.
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
Monday, August 30, 2021 | B5
Rework
work
Don’t just come back, come back to better. An Envoy workplace
flexes to balance people and mission in ways the old-school
office simply can’t.
With Envoy’s people-centric platform you can manage hybrid
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21-ENV-001-14-146309-1
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B6 | Monday, August 30, 2021
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
Alex Hussey
“My victory is removing ‘can’t’ from my vocabulary.” Alex was hit by an IED in
Afghanistan. He lost both legs, his left hand and has a traumatic brain injury.
With support from DAV, Alex is taking on mountains. DAV helps veterans of all
generations get the benefits they’ve earned—helping more than a million veterans
each year. Support more victories for veterans®. Go to DAV.org.
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
Monday, August 30, 2021 | B7
CLOSED-END FUNDS
Listed are the 300 largest closed-end funds as
measured by assets. Closed-end funds sell a limited
number of shares and invest the proceeds in securities.
Unlike open-end funds, closed-ends generally do not
buy their shares back from investors who wish to cash
in their holdings. Instead, fund shares trade on a stock
exchange. NA signifies that the information is not
available or not applicable. NS signifies funds not in
existence for the entire period. 12 month yield is
computed by dividing income dividends paid (during
the previous 12 months for periods ending at monthend or during the previous 52 weeks for periods
ending at any time other than month-end) by the
latest month-end market price adjusted for capital
gains distributions. Depending on the fund category,
either 12-month yield or total return is listed.
Source: Lipper
Friday, August 27, 2021
52 wk
Prem Ttl
Fund (SYM)
NAV Close /Disc Ret
General Equity Funds
Adams Diversified Equity ADX 24.06 20.72 -13.9 30.6
Boulder Growth & Income BIF 16.49 14.03 -14.9 40.5
Central Secs CET
51.29 43.13 -15.9 54.8
CohenStrsCEOppFd FOF 14.27 14.86 +4.1 36.6
EVTxAdvDivIncm EVT 28.50 28.37 -0.5 49.2
GabelliDiv&IncTr GDV 29.35 26.87 -8.4 47.1
Gabelli Equity Tr GAB 6.63 6.86 +3.5 38.5
GeneralAmer GAM 53.51 44.76 -16.4 36.2
JHancockTaxAdvDiv HTD 25.26 24.58 -2.7 35.9
Liberty All-Star Equity USA 8.31 8.50 +2.3 51.8
Liberty All-Star Growth ASG 8.91 8.72 -2.1 28.5
Royce Micro-Cap Tr RMT 13.65 11.95 -12.5 55.8
Royce Value Trust RVT 21.02 18.81 -10.5 46.3
Source Capital SOR 49.12 46.25 -5.8 31.5
Tri-Continental TY
39.19 34.74 -11.4 34.6
Specialized Equity Funds
Aberdeen Glb Prem Prop AWP 6.96 6.61 -5.0 47.4
Adams Natural Resources PEO 17.40 14.96 -14.0 35.3
ASA Gold & Prec Met Ltd ASA 23.88 20.93 -12.4 -9.8
BR Enh C&I CII
21.50 21.42 -0.4 41.8
BlackRock Energy & Res BGR 9.39 8.84 -5.9 32.8
BlackRock Eq Enh Div BDJ 10.43 10.20 -2.2 43.7
BlackRock Enh Glbl Div BOE 13.29 12.56 -5.5 35.8
BlackRock Enh Intl Div BGY 6.77 6.38 -5.8 24.1
BlackRock Hlth Sci Tr II BMEZ 29.51 28.25 -4.3 23.2
BlackRock Hlth Sciences BME 48.31 48.24 -0.1 17.7
BlackRock Res & Comm BCX 9.43 9.32 -1.2 50.7
BlackRock Sci&Tech Tr II BSTZ 42.31 40.60 -4.0 61.0
BlackRock Sci&Tech Trust BST 55.93 54.16 -3.2 29.4
52 wk
Prem Ttl
Fund (SYM)
NAV Close /Disc Ret
BlackRock Utl Inf & Pwr BUI 25.53 26.50 +3.8 26.8
CLEARBRIDGEENGYMDSOPP EMO 26.09 21.22 -18.7 95.0
ClearBridge MLP & Midstm CEM 30.88 26.60 -13.9 92.4
ChnStrInfr UTF
27.42 28.83 +5.1 33.7
Cohen&SteersQualInc RQI 16.64 15.88 -4.6 49.4
Cohen&Steers TotRet RFI 15.49 16.20 +4.6 34.2
CohenStrsREITPrefInc RNP 27.62 27.08 -2.0 43.8
Columbia Sel Prm Tech Gr STK 34.14 34.29 +0.4 62.3
DNP Select Income DNP 9.82 10.86 +10.6 15.2
Duff&Ph Uti&Infra Inc Fd DPG 14.24 14.59 +2.5 45.5
EtnVncEqtyInc EOI 19.14 19.35 +1.1 33.4
EtnVncEqtyIncoII EOS 23.94 24.68 +3.1 33.9
EVRskMnDvsEqInc ETJ 10.52 11.17 +6.2 19.0
ETnVncTxMgdBuyWrtInc ETB 16.12 16.47 +2.2 26.5
EtnVncTxMgdBuyWrtOpp ETV 16.02 16.52 +3.1 23.0
EvTxMnDvsEqInc ETY 14.18 14.50 +2.3 36.0
EtnVncTxMgdGlbB ETW 11.02 11.10 +0.7 34.7
EVTxMnGblDvEqInc EXG 10.52 10.69 +1.6 47.6
First Trust Energy Inc G FEN 14.27 13.80 -3.3 51.6
First Tr Enhanced Eq FFA 21.14 21.18 +0.2 43.1
FirstTrMLPEner&Inc FEI 8.13 7.30 -10.2 50.5
Gabelli Healthcare GRX 15.47 13.66 -11.7 32.8
Gab Utility GUT
4.40 8.20 +86.4 23.4
GAMCOGlGold&NatRes GGN 3.79 3.85 +1.6 16.3
J Han Finl Opptys BTO 38.20 44.00 +15.2 102.2
Neuberger Brmn MLP & EI NML 6.08 4.79 -21.2 80.9
NuvDow 30 DynOverwrite DIAX 18.27 17.60 -3.7 33.0
NuvCorEqAlpha JCE 17.58 17.04 -3.1 37.3
NuveenNasdaq100DynOv QQQX 29.74 30.00 +0.9 22.3
Nuv Real Est JRS
12.25 11.29 -7.8 51.5
Nuveen Rl Asst Inc & Gro JRI 17.24 15.89 -7.8 40.4
NuvS&P500DynOvFd SPXX NA 18.20 NA 36.8
NuvSP500BuyIncFd BXMX 15.21 14.91 -2.0 34.2
ReavesUtilityIncome UTG 35.14 35.60 +1.3 20.5
Tortoise Enrgy Infra Crp TYG 34.01 27.06 -20.4 70.9
VAGIAI & Tech Opptys AIO 30.11 27.71 -8.0 39.6
VDivInt&PremStr NFJ NA 15.66 NA 34.5
Income & Preferred Stock Funds
CalamosStratTot CSQ 18.36 18.80 +2.4 42.2
CohenStrsLtdDurPref&Inc LDP 26.24 26.71 +1.8 19.3
CohenStrsSelPref&Income PSF 27.11 30.85 +13.8 22.1
CohenStrsTaxAvPreSecs&I PTA 26.06 25.46 -2.3 NS
FirstTrIntDurPref&Inc FPF 25.13 26.04 +3.6 25.4
JHanPrefInc HPI
20.76 21.94 +5.7 17.6
A Week in the Life of the DJIA
A look at how the Dow Jones Industrial Average component stocks
did in the past week and how much each moved the index. The DJIA
gained 335.72 points, or 0.96%, on the week. A $1 change in the price
of any DJIA stock = 6.58-point change in the average. To date, a
$1,000 investment on Dec. 31 in each current DJIA stock component
would have returned $34,876, or a gain of 16.25%, on the $30,000
investment, including reinvested dividends.
The Week’s Action
Pct Stock price Point chg
chg (%) change in average* Company
Symbol Close
7.37
6.02
5.57
5.38
4.60
4.49
23.82
8.90
8.33
4.34
29.56
156.83
58.60
54.84
28.57
Dow
Goldman Sachs
American Express
JPMorgan Chase
Chevron
DOW
GS
AXP
JPM
CVX
$65.38
419.69
168.65
163.05
98.64
$1,204
1,603
1,408
1,307
1,216
4.27
4.06
3.85
3.61
2.87
9.08
10.40
7.89
1.88
5.02
59.78
68.47
51.95
12.38
33.05
Boeing
salesforce.com
Caterpillar
Intel
Walt Disney
BA
CRM
CAT
INTC
DIS
221.75
266.53
212.83
53.89
180.14
1,036
1,198
1,187
1,102
994
1.51
1.37
0.78
0.57
0.46
3.44
0.80
1.25
1.33
0.89
22.65
5.27
8.23
8.76
5.86
Honeywell
Cisco
Travelers
Visa
3M
HON
CSCO
TRV
V
MMM
231.14
59.02
162.09
232.69
195.05
1,101
1,348
1,168
1,068
1,142
0.37
0.28
0.22
–0.13
–0.34
0.18
0.41
0.30
–0.21
–0.75
1.19
2.70
1.98
–1.38
–4.94
Walgreens
Apple
IBM
Nike
Amgen
WBA
AAPL
IBM
NKE
AMGN
48.48
148.60
139.41
167.58
222.78
1,250
1,125
1,148
1,191
991
–0.42
–1.35
–1.52
–1.75
–1.78
–1.01
–0.75
–4.64
–0.99
–5.86
–6.65
–4.94
–30.55
–6.52
–38.58
McDonald’s
Verizon
Microsoft
Coca-Cola
Home Depot
MCD 237.48
VZ
54.77
MSFT 299.72
KO
55.65
HD 323.38
1,120
963
1,356
1,031
1,231
–1.92 –2.78
–2.55 –10.95
–3.02 –2.38
–3.26 –4.93
–3.63 –6.51
–18.30
–72.09
–15.67
–32.46
–42.86
Procter & Gamble
PG
UnitedHealth Group UNH
Merck
MRK
Walmart
WMT
Johnson & Johnson JNJ
$1,000 Invested(year-end '20)
$1,000
1,042
1,203
995
1,029
1,119
142.31
418.76
76.30
146.52
172.93
*Based on Composite price. DJIA is calculated on primary-market price.
Source: Dow Jones Market Data; FactSet.
52 wk
Prem Ttl
Fund (SYM)
NAV Close /Disc Ret
JHPrefIncII HPF
20.50 22.55 +10.0 32.8
HnckJPfdInco III HPS 18.34 19.30 +5.2 25.8
J Han Prm PDT
14.97 16.86 +12.6 39.3
LMP CapInco SCD
16.10 14.59 -9.4 45.4
Nuveen Pref & Inc Opp JPC 9.91 9.99 +0.8 21.4
Nuveen Fd JPS
9.91 9.98 +0.7 16.1
Nuveen Pref & Inc Term JPI 25.33 25.49 +0.6 19.2
Nuveen TxAdvDivGr JTD 18.03 16.49 -8.5 30.3
TCW Strat Income TSI NA 5.84 NA 2.7
Convertible Sec's. Funds
AdvntCnvrtbl&IncFd AVK 20.15 19.05 -5.5 43.5
CalamosConvHi CHY 16.11 16.23 +0.7 40.5
CalmosConvOp CHI 15.26 15.56 +2.0 42.8
VAGI Conv & Inc II NCZ 5.72 5.36 -6.3 35.1
VAGI Conv & Inc NCV 6.38 6.12 -4.1 37.2
VAGI Dvs Inc & Conv ACV 36.68 35.77 -2.5 42.2
VAGI Eqty & Conv Inc NIE 34.25 30.70 -10.4 27.9
World Equity Funds
Aberdeen Emg Mkts Eq Inc AEF 9.63 8.64 -10.3 32.2
Aberdeen Tot Dyn Div AOD 11.21 10.42 -7.0 37.0
BlackRock Capital Alloc BCAT 21.55 22.00 +2.1 NS
Calamos GloDynInc CHW 10.11 10.60 +4.8 37.0
China CHN
30.42 26.78 -12.0 10.8
EV TxAdvGlbDivInc ETG 22.76 22.14 -2.7 49.7
EtnVncTxAdvOpp ETO 31.46 32.35 +2.8 56.8
FirstTr Dyn Euro Eq Inc FDEU 15.14 13.61 -10.1 35.8
Gabelli Multimedia GGT 9.04 9.40 +4.0 45.0
Highland Global Alloc HGLB 11.87 9.91 -16.5 67.3
India Fund IFN
25.44 22.82 -10.3 48.2
Japan Smaller Cap JOF 10.37 9.07 -12.5 17.4
Korea KF
NA 42.94 NA 45.3
LazardGlbTotRetInc LGI 21.96 21.80 -0.7 49.5
MS ChinaShrFd CAF 23.16 20.87 -9.9 3.3
MS India IIF
30.84 26.75 -13.3 49.3
New Germany GF
23.75 20.90 -12.0 49.0
Templeton Dragon TDF 22.08 20.86 -5.5 6.7
Templeton Em Mkt EMF 19.69 17.60 -10.6 16.1
Wells Fargo Gl Div Oppty EOD 6.10 5.90 -3.3 43.1
Prem12 Mo
Fund (SYM)
NAV Close /Disc Yld
U.S. Mortgage Bond Funds
BlckRk Income BKT
5.95 6.33 +6.4 6.4
Invesco HI 2023 Tgt Term IHIT 9.46 9.75 +3.1 6.0
Investment Grade Bond Funds
Angel Oak FS Inc Trm FINS NA 18.31 NA 6.9
BlRck Core Bond BHK 16.19 16.30 +0.7 5.2
BR Credit Alloc Inc BTZ 15.61 15.12 -3.1 6.5
Insight Select Income INSI 21.96 21.02 -4.3 3.5
InvescoBond VBF
21.18 20.40 -3.7 3.2
J Han Income JHS
16.27 15.92 -2.2 5.2
MFS Intmdt MIN
3.73 3.69 -1.1 8.9
Western Asset Inf-Lk Inc WIA 14.78 13.87 -6.2 5.4
Western Asset Inf-Lk O&I WIW 14.73 13.22 -10.3 2.8
Westn Asst IG Def Opp Tr IGI 21.92 21.68 -1.1 3.6
Loan Participation Funds
Apollo Senior Floating AFT NA 15.69 NA 6.3
BR Debt Strategy DSU 11.63 11.46 -1.5 6.9
BR F/R Inc Str FRA
13.91 13.25 -4.7 6.4
BlackRock Floatng Rt Inc BGT 13.50 12.97 -3.9 6.3
Blackstone Strat Cr BGB 14.64 13.92 -4.9 6.7
Eagle Point Credit ECC NA 13.88 NA 7.3
EtnVncFltRteInc EFT 14.52 14.61 +0.6 5.3
EV SenFlRtTr EFR
14.29 14.18 -0.8 5.8
EVSnrIncm EVF
6.94 6.84 -1.4 6.1
FT/Sr Fltg Rte Inc 2 FCT 12.50 12.46 -0.3 9.8
FT/Sr Fltg Rte 2022 TgTr FIV 9.68 9.55 -1.3 1.7
Highland Income HFRO 13.91 10.93 -21.4 9.0
InvDYCrOpp VTA
12.33 11.70 -5.1 7.6
InvSnrIncTr VVR
4.65 4.37 -6.0 5.8
Nuveen Credit Strat Inc JQC 6.91 6.47 -6.4 13.0
NuvFloatRateIncFd JFR 10.39 9.92 -4.5 6.4
NuvFloatRteIncOppty JRO 10.29 9.89 -3.9 6.3
Nuveen Senior Income NSL 6.11 5.75 -5.9 6.6
High Yield Bond Funds
AllianceBernGlHiIncm AWF 13.06 12.39 -5.1 6.3
Barings Glb SD HY Bd BGH 17.78 17.03 -4.2 7.5
BR Corporate HY HYT 12.17 12.53 +3.0 7.5
BlackRock Ltd Dur Inc BLW 16.95 17.21 +1.5 6.8
BNY Mellon Hi Yield Str DHF 3.31 3.33 +0.6 7.3
Brookfield Real Asst Inc RA 20.44 21.99 +7.6 10.7
CrSuisHighYld DHY
2.56 2.50 -2.3 7.8
DELAWAREIVYHIGHINCOPP IVH 14.95 14.14 -5.4 7.2
DoubleLine Inc Sol DSL 18.48 17.83 -3.5 8.3
DoubleLine Yld Opps DLY 20.37 19.89 -2.4 7.0
First Tr Hi Inc Lng/Shrt FSD 16.47 15.92 -3.3 8.2
First Trust HY Opp:2027 FTHY 20.94 20.68 -1.2 6.5
KKR Income Opportunities KIO NA 16.43 NA 8.0
NexPointStratOppty NHF 22.66 15.11 -33.3 5.1
Nuveen CI Nov 2021 Tgt JHB 9.42 9.38 -0.5 2.7
Nuveen Crdt Opps 2022 TT JCO 8.25 8.29 +0.5 6.4
Nuveen Global High Inc JGH 17.01 16.17 -4.9 7.2
PGIM Global High Yield GHY 16.69 15.61 -6.5 8.0
PGIM High Yield Bond ISD 17.19 16.27 -5.4 7.7
PGIM Sh Dur Hi Yld Opp SDHY 19.88 19.01 -4.4 NS
PioneerHilncm PHT
9.63 10.74 +11.5 8.0
Wells Fargo Income Oppty EAD 9.21 9.10 -1.2 7.6
WstAstHIF II HIX
7.18 7.53 +4.9 7.9
Western Asset Hi Inc Opp HIO 5.48 5.23 -4.6 7.2
Western Asset Hi Yld D O HYI 15.88 15.58 -1.9 7.2
Other Domestic Taxable Bond Funds
Apollo Tactical Income AIF NA 15.87 NA 6.5
Ares Dynamic Crdt Alloc ARDC NA 16.25 NA 7.3
BlackRock Mlt-Sctr Inc BIT 18.25 18.50 +1.4 8.0
BlackRock Tax Muni Bd BBN 25.82 26.23 +1.6 5.3
Prem12 Mo
Fund (SYM)
NAV Close /Disc Yld
DoubleLine:Oppor Crdt Fd DBL 19.53 19.80 +1.4 8.6
EVLmtDurIncm EVV 13.48 13.31 -1.3 9.0
Franklin Ltd Dur Income FTF 9.26 9.37 +1.2 8.3
J Han Investors JHI 18.99 18.90 -0.5 7.4
MFS Charter MCR
8.62 8.65 +0.3 8.1
Nuveen Taxable Muni Inc NBB 23.25 23.30 +0.2 4.9
PIMCO Corp & Inc Oppty PTY 14.38 20.10 +39.8 7.5
PIMCO Corp & Inc Strat PCN 14.54 18.13 +24.7 7.1
PIMCOHilnco PHK
5.92 6.81 +15.0 8.2
PIMCO IncmStrFd PFL 10.64 13.09 +23.0 8.6
PIMCO IncmStrFd II PFN 9.39 11.30 +20.3 8.7
Putnam Mas Int PIM 4.11 4.08 -0.7 7.1
Putnam Prem Inc PPT 4.58 4.57 -0.2 7.4
Wells Fargo Multi-Sector ERC 12.82 13.09 +2.1 8.6
World Income Funds
Abrdn AP IncFd FAX 4.60 4.24 -7.8 7.5
BrndywnGLB Glb Inc Oppts BWG 13.61 12.62 -7.3 7.2
EtnVncStDivInc EVG 13.54 13.57 +0.2 7.3
MS EmMktDomDebt EDD 6.79 6.13 -9.7 6.5
PIMCO Dyn Crd & Mrt Inc PCI 20.48 22.04 +7.6 9.3
PIMCO Dynamic Income PDI 25.21 28.08 +11.4 9.3
PIMCO Dynamic Inc Opp PDO 20.57 21.55 +4.8 NS
PIMCO Income Opportunity PKO 23.82 26.35 +10.6 8.6
PIMCO Stratg Inc RCS NA 8.00 NA 7.9
Templeton Em Inc TEI 8.29 7.82 -5.7 5.3
Templtn Glbl Inc GIM 5.72 5.43 -5.1 3.4
WstAstEmergDebt EMD 14.70 13.92 -5.3 7.9
Western Asset Gl Cr D Op GDO 18.57 18.12 -2.4 6.4
National Muni Bond Funds
AllBerNatlMunInc AFB 15.58 15.12 -3.0 4.2
BlckRk Inv Q Mun BKN 16.72 18.47 +10.5 4.3
BlackRock Muni 2030 Tgt BTT 27.16 26.32 -3.1 2.8
BlackRock Muni BFK 14.83 15.66 +5.6 4.5
BlackRock Muni II BLE 15.18 16.03 +5.6 4.7
BlckRk Muni Inc Qly BYM 15.95 16.19 +1.5 4.1
BR MuniAssets Fd MUA 15.11 16.06 +6.3 3.9
BR MuniHoldings Qly MFL 15.37 14.83 -3.5 3.8
BR MH Qly 2 MUE
14.36 14.60 +1.7 4.2
BR MuniHoldngs MHD 17.42 17.22 -1.1 4.2
BR MuniVest Fd MVF 10.09 9.89 -2.0 4.1
BR MuniVest 2 MVT 15.72 16.66 +6.0 4.4
BR MuniYield Fd MYD 15.40 15.36 -0.3 4.3
BR MuniYield Qlty MQY 16.63 16.92 +1.7 4.7
BR MuniYld Qlty2 MQT 14.63 14.72 +0.6 4.2
BR MuniYld Qly 3 MYI 15.48 15.16 -2.1 3.9
BNY Mellon Muni Bd Infra DMB 14.77 15.46 +4.7 4.1
BNY Mellon Str Muni Bond DSM 8.49 8.43 -0.7 4.2
BNY Mellon Strat Muni LEO 8.87 9.48 +6.9 4.5
DWS Muni Inc KTF 12.85 12.34 -4.0 3.9
EVMuniBd EIM
14.17 13.85 -2.3 4.2
EVMuniIncm EVN
14.41 14.32 -0.6 4.0
EVNatMuniOpp EOT 22.30 22.84 +2.4 3.3
InvAdvMuIncTrII VKI 12.33 12.75 +3.4 4.6
Invesco MuniOp OIA 7.96 8.44 +6.0 4.5
InvescoMuOppTr VMO 13.81 14.05 +1.7 4.6
InvescoMuTr VKQ
13.83 14.11 +2.0 4.5
InvescoQual Inc IQI 13.91 13.69 -1.6 4.4
InvTrInvGrMu VGM 14.24 14.23 -0.1 4.6
InvescoValMunInc IIM 16.90 17.06 +0.9 4.4
MAINSTAY:MKDEFTRMUNOP MMD 21.25 22.62 +6.4 4.4
NeubrgrBrm NBH
15.40 17.40 +13.0 4.7
Nuveen AMT-Fr Mu Val NUW 17.63 17.38 -1.4 2.7
Nuveen AMT-Fr Qlty Mun I NEA 16.07 15.89 -1.1 4.4
Nuveen AMT-Fr Mu CI NVG 17.67 18.17 +2.8 4.5
Nuveen Dyn Muni Opp NDMO 16.10 16.81 +4.4 NS
Nuveen Enh Muni Val NEV 16.07 16.86 +4.9 4.3
Nuveen Int Dur Mun Term NID 14.91 14.90 -0.1 3.5
Nuveen Mu Crdt Opps NMCO 15.78 15.64 -0.9 4.7
Nuv Muni Credit Income NZF 17.34 17.43 +0.5 4.4
NuvMuniHiIncOpp NMZ 14.83 15.38 +3.7 4.9
Nuveen Muni Val NUV 10.79 11.75 +8.9 3.1
Nuveen Quality Muni Inc NAD 16.47 16.30 -1.0 4.3
Nuveen Sel TF NXP 16.53 17.49 +5.8 3.1
Nuveen Sel TF 2 NXQ 15.75 16.05 +1.9 3.1
PIMCO MuniInc PMF 13.52 15.48 +14.5 4.3
PIMCOMuniIncII PML 12.56 15.10 +20.2 4.6
Pimco Muni III PMX 11.55 13.13 +13.7 4.3
PioneerHilncAdv MAV 12.34 12.01 -2.7 4.6
PioneerMunHiIcm MHI 13.25 12.65 -4.5 4.4
Putnam Mgd Inc PMM 8.41 8.60 +2.3 4.4
Putnam Muni Opp PMO 14.05 14.71 +4.7 4.5
RiverNorth Flx Mu Inc II RFMZ 20.57 21.33 +3.7 NS
RiverNorth Mgd Dur Mun I RMM 20.40 21.35 +4.7 5.1
Western Asset Mgd Muni MMU 14.21 13.63 -4.1 3.9
Single State Muni Bond
BlackRock CA Mun BFZ 16.12 14.91 -7.5 3.2
BR MH CA Qly Fd Inc MUC 16.02 15.98 -0.2 4.0
BR MH NJ Qly MUJ 16.13 15.90 -1.4 4.7
BR MH NY Qly MHN 15.21 14.85 -2.4 4.3
BR MuniYld CA MYC 16.49 15.52 -5.9 3.3
BR MuniYld CA Qly MCA 16.35 15.98 -2.3 4.0
BR MuniYld MI Qly MIY 15.89 15.61 -1.8 4.1
BR MuniYld NJ MYJ 16.22 15.90 -2.0 4.7
BR MuniYld NY Qly MYN 14.57 14.35 -1.5 4.1
EVCAMuniBd EVM 12.63 12.03 -4.8 4.1
Eaton Vance NY Muni Bd ENX 13.50 12.65 -6.3 4.1
Prem12 Mo
Fund (SYM)
NAV Close /Disc Yld
InvCaValMuIncTr VCV 13.77 14.06 +2.1 4.0
InvPAValMuIncTr VPV 14.45 13.53 -6.4 4.4
InvTrInvGrNYMu VTN 14.66 13.81 -5.8 3.9
Nuveen CA AMT-F Qual MI NKX 16.87 16.50 -2.2 4.0
Nuveen CA Val NCA 10.86 10.67 -1.7 2.9
NuveenCAQtyMuInc NAC 16.26 15.90 -2.2 4.0
NuvNJ Qual Muni Inc NXJ 16.77 15.53 -7.4 4.4
Nuveen NY AMT/FrQual MI NRK 15.20 14.22 -6.4 4.0
Nuveen NY Qual Muni Inc NAN 15.70 15.22 -3.1 4.0
Nuveen OH Qual Muni Inc NUO 17.69 16.39 -7.3 3.4
Nuveen PA Qual Muni Inc NQP 16.12 15.11 -6.3 4.4
Nuveen VA Qlty Mun Inc NPV 15.52 17.33 +11.7 3.4
PIMCO CA PCQ
14.24 18.84 +32.3 4.1
PIMCOCAMuniII PCK 9.17 9.76 +6.4 4.0
52 wk
Prem Ttl
Fund (SYM)
NAV Close /Disc Ret
General Equity Funds
Alternative Strategies:I 6.60 NA NA 40.6
BOW RIVER CAPTL EVGN;I NA NA NA
N
Specialized Equity Funds
Aspiriant Rsk-Mgd RA NA NA NA NS
Broadstone Rl Est Acc:I 2.11 NA NA 3.8
Broadstone Rl Est Acc:W 2.10 NA NA 3.6
CBRE ClrnGlbRlEst IGR 9.86 9.09 -7.8 39.8
CIM RA&C A
25.94 NA NA 9.8
CIM RA&C C
25.68 NA NA 9.0
CIM RA&C I
26.02 NA NA 10.0
CIM RA&C L
25.85 NA NA 9.5
Clarion Partners REI D 10.99 NA NA 17.3
Clarion Partners REI I 11.00 NA NA 17.6
Clarion Partners REI S 10.99 NA NA 16.6
Clarion Partners REI T 10.98 NA NA 16.7
GS Real Est Div Inc:A 10.56 NA NA 16.5
GS Real Est Div Inc:C 10.54 NA NA 15.5
GS Real Est Div Inc:I 11.04 NA NA 16.8
GS Real Est Div Inc:L 10.56 NA NA 16.2
GS Real Est Div Inc:P 11.04 NA NA NS
GS Real Est Div Inc:W 10.72 NA NA 16.3
NexPointRlEstStrat;A 19.06 NA NA 35.4
NexPointRlEstStrat;C 19.27 NA NA 34.4
NexPointRlEstStrat;Z 19.27 NA NA 35.7
PREDEX;I
26.79 NA NA 10.4
PREDEX;T
26.93 NA NA 10.3
PREDEX;W
26.93 NA NA 10.3
Principal Dvs Sel RA A 27.96 NA NA 21.6
Principal Dvs Sel RA Ins 28.03 NA NA 21.7
Principal Dvs Sel RA Y 28.15 NA NA 22.0
RMR Mortgage Trust RMRM NA 11.20 NA NA
The Private Shares;A 43.85 NA NA 42.0
The Private Shares;I 44.26 NA NA 42.4
The Private Shares;L 43.46 NA NA 41.6
USQ Core Real Estate:I 25.96 NA NA 8.5
USQ Core Real Estate:IS 25.98 NA NA 8.6
Versus Cap MMgr RE Inc:I 29.05 NA NA NE
Versus Capital Real Asst 26.35 NA NA 9.6
Wildermuth Endwmnt:A 14.24 NA NA 7.1
Wildermuth Endwmnt:C 13.63 NA NA 6.3
Wildermuth Endowment:I 14.34 NA NA 7.4
Income & Preferred Stock Funds
A3 Alternative Inc
9.68 NA NA -3.6
Calamos L/S Eqty and DI CPZ 21.87 20.16 -7.8 25.8
Destra Multi-Altrntv;A 12.27 NA NA 11.5
Destra Multi-Altrntv;C 11.67 NA NA 10.7
Destra Multi-Altrntv;I 12.54 NA NA 11.8
Destra Multi-Altrntv;T 11.87 NA NA 11.0
Flat Rock Opportunity 22.36 NA NA 44.0
The Relative Value:A
NA NA NA NS
Variant Altrntv Inc:Inst 27.98 NA NA 12.0
Variant Altrntv Inc:Inv 27.98 NA NA 11.7
Zell Capital
NA NA NA NS
Convertible Sec's. Funds
Calmos Dyn Conv and Inc CCD 31.08 30.90 -0.6 28.7
World Equity Funds
ACAP Strategic:A
25.88 NA NA 2.7
ACAP Strategic:W
19.18 NA NA 3.5
Aspiriant Rsk-Mgd Cap Ap NA NA NA NS
CalamosGlbTotRet CGO 15.61 16.60 +6.3 31.1
CPG Cooper Square IE A NA NA NA NS
CPG Cooper Square IE I NA NA NA NS
Primark Priv Eq Inv:I 13.09 NA NA 31.0
Thornburg Inc Bldr Opps TBLD.O 20.31 NA NA NS
VirtusTotalRetFd ZTR 9.46 9.67 +2.2 16.0
Prem12 Mo
Fund (SYM)
NAV Close /Disc Yld
U.S. Mortgage Bond Funds
Arca US Treasury
NA NA NA 0.0
Loan Participation Funds
1WS Credit Income;A2 NA NA NA NS
1WS Credit Income;Inst NA NA NA 5.6
AlphCntrc Prime Merid In 9.78 NA NA 10.5
Axonic Alternative Inc NA NA NA 6.6
Borrowing Benchmarks | wsj.com/market-data/bonds/benchmarks
Money Rates
August 27, 2021
Key annual interest rates paid to borrow or lend money in U.S. and international markets. Rates below are a
guide to general levels but don’t always represent actual transactions.
Week
Latest ago
Inflation
July index
level
Insider-Trading Spotlight
Trading by ‘insiders’ of a corporation, such as a company’s CEO, vice president or director, potentially conveys
new information about the prospects of a company. Insiders are required to report large trades to the SEC
within two business days. Here’s a look at the biggest individual trades by insiders, based on data received by
Refinitiv on August 27, and year-to-date stock performance of the company
Company
Symbol
Oscar Health
Momentus
Rafael Holdings
Morphic Holding
Six Flags Entertainment
Apartment Investment & Management
Chinook Therapeutics
Vertex Pharmaceuticals
MercadoLibre
Ring Energy
Neoleukin Therapeutics
CrossAmerica Partners
Energy Transfer
Finance of America Companies
Krispy Kreme
Cyxtera Technologies
Lumos Pharma
Compass Diversified Holdings
0.48
0.33
Latest
Week
ago
52-Week
High
Low
Title
Insider
No. of shrs in Price range ($) $ Value
trans (000s) in transaction (000s)
Close ($) Ytd (%)
OSCR
MNTS
RFL
MORF
SIX
AIV
KDNY
VRTX
MELI
REI
NLTX
CAPL
ET
FOA
DNUT
CYXT
LUMO
CODI
1,269
12.69-13.41
1,300
10.00
113
44.92
75
54.71-56.82
100
37.89-38.60
450
6.50-6.61
209
11.98
10 195.14-196.34
n.a. 1779.83-1787.57
764
1.90-1.93
150*
6.11-6.45
53
17.48-18.23
100
8.90
168*
5.07-5.22
60
13.21
94
8.39
84
8.73-9.58
28
27.46-27.47
J. Kushner
E. Freedman
H. Jonas
T. Springer
A. Ruchim
T. Considine
S. Akkaraju
R. Kewalramani
H. Dubugras
W. Kruse
J. Drachman
J. Topper
R. Washburne
B. Libman
O. Goudet
G. Waters
K. Lalande
G. Burns
HI
BI
CEOI
DOI
DI
DI
DI
CEO
DI
B
CEO
DOI
DI
DO
CB
DI
DI
DI
T. Cook
S. Walton
A. Walton
J. Walton
S. Walton
A. Walton
J. Walton
D. Loeb
A. Counselman
L. Schleifer
C. Chan
J. Smith
A. Karp
L. Page
L. Page
L. Page
L. Page
A. Bechtolsheim
CEO
2,386 148.30-149.97
DOI
1,473 148.72-150.93
BI
1,473 148.72-150.93
BI
1,473 148.72-150.93
DOI
1,216 148.91-152.16
BI
1,216 148.91-152.16
BI
1,216 148.91-152.16
OXI
981 199.62-208.69
O
608 193.23-213.17
CEO
210* 650.03-660.03
CEO
279 314.98-316.43
DI
700
112.00
CEO
2,891
23.93-25.14
DO
14 2730.95-2770.36
DO
14 2706.83-2749.85
DO
14 2710.17-2747.42
DO
14 2691.40-2725.93
H 100*
367.81-376.25
16,191 14.05
9.55 -46.8
13,000
5,056 47.60 104.1
4,213 62.50 86.3
3,807 42.41 24.4
7.08 34.1
2,940
2,498 13.91 -12.3
1,956 199.92 -15.4
1,507 1865.00 11.3
2.35 256.1
1,468
7.81 -44.6
934
927 18.95 10.4
9.49 53.6
890
5.46 -47.5
874
793 17.00
8.36 -19.3
785
776 10.52 -70.5
769 29.66 52.5
3.25 3.25 3.25 3.25
2.45 2.45 2.45 2.45
1.475 1.475 1.475 1.475
Policy Rates
Euro zone
Switzerland
Britain
Australia
0.00
0.00
0.10
0.10
0.00
0.00
0.10
0.10
0.00
0.00
0.10
0.25
0.00
0.00
0.10
0.10
0.12
-0.04
0.04
U.S.
0.03
U.S. government rates
Discount
0.25
0.25
—52-WEEK—
High Low
0.0500 0.0300 0.0900 0.0000
0.0600 0.0800 0.0900 0.0100
0.0800 0.1000 0.1200 0.0500
Low
Bid
Offer
Treasury bill auction
0.035 0.040 0.090 0.000
0.055 0.070 0.115 0.015
0.050 0.050 0.125 0.030
4 weeks
13 weeks
26 weeks
Fannie Mae
30-year mortgage yields
2.386 2.335 2.622 1.836
2.420 2.371 2.674 1.875
30 days
60 days
0.25
0.25
Federal funds
Effective rate 0.0900 0.0900 0.1000 0.0500
High
0.1000 0.1000 0.1500 0.0700
Latest
Week
ago
2.00
2.00
AAPL
WMT
Upstart Holdings
UPST
Regeneron Pharmaceuticals
Synopsys
Papa John's International
Palantir Technologies
Alphabet
REGN
GOOG
Arista Networks
ANET
SNPS
PZZA
PLTR
354,568
220,015
220,015
220,015
182,714
182,714
182,714
198,231
122,725
136,606
87,865
78,400
71,106
38,331
37,998
37,961
37,665
37,185
148.60
146.52
12.0
1.6
663.29
331.81
125.02
25.71
2891.01
37.3
28.0
47.3
9.2
65.0
372.86
28.3
Based on actual transaction dates in reports received this past week
Sector
Basic Industries
Business services
Capital goods
Consumer durables
Consumer nondurables
Consumer services
Energy
Buying
527,567
636,040
0
11,045
260,439
812,361
1,332,040
Energy
Coal,C.Aplc.,12500Btu,1.2SO2-r,w
Coal,PwdrRvrBsn,8800Btu,0.8SO2-r,w
63.850
11.900
Gold, per troy oz
Engelhard industrial
Handy & Harman base
Handy & Harman fabricated
LBMA Gold Price AM
LBMA Gold Price PM
Krugerrand,wholesale-e
Maple Leaf-e
American Eagle-e
Mexican peso-e
Austria crown-e
Austria phil-e
Engelhard industrial
Handy & Harman base
Handy & Harman fabricated
LBMA spot price
(U.S.$ equivalent)
Coins,wholesale $1,000 face-a
Buying and selling by sector
Selling
14,627,334
39,315,439
0
11,163,444
34,273,901
122,501,442
197,156
Sector
Finance
Health care
Industrial
Media
Technology
Transportation
Utilities
Buying
4,603,861
2,646,502
575,552
132,000
846,839
13,650
283,582
Selling
145,254,700
60,558,666
39,033,556
2,427,123
136,238,361
1,206,292
2,470,754
Sources: Refinitiv; Dow Jones Market Data
0.25
0.04
0.08588
0.12838
0.15263
0.23663
0.15863
0.25388
0.30988
0.44525
0.07263
0.11775
0.14825
0.22988
-0.581 -0.543
-0.558 -0.501
-0.546 -0.470
-0.503 -0.371
-0.607
-0.574
-0.548
-0.511
Libor
0.08600
0.11988
0.15475
0.23513
One month
Three month
Six month
One year
One month
Three month
Six month
One year
-0.577
-0.562
-0.545
-0.498
Secured Overnight Financing Rate
0.05 0.11
0.05
52-Week
high
low
0.01
Value
52-Week
Traded High
Low
Latest
DTCC GCF Repo Index
2.00
2.00
Treasury
MBS
0.056
0.062
57.910 0.132 -0.008
17.204 0.143 0.002
Notes on data:
U.S. prime rate is the base rate on corporate loans posted by at least 70% of the 10 largest U.S. banks,
and is effective March 16, 2020. Other prime rates aren’t directly comparable; lending practices vary
widely by location; Discount rate is effective March 16, 2020. Secured Overnight Financing Rate is
as of August 26, 2021. DTCC GCF Repo Index is Depository Trust & Clearing Corp.'s weighted average
for overnight trades in applicable CUSIPs. Value traded is in billions of U.S. dollars. Federal-funds rates
are Tullett Prebon rates as of 5:30 p.m. ET.
Sources: Federal Reserve; Bureau of Labor Statistics; DTCC; FactSet;
Tullett Prebon Information, Ltd.
Friday, August 27, 2021
wsj.com/market-data/commodities
These prices reflect buying and selling of a variety of actual or “physical” commodities in the marketplace—
separate from the futures price on an exchange, which reflects what the commodity might be worth in future
months.
1794.00
1798.50
1996.34
*1783.80
*1786.60
1889.52
1907.69
1907.69
2198.58
1783.88
1907.69
Silver, troy oz.
* Half the transactions were indirect **Two day transaction
p - Pink Sheets
n.a.
0.09
90 days
Cash Prices |
Metals
223.18 447.7
—52-WEEK—
High Low
Commercial paper (AA financial)
Other short-term rates
Friday
Apple
Walmart
Week
Latest ago
Euro Libor
Secondary market
Call money
Overnight repurchase
Sellers
Aug. 25
Aug. 23-25
Aug. 23-25
Aug. 23-25
Aug. 18-19
Aug. 18-19
Aug. 18-19
Aug. 20-24
Aug. 19
Aug. 18-19
Aug. 20-23
Aug. 19
Aug. 20-24
Aug. 20
Aug. 20
Aug. 19
Aug. 19
Aug. 23-24
5.4
4.3
International rates
U.S.
Canada
Japan
Buyers
Aug. 20-24
Aug. 12
Aug. 24
Aug. 18-20
Aug. 19-20
Aug. 19-23
Aug. 18
Aug. 19
Aug. 18
Aug. 19-20
Aug. 24-25
Aug. 19-23
Aug. 19
Aug. 18-19
Aug. 19
Aug. 25
Aug. 20-24
Aug. 17-18
273.003
279.146
All items
Core
Prime rates
Based on reports filed with regulators this past week
Date(s)
Chg From (%)
June '21 July '20
U.S. consumer price index
KEY: B: beneficial owner of more than 10% of a security class CB: chairman CEO: chief executive officer CFO: chief financial officer
CO: chief operating officer D: director DO: director and beneficial owner GC: general counsel H: officer, director and beneficial owner
I: indirect transaction filed through a trust, insider spouse, minor child or other O: officer OD: officer and director P: president UT:
unknown VP: vice president Excludes pure options transactions
Biggest weekly individual trades
52 wk
Prem Ttl
Fund (SYM)
NAV Close /Disc Ret
Blackstone FR EI D
24.11 NA NA 5.4
Blackstone FR EI I
24.07 NA NA 5.6
Blackstone FR EI T
24.03 NA NA 5.1
Blackstone FR EI T-I 24.62 NA NA 5.1
Blackstone FR EI U
25.09 NA NA 5.1
Blstn Commnty Dev
NA NA NA 2.8
BNYM Alcntr Glb MS Cr Fd 105.12 NA NA 6.6
CliffwaterClFd;I
10.57 NA NA 7.6
CliffwaterElFd;A
10.23 NA NA NS
CNR Strategic Credit 10.90 NA NA 8.0
FedProj&TrFinanceTendr 9.98 NA NA 1.8
Flat Rock Core Income NA NA NA NS
Schrdrs Opp Inc;A
25.98 NA NA 3.2
Schrdrs Opp Inc;A2
NA NA NA 1.3
Schrdrs Opp Inc;I
25.99 NA NA 3.4
Schrdrs Opp Inc;SDR 26.03 NA NA 3.6
Invesco Sr Loan A
6.55 NA NA 3.2
Invesco Sr Loan C
6.56 NA NA 2.5
Invesco Sr Loan IB
6.55 NA NA 3.5
Invesco Sr Loan IC
6.55 NA NA 3.3
Invesco Sr Loan Y
6.55 NA NA 3.5
OFS Credit Company OCCI NA NA NA 14.9
High Yield Bond Funds
Griffin Inst Access Cd:A NA NA NA 6.0
Griffin Inst Access Cd:C NA NA NA 6.0
Griffin Inst Access Cd:F NA NA NA 6.0
Griffin Inst Access Cd:I NA NA NA 6.0
Griffin Inst Access Cd:L NA NA NA 6.0
PIMCO Flexible Cr I;A-1 9.68 NA NA NS
PIMCO Flexible Cr I;A-2 9.68 NA NA 7.1
PIMCO Flexible Cr I;A-3 9.68 NA NA NS
PIMCO Flexible Cr I;A-4 9.68 NA NA 7.1
PIMCO Flexible Cr I;Inst 9.68 NA NA 7.8
WA Middle Mkt Inc 644.69 NA NA 5.3
Other Domestic Taxable Bond Funds
AFA MMC;Inst
10.02 NA NA NS
AFA MMC;Inv
10.01 NA NA NS
Alternative Credit Inc:A 11.15 NA NA 6.3
Alternative Credit Inc:C 11.26 NA NA 5.5
Alternative Credit Inc:I 11.17 NA NA 6.5
Alternative Credit Inc:L 11.14 NA NA 6.0
Alternative Credit Inc:W 11.14 NA NA 6.3
Angel Oak Str Crdt:Inst NA NA NA 8.0
BR Credit Strat;A
10.42 NA NA 4.9
BR Credit Strat;Inst 10.42 NA NA 5.6
BR Credit Strat;U
10.43 NA NA NS
BR Credit Strat;W
10.43 NA NA NS
BlackRock Mlt-Sctr Oppty 89.46 NA NA 7.2
BlackRock Mlt-Sec Opp II 92.34 NA NA 7.2
Carlyle Tact Pvt Cred:A NA NA NA 6.8
Carlyle Tact Pvt Cred:I NA NA NA 7.3
Carlyle Tact Pvt Cred:L NA NA NA 6.8
Carlyle Tact Pvt Cred:M NA NA NA 6.6
Carlyle Tact Pvt Cred:N NA NA NA 7.3
Carlyle Tact Pvt Cred:Y NA NA NA 7.1
CION Ares Dvsfd Crdt;A NA NA NA 5.4
CION Ares Dvsfd Crdt;C NA NA NA 5.4
CION Ares Dvsfd Crdt;I NA NA NA 5.4
CION Ares Dvsfd Crdt;L NA NA NA 5.4
CION Ares Dvsfd Crdt;U NA NA NA 5.4
CION Ares Dvsfd Crdt:U2 NA NA NA 5.4
CION Ares Dvsfd Crdt;W NA NA NA 5.4
CNR Select Strategies 11.82 NA NA 0.0
First Eagle Crdt Opps A 26.25 NA NA NS
First Eagle Crdt Opps I 26.26 NA NA NS
FS Credit Income;A
NA NA NA 5.3
FS Credit Income;I
NA NA NA 5.5
FS Credit Income;T
NA NA NA 5.0
FS Credit Income;U
NA NA NA 4.9
FS Credit Income;U-2
NA NA NA NS
GL Beyond Income
0.48 NA NA NE
KKR CREDIT OPPTY;D NA NA NA NS
KKR CREDIT OPPTY;I
NA NA NA 5.6
KKR CREDIT OPPTY;T NA NA NA 4.9
KKR CREDIT OPPTY;U NA NA NA NS
Lord Abbett Cred Opps Fd 10.86 NA NA 6.0
Lord Abbett Cred Opps Fd 10.86 NA NA 6.7
Lord Abbett Crd Op:U 10.86 NA NA 6.0
Palmer Square Opp Inc 18.90 NA NA 4.9
Thrivent Church Ln&Inc:S 10.70 NA NA 2.4
World Income Funds
BlueBay Destra Itl E:A 29.54 NA NA 2.3
BlueBay Destra Itl E:I 29.55 NA NA 2.5
BlueBay Destra Itl E:L 29.51 NA NA 2.1
BlueBay Destra Itl E:T 29.46 NA NA 1.9
National Muni Bond Funds
Ecofin Tax-Adv Soc Impct 9.40 NA NA 4.2
Nuveen En HY Muni Bd:A 10.15 NA NA NS
Nuveen En HY Muni Bd:I 10.17 NA NA NS
PIMCO Flex Mun Inc;A-3 11.97 NA NA 1.9
PIMCO Flex Mun Inc:A1 11.97 NA NA 2.1
PIMCO Flex Mun Inc;A2 11.97 NA NA NS
PIMCO Flex Mun Inc;Inst 11.97 NA NA 2.6
23.8000
23.9950
29.9940
*£17.2400
*23.6750
19892
Other metals
LBMA Platinum Price PM
Platinum,Engelhard industrial
Palladium,Engelhard industrial
Aluminum, LME, $ per metric ton
Copper,Comex spot
*991.0
995.0
2441.0
*2635.0
4.3165
Friday
Iron Ore, 62% Fe CFR China-s
Shredded Scrap, US Midwest-s,m
Steel, HRC USA, FOB Midwest Mill-s
159.1
n.a.
1922
Battery/EV metals
BMI Lithium Carbonate, EXW China, =99.2%-v,k
BMI Lithium Hydroxide, EXW China, =56.5% -v,k
BMI Cobalt sulphate, EXW China, >20.5% -v,m
BMI Nickel Sulphate, EXW China, >22%-v,m
BMIFlakeGraphite,FOBChina,-100Mesh,94-95%-v,m
14250
16550
12168
5696
530
Fibers and Textiles
Burlap,10-oz,40-inch NY yd-n,w
0.7700
Cotton,1 1/16 std lw-mdMphs-u
0.9452
Cotlook 'A' Index-t
*103.90
Hides,hvy native steers piece fob-u
n.a.
Wool,64s,staple,Terr del-u,w
n.a.
Grains and Feeds
Barley,top-quality Mnpls-u
n.a.
Bran,wheat middlings, KC-u
125
Corn,No. 2 yellow,Cent IL-bp,u
5.9550
Corn gluten feed,Midwest-u,w
143.0
Corn gluten meal,Midwest-u,w
510.4
Cottonseed meal-u,w
300
Hominy feed,Cent IL-u,w
165
Meat-bonemeal,50% pro Mnpls-u,w
355
Oats,No.2 milling,Mnpls-u
4.9850
Rice, Long Grain Milled, No. 2 AR-u,w
27.25
Sorghum,(Milo) No.2 Gulf-u
7.2338
SoybeanMeal,Cent IL,rail,ton48%-u,w 360.40
Soybeans,No.1 yllw IL-bp,u
13.2700
Friday
Wheat,Spring14%-pro Mnpls-u
10.3775
Wheat,No.2 soft red,St.Louis-u
6.8250
Wheat - Hard - KC (USDA) $ per bu-u 7.4325
Wheat,No.1soft white,Portld,OR-u 10.8000
Food
Beef,carcass equiv. index
choice 1-3,600-900 lbs.-u
select 1-3,600-900 lbs.-u
Broilers, National comp wtd. avg.-u,w
Butter,AA Chicago
Cheddar cheese,bbl,Chicago
Cheddar cheese,blk,Chicago
Milk,Nonfat dry,Chicago lb.
Coffee,Brazilian,Comp
Coffee,Colombian, NY
Eggs,large white,Chicago-u
Flour,hard winter KC
Hams,17-20 lbs,Mid-US fob-u
Hogs,Iowa-So. Minnesota-u
Pork bellies,12-14 lb MidUS-u
Pork loins,13-19 lb MidUS-u
Steers,Tex.-Okla. Choice-u
Steers,feeder,Okla. City-u,w
258.30
231.31
1.0451
1.7075
140.25
175.00
129.25
1.7967
2.3655
1.2950
20.05
n.a.
98.73
n.a.
1.1358
122.42
168.13
Fats and Oils
Degummed corn oil, crude wtd. avg.-u,w 61.0000
Grease,choice white,Chicago-h
0.6650
Lard,Chicago-u
0.7400
Soybean oil,crude;Centl IL-u,w
0.6739
Tallow,bleach;Chicago-h
0.6800
Tallow,edible,Chicago-u
n.a.
KEY TO CODES: A=ask; B=bid; BP=country elevator bids to producers; C=corrected; E=Manfra,Tordella & Brookes; H=American Commodities Brokerage Co;
K=bi-weekly; M=monthly; N=nominal; n.a.=not quoted or not available; R=SNL Energy; S=Platts-TSI; T=Cotlook Limited; U=USDA; V=Benchmark Mineral Intelligence;
W=weekly; Z=not quoted. *Data as of 8/26
Source: Dow Jones Market Data
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
B8 | Monday, August 30, 2021
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
* ***
MARKETS DIGEST
Dow Jones Industrial Average
MARKETS
S&P 500 Index
Last Year ago
35455.80 s 335.72, or 0.96% last week Trailing P/E ratio 23.86
P/E estimate *
19.26
High, low, open and close for each of
Dividend
yield
1.78
the past 52 weeks
Last
4509.37 s 67.70, or 1.52% last week
High, low, open and close for each of
the past 52 weeks
28.62
25.89
2.23
All-time high 35625.40, 08/16/21
Year ago
Trailing P/E ratio * 31.26 36.19
P/E estimate *
22.26 26.74
Dividend yield *
1.31
1.75
All-time high 4509.37, 08/27/21
Current divisor 0.15188516925198
Week's high
UP
Friday's close
t
DOWN
Monday's open
4500
34000
4250
32000
4000
30000
3750
Monday's open
t
Friday's close
36000
Week's low
65-day
moving average
65-day moving average
28000
200-day moving average
3500
200-day moving average
26000
3250
Bars measure the point change from Monday's open
24000
O
N
D
J
F
M
A
M
J
J
AS
t
Primary
market
NYSE weekly volume, in billions of shares
3000
A
t
AS
O
N
D
J
F
M
A
M
J
J
N
D
J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
Composite
Track the Markets
36
24
12
0
AS
O
Compare the performance of selected
global stock indexes, bond ETFs,
currencies and commodities at
wsj.com/graphics/track-the-markets
A
Major U.S. Stock-Market Indexes
High
Nasdaq Composite
Latest Week
Close
Net chg
Low
% chg
52-Week
Close (l)
Low
Industrial Average 35501.14 35160.97 35455.80
Transportation Avg 14937.43 14574.25 14905.00
Utility Average
951.54 927.26
932.25
Total Stock Market 46838.32 46069.26 46795.53
Barron's 400
1047.93 1030.66 1045.96
0.96
2.41
335.72
350.29
-18.50
921.67
22.56
2.01
2.20
26501.60
10945.62
785.16
33005.83
687.57
2.82
2.26
10632.99
10833.33
-1.95
l
35625.4
15943.3
l
950.75
l 46795.53
l 1045.96
23.7
31.6
16.4
31.0
41.4
15.8
19.2
7.8
19.3
22.7
10.8
9.3
8.6
15.8
10.0
l 15129.5
l 15432.95
29.4
28.7
17.4
19.7
23.6
26.9
l
s 414.84, or 2.82%
last week
% chg
YTD 3-yr. ann.
% chg
High
15150
Nasdaq Stock Market
15144.48 14776.98 15129.50
15447.03 15140.14 15432.95
414.84
340.38
S&P
500 Index
MidCap 400
SmallCap 600
4513.33 4450.29
2772.80 2675.67
1377.47 1326.60
1.52
3.42
4.09
67.70
91.39
54.08
4509.37
2767.06
1375.04
l 4509.37
3236.92
1792.09
822.63
l 2770.27
l 1414.12
20.1
20.0
22.9
28.5
42.2
50.8
20 23 24 25 26 27
August
15.9
10.6
8.0
2169.11 2277.15
16516.68 16844.75
648.89
671.96
5773.00 5939.27
786.71
787.37
126.20
131.70
128.02
134.46
50.07
55.14
3287.36 3436.45
16.39
16.11
5.05
1.99
3.56
2.88
l
1451.46
12359.16
444.77
5128.49
613.07
5.22
69.87
6.81
125.78
13.62
26.30
5.53 2108.61
15.07
109.55
328.07
23.07
166.26
-2.52
-20.33
6.53
8.57
6.612
179.95
-2.17 -11.69
2360.17
l 16875.39
l
685.08
l
6319.77
l
811.41
l
134.82
166.01
l
69.77
l
3436.9
40.28
l
l
Nasdaq PHLX
Close
MSCI ACWI
737.24
MSCI ACWI ex-USA
348.11
MSCI World
3133.67
MSCI Emerging Markets 1272.67
World
Americas
Canada
Latin Amer.
Brazil
Chile
Mexico
MSCI AC Americas
S&P/TSX Comp
MSCI EM Latin America
BOVESPA
S&P IPSA
S&P/BMV IPC
472.34
3625.98
470.29
4190.98
3609.68
4318.44
6681.92
15851.75
914.39
1760.64
26006.63
787.04
5325.87
1664.25
67646.08
8922.20
992.09
12439.00
7148.01
Asia-Pacific
Australia
China
Hong Kong
India
Japan
Malaysia
Singapore
South Korea
Taiwan
197.35
7488.30
3522.16
25407.89
56124.72
27641.14
1590.16
3080.77
3133.90
17209.93
MSCI AC Asia Pacific
S&P/ASX 200
Shanghai Composite
Hang Seng
S&P BSE Sensex
NIKKEI 225
FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI
Straits Times
KOSPI
TAIEX
Low
2.03
2.62
1.74
4.25
549.57
273.57
2292.93
1057.74
2.37
1.97
2423.14
35517.77
0.75
0.22
0.97
1.05
1.52
0.96
0.84
0.28
3.54
2.06
0.34
2.03
341.76
2700.62
333.02
2958.21
2034.19
3036.59
4569.67
11556.48
564.93
1275.23
17872
533.88
3863.20
1066.60
51684.70
6411.8
679.56
9556.14
5577.27
–0.21
2.51
2.48
0.08
0.45
0.19
0.85
167.7
5784.1
3217.53
23235.42
36553.60
22882.65
1461.45
2423.84
2267.15
2.40
5.31 12232.91
3.34
0.37
2.77
2.25
1.44
2.32
4.75
–0.71
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
YTD
% chg
High
•
•
•
•
1250.80
1.76
15580.64
1.50
5.22 1801.73
93580.35
2.22
1751.31
20644.64
2489.08
120677.6
0
2979.16
52425.64
STOXX Europe 600
STOXX Europe 50
Eurozone
Euro STOXX
Euro STOXX 50
Austria
ATX
Belgium
Bel-20
France
CAC 40
Germany
DAX
Greece
Athex Composite
Israel
Tel Aviv
Italy
FTSE MIB
Netherlands AEX
Portugal
PSI 20
Russia
RTS Index
South Africa FTSE/JSE All-Share
Spain
IBEX 35
Sweden
OMX Stockholm
Switzerland Swiss Market
U.K.
FTSE 100
EMEA
52-Week Range
Close
•
•
737.24
359.82
3133.67
1444.93
14.1
6.6
16.5
–1.4
1751.31
20644.64
2687.02
130776.27
19.3
18.4
1.5
1.4
3396.76
52425.64
4.25
19.0
475.83
3664.18
473.90
4229.70
3647.24
4361.97
6896.04
15977.44
927.29
1767.34
26653
787.04
5361.77
1689.76
69617.16
9281.1
1003.75
12545.35
7220.14
18.4
16.7
18.3
18.0
29.8
19.3
20.4
15.5
13.0
17.5
17.0
26.0
8.7
19.9
13.9
10.5
29.1
16.2
10.6
220.6
7628.9
3696.17
31084.94
56124.72
30467.75
1684.58
3221.58
3305.21
18034.19
–1.3
13.7
1.4
–6.7
17.5
0.7
–2.3
8.3
9.1
16.8
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Source: FactSet; Dow Jones Market Data
Selected rates
A consumer rate against its
benchmark over the past year
30-year mortgage, Rate
4.00%
2.75%
785-335-2243
t
3.00
10-year Treasury
note yield
2.00
Dearborn Federal Svgs Bk
2.75%
Dearborn, MI
313-565-3100
1.00
First National Bank
Waverly, IA
t
0.00
S O N D J F M A M J JA
2020
2021
Interest rate
2.75%
319-266-2000
Guardian Savings Bank, A F.S.B.
2.88%
Covington, KY
859-341-0700
20 23 24 25 26 27
August
Yield/Rate (%)
Last (l)Week ago
Federal-funds rate target
0.00-0.25 0.00-0.25
Prime rate*
3.25
3.25
Libor, 3-month
0.13
0.12
Money market, annual yield
0.08
0.08
Five-year CD, annual yield
0.44
0.42
30-year mortgage, fixed†
3.05
3.10
15-year mortgage, fixed†
2.34
2.40
Jumbo mortgages, $548,250-plus† 3.14
3.08
Five-year adj mortgage (ARM)† 2.86
2.86
New-car loan, 48-month
4.06
3.89
3-yr chg
52-Week Range (%)
Low 0 2 4 6 8 High (pct pts)
0.00
3.25
0.12
0.08
0.42
2.83
2.28
2.85
2.83
3.89
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
0.25
3.25
0.25
0.24
0.66
3.37
2.64
3.41
3.43
4.23
45000
Aug. 31
YTD
% chg
45.29
5.31 22.80
12.22
5.90 30.62
Crude oil, $ per barrel
68.74
6.60 10.62 41.67
Natural gas, $/MMBtu
4.370
0.519 13.48 72.12
1816.60
Gold, $ per troy oz.
-1.75
-1.75
-2.20
-0.41
-1.40
-1.42
-1.56
-1.62
-1.43
-0.53
Bankrate.com rates based on survey of over 4,800 online banks. *Base rate posted by 70% of the nation's largest
banks.† Excludes closing costs.
Sources: FactSet; Dow Jones Market Data; Bankrate.com
ISOS.U 10.00
200.0
2.1
180 days
March 4, ’21 First Reserve Sustainable GrowthFRSG U 10.00
200.0
–0.2
180 days
1147.0
–64.0
180 days
2.00 -4.04
35.60
Sept. 1
March 2, ’21 Oscar Health
OSCR
March 3, ’21 InnovAge Holding
INNV
21.00
341.7
–27.4
180 days
March 5, ’21 Lerer Hippeau Acquisition LHAA
10.00
200.0
–2.6
180 days
10.00
300.0
–1.7
180 days
March 4, ’21 Khosla Ventures Acquisition KVSA
IPO Scorecard
Performance of IPOs, most-recent listed first
92.68
-0.81 -0.87
3.06
WSJ Dollar Index
87.38
-0.82 -0.93
2.80
Company SYMBOL
IPO date/Offer price
Cascadia Acquisition
CCAIU Aug. 26/$10.00
Euro, per dollar
0.8477 -0.007 -0.81
3.55
Yen, per dollar
109.85
0.07
0.06
6.33
1.38
0.013
0.98
52-Week
Low Close(l) High
U.K. pound, in dollars
2.6
AxonprimeInfrastructureAcquisition
APMIU Aug. 13/$10.00
9.82
–1.8
–0.3
0.70
MinorityEqualityOpportunitiesAcquisition 10.06
MEOAU Aug. 26/$10.00
0.6
0.3
CENAQ Energy
CENQU Aug. 13/$10.00
9.95
–0.5
0.3
% Chg
RenovoRx
RNXT Aug. 26/$9.00
7.71
–14.3
6.2
Dermata Thera
DRMA Aug. 13/$7.00
5.29 –24.4
1.9
Springwater Special Situations 9.85
SWSSU Aug. 26/$10.00
–1.5
...
Jupiter Acquisition
JAQCU Aug. 13/$10.00
9.80
–2.0
0.5
Waverley Capital Acquisition 1 9.98
WAVC.UT Aug. 20/$10.00
–0.2
0.8
Kensington Capital Acquisition V 10.08
KCGI.UT Aug. 13/$10.00
0.8
–0.4
610.25
l
915.91 41.19
144.12
l
221.21 42.84
Natural gas, $/MMBtu 1.834
Gold, $ per troy oz.
75.25 59.97
4.370 64.47
l
l
1677.70
1968.20 -7.53
0.34
U.S. Dollar Index
89.44
l
94.64
WSJ Dollar Index
84.56
l
89.50 -0.16
Euro, per dollar
0.8112
Yen, per dollar
102.72
U.K. pound, in dollars
l
0.8597
0.93
l
111.53
4.26
1.42
3.06
l
1.27
0.50
One year ago
0.00
1 2 3 5 7 10 20 30
years
maturity
Symbol/
Primary Amount
exchange ($mil.)
Expected Issuer/Business
Week of
Aug. 30
Muliang Viagoo Technology Inc MULG
MULG
Nq
Monday, August 30
0
s
Thursday, September 2
in US$
US$vs,
YTDchg
Fri
per US$ (%)
2021
Sources: Tradeweb ICE U.S. Treasury Close; Tullett Prebon; Dow Jones Market Data
Corporate Borrowing Rates and Yields
0.870
1.840
1.430
1.700
3.313
0.776
4.579
36
34
264
10
317
29
7
247
7
303
62
69
470
37
409
Total Return
52-wk
3-yr
-1.76
-6.07
0.21
-0.11
8.62
2.47
3.96
15.9
0.2
–0.9
10.2
11.9
unch
1.6
0.6
4.95
9.19
5.42
3.75
5.75
4.77
6.55
Sources: J.P. Morgan; S&P Dow Jones Indices; Bloomberg Barclays; ICE BofA
Australian dollar
.7312 1.3676 5.2
China yuan
.1545 6.4718 –0.9
Hong Kong dollar
.1284 7.7877 0.4
India rupee
.01361 73.497 0.6
Indonesia rupiah .0000694 14418 2.6
Japan yen
.009103 109.85 6.3
Kazakhstan tenge .002340 427.30 1.4
Macau pataca
.1246 8.0270 0.5
Malaysia ringgit
.2384 4.1950 4.3
New Zealand dollar
.7014 1.4257 2.4
Pakistan rupee
.00600 166.600 3.9
Philippines peso
.0201 49.822 3.8
Singapore dollar
.7430 1.3459 1.9
South Korea won .0008604 1162.23 7.0
Sri Lanka rupee
.0049875 200.50 8.2
Taiwan dollar
.03586 27.886 –0.7
Thailand baht
.03076 32.510 8.2
Sources: Tullett Prebon, Dow Jones Market Data
in US$
US$vs,
YTDchg
Fri
per US$ (%)
.00004388
22789 –1.3
Country/currency
Vietnam dong
.0103 97.4787
.1921 5.2048
.7922 1.2623
.001277 783.20
.000261 3829.01
1
1
.0495 20.1982
.02347 42.6150
Asia-Pacific
–10
Bond total return index
Boustead Securities LLC
Auction of 13 and 26 week bills;
Auction of 4 and 8 week bills;
announced on August 26; settles on September 2announced on August 31; settles on September 7
Argentina peso
Brazil real
Canada dollar
Chile peso
Colombiapeso
Ecuador US dollar
Mexico peso
Uruguay peso
Euro
U.S. Treasury, Barclays
U.S. Treasury Long, Barclays
Aggregate, Barclays
Fixed-Rate MBS, Barclays
High Yield 100, ICE BofA
Muni Master, ICE BofA
EMBI Global, J.P. Morgan
5.00
Treasurys
Americas
Spread +/- Treasurys,
Yield (%)
in basis pts, 52-wk Range
Last Wk ago
Last
Low High
40.0
Public and Private Borrowing
Country/currency
10%
–5
Friday’s
price ($) Bookrunner(s)
U.S.-dollar foreign-exchange rates in late New York trading
Yen, euro vs. dollar; dollar vs.
major U.S. trading partners
2020
0.860
1.800
1.430
1.710
3.511
0.759
4.607
Secondaries and follow-ons expected this week in the U.S. market
Currencies
WSJ Dollar Index
t
Other Stock Offerings
None expected this week
Real-time U.S. stock quotes are
available on WSJ.com.
Track most-active stocks, new highs/
lows, mutual funds and ETFs.
All are available free at
WSJMarkets.com
1.00
Sources: Dow Jones Market Data; FactSet
Off the Shelf
WSJ
.com
Yen
% Chg From
Friday3s Offer 1st-day
close ($) price close
Company SYMBOL
IPO date/Offer price
–1.5
DJ Commodity
l
% Chg From
Friday3s Offer 1st-day
close ($) price close
9.85
Refinitiv/CC CMD
Crude oil, $ per barrel 35.79
39.00
Sources: Dealogic; Dow Jones Market Data
U.S. Dollar Index
1.50
Bookrunner(s)
18.00/ B Riley Securities Inc
20.00
Offer Offer amt Through Lockup
Symbol price($) ($ mil.) Friday (%) provision
Issuer
Aug. 29 March 2, ’21 Isos Acquisition
898.41
5
0.3
DDI
Nq
Below, companies whose officers and other insiders will become eligible
to sell shares in their newly public companies for the first time. Such
sales can move the stock’s price.
Lockup
expiration Issue date
2.00
1
3 6
month(s)
DoubleDown Interactive Co Ltd
Software-Gaming
Platforms company
engaged with casino
games on the Internet.
Lockup Expirations
45750
Refinitiv/CC CRB Index 219.18
2.50%
Symbol/
Pricing
primary Shares Range($)
exchange (mil.) Low/High
Issuer/business
46500
DJ Commodity
Yield to maturity of current bills,
notes and bonds
Tradeweb ICE
Friday Close
7/20
47250
Last Week
Close Net chg %Chg
First Federal Savings of Lorain
2.63%
Lorain, OH
440-282-6188
Astra Bank
Scandia, KS
Initial public offerings of stock expected this week; might include some
offerings, U.S. and foreign, open to institutional investors only via the
Rule 144a market; deal amounts are for the U.S. market only
Commodities and
Currencies
t
30-year fixed-rate
mortgage
3.10%
Bankrate.com avg†:
IPOs in the U.S. Market
Benchmark Yields and Rates
Treasury yield curve Forex Race
Consumer Rates and Returns to Investor
U.S. consumer rates
14400
8/31
s
Region/Country Index
Latest Week
% chg
Public Offerings of Stock
Expected
pricing date Filed
Sources: FactSet; Dow Jones Market Data
International Stock Indexes
were boosted by the company’s merger with Eldorado
Resorts Inc. in July 2020, but
they also reflected improving
demand in the company’s regional markets and in Las Vegas. Other notable companies
that recovered strongly include Tesla Inc., Twitter Inc.
and Google parent Alphabet
Inc.
—Brian McGill
contributed to this article.
14650
s 921.67, or 2.01%
15.3
9.6
16.0
8.7
18.1
4.3
3.5
4.0
14.2 10.6
34.5
5.7
-6.7 25.0
24.4 -27.8
22.9 35.0
-28.0 10.5
44.3
27.9
38.7
10.6
16.9
68.1
-12.0
51.6
51.8
-28.6
The consumer-services sector had the largest decline in
second-quarter 2021 revenues
from the same period of 2019.
It was largely dragged down
by companies related to travel
and tourism.
The major U.S. airlines have
seen passenger numbers rebound but are still reporting
Roughly a third of
the S&P 500 have
seen steady or rapid
growth.
New to the Market
DJ US TSM
Other Indexes
Russell 2000
2281.84
NYSE Composite
16858.42
Value Line
672.97
NYSE Arca Biotech 6002.06
NYSE Arca Pharma
813.27
KBW Bank
131.78
PHLX§ Gold/Silver
135.02
PHLX§ Oil Service
55.51
PHLX§ Semiconductor 3441.78
Cboe Volatility
19.27
Continued from page B1
of 2021, largely thanks to its
use of experimental treatment
for Covid-19. Other pharmaceutical companies in the sector posted strong revenue
growth in their respective
markets.
Retailers—including those
that are primarily online as
well as those with stores—led
some of the largest growth in
the retail sector.
Select retail businesses that
specialize in home improvement and auto parts also saw
continuous revenue growth.
Videogame companies were
some of the best performers in
media and entertainment.
Most companies in the S&P
experienced some level of revenue drop in their first year of
the pandemic before rebounding back to pre-pandemic levels or better.
Caesars Entertainment
Inc. experienced the biggest
rebound in revenue among
S&P 500 companies. The gains
14900
s
Nasdaq Composite
Nasdaq-100
Bounced back
Slower to recover
*Weekly P/E data based on as-reported earnings from Birinyi Associates Inc.; † Based on Nasdaq-100 Index
Dow Jones
Revenue
Growth
Reported
revenues below 2019 levels. In
the energy sector, revenues at
the largest oil-and-gas companies are returning to pre-pandemic levels after big drops
last year.
Europe
Czech Rep. koruna
Denmark krone
Euro area euro
Hungary forint
Iceland krona
Norway krone
Poland zloty
Russia ruble
Sweden krona
Switzerland franc
Turkey lira
Ukraine hryvnia
UK pound
.04623 21.631
.1586 6.3042
1.1797 .8477
.003378 296.06
.007895 126.66
.1147 8.7156
.2578 3.8792
.01365 73.250
.1157 8.6403
1.0977 .9110
.1197 8.3546
.0371 26.9500
1.3761 .7267
0.7
3.5
3.6
–0.3
–0.9
1.6
3.9
–1.0
5.0
2.9
12.3
–4.9
–0.7
Middle East/Africa
Bahrain dinar
Egypt pound
Israel shekel
Kuwait dinar
Oman sul rial
Qatar rial
Saudi Arabia riyal
South Africa rand
2.6522 .3771
...
.0637 15.6979 –0.3
.3103 3.2229 0.3
3.3239 .3009 –1.1
2.5972 .3850 0.01
.2710 3.690 1.3
.2666 3.7509 –0.02
.0679 14.7277 0.2
Close Net Chg % Chg YTD%Chg
WSJ Dollar Index 87.38 –0.41–0.47
2.80
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
Monday, August 30, 2021 | B9
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
MARKETS
Demand for Treasurys Resists Pullback
Bond investors are
encouraged by latest
comments from Fed
chief on inflation, rates
BY SAM GOLDFARB
Investors keep buying U.S.
Treasury securities, defying
predictions for a broad selloff
that would send bond yields
back to their March highs.
Yields, which move in the
opposite direction of bond
prices, have held steady in recent weeks after rising sharply
in the first quarter and sliding
in subsequent months as investors scaled back some of
their most optimistic economic forecasts.
Many Wall Street analysts
and investors continue to argue that yields are bound to
rise based on surging U.S. inflation, a still solid economic
outlook and the approaching
reduction in central-bank bond
purchases. But the market so
far hasn’t cooperated, reflecting continuing demand from
around the globe.
Treasurys cleared their latest big hurdle Friday when
Federal Reserve Chairman Je-
rome Powell delivered a
speech at the central bank’s
annual symposium hosted by
the Kansas City Fed. Analysts
thought Mr. Powell might offer
clues as to when the Fed
might start scaling back its
$120 billion in monthly asset
purchases, including $80 billion of Treasurys—the type of
move that sent shudders
through the bond market in
2013.
Mr. Powell complied, to a
degree, saying he thought the
process likely could start before the end of the year. Yields
fell when his prepared remarks were made public, underscoring the market’s nearindifference to tapering since
the topic arose toward the end
of last year.
Explaining Friday’s drop in
yields, some analysts noted
that Mr. Powell stopped short
of laying out an aggressive
timetable for tapering, which
would likely start with a formal announcement at the central bank’s September meeting. More significantly, they
said, Mr. Powell reiterated
that tapering wouldn’t automatically lead the Fed to raise
short-term interest rates
above their current level near
Yields on U.S. Treasury notes
1.5
2.0%
10-year note
1.0
5-year note
0.5
0
2021
Aug.
Source: Tradeweb ICE Closes
zero, which most believe
would have a larger impact on
Treasurys.
Last December, Fed officials
pledged to maintain its bondbuying program until it sees
substantial progress toward
improved economic and labormarket health. Since then, officials made it clear they are
nearing that goal.
But Mr. Powell on Friday
took pains to note there was
“a different and substantially
more stringent test” for raising rates. He added there was
“much ground to cover” to
reach the Fed’s goal of maxi-
mum employment and spent a
large portion of the speech detailing again why he thought
the pace of consumer-price increases would moderate once
the supply of goods ramps up
to meet demand and longterm disinflationary forces,
such as globalization and technological advances, reassert
themselves.
“I think there’s some comfort in this sort of separation
of asset purchase sunsetting
and rate hikes,” said James
Camp, managing director of
strategic income at Eagle Asset
Management, where he man-
ages portfolios that hold both
stocks and bonds. Leading up
to Mr. Powell’s remarks, there
had been some discussion of
faster rate increases, but Mr.
Powell “quickly doused that.”
The market’s interpretation
of Mr. Powell’s message could
be seen in the nature of Friday’s move. The yield on the
benchmark 10-year note settled Friday at 1.311%, down
from 1.342% Thursday and its
March high of 1.749%. But the
yield on the five-year note led
declines, suggesting investors
anticipate a slower pace of
rate increases over the next
half-decade when near-term
monetary policy would have a
bigger impact.
Investors pay close attention to Treasury yields because they can both influence
and reflect the economic outlook. The 10-year yield, in particular, helps set interest rates
across the economy—from
mortgages
to
corporate
bonds—and tends to rise and
fall along with expectations
for growth and inflation.
The decline in yields since
March has therefore been welcome to many borrowers but
somewhat concerning to investors who have looked for
various explanations for why
it might be a temporary phenomenon.
Even now, many think that
the tide is about to turn partly
just because of the change in
seasons, as traders return
from summer vacations and
children return to school, encouraging some parents to reenter the job market. Yields
also could rise when new
cases of Covid-19 start to fall,
some analysts say, noting how
the recent resurgence of cases
has weighed on investors’ sentiment and sent them searching for safer assets.
John Briggs, global head of
desk strategy at NatWest Markets, said he still thinks the
10-year yield can rise to
around 1.65% by the end of the
year, as coronavirus cases recede, inflation stays hot and
investors start to more directly confront the prospect of
tighter monetary policy.
Still, he said, “as long as
the Fed holds credibility on inflation fighting...you’re not going to lose the long end,” referring
to
longer-term
Treasurys. The thinking, he
said, is that if the Fed raises
rates “earlier, maybe they
don’t need to go as high.”
Economic Slowdown Tests Curbs
On Steel Output Set by Beijing
Ada Is the Latest
Crypto to Surge
BY CHUIN-WEI YAP
BY CAITLIN MCCABE
HONG KONG—A two-month
fall in China’s steel output, ordered by economic officials,
handed Beijing a global showcase for advancing climate
goals and controlling commodity markets. A brewing economic slowdown is testing the
government’s will to sustain
the cuts.
China’s production of crude
steel, half the world’s annual
total, fell in July by the widest
year-on-year margin since the
2008 global financial crisis.
Early indicators suggest it
might slip again this month.
Culled by state inspections and
other official curbs at mills nationwide, the usually prodigious flow that is often the
subject of global trade and environmental tensions has fallen
by 12.5 million metric tons—
about twice Britain’s annual total—in July from May’s record.
The steel cuts have driven
global iron-ore prices down
40% since mid-July, delivering
China twin triumphs: a show of
policy leadership ahead of a
major climate summit in Glasgow in November and a demonstration that it can tamp
down rising global commodity
prices. Beijing has set a national goal to secure peak carbon emissions by 2030, with an
earlier target of 2025 for the
steel sector, China’s secondlargest such emitter after
power utilities.
“We have to resolutely implement the output-cut policy—this is a political issue,
and there is no room for bargaining,” said Chen Derong,
chairman of Baowu Steel
Group, China’s largest producer, at a conference this
month.
Also this month, climate envoy Xie Zhenhua said China
plans to stick to its emissions
goals and present them in
Glasgow.
But with the economy slow-
China ordered steel-output
cuts to pursue climate goals
and tamp commodity prices.
Falling output at China's steel
mills hit global prices of iron ore,
an essential steel ingredient.
China crude-steel
output, monthly
Australian 62%
iron-ore fines price
200 million metric tons
$225 a metric ton
Data
aggregated
when
reported
150
200
100
175
50
150
Aug 23
0
$136.71
125
2021
June 2021
July
Aug.
Sources: National Statistics Bureau(output); Metal Bulletin (price)
ing as Covid-19 surges again,
China’s top brass has begun to
provide some wiggle room. A
high-level meeting in late July
chaired by President Xi Jinping
warned against “campaignstyle” climate measures. State
media weighed in to discourage “unrealistic pledges.”
Growth in consumption, industrial production and investment slowed beyond alreadylowered expectations in July,
state data show. The government responded by putting off
further credit tightening. Analysts say more supportive measures are likely, as Beijing tries
to prevent its pollution
achievement from backfiring
on its larger goal of stable economic growth.
“It’s very difficult to do,”
Larry Hu, chief China economist at Macquarie Group, said
of Beijing’s balancing task.
“The cut on steel production is
due to environmental issues
and high iron-ore prices but
not a calibration on [the extent
of] a demand slowdown.”
For now, the steel policy,
which calls for annual output
no greater than last year’s, remains in place. But it requires
a production cut of 11%—59
million metric tons—in the second half, a huge sacrifice. Past
cases of similar orders suggest
they aren’t always followed, no
matter from how high they
came.
To fight pollution, Mr. Xi in
2013 demanded that the province of Hebei, which produced
a quarter of China’s steel, slash
its capacity by 60 million metric tons over five years. There
is no conclusive evidence to
show the goal was attained,
though officials say it was.
State data show Hebei last year
produced a record 250 million
metric tons of steel, up 33%
from 2013—and still a quarter
of China’s total.
The latest cuts were forced
through at times by old-school
Communist Party methods. The
sector had been enjoying a
banner
year—industrywide
profit in May was up 416%
from a year earlier.
The state-backed China Iron
and Steel Association had
members conduct a “self-discipline” videoconference session
to publicly distance themselves
from the recent successes.
“We have to actively cooper-
ate with the national ministries
and commissions to reduce
crude steel output and maintain the pressure to do so,”
said Shen Bin, president of the
China Iron and Steel Association. Images of the session
show dozens of steel leaders
gathered via a Chinese conferencing platform, taking turns
to vow allegiance to state objectives.
Beijing had tried to quell expansion in the industry by raising tariffs on some steel exports in May. But that policy
didn’t work well, indicating
how global demand and low
world-wide inventories are
working against Beijing’s steel
policy. Chinese finished-steel
exports in the January-to-July
period were up 31% year over
year, official data show.
“The sector looks likely to
miss the target of limiting 2021
steel output to 2020 levels,”
the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air said in a report. The organization said in
an email to The Wall Street
Journal that officials might
emphasize more broadly maintaining a downward output
trend.
The industry has proved resilient, bouncing back with every stimulus-fueled construction boom, the government’s
preferred weapon to ward off
slowdowns in the past 15 years.
Maintaining an even keel for
China’s economy will become
increasingly paramount as the
Communist Party gathers for a
major congress next year to
weigh leadership transition.
China’s leaders are caught
between unleashing another
wave of debt-fueled stimulus to
propel the economy or allowing demand to keep slumping,
said the clean-energy center’s
lead analyst, Lauri Myllyvirta.
“It’s now a matter of managing an exit while keeping everyone reasonably happy until
the big party meeting,” Mr.
Myllyvirta said.
Huarong Confirms $16 Billion Loss
BY XIE YU
China’s top manager of distressed assets, China Huarong
Asset Management Co., confirmed it had a net loss of
roughly $16 billion last year,
and warned investors that it
fell short of regulatory requirements
on
financial
strength.
The publication of the 2020
results is a key step in the rehabilitation of Huarong. The
company, a major borrower in
international bond markets,
rattled global investors earlier
this year after it delayed the
release of its annual results.
The figures, issued late
Sunday Hong Kong time,
showed that Huarong had a
net loss of about 103 billion
yuan last year, equivalent to
$15.9 billion, as it took huge
write-downs on its assets.
Those impairment charges
were equivalent to $16.7 bil-
lion.
Huarong, which is majority
owned by China’s Ministry of
Finance, warned on Aug. 18
that it expected to have a net
loss equivalent to about $16
billion for 2020. It said it
planned to obtain a capital infusion from five state-owned
financial institutions and reassured bond investors that it
has no plans to restructure its
debt.
In a separate set of results
for the six months through
June 30, released Sunday,
Huarong said it had failed to
reach minimum regulatory requirements for certain financial measures, such as its capital adequacy and leverage
ratios.
It blamed last year’s “significant decline in operating
performance and financial
condition” and warned that
regulators could impose a
range of restrictive measures.
Huarong said the decline could
also trigger immediate repayment of borrowings totaling
17.9 billion yuan, or the equivalent of $2.8 billion.
But the company also said
its management believed that
by implementing measures including asset sales and the
capital boost, the company
could ensure it and its subsidiaries continue to operate for
the next 12 months.
Huarong didn’t disclose further details on the planned
bailout by state-backed investors.
In its annual report, Huarong blamed “aggressive operation and disorderly expansion” by former Chairman Lai
Xiaomin for a buildup of risks.
Mr. Lai was executed earlier
this year, after a court found
him guilty of bribery and embezzlement.
In a statement in Huarong’s
results, Chairman Wang Zhan-
feng said the result was a
harsh lesson for the company.
“What is gone is gone, but go
for what to come. We will
learn from the lesson and take
it as valuable experience and
the desire to move forward,”
he said.
For the first half of this
year, net profit totaled 158.3
million yuan, or $24.5 million,
down 24.6% year over year.
Total revenue rose 0.8% to 46
billion yuan or about $7.1 billion.
In June, S&P Global Ratings
said China Huarong International Holdings Ltd., a core
subsidiary of the group, could
be in technical default on its
debt if it didn’t publish results
by the end of August. The ratings firm said Huarong International couldn’t issue its results until the parent company
had published its own figures.
—Frances Yoon
contributed to this article.
After a brief hibernation this
summer, cryptocurrencies are
surging again. And this time,
traders are abuzz about Cardano’s ada token.
But what is it and how did it
become the third-largest cryptocurrency? Here is what you
need to know:
What is Cardano?
Cardano is a decentralized
blockchain platform launched in
2017 and spearheaded by
Ethereum co-founder Charles
Hoskinson. Its self-described
mission is to become a more
environmentally sustainable
and scalable blockchain network, in part by relying less on
energy-consuming cryptocurrency miners.
What is ada?
Ada is a digital token, or
cryptocurrency, that runs on
the Cardano blockchain. It is
named for Ada Lovelace, a 19thcentury mathematician who is
often regarded as the first computer programmer.
Why is its price rising?
In general, altcoins—or alternatives to bitcoin—have
been surging as individual investors pile into cryptocurrencies. Cardano’s ada token has
emerged as a recent favorite in
the pack.
Behind some of its recent
momentum is enthusiasm over
what is expected to be a September upgrade to Cardano
that will provide for smart contracts, which many believe will
enable Cardano to better compete with the Ethereum network.
Smart contracts are digital
agreements, written in code,
that can be executed without
an intermediary once certain
conditions are met. Smart
contracts make popular nonfungible tokens, better known
as NFTs, possible, as well as
decentralized finance applications.
How has Cardano’s ada
token performed?
Ada’s price has more than
doubled over the past month. It
traded early Friday afternoon
at $2.85, according to CoinDesk,
up from around $1.28 a month
ago. That gives ada a market
capitalization of more than $90
billion, making it the third-largest cryptocurrency. Ada’s market capitalization is eclipsed
only by bitcoin and ether, according to Coinmarketcap.com.
On a year-to-date basis, ada
has surged nearly 1,500% after
starting the year hovering below 20 cents. Bitcoin, in contrast, is up about 67% in 2021,
CoinDesk figures show, while
ether has gained almost 340%.
Still, ada’s rise hasn’t
matched that of dogecoin. That
cryptocurrency was created as
a joke, but has since gone mainstream. It has gained about
5,900% this year.
Price of Cardano's
ada token in U.S. dollars
$3
2
1
0
2021
Aug.
Source: Kraken
THE TICKER
MARKET EVENTS COMING THIS WEEK
Monday
Earnings expected*
Estimate/Year Ago
Catalent
1.10/0.90
Nordson
2.08/1.42
StoneCo
0.18/0.10
Zoom Video
Communications
1.16/0.92
Tuesday
Chicago PMI
July, previous
73.4
Aug., expected
69.8
Consumer Confidence
July, previous
129.1
Aug., expected 124.0
Earnings expected*
Estimate/Year Ago
CrowdStrike Holdings
0.09/0.03
PVH
1.20/0.13
Wednesday
Construction spending
June, previous up 0.1%
July, expected up 0.2%
EIA status report
Previous change in stocks in
millions of barrels
Crude-oil stocks, down 3
Gasolinestocks, down2.2
Distillates
up 0.6
ISM mfg. index
July, previous
59.5
Aug., expected
58.8
Mort. bankers indexes
Purch., previous up 3%
Refinan., previous up 1%
Earnings expected
Estimate/Year Ago
Brown-Forman
0.39/0.40
CampbellSoup 0.47/0.63
Chewy (0.02)/(0.08)
Five Below
1.11/0.53
Okta
(0.35)/0.07
Veeva Systems
0.87/0.72
Thursday
EIA report: natural-gas
Previous change in stocks in
billions of cubic feet
up 29
Factory orders
June, previous up 1.5%
July, expected up 0.3%
Initial jobless claims
Previous
353,000
Expected
347,000
Productivity
1st qtr., prev
up 2.3%
2nd qtr. prel, exp. up 2.4%
Int’l trade deficit
in billions
June, previous $75.7
July, expected
$72.6
Unit labor costs
1st qtr., prev. up 1.0%
2nd qtr. prel., exp. up 1.0%
Earnings expected*
Estimate/Year Ago
Broadcom 6.88/5.40
Cooper
3.29/2.28
Guidewire Software
0.24/0.83
Hewlett Packard
Enterprise 0.42/0.32
Hormel Foods
0.40/0.37
Toro
0.78/0.82
Friday
Nonfarm payrolls
July, previous 943,000
Aug., expected 750,000
Unemployment rate
July, previous
0.054
Aug., expected 0.052
ISM non-mfg index
July, previous
64.1
Aug., expected
62.0
Monday
U.S. markets are
closed for Labor Day
For personal, non-commercial use only. Do not edit, alter or reproduce. For commercial reproduction or distribution, contact Dow Jones Reprints & Licensing at (800) 843-0008 or www.djreprints.com.
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
B10 | Monday, August 30, 2021
HEARD STREET
ON
THE
FINANCIAL ANALYSIS & COMMENTARY
China’s New Populism Looks to Common Prosperity
Investors are realizing that President Xi Jinping’s rhetoric on inequality is far more than just empty sloganeering
Surveyed unemployment in China by age
16%
16 to 24
14
12
Youth unemployment gap*
10
8
6
4
ZHANG LONG/XINHUA/ZUMA PRESS
After decades of hewing to
Deng Xiaoping’s maxim that it is
OK for some people to become
wealthy first, Beijing suddenly
seems more inclined to eat its
rich—or at least take a healthy
nibble out of their fortunes.
Following the high-profile action
against tech firms like Alibaba and
Meituan, an Aug. 17 speech from
President Xi Jinping on “common
prosperity” caught investors’ attention. Mr. Xi called for rationally “adjusting” excessive incomes and for
high-income individuals and companies to contribute more to society.
He also called for more aggressive
measures to expand the middle
class and the social safety net, including health and elderly care.
China has long been one of the
most unequal major economies in
the world, with one common measure of income inequality, the Gini
coefficient, at 0.465 in 2019 according to official data out of a possible
1.0. Wealth inequality is higher: The
top 1% hold 30.6% of the country’s
wealth according to Credit Suisse
data, below the U.S. at 35.3% but
well above the U.K., Japan and Italy.
But rapidly falling birthrates, the
coronavirus pandemic and its aftermath have made inequality tougher
to ignore. The political stumbles and
anticompetitive practices of tech titans like Alibaba and Tencent have
also handed Mr. Xi a convenient target for the public’s ire. As a result,
high-net-worth individuals and tech
firms could come under further
pressure to “donate” resources to
social causes and find their tax rates
rising. China’s long-mooted property
tax could finally become a reality, although that is less certain.
Beijing’s response to the pandemic focused on loan forbearance
for businesses and goosing credit
growth rather than direct support
for households as in the West. That
helped small businesses survive and
positioned China well for rebounding exports. But it also meant a big
income loss for average households
25 to 59
2
2018
'20
China's housing price and household income , year-over-year change
15%
Median urban
household disposable
income (year to date)
10
5
Housing prices
0
-5
2012
'15
'20
*Percentage-point difference in unemployment between workers under 25 and workers 25 to 59.
Source: CEIC
and even more debt as housing
prices headed skyward again. The
climb in China’s household debt
over the past half-decade has been
among the most impressive in recent global history: one reason consumption has remained stubbornly
weak this year, even as income
growth has finally rebounded.
The weak recovery in services—
where most college students head
after graduation—has also further
exacerbated already high youth joblessness: Surveyed unemployment
among the 16-to-24 set, which averaged 11% in 2018 and 2019, has since
then averaged 14%. Demographic
changes are making the problem
worse: About half of the newly
available labor force every year are
now college graduates, according to
HSBC. China’s rising population of
graduates is often cited as a key advantage, but if structural economic
problems mean there aren’t enough
suitable jobs, it could end up as a
major source of discontent instead.
In this context, Beijing’s decision
to paint big, fast-growing tech companies as the villain looks risky. The
IT, software and finance industries
have experienced by far the largest
private-sector salary growth since
2008, according to HSBC—roughly
quadrupling to around 80,000 yuan,
the equivalent of $12,360, annually
in 2019. Those are also the two sectors that employ the most new
graduates of Tsinghua, one of
China’s top two universities, according to the bank. Cracking down hard
on fast-growing, highly remunerative sectors is one way to deal with
inequality. But it is unlikely to do
much to salve the anxiety of ambitious young grads—especially if prospective internet entrepreneurs are
scared away, rather than encouraged, by the wide-ranging assault.
Tech giants clearly have received
The weak recovery in services has exacerbated already high youth
joblessness. Students at a job fair in Xining, China, in March.
the message that they are expected
to give back more. On Tuesday, internet commerce firm Pinduoduo
reported its first quarterly profit
since listing in 2018. It also said it
would donate it all—$374 million—
to support agriculture and rural areas, and would do the same with
any future profit up to a total of 10
billion yuan. Its shares rose 22%
that day. On Aug. 18, Tencent
pledged to contribute 50 billion
yuan, the equivalent of $7.73 billion,
to low-income groups, basic healthcare and education—on top of a
separate 50 billion-yuan charitable
pledge in April. Meituan founder
Wang Xing donated 10% of his stake
in the food-delivery company to his
philanthropic foundation in June.
All of this might indeed help to
a certain extent with issues like rural poverty—but it also looks like a
convenient way for the government
to shift the political and financial
burden of dealing with social problems to private actors, forcing
them to act more like state-owned
enterprises, without necessarily addressing the deep structural roots
of inequality and scarce opportuni-
ties for good jobs.
China’s public revenue system,
which relies heavily on value-added
taxes and mandatory contributions
to social insurance funds, is extraordinarily regressive. Effective tax
rates at the lower end of the income
distribution can be above 40%, according to a 2020 blog post by Brad
Setser, formerly of the Council on
Foreign Relations. China’s household registration system, which in
many cases still ties benefits to a
person’s place of birth, often in
small cities or the countryside,
makes it harder for workers to
chase the best jobs.
Fundamentally, China needs a
better-funded social safety net not
tied to a certain location, and a financial sector that is less unfair to
small businesses and households, if
it really wants to fight inequality
and keep young graduates employed. Foisting the blame on the
tech sector without undertaking
tougher fiscal overhauls, on the
other hand, looks a lot like trying to
have your cake and eat it too.
—Nathaniel Taplin
and Jacky Wong
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