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SYDNEY (Reuters) -Qantas Airways Ltd will offer A$50 ($34) vouchers, loyalty status extensions and lounge passes to frequent flyers to apologise for a rise in delays, cancellations, lost baggage and staffing issues since travel demand rebounded.

Airlines around the world, including domestic rival Virgin Australia, are facing similar problems but Qantas had attracted significant negative local media coverage given its position as the dominant carrier.

In response, the airline said on Sunday it would send frequent flyer members an email and video message on Monday from its long-serving chief executive Alan Joyce, whose home was pelted with eggs and covered in toilet paper last month amid vicious customer criticism on social media.

“On behalf of the national carrier I want to apologise and assure you we are working hard to get back to our best,” Joyce said in the video message, which was also posted on YouTube.

Qantas said it was rolling out a range of initiatives to improve on-time performance and mishandled baggage as it also dealt with high levels of staff sick leave and an industry-wide labour shortage.

The carrier, which cut thousands of jobs during the pandemic and put most of its staff on leave without pay for long periods, said it had hired 1,500 new people since April, with more to come.

Qantas is due to release its full-year financial results on Thursday.

($1 = 1.4552 Australian dollars)

(Reporting by Jamie Freed; Editing by William Mallard)

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By Lucy Craymer

WELLINGTON (Reuters) – New Zealand’s government said on Monday it had transferred Kiwibank’s assets to a new state-owned company, since the lender no longer fit within the long-term plans for two state entities that currently own it.

Kiwibank, which is New Zealand fifth-largest retail bank, was owned by state-owned entities New Zealand Post, Accident Compensation Corporation and sovereign wealth fund New Zealand Superannuation Fund.

The government said in a statement that the transaction valued at NZ$2.1 billion will be done through a transfer of assets from the entities to a newly incorporated company that will also be owned by the state.

It said the government will fund the purchase through a multi-year capital allowance. The purchase was already part of the borrowing programme published in 2022.

“The Government is fully committed to supporting Kiwibank to be a genuine competitor in the banking industry – ensuring the bank has access to capital to continue to grow on a commercially sustainable basis and offer a viable and competitive alternative for New Zealanders,” said New Zealand Finance Minister Grant Robertson.

($1 = 1.6194 New Zealand dollars)

(Reporting by Lucy Craymer, editing by Deepa Babington)

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NEW YORK (AP) — “Reliable Sources” host Brian Stelter insisted Sunday that he’ll still be rooting for CNN even after his show was canceled this week, but stressed that it was important for the network and others to hold the media accountable.

CNN gave Stelter the chance to host a final episode of the 30-year Sunday morning program on the media even after it was learned this week that he and the show would be exiting — a gesture that’s relatively rare in television.

Stelter said that it was not partisan to stand up for decency, democracy and dialogue.

“It’s not partisan to stand up to demagogues,” he said. “It’s required. It’s patriotic. We must make sure we don’t give platforms to those who are lying to our faces. But we also must make sure we are representing the total spectrum of debate and representing what’s going on in the country and the world.”

It was Stelter’s most direct reference to what is believed to be the reason for his demise; CNN hasn’t talked publicly about it. Since he started this spring, new CNN chief executive Chris Licht has made clear he wants to tone down opinion, particularly as it made Republicans resistant to the network.

Stelter, who wrote a book about Fox News Channel and was frequently critical of Fox, was a lightning rod for conservatives’ complaints.

Some of his final “Reliable Sources” guests were more direct. Eric Deggans, NPR television critic, said he hopes CNN will continue to give viewers context and not be reduced to false equivalency. “Just the facts” isn’t enough, he said.

“Will CNN have the courage to do that?” Deggans asked. “I hope so.”

Stelter, who hosted the show for nine years, also had Watergate scribe Carl Bernstein as a guest and brought back the first guest from the first “Reliable Sources” in 1992 — then-local journalist Brian Karem.

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WOODSTOCK, Ga. (AP) — Ford Motor Co. plans to appeal a $1.7 billion verdict against the automaker after a pickup truck crash that claimed the lives of a Georgia couple, a company representative said Sunday.

Jurors in Gwinnett County, just northeast of Atlanta, returned the verdict late last week in the yearslong civil case involving what the plaintiffs’ lawyers called dangerously defective roofs on Ford pickup trucks, lawyer James Butler Jr. said Sunday.

Melvin and Voncile Hill were killed in April 2014 in the rollover wreck of their 2002 Ford F-250. Their children Kim and Adam Hill were the plaintiffs in the wrongful death case.

“While our sympathies go out to the Hill family, we do not believe the verdict is supported by the evidence, and we plan to appeal,” Ford said in a statement to The Associated Press on Sunday.

Butler said he was stunned by evidence in the case.

“I used to buy Ford trucks,” Butler said on Sunday. “I thought nobody would sell a truck with a roof this weak. The damn thing is useless in a wreck. You might as well drive a convertible.”

In closing arguments, lawyers hired by the company defended the actions of Ford and its engineers.

The Michigan-based automaker sought to defend the company against accusations “that Ford and its engineers acted willfully and wantonly, with a conscious indifference for the safety of the people who ride in their cars when they made these decisions about roof strength,” defense lawyer William Withrow Jr. said in his closing arguments, according to a court transcript.

The allegation that Ford was irresponsible and willfully made decisions that put customers at risk is “simply not the case,” another defense lawyer, Paul Malek, said in the same closing argument.

Lawyers for the plaintiffs had submitted evidence of nearly 80 similar rollover wrecks that involved truck roofs being crushed that injured or killed motorists, Butler’s law firm, Butler Prather LLP, said in a statement.

“More deaths and severe injuries are certain because millions of these trucks are on the road,” Butler’s co-counsel, Gerald Davidson, said in the statement.

“An award of punitive damages to hopefully warn people riding around in the millions of those trucks Ford sold was the reason the Hill family insisted on a verdict,” Butler said.

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SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — A proposal circulated Friday by California Democratic legislators would reject Gov. Gavin Newsom’s plan to extend the lifespan of the state’s last operating nuclear power plant — and instead spend over $1 billion to speed up the development of renewable energy, new transmission lines and storage to maintain reliable power in the climate change era.

The legislative plan obtained by The Associated Press reveals mounting tension between the Democratic governor and some members of his own party over a politically volatile issue.

The rift was revealed one week after Newsom proposed giving plant operator Pacific Gas & Electric a forgivable loan up to $1.4 billion as part of a plan to keep the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant running beyond its scheduled closing by 2025.

Newsom has argued that as hotter temperatures drive up the demand for power, the twin-domed reactors along the coast between Los Angeles and San Francisco would provide a necessary buffer against electrical blackouts, as the state transitions to power from solar, wind and other renewable energy sources.

The legislative plan drops the idea of keeping the decades-old reactors running. Instead, it would funnel the $1.4 billion Newsom proposed for PG&E into speeding up other zero-carbon power and new transmission lines to get the electricity to customers.

The legislative plan included a series of related, but separate, proposals for investing over $1 billion to install install energy-efficient cooling and lighting for low-income Californians, at no cost to qualifying residents. It would also place $900 million in an “electric ratepayer relief fund” to provide bill credits to offset ratepayer costs. Another $900 million would got toward funding solar and storage systems for low-income households, among other programs.

The conflict over Diablo Canyon reveals deep anxiety among some legislators that Newsom wants an abrupt, complex turnaround in state energy policy with less than two weeks left in the legislative session, which ends for the year at the end of August.

Newsom’s proposal also came with many unanswered questions and concerns, including how ratepayers across the state might be impacted, the risk of sidestepping environmental rules and whether continued power from the reactors for years to come might crowd out wind and other renewables expected to start production in the future.

It was not immediately clear how broadly the Democratic alternative was supported in the Legislature.

Newsom’s proposal to reverse course restarted a decades-long fight over seismic safety — several earthquake faults are near the nuclear plant, with one fault running 650 yards (594 meters) from the reactors. Critics said Newsom’s plan for the plant guts environmental safeguards while providing a huge financial giveaway to the investor-owned utility.

Newsom spokesperson Anthony York said the governor “wants California to go faster to meet our climate goals, while ensuring we can keep the lights on and safely transition to clean power.”

York said the proposal came out of the state Assembly and “feels like fantasy and fairy dust, and reflects a lack of vision and a lack of understanding about the scope of the climate problem.”

Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon’s office declined comment.

The governor’s late-hour proposal amounts to an attempt to unspool a complex 2016 agreement among PG&E, environmentalists and plant worker unions to close the reactors by 2025, which Newsom supported at the time as lieutenant governor. The joint decision also was endorsed by California utility regulators, the Legislature and then-Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown.

With the state’s legislative session ending for the year at the end of the month, there is little time to work out a compromise on a vastly complex issue. PG&E CEO Patricia “Patti” Poppe told investors in a call last month that state legislation would have to be signed by Newsom by September to open the way for the utility to reverse course.

PG&E also would have to obtain a new operating license from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to run the plant beyond 2025. The utility is following two tracks — assessing the possibility of a longer run, while simultaneously continuing to plan for closing and dismantling the plant, as scheduled.

In a statement, the utility said it was aware of continuing discussions to potentially extend Diablo Canyon’s lifespan and PG&E stands ready “should there be a change in state policy.”

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By Rachael Levy

(Reuters) – Elon Musk has approached brain chip implant developer Synchron Inc about a potential investment as his own company Neuralink plays catch-up in the race to connect the human brain directly to machines, according to four people familiar with the matter.  

Musk reached out to Synchron’s founder and chief executive, Thomas Oxley, in recent weeks to discuss a potential deal, the sources said. It is not clear if any transaction would involve a tie-up or collaboration between Synchron and Neuralink.

Synchron, which is based in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, is ahead of Neuralink in the process to win regulatory clearance for its devices, the sources said. It has not decided whether it would accept an investment and no deal is certain, the sources added.

The sources requested anonymity because the matter is confidential.

Representatives for Musk and Neuralink did not respond to requests for comment. A Synchron spokesperson declined to comment.

The approach comes after Musk, who is also chief executive of electric car maker Tesla Inc and rocket developer SpaceX, expressed frustration to Neuralink employees over their slow progress, four current and former employees said. That frustration was not conveyed to Oxley when Musk reached out to him, two of the sources added.

It is not clear where Neuralink stands in its application with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to begin human trials. An FDA spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Musk said in a 2019 public presentation that Neuralink, which he launched in 2016, was aiming to receive regulatory approval by the end of 2020. He then said at a Wall Street Journal conference in late 2021 that he hoped to start human trials this year.

Founded in 2016, Synchron has developed a brain implant that would not require cutting in to the skull to install it, unlike Neuralink’s product. Its goal is to help paralyzed patients operate digital devices with their mind alone.

Synchron crossed a major milestone last month by implanting its device in a patient in the United States for the first time. It received FDA clearance for human trials in 2021 and has completed studies in four people in Australia.

Synchron has about 60 employees and has raised about $65 million so far from investors, according to market research firm Pitchbook.

Neuralink is larger, with 300 employees split between San Francisco and Austin, Texas. It has raised $363 million from investors so far, according to Pitchbook.

Only two of Neuralink’s eight founders have remained with the company – Musk and implant engineer Dongjin “DJ” Seo, who has a leadership role. Max Hodak, who stepped down as Neuralink’s president last year, is now an investor in Synchron.

Musk has approached Neuralink’s competitors in the past. In 2020, he held discussions with brain technology company Paradromics Inc, according to three people familiar with the matter. Musk subsequently abandoned those talks, two of these sources added. 

(This story has been refiled to remove extraneous “and” in paragraph 9)

(Reporting by Rachael Levy in Washington; Editing by Greg Roumeliotis and Matthew Lewis)

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By Chen Aizhu

(Reuters) – Russia held its spot as China’s top oil supplier for a third month in July, data showed on Saturday, as independent refiners stepped up purchases of discounted supplies while cutting shipments from rival suppliers such as Angola and Brazil.

Imports of Russian oil, including supplies pumped via the East Siberia Pacific Ocean pipeline and seaborne shipments from Russia’s European and Far Eastern ports, totalled 7.15 million tonnes, up 7.6% from a year ago, data from the Chinese General Administration of Customs showed.

Still, Russian supplies in July, equivalent to about 1.68 million barrels per day (bpd), were below May’s record of close to 2 million bpd. China is Russia’s largest oil buyer.

Imports from second-ranking Saudi Arabia rebounded last month from June, which was the lowest in more than three years, to 6.56 million tonnes, or 1.54 million bpd, but still slightly below year-ago level.

Year-to-date imports from Russia totalled 48.45 million tonnes, up 4.4% on the year, still trailing behind Saudi Arabia, which supplied 49.84 million tonnes, or 1% below the year-ago level.

China’s crude oil imports in July fell 9.5% from a year earlier, with daily volumes at the second lowest in four years, as refiners drew down inventories and domestic fuel demand recovered more slowly than expected.

The strong Russian purchases squeezed out competing supplies from Angola and Brazil, which fell 27% year-on-year and 58%, respectively.

Customs reported no imports from Venezuela or Iran last month. State oil firms have shunned purchases since late 2019 for fear of falling foul of secondary U.S. sanctions.

Imports from Malaysia, often used as a transfer point in the past two years for oil originating from Iran and Venezuela, soared 183% on the year, to 3.34 million tonnes, and up from June’s 2.65 million tonnes.

Here is the detailed breakdown of oil imports, in metric tonnes:

July y/y pct Jan-July y/r pct

change change

Saudi 6,563,472 -1.60 49,835,011 -1.20

Russia 7,145,611 7.60 48,453,258 4.43

Iraq 3,639,508 -22.10 30,375,600 -1.30

Angola 2,125,769 -27.00 19,314,320 -15.50

Brazil 1,026,900 -58.00 14,025,389 -27.00

United 128,527 -84.00 4,585,464 -49.00

States

Malaysia 3,344,832 183.00 14,420,592 69.70

Iran 0 – 780,392 –

Venezuela 0 – 0 –

Oman 2,764,238 -25.00 23,793,940 -10.70

UAE 3,562,013 86.00 22,992,753 42.00

(1 tonne = 7.3 barrels for crude oil conversion)

(Reporting by Chen Aizhu; Editing by Richard Pullin and Clarence Fernandez)

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(Reuters) – Billionaire investor William Ackman on Friday named insider Ryan Israel as the chief investment officer for his hedge fund Pershing Square Holdings Ltd.

Israel joined Pershing from Goldman Sachs in 2009.

Ackman also said that he will continue as chief executive officer and portfolio manager for Pershing with continued control over “ultimate decision making”. (https://bit.ly/3AxQlcn)

“If the pie truck were to run me over tomorrow, Ryan would be my choice to manage the portfolio,” added Ackman.

Earlier in March, Ackman, who spent years building his reputation as a vocal corporate agitator, said he plans to work mainly behind the scenes with management and adopt what he calls a “quieter approach” to force change.

Pershing Square, which liquidated a $1.1 billion bet on Netflix in April, also said that it has also fully sold its position in Domino’s as of Aug. 16 this year.

(Reporting by Tiyashi Datta in Bengaluru; Editing by Shailesh Kuber)

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By Caroline Valetkevitch

NEW YORK (Reuters) – U.S. stocks fell on Friday in a broad selloff led by megacaps as U.S. bond yields rose, with the S&P 500 posting losses for the week after four straight weeks of gains.

Amazon.com, Apple and Microsoft all fell and were the biggest drags on the S&P 500 and Nasdaq. Higher rates tend to be a negative for tech and growth stocks, whose valuations rely more heavily on future cash flows.

U.S. Treasury yields rose, with the benchmark 10-year note nearly hitting 3%, after Germany reported record-high increases in monthly producer prices.

Investors have been weighing how aggressive the Federal Reserve may need to be as it raises interest rates to battle inflation.

Richmond Federal Reserve President Thomas Barkin said on Friday that U.S. central bank officials have “a lot of time still” before they need to decide how large an interest rate increase to approve at their Sept. 20-21 policy meeting.

“The rise in rates around the globe and tough talk from central bankers are being used as an excuse to push stocks lower in very light volume on an August Friday session,” said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at Spartan Capital Securities in New York.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 292.3 points, or 0.86%, to 33,706.74, the S&P 500 lost 55.26 points, or 1.29%, to 4,228.48 and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 260.13 points, or 2.01%, to 12,705.22.

All three major indexes registered losses for the week. The S&P 500 fell about 1.2% and the Nasdaq slid 2.6% in their first weekly declines after four weeks of gains. The Dow lost about 0.2% for the week.

After notching its worst first half since 1970, the S&P 500 has bounced some 16% from its mid-June low, fueled by stronger-than-expected corporate earnings and hopes the economy can avoid a recession even as the Fed hikes rates.

Friday’s monthly options expiration should also make way for greater near-term stock market moves as options positions expire, said Brent Kochuba, founder of options-focused financial insights company SpotGamma.

The U.S. central bank needs to keep raising borrowing costs to tame decades-high inflation, a string of U.S. central bank officials said on Thursday, even as they debated how fast and how high to lift them.

The Fed has raised its benchmark overnight interest rate by 225 basis points since March to fight inflation at a four decade-high.

Focus next week may be on Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s speech on the economic outlook at the annual global central bankers’ conference in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.

Meme stock Bed Bath & Beyond Inc plunged 40.5% as billionaire investor Ryan Cohen exited the struggling home goods retailer by selling his stake.

The S&P banking index fell 2.1% after recent gains.

Shares of Deere & Co ended slightly higher, even after it lowered its full-year profit outlook and said it has sold out of large tractors as it grapples with parts shortages and high costs.

Volume on U.S. exchanges was last at 10.01 billion shares in one of the lowest volume days of the year.

Declining issues outnumbered advancing ones on the NYSE by a 6.06-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 3.59-to-1 ratio favored decliners.

The S&P 500 posted 1 new 52-week highs and 29 new lows; the Nasdaq Composite recorded 43 new highs and 93 new lows.

(Reporting by Caroline Valetkevitch, additional reporting by Saqib Iqbal Ahmed in New York, Editing by Shounak Dasgupta, Arun Koyyur and Deepa Babington)

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By David Lawder

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – As a political messaging war rages over $80 billion in new Internal Revenue Service funding, a U.S. Treasury official is pushing back on an informal estimate that the money could cause Americans earning less than $400,000 to pay as much as $20 billion more in taxes over a decade.

Republicans have seized on the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimate, claiming Democratic President Joe Biden’s recently enacted, sweeping tax, drugs and climate law would break his pledge not to increase taxes on middle-class Americans.

Republicans are also claiming the funding will unleash an 87,000-strong “army” of new IRS agents on American households, despite the Treasury’s plans to focus the bulk of IRS hiring on offsetting a wave of retirements and improving customer service and information technology.

When the bill, formally known as the Inflation Reduction Act, was being debated in the Senate, Republican Senator Mike Crapo introduced an amendment to prohibit any use of funds to audit Americans with taxable incomes below $400,000.

Responding to a request from Crapo, the CBO found that the proposed amendment would reduce revenues by $20 billion over a decade if it was enacted, his office said. A spokesperson for the CBO confirmed the figure.

The amendment was rejected on a party-line vote.

Asked about the claims about middle-class taxes, Natasha Sarin, Treasury Department counselor for tax policy and administration, told Reuters this week that the CBO estimate assumed a threshold of $400,000 in reported taxable income before any audits, which would exclude the middle class.

Sarin said those making $400,000 and up include far wealthier people who have hidden their incomes to lower taxable incomes below $400,000, sometimes even to zero — the very people the Treasury is seeking to target for audits.

A significant portion of the $20 billion estimated by CBO would be recouped from wealthier people who are under-reporting their income, she said.

“People are trying to look like they are under $400,000 when actually they are well above it,” said Sarin, who as a University of Pennsylvania law professor did influential research https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w26475/w26475.pdf on policing tax evasion with former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers.

The CBO has not issued a final cost estimate for the Inflation Reduction Act, which includes the IRS funds along with massive new spending on clean energy and healthcare.

Sarin said the $80 billion in funding to improve enforcement, information technology and taxpayer services would actually spare more middle-class taxpayers reliant on wage income from being targeted with audits. New, modern computer systems would be better able to use data analytics and other tools to more precisely target wealthier Americans for audits, she said.

(Reporting by David Lawder; editing by Jonathan Oatis)

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