US News

Shootings Send Black Friday Shoppers Scurrying in North Carolina, Washington State

Shootings erupted at retail outlets crowded with post-Thanksgiving holiday shoppers in North Carolina and Washington state on Friday, sending bystanders at both locations scurrying for cover and injuring a total of seven people, police said. At a shopping mall in Durham, North Carolina, a late-afternoon shootout between “two groups who knew each other” left three people struck by ricocheting gunfire and three others injured in the ensuing chaos, city Police Chief Patrice Andrews said. One of those wounded was a 10-year-old boy, but Andrews described the injuries sustained by all six people hurt in the melee as non-life-threatening. She said it was not immediately clear whether any of the victims were among the individuals who exchanged gunfire, and that the majority of those involved had fled the scene, though one was taken into custody. “This is not a situation where someone came into the mall and indiscriminately just began firing,” …

Naturally Immune People at Little Risk of Reinfection, Severe Disease From COVID-19: Study

People who recovered from COVID-19 are at little risk of contracting the disease again, according to a study published this week. Researchers in Qatar examined a cohort of over 353,000 people using national databases that contain information about patients with polymerase-chain-reaction-confirmed infections. The studied population contracted COVID-19, the disease caused by the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, between Feb. 28, 2020, and April 28, 2021. Reinfections were counted if a person tested positive at least 90 days after their first infection. After excluding approximately 87,500 people with a vaccination record, researchers found those with immunity from having recovered from COVID-19 had little risk of reinfection and severe cases of the disease. Just 1,304 reinfections were identified. That means 0.4 percent of people with natural immunity and without a vaccination record got COVID-19 a second time. The odds of severe disease were 0.1 percent that at primary infection, according to the study. Just four …

US Bond Funds See First Weekly Outflow in Over Four Months: Lipper

U.S. bond funds posted a net outflow in the week to Nov. 24 as investors raised bets that the Federal Reserve would become more aggressive in normalizing monetary policy to fight inflation after President Joe Biden nominated Jerome Powell as chairperson for a second term. According to Refinitiv Lipper data, investors sold U.S. bond funds worth a net $158 million, the first outflow since the week to July 14. The two-year U.S. Treasury yield, which typically moves in step with interest rate expectations, rose to 0.687 percent on Tuesday, its highest level since early March 2020. However, Treasury yields dipped on Friday as concerns about a new COVID-19 variant drove demand for safe-haven assets. U.S. taxable bond funds faced net selling of $1.08 billion compared with inflows of $3.97 billion in the previous week. Municipal bond funds attracted $598 million in net buying, the smallest in four weeks. U.S. short/intermediate …

Mexican Authorities List Conditions to Reboot ‘Remain in Mexico’ Program

Mexican authorities have laid out a series of conditions for reviving the “Remain in Mexico” program, the Trump-era framework under which asylum-seekers were returned to Mexico to await the processing of their claims, with the development coming in context of the Biden administration’s plans to reinstate the policy following a court order. Mexico’s Foreign Ministry said in a Nov. 26 announcement that talks have “intensified” with the United States on rebooting the program, known as the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP), but that Mexican authorities are waiting for a formal response from the Biden administration on a number of concerns. “The government of Mexico … has raised various concerns of a humanitarian nature regarding the asylum procedure in the United States,” the ministry said, adding that it has “highlighted the need to improve conditions for migrants and asylum seekers, so that they have better legal advice” regarding the processing of their …

India Tells Public to Shun Musk-Backed Starlink Until It Gets Licence

NEW DELHI—The Indian government advised people against subscribing to Starlink Internet Services, a division of billionaire Elon Musk’s SpaceX aerospace company, as it does not have a licence to operate in the country. A government statement issued late on Friday said Starlink had been told to comply with regulations and refrain from “booking/rendering the satellite internet services in India with immediate effect.” Starlink registered its business in India on Nov.1. It has begun advertising, and according to the government, it has started pre-selling its service. Responding to a Reuters email, Starlink said: “No comment for now.” A growing number of companies are launching small satellites as part of a low-Earth orbiting network to provide low-latency broadband internet services around the world, with a particular focus on remote areas that terrestrial internet infrastructure struggles to reach.

Fed’s Bostic Says He Remains Open to Faster Taper and One or Two Rate Hikes in 2022

Atlanta Federal Reserve President Raphael Bostic said on Friday he is hopeful that the momentum of the U.S. economy will carry it through the next wave of the coronavirus pandemic, and said he remains open to accelerating the pace of the central bank’s bond taper. Earlier on Friday, the World Health Organization said it was designating the new Omicron variant, first identified in South Africa, as being “of concern.” If the new Omicron coronavirus variant follows the pattern seen with previous variants, it should cause less of an economic slowdown than the Delta variant, Bostic said. “We have a lot of momentum in the economy right now,” Bostic said during an interview with Fox News, citing strong jobs growth. “And that momentum, I’m hopeful, will be able to carry us through this next wave, however it turns out.” Bostic reiterated that he is open to speeding up the pace at …