Year: 2024

Bitcoin Hits Record High, Recovering From 2022 Meltdown

Bitcoin Hits Record High, Recovering From 2022 Meltdown

Bitcoin hit a record high of more than $69,000 on Tuesday, capping a remarkable comeback for the volatile cryptocurrency after its value plunged in 2022 amid a market meltdown.Bitcoin’s price has risen more than 300 percent since November 2022, a resurgence that few predicted when the price dropped below $20,000 that year. Its previous record was just under $68,790 in November 2021, as crypto markets boomed and amateur investors poured savings into experimental digital coins.The cryptocurrency was “pronounced dead for the 150th time,” said Cory Klippsten, the chief executive of Swan, a financial services firm focused on Bitcoin. “And Bitcoin…
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Bank Runs Spooked Regulators. Now a Clampdown Is Coming.

Bank Runs Spooked Regulators. Now a Clampdown Is Coming.

One year after a series of bank runs threatened the financial system, government officials are preparing to unveil a regulatory response aimed at preventing future meltdowns.After months of floating fixes at conferences and in quiet conversations with bank executives, the Federal Reserve and other regulators could unveil new rules this spring. At least some policymakers hope to release their proposal before a regulation-focused conference in June, according to a person familiar with the plans.The interagency clampdown would come on top of another set of proposed and potentially costly regulations that have caused tension between big banks and their regulators. Taken…
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Inmates Escape After Attacks on 2 Prisons in Haiti’s Capital

Inmates Escape After Attacks on 2 Prisons in Haiti’s Capital

Gangs attacked two prisons in Haiti, including the country’s largest penitentiary, and allowed prisoners to escape on Saturday night, according to Haitian officials, the latest instance of escalating violence and disorder in the country’s capital, which has been ravaged by gang violence for more than two years.While details of the attack remained murky, the government of Haiti released a statement Sunday saying that police officers were unable to prevent gang members from releasing “a large number of prisoners,” adding that several inmates and prison staff were injured.Haiti’s national penitentiary held nearly 4,000 inmates at the time of the attack and…
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Why ‘Fetal Personhood’ Is Roiling the Right

Why ‘Fetal Personhood’ Is Roiling the Right

As I.V.F. grew in popularity, so did the concerns of its opponents. Standard practice involves creating multiple embryos, which are screened for genetic abnormalities, and the ones that appear healthiest can be transferred. Extra embryos are often frozen; by one count, there are a million and a half frozen embryos in the United States. After a designated time period, they may be donated to science or destroyed, just as the Catholic Church feared.The anti-abortion movement won a partial victory for protecting life at conception in 2001, when President George W. Bush banned the use of federal funds for embryonic stem…
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Dale Earnhardt Jr. leaving NBC for Amazon Prime, Warner Bros. Discovery: Sources

Dale Earnhardt Jr. leaving NBC for Amazon Prime, Warner Bros. Discovery: Sources

The biggest name in NASCAR is on the move.Dale Earnhardt Jr. is leaving NBC and heading to racing newcomers Amazon Prime Video and Warner Bros. Discovery Sports, sources briefed on his decision told The Athletic.Earnhardt is expected to take this season off and then resume his broadcasting career in 2025 when WBD Sports and Amazon begin their coverage.The move figures to give WBD Sports and Amazon instant credibility when they start their series. Each will have five races a season. WBD Sports’ races will be broadcast on TNT, streamed on Max and have a Bleacher Report component. NASCAR complements WBD…
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The Paradox at the Heart of Elon Musk’s OpenAI Lawsuit

The Paradox at the Heart of Elon Musk’s OpenAI Lawsuit

It would be easy to dismiss Elon Musk’s lawsuit against OpenAI as a case of sour grapes.Mr. Musk sued OpenAI this week, accusing the company of breaching the terms of its founding agreement and violating its founding principles. In his telling, OpenAI was established as a nonprofit that would build powerful A.I. systems for the good of humanity and give its research away freely to the public. But Mr. Musk argues that OpenAI broke that promise by starting a for-profit subsidiary that took on billions of dollars in investments from Microsoft.An OpenAI spokeswoman declined to comment on the suit. In…
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