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Wealth Matters: When the Social Mission Comes Before Making a Buck

November 30, 2018 by Leave a Comment

Philanthropy has long been a big part of business, with chief executives dictating where charitable dollars should go or how employees ought to volunteer their time. But some entrepreneurs are letting their customers drive the giving by how much they spend.

“My research basically shows that companies give back for two primary reasons,” said C. B. Bhattacharya, a marketing professor who holds the Zoffer Chair of Sustainability and Ethics at the University of Pittsburgh’s Katz Graduate School of Business. “It’s the right thing to do — corporations need to give back to society — and they believe it’s the smart thing to do, in terms of stakeholders taking notice of what you’re doing.”

Still, there isn’t a road map to success, and the journey can be full of bumps. When Richard and Ashley Perkin started Gells four years ago to manufacture belts, they thought they had landed on a clever way to link sales to causes they believed in.

The couple, who live in Southport, Conn., selected five small charities that they wanted to help. They also had belts in five colors, each matched to a charity that took a share of 5 percent of sales. The only problem was, most customers bought navy blue belts, which Gells had linked to the Blue Ocean Society for Marine Conservation.

“The Blue Ocean Society was getting a greater share of the 5 percent, and that didn’t seem right to us,” Mr. Perkin said. “It also became an accounting headache as we went into stores.”

The couple changed tack and decided to split the money earmarked for charities evenly.

Such logistical problems are not uncommon, particularly for a small entrepreneurial business. Pledgeling, an organization that works with companies on their corporate giving strategies, aims to help with this. As part of its “give and grow” program, it operates the charitable component of a company’s business, vets the recipient groups and aims to make the accounting process smoother.

It also created an impact calculator that can be displayed on a company’s website to show customers how their purchases are helping, said James Citron, chief executive of Pledgeling.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/30/your-money/social-entrepreneurship.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Your Money

Your Money: We Went to a Steak Dinner Annuity Pitch. The Salesman Wasn’t Pleased.

November 30, 2018 by Leave a Comment

Of course, showing the SP 500 with reinvested dividends would also do that.

In any event, Mr. Schwartz said, Mr. Halaby should not be using that chart, because the company has discontinued the annuity it depicts.

“It is expected that our independent producers will use current materials,” Mr. Schwartz wrote in an email, using industryspeak for salespeople who don’t work directly for the insurance companies.

When I asked Mr. Halaby about that, he told me that someone who had not been working for him for very long put the old chart in the pamphlet. He added that the chart behind him at the dinner, which to my eyes looked identical to the one in the pamphlet, was in fact different. He would not tell me what company had created it.

American Equity’s updated chart, which it sent me Thursday, shows the SP 500 — still with no reinvested dividends — doing a bit better than a hypothetical indexed annuity for a period starting in 2006 and ending in 2017. To Mr. Halaby’s credit, he made no outsize promises during the dinner. “The primary thing is not to lose your money,” he told the crowd. “My job is not to make you rich.” It was reasonable, he said, for those in attendance to expect their money to grow 3 to 6 percent annually in an equity indexed annuity. Some people thought it was a compelling pitch; there was a smattering of applause when his presentation ended.

Such annuities may be suitable for some risk-averse retirees who are tired of owning stocks. But as I wrote a decade ago, you can probably get better returns during retirement (and not be penalized for taking too much out too soon) by investing mostly in ultrasafe bonds and adding some stock index fund exposure too.

There are probably plenty of advisers who sell useful products over a steak dinner. But as my experience here demonstrates, you shouldn’t show up for one without doing a couple of things. First, conduct a quick online search about the host, including a check of the central database for stockbrokers’ black marks and the similar ones that state insurance departments maintain. Mr. Halaby’s run-in with the state is right there on the first page of his Google search results.

Then, read any and all fine print, even if it requires a magnifying glass. Ask lots of questions. AARP published a good list several years ago, though I’d add another one: Why aren’t referrals from happy customers alone enough to keep you in business?

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/30/your-money/retirement-annuities-steak-dinner.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Your Money

Understanding The Times: How a Times Court Decision Revolutionized Libel Law

November 30, 2018 by Leave a Comment

By the time the case reached the Supreme Court, the justices had seen enough. “This technique for harassing and punishing a free press — now that it has been shown to be possible — is by no means limited to cases with racial overtones; it can be used in other fields where public feelings may make local as well as out-of-state newspapers easy prey for libel verdict seekers,” one of the justices wrote.

The court famously held that public officials, and later all public figures, would need to show not just that an article was inaccurate and hurt their reputation, but also that the publisher acted with “actual malice” — with reckless disregard for the truth. It is a demanding standard, effectively requiring plaintiffs to show that editors knew a story was false, or had serious doubts about its accuracy, and published it anyway.

Sullivan led to a series of other court decisions that curtailed the ability of libel plaintiffs to win their lawsuits. None of it was intended to be a balancing. It was an imbalancing, a conscious decision by the courts to free journalists to pursue the truth without fear of triggering a lawsuit that could bankrupt their publisher. The Sullivan decision, like the First Amendment itself, was anchored in the belief that competing voices rather than lawsuits were the best way to get at the truth. The Times has long believed that as well. Its policy of not paying money to plaintiffs to settle libel suits in the United States against the newspaper traces back to a 1922 letter written by the publisher.

As powerful as Sullivan has been in curbing libel suits, it doesn’t really change the way newspaper lawyers go about their jobs. We still want to know whether the undertaker was really drunk and how our reporters came to know that. No lawyer here has ever reviewed a story draft, concluded it was a factual wreck and then declared it was good to go because the reporter didn’t have a reckless disregard for the truth. Whatever the Supreme Court may have said in Sullivan, getting it right is still what matters.

At The Times, Legal is asked every day to review articles and videos in advance of publication. Over time, trends emerge. We will almost always be focused on a story’s minor players, who tend to be the people most likely to sue. They are often unhappy to be in an article about someone else’s misconduct, have grievances about context or feel they should have been given more of a say. We spend lots of time considering the line between opinion (which is legally protected) and fact (which can give rise to a libel suit). And nothing more bedevils lawyers and editors than claims for “libel by implication” — when the facts may be right but a plaintiff says that the story implied something defamatory.

Undertaker Holmes’s case involved no such legal subtleties. At trial, The Times tried to prove he was drunk. That didn’t work out so well. Holmes won a $3,500 verdict. The Times soldiered on and finally got the verdict set aside on appeal — after nine years of litigating. Then as now, the decision makers at The Times thought the journalism was worth defending.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/30/reader-center/libel-law-explainer.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Media Business

Mic, a News Site for Millennials, Lays Off Most of Its Staff

November 30, 2018 by Leave a Comment

This year, it earned awards from the American Society of Magazine Editors and the Radio Television Digital News Association for a story and a video on the opioid epidemic, produced with Time magazine.

Mic, along with the American Civil Liberties Union and Kim Kardashian West, also successfully campaigned for the release of Alice Marie Johnson, who had been serving life in prison for a nonviolent drug conviction until President Trump commuted her sentence this year.

The two employees who spoke on the condition of anonymity said that Mic had come to lean too heavily on a partnership with Facebook, which provided funding for a Mic-produced show on the social network’s Facebook Watch video platform.

“For those of us who didn’t have insight into the financials, the shock was just that we were relying so heavily on it,” said one of the employees, a senior member of the editorial staff.

Facebook had signaled for some time that it would walk back the investment, which was part of a broader initiative introduced in June that included similar deals with several newsrooms.

Mic, too, invested heavily in the partnership, its largest, under the expectation that it would last at least a year. But, just before Thanksgiving, the social network suggested that, in 2019, it would effectively cancel the show, “Mic Dispatch.”

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/29/business/media/mic-staff-layoff.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Media Business

Your Money Adviser: Those Halls Won’t Deck Themselves: Pros Help With Holiday Lights

November 30, 2018 by Leave a Comment

How much does it cost to have a professional take over the decorations? That will vary by region, the size of your house and the dazzle of the display. Basic décor, like lights that outline your roof and front door, may cost $500 or less if you own a single-story home. But if you have a larger house with lots of gables or want more eye-catching décor, the price can stretch to thousands of dollars.

At Christmas Decor, a professional holiday decorator with locations across the country and in Canada, the average cost of a display in the United States is $1,650, said Brandon Stephens, the company’s president. Pricing tends to be higher on the coasts, he said, and lower in the nation’s interior.

“I’d say there’s a larger group of people more willing to spend on decorations,” he said. The company said its sales last year rose by 14 percent, with a similar increase expected this year.

While classic white lights remain popular, consumers have choices far beyond the traditional. Homeowners may now select tubes of glowing lights that mimic falling snowflakes, giant ornament decorations or app-controlled light strips that blink in patterns synchronized with music.

“People are looking for that showstopper,” Mr. Stephens said. Specialty items include six-foot-tall, three-dimensional snowflakes.

Christmas Decor’s representatives take a photo of your house with a tablet, then superimpose lighting displays on the image. If the suggested display is too costly, the software can adjust the proposed lighting until the represented results fit your budget.

While professional installations are costlier than doing it yourself, the advent of LED lighting, which is much more energy-efficient than traditional incandescent bulbs, means powering the holiday décor doesn’t have to be as wallet-draining as it once was. Some people still prefer the look of incandescent lights, but professionals say the quality of LED lighting has improved significantly in recent years. The bulbs no longer “flicker” and are available in a range of colors.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/30/your-money/christmas-light-installation.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Your Money

New NAFTA: US inks trade agreement with Canada and Mexico at G20 summit

November 30, 2018 by Leave a Comment

The signing ceremony took place on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Buenos Aires. According to Trump, all sides will benefit from the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement or USMCA which he said “is probably the largest trade deal ever made.”

The USMCA emerged in early October, months after Trump hit Mexico and Canada with tariffs on their steel and aluminum products. Canada’s Trudeau called USMCA “the new North American Free Trade Agreement.” He said that it “lifts the risk of serious economic uncertainty that lingers throughout a trade renegotiation process — uncertainty that would have only gotten worse and more damaging if we had not reached a new NAFTA.”

Also on rt.com Mexico slaps levies on US pork in response to Trump’s steel aluminum tariffs

There is more work to be done, Trudeau said, calling the recent announcement that General Motors will close plants in Canada and the US “a heavy blow.”

On his final day as Mexico’s president before Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador is sworn in on Saturday, Pena Nieto said the trade agreement includes provisions for e-commerce and information technology.

Nieto explained the USMCA “is the first trade agreement that incorporates elements that address the social impact of international trade; it enables the participation of more sectors in the economy.”

Trump, who repeatedly branded NAFTA as the “worst trade deal ever made,” said earlier he will not back down from his pledge for the US to quit the agreement, if his concerns were not met. “We make new deal or go back to pre-NAFTA!” he said.

Also on rt.com Trump urges Mexico to stop illegal migration into US, says it may be condition for new NAFTA treaty

NAFTA was signed by Canada, Mexico, and the United States in 1993 and came into force in 1994, during the presidency of Bill Clinton. The longstanding trilateral deal was roundly criticized by the US protectionist right, as well as the anti-globalization left, particularly for the damage that eliminating tariffs did to the US auto industry.

In June this year, Washington introduced a 25-percent tariff on steel imports and a 10-percent tariff on aluminum imports from Mexico, Canada and the EU. Mexico swiftly retaliated with import tariffs on some US goods, including steel, apples and pork.

Ottawa introduced retaliatory taxes on US imports of steel, aluminum and goods such as whiskey, orange juice and other food products.

Canada and Mexico are the second and third-biggest US trading partners, each accounting for more than $500 billion in trade per year, almost rivaling China and the 28 European Union member states combined.

For more stories on economy finance visit RT’s business section

Article source: https://www.rt.com/business/445253-us-mexico-canada-deal/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS

Filed Under: Global Business

China & US may reach deal at G20 but it might not be what either side wants – Wells Fargo

November 30, 2018 by Leave a Comment

“I am optimistic that they will strike a deal. I don’t think it’s going to be the deal that either side wants, but I think there will be some concessions,” said Kirk Hartman, global chief investment officer at Wells Fargo Asset Management as cited by CNBC. “I think this is more about protecting US technology as much as it is trade, so I think you will see some comments on that front.”

He said that Washington may delay higher tariffs on Chinese imports that were due to take effect in January. The sides may also agree to meet for further negotiations, according to Hartman.

Also on rt.com Trade war may boost Chinese economy hurt US growth – ECB

On Thursday, Trump told reporters he could be close to striking a deal with China on trade but was not sure he wanted to do it. He cited the money coming into the US in the form of taxes on Chinese imports.

“Because what we have right now is billions and billions of dollars coming into the United States in the form of tariffs or taxes, so I really don’t know,” said Trump.

Reports that White House advisor Peter Navarro would be attending the dinner between Trump and Xi dampened hopes on the possibility of a trade deal. Navarro is known for his long standing hawkish tone on US-China trade.

“Both sides have so much at stake here that they are going to reach some kind of agreement,” Hartman noted, adding that any agreement at the meeting “will be extremely positive for the market.”

Also on rt.com ‘When trade stops, sometimes war starts’ – Jack Ma

However, some experts like veteran economist Stephen Roach are not so optimistic about the chances of a Washington-Beijing deal. Roach told CNBC the two nations could be in the early stages of a Cold War, warning that the global trade dispute is likely to last for a long time.

“I think the end game is that this is a clash between two systems. And the US is objecting to a state-sponsored ‘market-based socialist system’ that uses the largess of the state to subsidize industrial policy,” said Roach, senior fellow at Yale University and former chairman of Morgan Stanley Asia.

The US has imposed a total of $250 billion worth of tariffs on Chinese goods since July, prompting China to retaliate with levies on $110 billion worth of US products.

For more stories on economy finance visit RT’s business section

Article source: https://www.rt.com/business/445234-trump-xi-g20-deal/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS

Filed Under: Global Business

Strategies: The Stock Market’s Dangers Are Easier to See Now

November 30, 2018 by Leave a Comment

The stock market, Mr. Paulsen said, often moves in advance of a recession — and a declining market can help cause a recession — making investment timing extremely difficult now. In this dangerous environment, he said, “right now, I’d be a little careful.”

Mr. Hickey, too, advises caution, because when he enumerates the pros and cons for the market, the positive side is scanty. It includes factors like these:

■ Despite some difficulties, the gross domestic product in the United States rose at a 3.5 percent annual rate in the third quarter.

■ The Conference Board’s Leading Economic Indicators index has been rising, which suggests that a recession is probably not imminent.

■ The yield curve — the difference between long- and short-term interest rates — remains in a bullish zone, although that positive margin has been narrowing and bears close watching.

■ The end of the Federal Reserve’s interest rate tightening cycle may be in sight. Jerome H. Powell, the Fed chairman, said on Wednesday that interest rates were already close to a “neutral” level, which might imply that rates won’t rise much higher.

■ Finally, there is already so much bad news about the stock market that it amounts to good news. According to contrarian logic, Mr. Hickey said, the negatives are baked into stock prices, so the market has room to rise.

That last item may be a stretch. It is an indication, he said, that he is having difficulty being upbeat.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/30/business/stock-market-dangers-bear.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Your Money

Renault-Nissan boss arrest blows up into conflict between France & Japan ahead of G20

November 30, 2018 by Leave a Comment

Ghosn was arrested in Tokyo on November 19 over suspected financial misconduct. The 19-year partnership between auto-making giants Renault, Nissan and Mitsubushi is reportedly facing the biggest test ever amid the scandal. Nissan fired Ghosn as chairman after a nearly two-decade reign over the Japanese automaker.

FBI looking into whether Tesla deceived investors – report

French multinational Renault currently holds 43.4 percent of Nissan’s shares, while only 15 percent of the French automaker’s stocks belong to the Japanese car manufacturer. The scandalous arrest has reportedly prompted Nissan to resume attempts to change what the Japanese company considers Renault’s outsized control of it. Now, Renault has shareholder voting rights in the tie-up.

The leaders of Japan and France are planning to discuss the future of the cooperation between Nissan and Renault, in which the French government has the largest stake, the Mainichi, one of the major Japanese newspapers, reports. The French President reportedly wants an explanation of the circumstances of Ghosn’s arrest.

The parties are reportedly arranging a short meeting on the sidelines of the Group of 20 summit of the world’s major economies, which starts this week in Buenos Aires, according to the sources close to the issue, as cited by the media.

The French side is reportedly planning to request greater transparency of the Japanese probe, claiming the case surrounding Ghosn has been recently underreported.

Last week, Japanese Industry Minister Hiroshige Seko and French Finance and Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire reaffirmed the two countries’ support for the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi alliance.

Earlier, the board of Mitsubishi Motors that is allied with Renault and Nissan fired Carlos Ghosn as its chairman following the arrest. Ghosn won’t be able to perform his duties, considering his arrest and Nissan’s dismissal of him as chairman, according to Mitsubishi Motors’ CEO Osamu Masuko, who was chosen acting chairman pending a shareholders’ meeting.

For more stories on economy finance visit RT’s business section

Article source: https://www.rt.com/business/445219-macron-abe-nissan-renault-spat/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS

Filed Under: Global Business

Argentina seeks to capitalize on US-China trade war, loading up on cheap American soybeans

November 30, 2018 by Leave a Comment

A ship named the Torrent is scheduled to dock in the Rosario grains hub on December 4, ending a 5,000-mile trip to carry soybeans from the US Great Lakes to Argentina.

The Torrent’s 20,000-tonne cargo is one of 14 ships the Argentine soy crusher Vicentin has lined up to import US soybeans, according to port data reviewed by Reuters. The shipments are among the first significant Argentine purchases from the United States in two decades.

Russia to replace US soybean exports to China amid escalating trade war

“One of the consequences of the trade war is that US beans have to find a new home,” said Thomas Hinrichsen, president of Buenos Aires-based brokerage J.J. Hinrichsen SA, which cut the deals for Vicentin. “You are in the money to ship cheaper US beans into efficient crushing plants in Argentina.”

One of the world’s top soybean exporters, Argentina usually has no reason to import beans. However now, the country needs US beans to feed its massive soy-crushing industry after a drought. What is left of the nation’s own crops will go towards feeding pigs in China.

“The combination of the drought in Argentina and the soy glut in the United States caused by the trade conflict has directed US soybeans toward Argentina,” said Guillermo Wade, manager of Argentina’s Port and Maritime Activities Chamber. He added: “They are being used to keep our crushers working while freeing Argentine soybeans to go to China.”

via GIPHY

Buenos Aires also seeks to export more soy and byproducts to India and Southeast Asia, according to Argentina’s International Trade Secretary Marisa Bircher. The country’s current top soymeal buyers include the European Union, Vietnam and Indonesia.

“Clearly, this US-China conflict is generating a change in the grain trade,” Bircher told Reuters, adding: “We have a very good relationship with China… we are negotiating to open the market to soybean meal before the end of the year.”

Also on rt.com Crop stop: Beijing plans complete ban on American soybeans as trade war escalates

Statistics from US Department of Agriculture showed that a year ago 282 soybean cargo vessels were loaded in the US bound for China and none to Argentina.

China, the world’s biggest soybean importer, has been curbing purchases of the crop from the US, and now seeks to stop imports altogether. The move was part of the escalating trade war between the two countries. In July, Beijing imposed a retaliatory 25-percent import duty on US soybeans as part of the tit-for-tat trade dispute with Washington.

For more stories on economy finance visit RT’s business section

Article source: https://www.rt.com/business/445215-argentina-cheap-us-soybeans/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS

Filed Under: Global Business
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