2024-05-11 04:22

SYDNEY, May 11 (Reuters) - Australia's government said on Saturday it would ban live sheep exports from the country by sea from May 2028, fulfilling a pledge to end a practice long opposed by animal welfare advocates. "We are giving certainty to sheep producers and the supply chain by legislating the date," Agriculture Minister Murray Watt said in a statement on Saturday. The announcement makes good a commitment from the Labor government to phase out the controversial practice, despite pushback from farm groups that say the move will put people out of work and destroy farming communities. Watt said A$107 million over five years would be offered as a transition package to support people, including sheep farmers, affected by the industry wind-down. "We are putting support on the table now so that people can start planning and acting now," the agriculture minister added. Legislation to enact the ban would be introduced in federal parliament's current term, Watt said. The phase out does not apply to other livestock export industries, such as live cattle exports, nor does it apply to live sheep exports by air. The national body representing farmers, the National Farmers' Federation (NFF), said its members were "left shocked" by the timeline for the phase-out. "Murray Watt has decided to book us on the express train to disaster," NFF CEO Tony Mahar said in a statement. Australia’s live sheep trade, centred in the country's vast Western Australia state, shipped about 5 million sheep a year in the 1990s and early 2000s, but that number has gradually declined. Last year, Australia exported 684,000 sheep, worth about $50 million, Australian trade data show. Most sheep are shipped to the Middle East, around two weeks’ sailing away. The main export destinations are Kuwait, Israel and the United Arab Emirates. Animal rights groups have for years pushed to end those shipments from Australia, where public outcry in 2018 over the death of 2,400 sheep from heat stress prompted calls for stricter welfare standards. In January, a ship carrying about 14,000 sheep and 2,000 cattle bound for Israel became stranded off the coast of Australia in sweltering heat after it was forced to abandon a trip through the Red Sea, causing renewed outcry from people concerned about animal welfare in the industry. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/australia-ban-controversial-live-sheep-exports-by-sea-may-2028-2024-05-11/

2024-05-11 01:59

May 10 (Reuters) - U.S. Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm will visit Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates next week to work on "climate co-operation" and other issues, two Biden administration officials told Reuters on Friday. The visit will run from Tuesday through Thursday, with Granholm visiting the UAE first, one of the officials said. It will be her first trip to the region as secretary. "The visit is a continuation of long-standing engagement between the U.S. and this region," the officials said. "Specifically, for the Department of Energy, it will move forward work both countries are doing on climate cooperation and to diversify the energy economy." Granholm will participate in a meeting of the Net-Zero Producers Forum, a group of countries representing 40% of global oil and gas production, including the U.S., Saudi Arabia and Qatar, the sources said. The group, which works on ways to cut emissions such as abatement of methane and deployment of clean energy, was formed in 2021. Saudi Arabia and UAE are both members of OPEC, which is debating whether to extend output cuts. The Net-Zero meeting was planned long in advance and Granholm does not plan to discuss oil policy with counterparts on the trip, one of the sources said. The Biden administration and Saudi Arabia are nearing an agreement for U.S. security guarantees and civilian nuclear assistance, even as an Israel-Saudi normalization deal envisioned as part of a Middle East "grand bargain" remains elusive, sources told Reuters this month. Those talks are being led on the U.S. side by White House officials and the State Department, but not Granholm. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/us-energy-secretary-visit-saudi-arabia-uae-next-week-officials-say-2024-05-11/

2024-05-10 22:49

Nvidia climbs after TSMC's April sales jump Novavax surges on Sanofi deal UMich: Consumer Sentiment hits 6-month low Indexes: Dow up 0.32%, S&P up 0.16%, Nasdaq off 0.03% NEW YORK, May 10 (Reuters) - U.S. stocks eked out modest gains on Friday and all three indexes posted another weekly advance as investors parsed comments from Federal Reserve officials and looked ahead to crucial inflation data next week. The S&P 500 and the Dow were modestly higher and the Nasdaq ended essentially unchanged. All three indexes were up for the week with the blue-chip Dow nabbing its largest Friday-to-Friday percentage advance since mid-December. Commentary from several Fed officials helped set expectations as market participants looked toward next week's inflation data. "Nobody really wants to take a big position prior to next week," said Chuck Carlson, chief executive officer at Horizon Investment Services in Hammond, Indiana. "And we’re getting into a time of year where people seem to slip out early on Fridays." "The biggest story is the decline in Consumer Sentiment, but outside of that there isn't much to hang your hat on," Carlson added. Atlanta Fed President Raphael Bostic acknowledged recent clues the economy is slowing, but added the timing of rate cuts remains uncertain. Striking a more hawkish tone, Dallas Fed President Lorie Logan said it was unclear whether monetary policy was tight enough to bring inflation down to the central bank's 2% target. Hints of progress toward that target will come next week when the Labor Department releases its Consumer and Producer price indexes (CPI and PPI). Analysts expect the crucial CPI report to show underlying "core" price of 3.6% year-on-year, which would be the coolest reading in over three years. "The Fed is geared not to raise rates but cut them, so 'higher for longer' is about as dire as it's going to unless things really fall off the table," said Paul Nolte, senior wealth advisor & market strategist at Murphy & Sylvest in Elmhurst, Illinois. On Friday, the University of Michigan's preliminary take on May Consumer Sentiment showed the mood of the American consumer has taken its biggest monthly plunge since August 2021, while near- and long-term inflation expectations heated up. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (.DJI) New Tab, opens new tab rose 125.08 points, or 0.32%, to 39,512.84, the S&P 500 (.SPX) New Tab, opens new tab gained 8.6 points, or 0.16%, to 5,222.68 and the Nasdaq Composite (.IXIC) New Tab, opens new tab dropped 5.40 points, or 0.03%, to 16,340.87. Of the 11 major sectors in the S&P 500, consumer staples (.SPLRCS) New Tab, opens new tab enjoyed the largest percentage gains, while consumer discretionary shares (.SPLRCD) New Tab, opens new tab were the laggards. First-quarter earnings season is approaching its finish line. Of the 459 of the companies in the S&P 500 that have reported, 77% delivered consensus-beating results, according to LSEG data. Nvidia (NVDA.O) New Tab, opens new tab gained 1.3% after Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (2330.TW) New Tab, opens new tab, the world's largest chipmaker and a major supplier to Nvidia, reported a near 60% jump in April sales. Novavax shares (NVAX.O) New Tab, opens new tab surged 98.7% in the wake of the vaccine maker's licensing deal worth up to $1.2 billion with Sanofi (SASY.PA) New Tab, opens new tab. SoundHound AI (SOUN.O) New Tab, opens new tab jumped 7.2% after beating first-quarter revenue estimates. Declining issues outnumbered advancing ones on the NYSE by a 1.10-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 1.59-to-1 ratio favored decliners. The S&P 500 posted 58 new 52-week highs and one new low; the Nasdaq Composite recorded 95 new highs and 105 new lows. Volume on U.S. exchanges was 9.47 billion shares, compared with the 10.87 billion average for the full session over the last 20 trading days. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/markets/us/futures-rise-ahead-data-speeches-fed-officials-2024-05-10/

2024-05-10 22:11

MEXICO CITY, May 10 (Reuters) - Ten cities in Mexico registered record-high temperatures in 10 cities, including the capital, authorities said on Friday, amid a searing heat wave that has prompted blackouts nationwide and pushed the power grid to the brink. In the normally temperate high-altitude capital of Mexico City, North America's largest metropolis, thermometers on Thursday peaked at 34.3 degrees Celsius (93.7 degrees Fahrenheit), a tenth of a degree higher than the record hit just a month earlier. Neighboring Puebla broke its previous record of 34.3 C - set in 1947 - when it reached 35.2 C on Thursday. In Ciudad Victoria, in the northern border state Tamaulipas, across from Texas in the United States, the temperature hit a sweltering 47.4 C on Thursday, breaking the previous high set in 1998. The intense heat caused blackouts lasting several hours in some areas of Mexico this week, mainly in the north, and caused classes to be suspended in the central state of San Luis Potosi, which this week reached 50 C. In a weekly report published on Thursday, Mexico's health ministry reported seven heat-related deaths this heat season between its start on March 17 and May 4, a tally that could rise after this week's brutal heat. Human-caused climate change and El Nino have been pushing up temperatures worldwide and causing deadly heat waves. Mexico's electricity system regulator issued several alerts this week as demand in some parts of the country exceeded supply. Business chambers and sector analysts criticized the blackouts, accusing the government of not investing in energy transmission networks or in sufficient generation to cover demand. President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who leaves office in October, described the blackouts as "exceptional" and assured that Mexico has sufficient generation capacity. The heat wave comes amid a severe nationwide drought that has caused a worsening water crisis in much of Mexico, making water a key issue in June general elections. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/mexico-heat-wave-melts-temperature-records-ten-cities-including-mexico-city-2024-05-10/

2024-05-10 21:40

HAVANA, May 10 (Reuters) - Cuba's government and independent online news site El Toque exchanged blows this week after state-run media accused the website of manipulating the black market currency exchange rate to impoverish Cubans and stoke unrest on the Caribbean island. The El Toque site (eltoque.com) has enraged the administration of Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel by publishing a rate in Cuban pesos for the greenback far higher than the two official levels set by his government. Cuba's state-run media this week ratcheted up its long-running criticism of El Toque, claiming the site's currency tracker - by far the most widely used on the island - amounts to "financial terrorism." "El Toque is secretly financed by the United States and establishes a false value of the peso in relation to the dollar," said a story in the state-run media outlet CubaDebate. "The strategy aims to foment (large-scale) protests in Cuba." The U.S. State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the allegations. The spat over the currency tracker comes as Cuba's peso currency has lost nearly half its value against the dollar in 2024 alone, according to El Toque, a devastating freefall that has slashed the buying power of Cubans already rattled by economic crisis, inflation and shortages. Cubans covet increasingly pricey dollars as a safe haven against currency shocks, as well as for migration and purchase of food and fuel on an island increasingly dependent on the greenback. El Toque defends its online exchange rate tracker, saying Cuba's allegations, some of which could be lead to criminal charges, according to state-run media, are "ridiculous and implausible." "The Communist Party has decided to convert our platform, elToque, into a scapegoat to justify its failure," El Toque's Miami-based editor-in-chief, Jose Jasan Nieves, said in a message sent by email to readers. El Toque says it calculates its exchange rate using artificial intelligence to scan messages posted online in which buyers and sellers state their intended purchase or sale prices for the various currencies. Independent economists on and off the island have said that the peso's fast depreciation has tracked a crippling contraction in domestic production and exports, a ballooning fiscal deficit and high demand for scarce dollars. The Cuban government has for months promised to take decisive action to halt the peso's decline, but has yet to announce fresh measures. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/cuba-accuses-online-news-site-us-backed-plot-sabotage-economy-2024-05-10/

2024-05-10 21:02

WASHINGTON, May 10 (Reuters) - The Biden administration said on Friday it will provide nearly $200 million to fight the spread of avian flu among dairy cows, in the government's latest bid to contain outbreaks that have fueled concerns about human infections with the H5N1 virus. The virus has been detected among dairy cattle in nine states since late March. Scientists have said they believe the outbreak is more widespread based on U.S. Food and Drug Administration findings of H5N1 particles in about 20% of retail milk samples. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) will make $98 million available to provide up to $28,000 per dairy farm for efforts to contain the spread of the virus between animals and humans and for testing milk and animals for the virus, the agency said on Friday. "USDA is doing the work to track and eliminate H5N1 in the dairy cattle herd," said Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack on a call with reporters. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) said it would provide $101 million through the FDA and U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to protect public health and the nation's food supply. "The risk to the public from this outbreak remains low," HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra said on the call. The money includes $34 million through the CDC for testing efforts and supporting public health labs, $8 million for vaccines, and $3 million for wastewater surveillance. While the CDC has said the public health risk is low, scientists are closely watching for changes in the virus that could make it spread more easily among humans. The FDA also will provide $8 million to ensure the safety of the commercial milk supply. “At this stage there’s no concern about the safety of the commercial milk supply or beef supply,” Vilsack said on the call. Health experts have cautioned against the consumption of raw milk but said pasteurization appears to kill the virus. One dairy farm worker in Texas tested positive for the virus and reported conjunctivitis, commonly known as pink eye. To limit transmission in cattle, the USDA on April 29 started requiring lactating dairy cows to test negative before being shipped across state lines. In the first week of the order, USDA laboratories reported 905 tests, of which 112 were presumptive positives, said an agency spokesperson. The figure could include samples that were tested more than once or those collected for other purposes like research studies, the spokesperson said. (This story has been officially corrected to replace paragraph 13 with updated figures from USDA) Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/us-provide-nearly-200-million-contain-bird-flu-spread-dairy-farms-2024-05-10/