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  • US Chess Federation investigates grandmaster following accusations of sexual misconduct | CNN

    US Chess Federation investigates grandmaster following accusations of sexual misconduct | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    A chess grandmaster is under investigation by the game’s governing body in the US following accusations of sexual misconduct, according to the US Chess Federation.

    Two formal complaints were received last September by the federation regarding conduct by Grandmaster Alejandro Ramirez and the investigation “is ongoing,” the organization stated Thursday, adding that Ramirez’s membership has been suspended.

    The announcement comes after two-time US women’s chess champion Jennifer Shahade posted on social media on February 15, “Time’s up,” accompanied by a two-page statement saying she was assaulted by Ramirez two times “9 and 10 years ago.”

    Shahade wrote that she was speaking out now after other women had approached her with their own accounts of abuse by Ramirez.

    CNN has reached out to Ramirez for comment about the accusations through his lawyer Albert S. Watkins, who replied, “I have been directed to respect the confidentiality I was advised would purportedly attach to pending investigative undertakings.”

    The Wall Street Journal, which first reported on the accusations, quoted Watkins as saying, “At some point we are all compelled to take pause and reflect on the reality that unsubstantiated, temporally aged, and concurrent use of social media to incite a ‘Me Too’ call-to-arms runs afoul of every constitutional safeguard we have always held so dear. Superimposing today’s mores on erroneous recitals of acts of yesteryear is a recipe for disaster for both the accused and the accuser.”

    Shahade told CNN she had notified the US Chess Federation and the prominent Saint Louis Chess Club – where Ramirez served as a resident Grandmaster – of the alleged transgressions in 2020. She again reported concerns about Ramirez in 2021 after learning of a separate allegation from a fellow chess player, she said.

    Since her tweet last month, Shahade told the Wall Street Journal and CNN that other women have told her about alleged experiences of abuse by Ramirez.

    US Chess said it “strongly respects the right of alleged victims to control when and to whom they tell their story. However, because US Chess did not receive complaints from, or sufficient information regarding, the allegations of the other women referenced in the WSJ article, we have not had the opportunity to investigate and consider those additional allegations. That process is underway.”

    The Wall Street Journal reports Ramirez has resigned from his post at the Saint Louis Chess Club.

    Ramirez had been a chess coach with Saint Louis University since the inception of the school’s chess program in 2016. A university spokesperson told CNN Thursday, “On February 16, at our request, the St. Louis Chess Club removed Ramirez as SLU’s coach. They have since assigned an interim coach to lead the team.”

    Shahade told CNN Thursday, “I am relieved to hear Alejandro Ramirez resigned from the chess club and SLU. It is high time for a new chess era where we do all we can to make women, girls and all children feel fully safe and welcome.”

    CNN has reached out to the Saint Louis Chess Club and the International Chess Federation (FIDE) for comment.

    According to the Saint Louis Chess Club website, Ramirez was a chess prodigy and a FIDE Master when he was 9 years old. Ramirez earned his Grandmaster title by the age of 15.

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  • Why lithium-ion batteries found in many products keep exploding | CNN Business

    Why lithium-ion batteries found in many products keep exploding | CNN Business

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    CNN
     — 

    Lithium-ion batteries, found in many popular consumer products, are under scrutiny again following a massive fire this week in New York City thought to be caused by the battery that powered an electric scooter.

    At least seven people have been injured in a five-alarm fire in the Bronx which required the attention of 200 firefighters. Officials believe the incident stemmed from a lithium-ion battery of a scooter found on the roof of an apartment building. In 2022, the the New York City Fire Department responded to more than 200 e-scooter and e-bike fires, which resulted in six fatalities.

    “In all of these fires, these lithium-ion fires, it is not a slow burn; there’s not a small amount of fire, it literally explodes,” FDNY Commissioner Laura Kavanagh told reporters. “It’s a tremendous volume of fire as soon as it happens, and it’s very difficult to extinguish and so it’s particularly dangerous.”

    A residential fire earlier this week in Carlsbad, California, was suspected to be caused by an e-scooter lithium battery. On Tuesday, an alarming video surfaced of a Canadian homeowner running downstairs to find his electric bike battery exploding into flames. A fire at a multi-family home in Massachusetts last month is also under investigation for similar issues.

    These incidents are becoming more common for a number of reasons. For starters, lithium-ion batteries are now in numerous consumer tech products, powering laptops, cameras, smartphones and more. They allow companies to squeeze hours of battery life into increasingly slim devices. But a combination of manufacturer issues, misuse and aging batteries can heighten the risk from the batteries, which use flammable materials.

    “Lithium batteries are generally safe and unlikely to fail, but only so long as there are no defects and the batteries are not damaged or mistreated,” said Steve Kerber, vice president and executive director of Underwriters Laboratory’s (UL) Fire Safety Research Institute (FSRI). “The more batteries that surround us the more incidents we will see.”

    In 2016, Samsung issued a global recall of the Galaxy Note 7 in 2016, citing “battery cell issues” that caused the device to catch fire and at times explode. HP and Sony later recalled lithium computer batteries for fire hazards, and about 500,000 hoverboards were recalled due to a risk of “catching fire and/or exploding,” according to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission.

    In 2020, the Federal Aviation Administration banned uninstalled lithium-ion metal batteries from being checked in luggage and said they must remain with a passenger in their carry-on baggage, if approved by the airline and between 101-160 watt hours. “Smoke and fire incidents involving lithium batteries can be mitigated by the cabin crew and passengers inside the aircraft cabin,” the FAA said.

    Despite the concerns, lithium-ion batteries continue to be prevalent in many of today’s most popular gadgets. Some tech companies point to their abilities to charge faster, last longer and pack more power into a lighter package.

    But not all lithium batteries are the same.

    Dylan Khoo, an analyst at tech intelligence firm ABI Research, said electric bikes and scooters use batteries which can be around 50 times larger than the one in a smartphone. “So when a fire does happen, it’s much more dangerous,” Khoo said.

    All lithium-ion batteries use flammable materials, and incidents such as the one in the Bronx are likely the result of “thermal runaway,” a chain reaction which can lead to a fire or catastrophic explosion, according to Khoo.

    “This process can be triggered by a battery overheating, being punctured, or an electrical fault like a short circuit,” Khoo said. “In cases where fires occur spontaneously while charging, it is likely due to manufacturing defects.”

    According to Kerber, the number of lithium-ion battery-based fires is growing with enormous frequency both in the United States and internationally, particularly when it comes to e-bikes and e-scooters, due to an uptick in purchases of these products during the pandemic.

    “After Covid started, scooter use went dramatically up, especially in places like New York City, for deliveries,” Kerber said. “People started to get overcharged for them and turned to manufacturers which happened to have lower quality control with the battery systems. The quality manufacturers are not having issues.”

    “It will continue to happen until there are regulations around the quality of these devices,” Kerber said.

    Kerber recommends people buy UL-certified electric bikes and scooters from reputable retailers; online marketplaces often make it hard for customers to tell where products are actually coming from. If a fire occurs, he advised people to evacuate and call 911 immediately rather than trying to put it out themselves.

    “The fire spreads incredibly fast and a fire extinguisher is not effective,” he said.

    Beyond scooters and e-bikes, experts warn anyone with a lithium-ion battery should follow proper charging and battery usage guidelines. According to researchers at the University of Michigan, any device with this kind of battery should be charged and stored in a cool, dry place, and not left charging for too long or while you’re asleep – a recommendation likely at odds with how many consumers handle their devices.

    “Elevated temperatures can accelerate degradation of almost every battery component and can lead to significant safety risks, including fire or explosion,” the researchers said. “If a laptop or cellphone is noticeably hot while it’s charging, unplug it. Minimize exposure to low temperatures, especially when charging.”

    Batteries should also be routinely inspected to make sure there is no cracking, bulging or leaking, and people should always use the charger that came with the device or use one from a reputable supplier. When charging an electric scooter or bike, Kerber said it should never block a fire escape or exit route.

    Although some battery chemistries are safer than others, we are still a few years away from adoption of a better, safer lithium-ion alternative, according to Sridhar Srinivasan, a senior director at market research firm Gartner.

    For example, LFP (lithium iron phosphate) batteries don’t overheat as much as other types of lithium-ion batteries. Future battery technologies in development, such as sodium-ion or solid state batteries, are also expected to address some of the safety issues of lithium ion.

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  • There’s a new Reese’s in town, hold the dairy | CNN Business

    There’s a new Reese’s in town, hold the dairy | CNN Business

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    New York
    CNN
     — 

    Vegan Reese’s are happening.

    Hershey, which makes Reese’s along with Hershey bars, Kisses and other chocolates and candies, announced two new dairy-free products on Tuesday: Reese’s plant-based peanut butter cups, and a vegan chocolate Hershey bar with almonds and sea salt, each made with oats instead of dairy and designed to taste like milk chocolate. The new Reese’s variety will be available nationally this month, and the new Hershey bar is arriving in April.

    The company is the latest to introduce a vegan chocolate in hopes that it will attract more customers. But Hershey is a little late to the game.

    Nestlé

    (NSRGY)     introduced KitKat V, a vegan version of the chocolate bar, in 2021. Mondelez

    (MDLZ)     acquired Hu, a company which makes vegan chocolate, that year, as well. Hershey also initiated a test of a version of its product in 2021.

    In prepared remarks discussing the company’s fourth-quarter results, CEO Michele Buck said that “better for you,” which includes plant-based items, presented an opportunity for the company and will “receive greater levels of support this year.”

    “We are excited to introduce these delicious, plant-based options,” Teal Liu, brand manager of Better For You at Hershey

    (HSY)    , said in a statement announcing the launch Tuesday, adding that the new products offer more options for “chocolate lovers looking for plant-based alternatives.”

    By focusing on vegan alternatives to milk chocolate, specifically, Hershey may have a better chance of setting its products apart from others in the market.

    “As the vegan chocolate space gets more crowded, claims beyond plant-based may be necessary,” Kelsey Olsen, consumer insights analyst for food & drink at market research firm MIntel, told CNN in an email. “While many plant-based items previously launched have been dark chocolate varieties, brands should explore the areas of plant-based milk chocolate and white chocolate.”

    Touting oat as an ingredient could also help.

    Confectioners “can take advantage of oat milk’s unique properties to appeal to a larger consumer base, whether vegan or not,” Olsen said.

    Chocolate as a category has been resilient in the past few years, with people reaching for treats during the stress of the early pandemic and seeing it as a relatively affordable splurge even as prices rise.

    But it’s not clear that an oat-based chocolate will do the trick. “The majority of consumers are not focused on added [better for you] components to chocolate,” Olsen noted in a Mintel report last year.

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  • This is the dynamic that could decide the 2024 GOP race | CNN Politics

    This is the dynamic that could decide the 2024 GOP race | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    The same fundamental dynamic that decided the 2016 Republican presidential primaries is already resurfacing as the 2024 contest takes shape.

    As in 2016, early polls of next year’s contest show the Republican electorate is again sharply dividing about former President Donald Trump along lines of education. In both state and national surveys measuring support for the next Republican nomination, Trump is consistently running much better among GOP voters without a college education than among those with a four-year or graduate college degree.

    Analysts have often described such an educational divide among primary voters as the wine track (centered on college-educated voters) and the beer track (revolving around those without degrees). Over the years, it’s been a much more consistent feature in Democratic than Republican presidential primaries. But the wine track/beer track divide emerged as the defining characteristic of the 2016 GOP race, when Trump’s extraordinary success at attracting Republicans without a college degree allowed him to overcome sustained resistance from the voters with one.

    Though the early 2024 polls have varied in whether they place Trump or Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis in the lead overall (with the latest round tilting mostly toward Trump), that same overriding pattern of educational polarization is appearing in virtually all of those surveys, a review of public and private polling data reveals.

    “Trump does seem to have a special ability to make this sort of populist appeal [to non-college voters] and also have a special ability to make college-educated conservatives start thinking about alternatives,” GOP pollster Chris Wilson said in an email. “I think we’ll continue to see a big education divide in his support in 2024.”

    The stark educational split in attitudes toward Trump frames the strategic challenge for his potential rivals in the 2024 race.

    On paper, none of the leading candidates other than DeSantis himself seems particularly well positioned to threaten Trump’s hold on the non-college Republicans who have long been the most receptive audience for his blustery and belligerent messaging. By contrast, most of the current and potential field – including former Governors Nikki Haley and Chris Christie; current Governors Chris Sununu of New Hampshire and Glenn Youngkin of Virginia; former Vice President Mike Pence; and Sen. Tim Scott – appear better suited to attract the white-collar Republicans who have always been the most skeptical of Trump.

    That could create a situation in which there’s too little competition to Trump for voters on the “beer track” and too many options splintering the voters resistant to him on the “wine track.” That was the dynamic that allowed Trump to capture the nomination in 2016 even though nearly two-thirds of college-educated Republicans opposed him through the primaries, according to exit polls, and he didn’t reach 50% of the total vote in any state until the race was essentially decided.

    While the political obstacles facing Trump look greater now than they were then, his best chance of winning in 2024 would likely come from consolidating the “beer track” to a greater extent than anyone else unifies the “wine track” – just as he did in 2016. In each of the past three contested GOP presidential primaries, the electorate have split almost exactly in half between voters with and without college degrees, analyses of the exit polls have found.

    “Right now, unless somebody cracks that code to get competitive with Trump there [among blue-collar Republican voters], it could fall into the old pattern which is the best scenario for him,” said long-time GOP strategist Mike Murphy, who directed the super PAC for Jeb Bush in the 2016 race.

    Jennifer Horn, the former GOP state chair in New Hampshire, added that while Trump’s ceiling is likely lower than in 2016, he could still win the nomination with only plurality support if no one unifies the majority more skeptical of him. “He isn’t going to need 50% to win,” cautioned Horn, a leading Republican critic of Trump.

    The wine track/beer track divide has been a consistent feature of Democratic presidential primary politics since 1968. Since then, a procession of brainy liberal candidates (think Eugene McCarthy in 1968, Gary Hart in 1984, Paul Tsongas in 1992 and Bill Bradley in 2000) have mobilized socially liberal college-educated voters against rivals who relied primarily on support from non-college educated White voters and racial minorities (Robert F. Kennedy, Walter Mondale, Bill Clinton and Al Gore in those same races). In the epic 2008 Democratic primary struggle, the basic divide persisted in slightly reconfigured form as Barack Obama attracted just enough white-collar White and Black voters to beat Hillary Clinton’s coalition of blue-collar Whites and Latinos. Joe Biden in 2020 was mostly a beer track candidate.

    Generally, over those years, the educational divide had not been as important in Republican primary races. More often GOP voters have divided among primary contenders along other lines, including ideology and religious affiliation. Both the 2008 and 2012 GOP races, for instance, followed similar lines in which a candidate who relied primarily on evangelical Christians and the most conservative voters (Mike Huckabee in 2008 and Rick Santorum in 2012) ultimately lost the nomination to another who attracted more support from non-evangelicals and a broader range of mainstream conservatives (John McCain and Mitt Romney).

    The conservative columnist Patrick J. Buchanan, in his long-shot 1992 and 1996 bids for the GOP nomination, pioneered a blue-collar conservatism centered on unwavering cultural conservatism and an economic nationalism revolving around hostility to foreign trade and immigration. Huckabee and even more so Santorum advanced those themes, clearing a path that Trump would later follow – with a much harsher edge than either.

    In 2008, there was no educational divide in the GOP race: McCain won exactly the same 43% among Republican voters with and without a college degree, according to a new analysis of the exit poll results by CNN polling director Jennifer Agiesta. But by 2012, Santorum’s blue-collar inroads meant Romney won the nomination with something closer to the Republican equivalent of a wine-track coalition: Of the 20 states that conducted exit polls that year, Romney won voters with at least a four-year college degree in 14, but he carried most non-college voters in just 10.

    Wilson, the GOP pollster, said that an educational divide also started appearing around that time in other GOP primaries for Senate, House and governor’s races more frequently though by no means universally.

    “This wasn’t always the driving demographic or ideological difference in primaries before Trump,” Wilson said. “Sometimes a candidate [who] was particularly strong in sounding populist themes would create this type of gap, but often a more traditional issue difference either on social issues or on issues like tax increase votes or support for Obamacare or something adjacent to it would be a stronger signal in a primary.”

    In 2016, Trump turned this traditional GOP axis on its head. He narrowed the big divisions that had decided the 2008 and 2012 races. He performed nearly as well among voters who identified as very conservative as he did among those who called themselves somewhat conservative or moderate, according to a cumulative analysis of all the 2016 exit polls conducted by ABC’s Gary Langer. Likewise, Trump performed only slightly better among voters who were not evangelicals than those who were, Langer’s analysis found.

    Instead, Trump split the GOP electorate along the wine-track/beer-track divide familiar from Democratic primary contests over the previous generation. According to Langer’s cumulation of the exit polls, Trump won fully 47% of GOP voters without a four-year college degree – an incredible performance in such a crowded field. Trump, in stark contrast, carried only 35% of Republican voters with at least a college-degree across the primaries overall. But the remainder of them dubious of him never settled on a single alternative. Sen. Ted Cruz, who proved Trump’s longest-lasting rival, captured only about one-fourth of the white-collar GOP voters, with the rest splitting primarily among Marco Rubio, John Kasich and Trump himself.

    In October 2015, I wrote that Trump’s emerging strength in the GOP nomination race could be explained in two sentences: “The blue-collar wing of the Republican primary electorate has consolidated around one candidate. The party’s white-collar wing remains fragmented.” That same basic equation held through the primaries and largely explained Trump’s victory. The question now is whether it could happen again.

    There’s no question that some of the same ingredients are present. Recent national polling by the non-partisan Public Religion Research Institute, according to detailed results shared with CNN, shows that Republicans without a college degree are more likely than those with advanced education to agree with such core Trump themes as the belief that discrimination against Whites is now as big a problem as bias against minorities; that society is growing too soft and feminine; and that the growing number of immigrants weakens American society.

    The educational divide is also appearing more regularly in other GOP primaries for offices such as senator or governor, especially in races where one candidate is running on a Trump-style platform, Republican strategists say. It is also reappearing in polls measuring GOP voters’ early preferences for 2024. Recent national polls by Quinnipiac University, Fox News Channel and Republican pollsters including Whit Ayres, Echelon Insights and Wilson have all found Trump still running very strongly among Republicans without a college degree, usually capturing more than two-fifths of them, according to detailed results provided by the pollsters. But those same surveys all show Trump struggling with college-educated Republican voters, usually drawing even less support among them than he did in 2016, often just one-fourth or less.

    Wilson, for instance, said that in his national survey of prospective 2024 GOP voters, Trump’s support falls from about half of those with a high school degree or less, to about one-third of those with some college experience, one-fourth of those with a four-year degree and only one-fifth of those with a graduate education. In a recent national NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll, half of Republicans without a college degree said nominating Trump again would give the party the best chance of winning in 2024; two-thirds of the Republicans with degrees said the party would have a better chance with someone else.

    State polls are showing the same pattern. The latest University of New Hampshire survey showed Trump attracting about two-fifths of GOP voters there without a high school degree, about one-third of those with some college experience, and only one-sixth of those with a four-year or graduate degree. A recent LA Times/University of California (Berkeley) survey in that state produced very similar results. Trump also ran much better among Republicans without a degree than those with one in the latest OH Predictive Insights primary poll in Arizona, according to detailed results provided by the firm.

    Craig Robinson, the former GOP state party political director in Iowa, said he sees the same divergence in his daily interactions. “The people that I hang out with or have breakfast with on Saturday, it’s the more business, more educated guys, and they are like, ‘Hey, we just want to move on [from Trump],’” Robinson told me. “But if I go back home to rural Iowa, they are not like that. They are looking for the fighter; they are looking for the person that they think will stand up for them and that’s Trump by and large.”

    Republicans who believe Trump is more vulnerable than in 2016 largely point to one reason: the possibility that DeSantis could build a broader coalition of support than any of Trump’s rivals did then. In many of these early state and national polls, DeSantis leads Trump among college educated voters. And in the same polls, DeSantis is generally staying closer to Trump among non-college voters than anyone did in 2016. “DeSantis may be able to do some business there,” said Murphy, referring to the GOP’s blue-collar wing.

    When DeSantis spoke on Sunday at the Ronald Reagan presidential library about an hour northwest of Los Angeles, he smoothly displayed his potential to bridge the GOP’s educational divide. For the first part of his speech, he touted Florida’s economic success around small government principles – a message that could connect with white-collar GOP voters drawn to a Reaganite message of lower taxes and less regulation. In the speech’s later sections, DeSantis recounted his clashes with what he called “the woke mind virus” over everything from classroom instruction about race, gender and sexual orientation, to immigration and crime and his collisions with the Walt Disney Co. Those issues, which drew the biggest response from his audience, provide him a powerful calling card with GOP voters, especially those without degrees, drawn to Trump’s confrontational style, but worried he can’t win again.

    “There is a lot of energy in the party right now around these cultural issues,” said GOP consultant Alex Conant, who served as the communications director for Marco Rubio’s 2016 presidential campaign. “If you watch Fox prime time, they are not talking about tax cuts and balancing budgets. They talk about the same cultural issues that DeSantis is putting at the core of his campaign.”

    The risk to DeSantis is that by leaning so hard into cultural confrontation on so many fronts he could create a zero-sum dynamic in the race. That approach could allow him to cut into Trump’s blue-collar base, but ultimately repel some college educated primary voters, who view him as too closely replicating what they don’t like about Trump. (If DeSantis wins the nomination, that same dynamic could hurt him with some suburban voters otherwise drawn to his small government economic message.)

    That could leave room in the top tier of the GOP race for another candidate who offers a sunnier, less polarizing message aimed mostly at white-collar Republicans. “I think there is absolutely room for more than two candidates, especially two candidates who are both competing very hard for the Fox News audience,” Conant said. Almost anyone else who joins the race beyond Trump and DeSantis (assuming he announces later this year) may ultimately conclude that lane represents their best chance to win.

    In many ways, Trump looks more vulnerable than he did in the 2016 primary. But assembling a coalition across the GOP’s wine-track/beer-track divide that’s broad enough to beat him remains something of a Rubik’s Cube, and the countdown is starting for the field that’s assembling against him to solve it.

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  • $30 million of Funko Pop! toys will be thrown in the trash | CNN Business

    $30 million of Funko Pop! toys will be thrown in the trash | CNN Business

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    New York
    CNN
     — 

    Thirty million dollars worth of Funko

    (FNKO)     Pop! figures – those big-headed, vinyl pop-culture dolls – will soon make their way into the hands of a new collector: The garbage collector.

    Funko said in its fourth quarter earnings report that a combination of waning demand for the toys and a surplus of inventory is creating financial trouble for the company. Last year, they had to rent excess warehouse space just to hold the buildup of Funko figures, which range from Baby Yoda to Eddie Van Halen.

    Funko was holding onto about $246.4 million worth of dolls at the end of 2022. That’s 48% more than what they had on hand just one year before.

    The company intends to “eliminate” a bit of that nearly $250 million in inventory in the first half of 2023 “to reduce fulfillment costs by managing inventory levels to align with the operating capacity of our distribution center,” Funko said in a statement Wednesday. “This is expected to result in a write down in the first half of 2023 of approximately $30 to $36 million.”

    In short, the product they’re storing is now worth less than the cost of keeping it on hand, so they’re dumping at least $30 million worth of it.

    On a call with investors last week, CEO Brian Mariotti said Funko had already filled its Arizona distributing center to the brim with dolls and was forced to rent excess storage containers for them. The cost of that extra storage, he said, was causing the company to lose money at a rapid clip.

    Company executives also announced that they would cut 10% cut of their workforce as a cost-saving measure.

    Funko benefited during the pandemic boom, posting $1 billion in net sales for 2021 – a 58% increase from 2020 – but those gains didn’t hold up as the global economy reopened.

    The company reported a total loss of $47 million in the fourth quarter of 2022. That’s down from a profit of $17 million during the same period the year before.

    “It was clear on our last earnings call that the business and our operations hit an inflection point,” Mariotti said. “A combination of macro factors and Funko-specific issues have disrupted our financial and operating performance to an unacceptable degree.”

    Funko stock has fallen by 9.4% so far this year.

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  • Apple supplier Foxconn is on the hunt for semiconductor and EV deals in India | CNN Business

    Apple supplier Foxconn is on the hunt for semiconductor and EV deals in India | CNN Business

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    Hong Kong
    CNN
     — 

    Apple supplier Foxconn says it is seeking Indian partners to cooperate in areas such as chips and electric vehicles, as its chief executive wrapped up a visit to the country.

    Taiwan’s Foxconn has been looking to expand its operations in the South Asian giant after suffering severe supply disruptions in China last year. The firm bounced back from the disruptions early this year.

    “India is a country with a large population,” Young Liu, the company’s chairman and CEO, said in a Saturday statement. “My trip this week supported Foxconn’s efforts to deepen partnerships … and seek cooperation in new areas such as semiconductor development and electric vehicles.”

    “Foxconn will continue to communicate with local governments to seek the most beneficial development opportunities for the company and all stakeholders,” he added.

    The company, best known for making Apple

    (AAPL)    ’s iPhones, is one of the world’s biggest contract makers of electronics. It’s now expanding into other areas including electric vehicles.

    Liu did not specify any investment spending in India during his trip, which included a meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

    The company already has factories in the states of Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu.

    On Friday, the investment promotion office of the southern Indian state of Karnataka said Foxconn had announced a major deal there and that 300 acres of land had been allocated for a facility. The investment will generate 100,000 jobs over 10 years in the state, it said.

    According to a report from Bloomberg citing unnamed sources, the company plans to invest about $700 million on a new plant in Bengaluru, the capital of Karnataka, to make iPhone parts.

    India has emerged as an attractive potential alternative to China for the likes of Apple. One of India’s top ministers, Piyush Goyal, said in January that Apple wants to ramp up its production in the South Asian country to a quarter of its overall total from between 5% and 7% now.

    For years, Apple had relied on a vast manufacturing network in China to mass produce iPhones, iPads and other popular products. But its dependence on the country was tested last year by Beijing’s strict zero-Covid strategy, which was rapidly dismantled last December.

    Apple devices are currently manufactured in India by Foxconn, Wistron and Pegatron, which are all Taiwanese companies.

    – CNN’s Diksha Madhok contributed reporting

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  • US is reviewing Huawei export license policy amid rising congressional scrutiny of China | CNN Business

    US is reviewing Huawei export license policy amid rising congressional scrutiny of China | CNN Business

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    The US government is reviewing a policy that permits certain US exports to continue to Huawei, despite an overall push by the Trump and Biden administrations to block the Chinese telecommunications giant from receiving American technology.

    Alan Estevez, a Commerce Department official, told lawmakers Tuesday that the policy is “under assessment” as the agency conducts a “top-to-bottom review of our export control policies related to the [People’s Republic of China].”

    Estevez testified before the House Foreign Affairs Committee, which was holding a hearing to scrutinize China’s impact on US national security.

    In 2019, Huawei was one of a number of Chinese companies placed on the Commerce Department’s Entity List, which prohibits US companies from trading specified items with entities named on the list unless they obtain a license to do so.

    US officials have expressed concerns that Huawei’s 5G wireless networking gear could allow the Chinese government to spy on American communications. Huawei has denied that it poses a security risk, and its founder has said the company would resist any Chinese government effort to obtain its data.

    According to Foreign Affairs Committee chairman Michael McCaul, between January and March of 2022 the Commerce Department approved more than $23 billion in license applications to trade with Chinese-affiliated companies on the Entity List. Confronting Estevez at Tuesday’s hearing, McCaul asked the Commerce Department to square the license approvals with the US government’s wider effort to sideline Huawei and similar companies.

    “A licensing rule of the previous administration that still stands for Huawei allows things below 5G, below cloud-level to go,” Estevez said, “and I will say that all those things are under assessment.”

    Entity List restrictions do not provide for a “blanket embargo” on exports generally, Estevez added, but rather reflect specific rules about particular exports.

    Separately, in 2020 the Commerce Department moved to prevent Huawei’s suppliers from selling the company semiconductor chips made by US-built software and equipment, unless those suppliers also obtained a license.

    Other parts of the US government have also moved against Huawei. The Federal Communications Commission has prohibited US wireless carriers from using federal funding to purchase Huawei networking gear, and last year also banned future approvals of Huawei equipment for sale in the United States, in the first use of the FCC’s equipment authorization authority for a national security purpose.

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  • Biden administration launches new semiconductor push amid ‘very heated global competition with China’ | CNN Politics

    Biden administration launches new semiconductor push amid ‘very heated global competition with China’ | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo is launching the Biden administration’s high-priority effort to out-compete China in a key sector: Semiconductor chips.

    And amid tensions with China marked by the dramatic downing of a spy balloon and new warnings that Beijing is considering providing lethal aid to Russia, Raimondo’s sales pitch these days is simple: Making chips is core to US national security.

    “It’s no secret that we are in a global – very heated global competition with China. And technology is at the crux of that competition,” Raimondo told CNN in an interview. “Right now, we are much too reliant upon Taiwan for leading edge chips. So, a big part of our strategy around being a global leader is investing in America: In our people, in our capacity to out innovate China and the rest of the world.”

    As the Commerce Department on Tuesday launches its application for billions of dollars in semiconductor subsidies, Raimondo said she wants to be “crystal clear” that the program is “a national security initiative.” But reaching those national security goals, she said, will require developing a US workforce that can meet the moment.

    “We simply will not be successful in achieving the national security goals of the CHIPS initiative unless we invest in our workforce, period. Full stop,” Raimondo said. “For decades, we’ve taken our eye off the ball with manufacturing, which means the worker supply of people with the skills to do super technical manufacturing has withered. And so, we need to be honest about that, but also embrace it as an opportunity to come up with creative solutions.”

    To that end, the Commerce Department is asking every company vying for a share of the $39 billion in direct funding for semiconductor manufacturing to develop and outline plans for how they plan to build a skilled and diverse workforce, including by working with high schools and community colleges.

    Companies applying for the funding will need to lay out strategies and commitments for training workers and coordinating with educational and other community institutions to meet their workforce goals.

    As part of Raimondo’s initiative to bring one million women into the construction industry over the next decade, applicants will also need to detail steps they will take to recruit and train a diverse construction workforce, including efforts to recruit women to the field. Raimondo said she expects building new chips manufacturing hubs will require 120,000 to 140,000 construction workers.

    Applicants seeking over $150 million in funding will also need to lay out how they will provide its workforce with access to childcare, including through on-site childcare or by subsidizing the cost of childcare.

    Some of these initiatives – recruiting more women and people of color into specialized fields or ensuring that high school and community college graduates can receive technical training – are ideas that the Biden administration has touted in other contexts throughout the president’s first two years in office. But one senior administration official insisted that the applications would be “seriously vetted and pressure-tested,” saying that if their workforce plans do not clear the bar, “we will not sign off on the funding.”

    Raimondo, for her part, acknowledged that senior executives at chips manufacturing companies have questioned whether the US workforce is up to the task.

    “They say, ‘America doesn’t manufacture anymore. America hasn’t manufactured chips in a really long time at scale, you don’t have the talent supply. How are we going to be successful?’” Raimondo said.

    She also suggested to CNN that there is a unique opportunity to make real headway on these goals in the context of semiconductors – precisely because there are such serious national security imperatives at stake.

    “If we don’t recruit more people, including women, into the construction trades, these projects won’t be built on time and on budget. And then we won’t as a nation hit our national security goal,” Raimondo said. “Same thing for engineers. Same thing for technicians.”

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  • Microsoft Windows 11 update puts AI front and center | CNN Business

    Microsoft Windows 11 update puts AI front and center | CNN Business

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    CNN
     — 

    Microsoft will roll out on Tuesday an update to Windows 11 that puts its new AI-powered Bing capabilities front and center on its taskbar, one of the operating system’s most widely used features, in the latest sign the company is doubling down on the buzzy technology despite some recent controversy.

    With the update, the AI tool will be accessible from the Windows search box, which allows users to directly access files, settings and perform web queries. The search bar has more than half a billion users every month, according to the company, making it prime real estate for eventually exposing more users to the new feature. (A preview version of the AI tool remains available on a limited basis.)

    Earlier this month, Microsoft said it was looking for ways to rein in Bing’s AI chatbot after users highlighted responses that ranged from inaccurate to emotionally reactive. Despite such early hiccups, the company told CNN “as a whole, we are feeling very good about the product experience for people” and continues to learn from feedback.

    “AI itself is reinventing right now … and it’s just the beginning,” Panos Panay, Microsoft’s chief product officer, told CNN ahead of Tuesday’s launch. He likened the AI changes coming to the PC to how the keyboard and mouse changed the way we interact with computers.

    However, only users of the new Bing preview will have access to its additional AI capabilities out of the gate. The company will continue to add users to the preview who have signed up for the new Bing waitlist. “We want to thoughtfully and responsibly scale it up,” Panay said.

    Last year, Microsoft unveiled several AI-powered Windows 11 features, such as quieting background noise like lawnmowers and baby cries on video calls and automatic framing so the camera follows the speaker’s movements. It also automated some of its accessibility tools, such as live video captions.

    Its efforts around AI have only grown. Earlier this year, Microsoft confirmed it is making a “multibillion dollar” investment in OpenAI, the company behind the viral AI chatbot tool ChatGPT. Microsoft launched its AI chatbot tool in early February; one million people have since tried it out in 169 countries, according to Microsoft. The company has since expanded it to the Bing and Edge browser mobile apps and Skype.

    But adding it to the Windows’ search bar is a high vote of confidence from the company and reflects its greater effort to “go all-in on AI,” according to Patrick Moorhead, president and principal analyst at Moore Insights and Strategy.

    The Bing integration is just one of several notable updates coming to Windows 11. Microsoft is also taking steps to improve the Windows experience for Apple and Samsung users.

    Apple users will now be able to receive iOS alerts and messages directly on their Windows 11 devices, potentially chipping away at Apple’s closed ecosystem. (Android users have been able to receive messages on Windows devices since 2018.) The new iOS support does not, however, work with replying to group iMessages or sending media such as photos and videos in messages.

    Microsoft said its move to add iOS messages to PCs was not done directly in partnership with Apple; instead it’s done via Bluetooth technology. Moorhead said Apple “has been very reticent to open up its iMessage APIs to vendors like Microsoft, which could improve the Windows experience.”

    “This is what customers need and want, so we went and designed it to make sure it was in there for our users on the Microsoft side,” Panay said. “I know our customers need their iPhones to work on their PC, and I [want] to do everything I can to help them do that.”

    For Samsung device users, Microsoft is making it easier to activate their phone’s personal hotspot with a single click from within the Wi-Fi network list on their PC. It’s also adding a Recent Websites feature that allows users to transfer their browser sessions from their smartphone to their Windows PC.

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  • Inflation is doing a crab walk and Fed officials fear its pinch | CNN Business

    Inflation is doing a crab walk and Fed officials fear its pinch | CNN Business

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    A version of this story first appeared in CNN Business’ Before the Bell newsletter. Not a subscriber? You can sign up right here. You can listen to an audio version of the newsletter by clicking the same link.


    New York
    CNN
     — 

    The possibility of a 2023 market rally ground to a halt last week amid an onslaught of unfortunate inflation and economic data that spooked investors and increased the likelihood that the Federal Reserve will continue its economically painful rate hikes campaign for longer than Wall Street hoped.

    All major indexes notched their largest weekly losses of 2023 on Friday. The S&P 500 fell by 2.7%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average sank 3%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq fell 3.3%.

    What’s happening: It appears that after months of steady decline, the pace of inflation is going sideways. January’s Personal Consumption Expenditures price index – the Fed’s favored inflation gauge – came in hotter than expected on Friday.

    Prices rose a whopping 5.4% in January from a year earlier, the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Economic Analysis reported. In December, prices rose 5.3% annually.

    In January alone, prices were up 0.6% from the prior month, a higher monthly gain from December’s increase of 0.2%.

    This inflationary crab walk is almost certainly causing Fed officials to rethink their policy.

    A paper presented Friday at the Booth School of Business Monetary Policy Forum in New York argued that disinflation will likely be slower and more painful than markets anticipate.

    “Significant disinflations induced by monetary policy tightening are associated with recessions,” said the paper. “An ‘immaculate disinflation’ would be unprecedented.” (Immaculate, in this instance, refers to the possibility of inflation falling quickly to the Fed’s 2% goal without any serious economic damage).

    Several Fed presidents, governors and top economists were on hand at the Booth School forum to discuss the paper and monetary policy on Friday. The majority of those speaking expressed deep concern about the stubbornness of inflation and general market reaction.

    Inflation won’t quit: Cleveland Fed President Loretta Mester said that while price growth has moderated from its recent high, the overall pace of inflation remains too high and could be more persistent than her colleagues currently anticipate.

    “I anticipate further rate increases to reach a sufficiently restrictive level, then holding there for some, perhaps extended, time,” echoed Boston Fed President Susan Collins at the conference.

    Collins referred to inflation as “recalcitrant,” a loaded million-dollar word that means uncooperative, or defiant to authority.

    Fed Governor Philip Jefferson struck a more befuddled stance on Friday, observing that inflation continues to baffle economists. “The inflationary forces impinging on the US economy at present represent a complex mixture of temporary and more long-lasting elements that defy simple, parsimonious explanation,” he said. Parsimonious being another million-dollar word for frugal.

    Economists stressed that more pain lies ahead. “It’s important that markets understand that ‘no landing’ is not an option,” said Peter Hooper, vice chair of research at Deutsche Bank, an author of the report.

    While recent data has signaled that the US economy remains strong, “by the time we get to the middle of this year we expect to see some bad news coming and the sooner the markets get that message the more helpful it will be to the Fed,” he said.

    The final word: Former Bank of England Governor Lord Mervyn King summed up what many were thinking on Friday: Given the complexity of the current monetary situation, he said, “I wouldn’t want to give advice to any central banks about what we should do.”

    Researchers at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York have issued a dire warning: If President Joe Biden’s student loan forgiveness plan doesn’t come to fruition, the US could face another credit crisis.

    Some background: The Covid-19 crisis triggered a sudden shift in student loan policy and a new openness to forgiveness. In March 2020, Congress passed the CARES Act, which automatically paused required payments on all federally held student loans.

    That forbearance has since been extended eight times and is set to end as late as August, 40 months after it began.

    The Biden Administration had announced an unprecedented debt cancellation proposal which would provide relief to more than 40 million borrowers. An analysis by the New York Fed found that roughly $441 billion of federal student loans are eligible for forgiveness under the proposal, canceling about 30% of all outstanding federal student loan debt.

    That forgiveness proposal is now on hold after an injunction by the 8th US Circuit Court of Appeals. On Tuesday, The Supreme Court of the United States will hear the case with its decision expected by June 2023.

    What’s on the line: If the Biden Administration’s forgiveness plan survives the court challenge, it will mark the largest mass discharge of consumer debt in modern history, according to the New York Fed. About 40% of those with federal student loan debt would have a zero balance; even more would have a much smaller monthly payment.

    But, “if payments resume without debt relief, we expect both student loan default and delinquencies to rise and potentially surpass pre-pandemic levels,” warned Fed researchers.

    “We note a stark increase in new credit card and auto loan delinquency for borrowers with eligible student loans over the past few quarters, growing at a faster pace than those without student loans and those with ineligible loans,” they wrote.

    Those missed payments suggest that some federal student loan borrowers are having trouble meeting their monthly debt obligations. “We expect these delinquency patterns to worsen if federal student loan payments resume without relief,” said the report.

    The data “may be suggestive of problems to come, a sign of economic distress that may appear particularly concerning when the burden of student loan payments resumes.”

    Future concerns: If student loan borrowers expect future debt cancellation, they may borrow even more, said researchers, which would increase debt balances even more sharply. “Absent direct policies to address this growing burden, taxpayers may be again called to for relief in the future,” they concluded.

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  • The best time and days to book your domestic and international flights | CNN

    The best time and days to book your domestic and international flights | CNN

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    Editor’s Note: Sign up for Unlocking the World, CNN Travel’s weekly newsletter. Get news about destinations opening, inspiration for future adventures, plus the latest in aviation, food and drink, where to stay and other travel developments.



    CNN
     — 

    This week in travel news: the best time and day to book your flights, new business and first class cabins for Qantas and Air France, and the only woman living on an island populated by convicted criminals.

    With some airfares up by as much as 50%, it’s more crucial than ever to get smart about your booking strategy. An expert at travel site Hopper tells CNN you should start tracking your May, June and July vacations now. And there’s a “Goldilocks window” for booking – not too early, not too late – says another expert from travel site Going.

    Get your laptop and credit card out on a Sunday to stand the best chance of securing the best deals, says booking platform Expedia. You can refine your search further with flight comparison site Skyscanner’s new Savings Generator, launched this month. Plug in your departure city, your destination and when you’d like to travel, and it’ll help you pinpoint the best time to book and the cheapest time to travel.

    If you’re an airline planning to launch record-breaking new 19-hour flights connecting Australia with New York and London, you’d better make darn sure you’re offering your customers a comfortable experience – especially for those shelling out the big dollars in the front section.

    Qantas has revealed the first and business class prototypes for the Airbus A350s that will be serving its new “Project Sunrise” routes that are slated to launch in 2025. The airline says its First Suite will feel like “a mini boutique hotel.”

    That follows the unveiling last month of Air France’s swanky new long-haul business cabin, complete with sliding doors and redesigned seats. It debuted on a Boeing 777-300ER flying Paris-New York and the first destinations it will serve are New York, Rio de Janeiro and Dakar, Senegal.

    Back in 2011, Giulia Manca went to a former Italian prison island in search of a relaxing break. Twelve years later, she’s the only woman living on an island populated by convicted criminals and is loving life in the “Alcatraz of the Tyrrhenian Sea.”

    Over in Mexico, one of the country’s most notorious prisons began a new chapter in December as a Pacific Ocean getaway. The former penal colony on the Islas Marías archipelago now boasts a tourism center, restaurant and cafe, as well as villas for guests to stay in before hitting the beaches.

    Dubai could be getting an indoor, climate-controlled, 93-kilometer cycling superhighway looping round the city, if developer URB gets its way. The greenery-filled corridor “aims to make Dubai the most connected city on Earth by foot or bike.”

    The move could perhaps earn the Middle Eastern hub a future spot on our list of the world’s best cities to see by bike: destinations in North America, Scandinavia and Asia Pacific all make the current roundup.

    Two people who have a better knowledge than most of global cycling culture are British couple Laura Massey-Pugh and Stevie Massey, who last year became the fastest cyclists to circumnavigate the world on a tandem bicycle.

    Anthony met Barbara at a Greek ferry port in the summer of 1969. He was a 28-year-old American college graduate with a third-class ticket and she was a 24-year-old flight attendant for Air France, traveling in second class.

    Like Jack and Rose in “Titanic,” the boat’s class divisions didn’t stand in the way of love. Here’s how Anthony jumped the barriers to the meet the woman who’d be his bride.

    What dinky little travel essential are you most likely to lose – and most likely to mourn when you do? For many of us, the answer is earphones.

    If you’re someone whose most cherished travel companion is a playlist or podcast, but also doesn’t like to break the bank on something that could end up on the floor of a foreign city’s metro system, take a look at this guide to best budget earbuds. It’s been put together by our partners at CNN Underscored, a product reviews and recommendations guide owned by CNN.

    After a brief hiatus, we’re sorry to say unruliness is back. An American Airlines flight was diverted to a North Carolina airport on February 22 due to a disruptive passenger. The woman was taken into custody, but a misdemeanor charge was dismissed.

    An Airbnb plumbing disaster led to a beautiful continent-spanning friendship.

    Turn on the waterworks, this one will touch your heart.

    This Asian nation has the world’s most “powerful” passport.

    So why aren’t its citizens using it?

    What it’s like to live off grid in a traditional Maya village.

    And why their lifestyle is now under threat.

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  • Molson Coors’ funny ad went too far, regulator says | CNN Business

    Molson Coors’ funny ad went too far, regulator says | CNN Business

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    New York
    CNN
     — 

    Beer ads try to be funny, but a regulatory group has determined that Molson Coors went too far with a recent ad that compares rivals’ light beer to water.

    The National Advertising Division, which is part of the Better Business Bureau, sided with Anheuser-Busch, which challenged a 2022 ad for Miller Lite that uses the phrase “light beer shouldn’t taste like water, it should taste like beer.” The agency said that Molson Coors should “discontinue” the ad because is “not puffery or a mere opinion.”

    In the 15-second spot, a cyclist takes a break from riding uphill, cracks open a beer and douses himself with it. No specific beers were mentioned, however the beer uses a similar blue color that adorns Bud Light packaging. NAD said that it “determined that tasting ‘like water’ is a measurable attribute” and that customers might “reasonably expect that the statement is supported by such evidence.”

    NAD said the ad should be discontinued because Molson Coors “did not submit evidence supporting the claim that any other light beers ‘taste like water.’”

    In response, Anheuser-Busch said it “appreciates” NAD’s decision.

    “True stewards of the beer industry should be working together to strengthen the beer category instead of resorting to misleading attacks that denigrate products enjoyed by millions of beer drinkers,” an Anheuser- Busch spokesperson said in a statement.

    Molson Coors is appealing the decision, saying it “vehemently disagrees with this decision because we believe light beer should taste like beer, not water, and we are well within our right to share that belief.” A spokesperson also questioned to Anheuser-Busch’s “sudden concern” with the ad since it hasn’t aired since last August.

    NAD’s decisions aren’t legally binding, however most advertisers comply with their decision. If an advertiser doesn’t comply, the ads are referred to the Federal Trade Commission for further scrutiny.

    This isn’t the first time Molson Coors and Anheuser-Busch, which are the top-selling beer makers in the US, have challenged each other. Molson Coors sued Anheuser-Busch in 2019 over Super Bowl ads that accused the Miller Lite and Coors Light maker for saying its beer was sweetened with rice rather than corn syrup. The case was dismissed.

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  • It’s never been this warm in February. Here’s why that’s not a good thing | CNN

    It’s never been this warm in February. Here’s why that’s not a good thing | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    As parts of the West and Northern US face a winter storm with blizzard conditions and significant snowfall, much of the rest of the country is experiencing a summer-like heat that has never been felt before during the month of February.

    More than 130 cities from the Gulf of Mexico to the Great Lakes could set new records for daily and monthly high temperatures this week. Highs will climb up to 80 degrees as far north as Ohio and West Virginia — certainly unusual, but becoming less so in the warming climate.

    Here’s a stark example: Before this decade, Charleston, West Virginia, had only hit 80 degrees before March three times in more than 100 years of record-keeping. But this week’s incredible warmth will mean that four of the last six years will have logged temperatures of 80 degrees, which is its normal high on June 1, in February.

    Record warmth in February — a time that’s supposed to still feel like winter — might not sound like such a bad thing, but its negative consequences spread across the plant world, sports, tourism and agriculture. And it is another clear sign that our planet is warming rapidly, experts say.

    “Whenever we get these events, we should always be thinking there’s the possibility or likelihood that human-induced climate change is increasing the likelihood of strange weather,” Richard Seager, climate researcher at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University, told CNN. “The more it goes on, the more they can bring such tremendous damage.”

    A satellite image taken on February 13 shows just around 7% of the Great Lakes are covered in ice -- significantly lower than average for this time of year.

    On the Great Lakes, ice coverage reached a record low for this time of the year — the same time that the annual maximum extent of ice usually occurs. As of last week, only 7% of the five freshwater lakes were covered in ice, a sharp difference from the 35 to 40% ice cover typically expected in mid-to-late February, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

    Great Lakes ice is on a downward trend, NOAA scientists report. A recent study found a 70% decline in the lakes’ ice cover between 1973 and 2017.

    The decline in Great Lakes ice each winter may not seem like it has any harmful impact, but that ice acts as a buffer for large, wind-driven waves in the winter, scientists have reported. Without the ice, the coastlines are more susceptible to erosion and flooding.

    Ayumi Fujisaki-Manome, a research scientist at NOAA’s Cooperative Institute for Great Lakes Research at the University of Michigan, said low ice coverage could also set the stage for another severe lake-effect snow storm like the one Buffalo, New York, experienced in December.

    “The moisture and heat from the lake surface water are absorbed into the atmosphere by storm systems, and then fall back to the ground as snow in the winter,” Fujisaki-Manome said in a statement.

    The Lake Champlain shoreline on February 16. The lake near the access area is covered with ice, but officials are warning anglers to stay off the lake because unseasonably warm temperatures have made it unsafe.

    The thin ice has already had deadly consequences in New England.

    At Vermont’s Lake Champlain, the annual ice fishing tournament was cancelled last weekend when three fishermen died after falling through the ice. One man’s body was found hours after he was expected to return home from the lake, while the other two died after their utility vehicle broke through the ice.

    Montpelier, Vermont, had its warmest January on record this year since 1948, with Burlington recording its fifth warmest January since 1884, according to the Burlington National Weather Service.

    Robert Wilson, a professor of geography and environment at Syracuse University, said the Northeast as a whole is now a “fast-warming region,” with winter seasons warming faster than summers due to the climate crisis.

    And he underscored how this trend is threatening some of New England’s most cherished winter activities.

    “In coming decades, winter — as most people understand it — will get shorter and warmer, with less snow and more rain,” Wilson said. “This poses a serious threat to winter recreation: snowmobiling, cross-country skiing, and downhill skiing.”

    Daffodils bloom in Norfolk, Virginia, on Tuesday.

    Plants are blooming way earlier than usual across much of the country, a clear sign that spring is either right around the corner — or it has already arrived, in some places.

    “Spring is coming early in much of the Southern and Eastern US,” Brad Rippey, meteorologist with the US Department of Agriculture, told CNN. “Here in the mid-Atlantic, that means everything from budding trees to crocuses in bloom to spring peepers making lots of noise — and in February, no less.”

    Many plants species — including daffodils, witch-hazel, forsythia and even cherry blossoms — are beginning to leaf out in the East. Theresa Crimmins, director of the USA National Phenology Network, said it’s the plants responding to very early warm temperatures.

    “Plants, especially those of temperate systems, respond to a number of cues in order to wake up in the spring, including exposure to chill in the winter, exposure to warmth in the spring, and day length,” she told CNN.

    Dead or dying peach trees at Carlson Orchards in Massachusetts. Temperatures dropped below freezing in recent weeks, after abnormal warmth in January, threatening the crop.

    If another cold snap occurs after an early warm spell, Crimmins said it could be disruptive and damaging for the plants’ cycle. As flower buds develop, many species lose their ability to tolerate cold temperatures, which means a freeze could kill blooms and leave fruit crops and other commodities vulnerable to spring freezes.

    Rippey said warm winters followed by a spring freeze has become more common in recent years. In 2017, for instance, a severe spring freeze in March damaged several fruit crops — peaches, blueberries, apples and strawberries — in states including Georgia and South Carolina, which carried an economic toll of roughly $1.2 billion.

    “As nice as it feels to have temperatures in the 70s and 80s this time of year, the fact that it’s not ‘normal’ can have a profound impact on the ecosystem,” Rippey said. “Even a typical spring freeze can damage commercial and back-yard fruit crops that have been pushed into blooming by late-winter warmth.”

    India issued its first heatwave alert, with temperatures in some states reaching 39 degrees Celsius (102 Fahrenheit) – up to 9 degrees Celsius (16.2 Fahrenheit) above normal, according to data released by the India Meteorological Department on Monday.

    “The heatwave warnings as early as February is a scary situation,” Krishna AchutaRao, a professor at the Centre for Atmospheric Sciences at the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, told CNN.

    It has raised fears of a repeat of last year’s deadly heatwave, which scorched swaths of India and Pakistan.

    Blistering heat has devastating consequences for people’s health, for water supplies and for crops; last year, crop yields were reduced by as much as a third in some parts of the country. As temperatures soared last spring, India banned exports of wheat, dashing hopes that the world’s second-largest wheat producer would fill the supply gap caused by the war in Ukraine.

    Commuters cover their faces with clothes to protect themselves from sun as temperatures soar in Hyderabad, India, on Wednesday.

    This February, with high temperatures hitting wheat-producing states, including Rajasthan and Gujarat, India has set up a committee to monitor the impact of rising temperatures on the crop, according to Reuters.

    Europe, too, has seen unusually high temperatures, kicking off 2023 with an extreme winter heatwave that broke January temperature records in several countries. Low levels of snow and rainfall have fueled concerns about the region’s rivers and lakes.

    The River Po, which winds through northern Italy’s agricultural heartland, fed by snow from the Alps and rainfall in the spring, is at very low levels, while water in Lake Garda in northern Italy has reached record lows. There are fears Italy, which declared a state of emergency last year after its worst drought in 70 years, may face another drought.

    The unusually warm weather has also left ski resorts across the Alps with little or no snow. In February, top skiers wrote an open letter to the International Ski and Snowboard Federation demanding action on the climate crisis.

    “The seasons have shifted,” they wrote. “Our sport is threatened existentially.”

    While ski resorts have adapted to warming by relying on artificial snow – a process that uses a lot of water and energy – Wilson noted that resorts would still need cold nighttime temperatures to make it.

    “The long-term survival of skiing and other winter recreation will depend on nations lowering their carbon emissions to avoid the more dire consequences and severe warming in the future,” he said.

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  • Murder of Vermont woman solved after more than 50 years using DNA found on a cigarette and the victim’s clothing | CNN

    Murder of Vermont woman solved after more than 50 years using DNA found on a cigarette and the victim’s clothing | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    More than 50 years after Rita Curran’s roommate found her strangled to death in her room, police in Vermont say they have identified the killer using DNA found on a cigarette butt and Curran’s clothing.

    Investigators identified William DeRoos, a man who lived in Curran’s Burlington apartment building, as the person responsible with the help of advances in DNA technology and genetic genealogy, police in Vermont’s most populous city announced Tuesday.

    DeRoos died of a drug overdose in San Francisco in 1986, police said. The case is now closed.

    On the night of the July 1971 killing, DeRoos, who lived with his wife two floors above Curran, had a fight with his spouse and left their apartment to “cool down,” according to a Burlington police investigation report.

    Curran, 24, was later found dead, severely beaten after apparently having put up a “vicious struggle,” a detective wrote at the time. Investigators are now “unanimously certain” DeRoos was responsible, the report released Tuesday says.

    But when investigators questioned DeRoos and his wife the next morning, the couple said they had been together all night and didn’t hear or see anything. After police left, DeRoos told his wife if they were questioned again, she should not admit that he had left the apartment “or they would go after him” because he had a criminal history, police said during a news conference Tuesday.

    A break in the case finally came in 2014 when a DNA profile was extracted from a cigarette butt that had been found next to Curran’s body, Detective Lt. James Trieb said at the news conference. Though the profile was submitted to a national criminal database for DNA, he said, no matches were made. That meant the person with that DNA likely never had genetic material entered into the database, possibly because the person didn’t have a felony conviction.

    In 2019, Trieb reopened the case and decided to take a new approach.

    Instead of having a single detective work the cold case alone – the department’s usual strategy – he treated the crime as if it had just been committed, bringing in a team of detectives and expert technicians to review and discuss it, his investigation report says.

    The team began retesting evidence, Trieb said, and decided to analyze the cigarette DNA using genetic genealogy – a process that uses DNA databases for genealogy research to identify possible family members of the person whose DNA is unmatched.

    An outside genetic genealogy expert then concluded that the cigarette DNA had strong connections to relatives of DeRoos, both on the paternal and maternal sides.

    “She was certain that it was William DeRoos” who put his DNA on the cigarette, the police report says.

    cnn world rugby bryan habana dnafit rugby spc_00013322.jpg

    Why your DNA may be solving cold cases

    Investigators then found a living half-brother of DeRoos who was willing to provide a DNA sample, and that sample bolstered the conclusion that the cigarette DNA belonged to DeRoos, the report says.

    Finally, investigators found that DNA left on Curran’s ripped house coat also matched the DNA on the cigarette butt, the report reads. Investigators re-interviewed his then-wife, who admitted that she had lied about DeRoos’ alibi.

    At the news conference, acting Burlington Police Chief Jon Murad said the day was “filled with mixed emotions.”

    “Ultimately, those emotions are ones of relief, of pride for me (and) for this department, but mostly of gratitude to a family that has been through an incredible ordeal for more than half a century,” he said.

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  • Why UK supermarkets are rationing fruit and vegetables | CNN Business

    Why UK supermarkets are rationing fruit and vegetables | CNN Business

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    London
    CNN
     — 

    Major UK supermarkets have started rationing the sale of some staple fruits and salad vegetables, blaming poor weather that has depressed production in Spain and north Africa.

    Tesco

    (TSCDF)    , the UK’s biggest supermarket, confirmed to CNN Wednesday that it had temporarily capped the number of packs of tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers to three per customer.

    Asda told CNN that it was temporarily limiting purchases of some items to three packs per customer. These include tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers and lettuce.

    “Like other supermarkets, we are experiencing sourcing challenges on some products that are grown in southern Spain and north Africa,” an Asda spokesperson said.

    Morrisons told CNN that it had imposed a cap of two packs per customer on tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers and lettuce. Aldi, a German discount grocery chain, announced Wednesday that it would also introduce a limit of three packs per person on peppers, cucumbers and tomatoes in its UK stores.

    Asda, Morrisons and Aldi are Britain’s third-, fourth- and fifth-biggest supermarket chains respectively, according to market share data from Kantar.

    Sainsbury’s

    (JSAIY)    , the United Kingdom’s second-largest food retailer, told CNN it had no plans to ration the sale of fruit and vegetables.

    The rationing is another knock for British shoppers already grappling with record grocery price rises, which have inflamed the worst cost-of-living crisis in decades.

    In the four weeks to January 22, food price inflation hit 16.7%, according to Kantar. That’s its highest level since the data company started tracking the indicator in 2008.

    “The more we face shortages, the more it will drive food inflation,” Minette Batters, president of the National Farmers’ Union (NFU), which represents more than 46,000 farming and growing businesses, told the BBC Wednesday.

    A spokesperson for the UK’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) said in a statement: “We understand public concerns around the supply of fresh vegetables. However, the UK has a highly resilient food supply chain and is well-equipped to deal with disruption.”

    So what explains the empty shelves?

    Asda and Morrisons pointed the finger at poor weather in key growing regions as the main driver of the shortages.

    Andrew Woods, a sub-editor at Mintec, a commodities data company, told CNN that hotter-than-average weather in Spain and Morocco last fall, combined with a cold snap over the past two weeks, had hit production.

    The tomato crop in southern Spain is 20% smaller than a year ago, he said.

    The poorer harvests are problematic for UK retailers, reliant as they are on imports to fill their stocks at this time of year.

    According to the British Retail Consortium (BRC), a trade group, UK supermarkets import 95% of their tomatoes and 90% of their lettuce in December, and typically import the same proportions in March.

    James Bailey, executive director of supermarket Waitrose, told LBC radio Monday that snow and hail in Spain, as well as hail in parts of north Africa, had “wip[ed] out a large proportion” of key crops.

    The high-end supermarket chain told CNN that it was “monitoring the situation” but had no plans to introduce rationing.

    “Give it about [two weeks] and the other growing seasons in other parts of the world will have caught up and we should be able to get that supply back in,” Bailey added.

    The BRC also says it expects the current disruption to last a few weeks before home-grown produce arrives to fill the gaps on UK store shelves.

    “Supermarkets are adept at managing supply chain issues and are working with farmers to ensure that customers are able to access a wide range of fresh produce,” Andrew Opie, the BRC’s director of food and sustainability, told CNN.

    High input costs have contributed to the shortages of fruit and vegetables, the NFU says, as well as reduced production across the farming sector more broadly.

    “Labor shortages and soaring energy prices are hitting the poultry industry, already reeling from avian influenza, as well as horticultural businesses and pig farms,” Batters said in a speech Tuesday.

    The price of natural gas — a key input for nitrogen-based fertilizers — shot up following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last year. Though gas prices have fallen back in recent weeks, they are still triple their historical average, while fertilizer costs are up 169% since 2019, Batters noted.

    Empty fruit and vegetable shelves at an Asda store in London on February 21, 2023.

    According to the NFU, the production of tomatoes and cucumbers is expected to fall to the lowest levels since the union started keeping records in 1985, on the back of crippling input costs.

    Woods at Mintec said processing and storing vegetables, such as tomatoes, was “energy intensive.”

    Europe, too, has wrestled with many of the same problems in recent months.

    “Across Europe, supplies [of tomatoes] are reportedly tight, and growers continue to grapple with higher fertilizer, energy and labor costs,” Mintec said in a note.

    Yet, currently, there are few indications — in media reports or on social media — that retailers in other countries are rationing sales.

    But Defra said in its statement Wednesday that “similar disruption is also being seen in other countries,” and that it was helping UK growers by expanding a visa scheme for seasonal workers to fill labor gaps.

    UK supermarkets have not cited Brexit as a reason for the supply crunch. But the NFU and some campaign groups argue that it has worsened labor shortages.

    Direct subsidy payments to UK farmers from the European Union are being phased out, which has increased uncertainty for farmers, Batters said in her speech. The United Kingdom plans to fully implement its own subsidy scheme by 2024.

    — Julia Horowitz contributed reporting.

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  • Microsoft enters 10-year agreement with Nvidia and Nintendo in fight to save Activision deal | CNN Business

    Microsoft enters 10-year agreement with Nvidia and Nintendo in fight to save Activision deal | CNN Business

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    CNN
     — 

    Microsoft announced it has agreed to partnerships with Nvidia and Nintendo as it tries to convince European Union officials to approve its $69 billion purchase of Activision Blizzard — the company behind the popular game franchise Call of Duty.

    Microsoft President Brad Smith had a closed-door meeting Tuesday with EU regulators and competitors in Brussels to address concerns that its acquisition of Activision Blizzard could hurt competition in the video game industry. The deal has also come under scrutiny from regulators in the United States and the United Kingdom.

    Microsoft

    (MSFT)     said that it has entered into a 10-year partnership with Nvidia to bring Xbox PC games to Nvidia’s cloud gaming service. In a statement, the software giant said the partnership “resolves Nvidia’s concerns with Activision Blizzard. Nvidia therefore is offering its full support for regulatory approval of the acquisition.”

    Microsoft also revealed it has finalized a 10-year agreement to bring the latest version of “Call of Duty” to the Nintendo platform once the merger with Activision is completed.

    Smith told CNN’s Richard Quest on Tuesday that “a lot changed today because Microsoft has announced two agreements that together will bring Call of Duty, the game that everyone has been talking about, to 150 million more people on Nintendo devices and Nvidia’s cloud streaming services.” He went on to say these two deals address the concern that Call of Duty will be less available than it is today and will be more available instead due to these two binding agreements.

    “We’re really down to one principal company that is objecting to this deal, and that’s Sony, and we’ve made clear that we’re happy to enter a 10-year agreement with Sony and we’re prepared to enter regulatory obligations as well, whether it’s London or Brussels or Washington,” Smith said. “So, in addition to a contract, we’d have a duty under the law.”

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  • 145,000 cans of Enfamil ProSobee infant formula recalled over bacterial risk | CNN

    145,000 cans of Enfamil ProSobee infant formula recalled over bacterial risk | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Reckitt, one of the main formula manufacturers in the US, said Monday that it is recalling two batches of Enfamil ProSobee Simply Plant-Based Infant Formula because of possible cross-contamination with Cronobacter sakazakii bacteria.

    The recall is being conducted out of an abundance of caution, the company says, as tests of the product have been negative for the bacteria and no illnesses have been reported.

    Reckitt is recalling about 145,000 12.9-ounce cans of formula manufactured between August and September and distributed to stores across the US, Guam and Puerto Rico. They have a use-by date of March 1, 2024, on the bottom, along with the codes ZL2HZF or ZL2HZZ.

    Consumers should throw out these products or return them to the place of purchase for a refund. No other ProSobee or Reckitt products are affected.

    The company says that the cause of the issue “was linked to a material from a third party” and that it has taken “all appropriate corrective actions, including no longer sourcing this material from the supplier.”

    Cronobacter was behind a recall of Abbott Nutrition formula last year that exacerbated a nationwide shortage. Cronobacter infections are rare, but they can be serious and even fatal, especially in newborns. The bacteria lives in the environment, but infections in infants are often linked to powdered formula.

    The US Food and Drug Administration received reports of four Cronobacter illnesses and two deaths in three states last year. The infants had all consumed powdered formula made at Abbott’s Sturgis, Michigan, plant. The FDA identified Cronobacter in the plant, but genetic testing did not match it to the sick babies.

    In the wake of the recall and shortage, the FDA said it is working on a plan to enhance its surveillance of baby formula for Cronobacter.

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  • China’s capital offers $6 monthly handout to offset inflation. The public says it’s not nearly enough | CNN Business

    China’s capital offers $6 monthly handout to offset inflation. The public says it’s not nearly enough | CNN Business

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    Hong Kong
    CNN
     — 

    Beijing will give out a $6 monthly cash subsidy to low-income residents to cushion the impact of rising food prices, a move that has unexpectedly angered many online who say the amount is far too low.

    The announcement from the city government comes as food inflation accelerated in China after policymakers scrapped their zero-Covid strategy in December and eased monetary policy further to fuel economic recovery.

    Last week, protests by retirees broke out in the cities of Wuhan and Dalian over cuts to their medical care benefits, highlighting the growing risk of unrest over livelihood issues as China’s economy struggles to regain its footing after being drained by pandemic policies.

    The demonstrations were the latest outburst of public discontent since mass protests against Covid curbs gripped the country late last year. The recent protests underscored the financial pressure on local governments, after three years of the zero-Covid policy strained their coffers and a property market slump severely eroded their income.

    According to the Beijing Municipal Commission of Development and Reform, the city’s economic regulator, more than 300,000 people on low incomes will each receive a cash payment of 40 yuan (about $6) per month. The first payment will be given out later this month and it’s unclear for how long they will continue.

    “In January, food prices in Beijing rose by 6.6%, meeting the conditions for starting the price-linked subsidy program,” the state-run Beijing Daily newspaper quoted an official from the commission as saying in a Friday report.

    “[We will] try to do a good job in ensuring the basic livelihood of the needy people … and continuously enhance the people’s sense of gain, happiness and security.”

    China launched a low-income subsidy program in 2011 to offer cash handouts to the needy when the consumer price index or food prices hit certain thresholds. Each city or region sets its own standard as living costs vary across the country.

    The news of Beijing’s latest handout was not well received by the public, who took to social media to complain about the high cost of living in the city.

    “40 yuan? Are you serious? [When] the low-income people take the subway to collect the money and then they return, they lose 8 yuan,” said one comment on Weibo.

    “Is it like an insult? [The amount] just subsidizes a bowl of noodles,” another Weibo user said.

    Some people criticized the country’s weak social welfare system, while others blasted the government’s move to write off billions of debt to other countries.

    “Can’t we question the move? Do you think the current welfare system in our country is good? Can it meet the needs of people?” one said.

    China’s consumer inflation accelerated in January, as the CPI rose 2.1% from a year earlier. Although the headline figure remains relatively low compared to other countries, food prices jumped 6.2%, with pork and fruit prices rising the most.

    In Beijing, food prices outpaced the national level. Vegetable prices soared 24% last month.

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  • Here are the US cities where home prices are actually falling | CNN Business

    Here are the US cities where home prices are actually falling | CNN Business

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    Washington, DC
    CNN
     — 

    Home prices are going up across the country — in aggregate. Looking at individual markets, however, some are showing prices have fallen from a year ago.

    Single-family median home prices increased 4% in the fourth quarter from a year ago to $378,700. Prices were strongest in the Northeast in the last quarter, up 5.3%; followed by the South, up 4.9%; the Midwest, up 4% and the West, up 2.6%, according to the National Association of Realtors.

    But drill down to the market level and it’s clear that prices in some areas are declining from the prior year. The positive regional numbers mask that about 11% of individual housing markets tracked by NAR — 20 of 186 cities — experienced home price declines in the fourth quarter of last year.

    “A few markets may see double-digit price drops, especially some of the more expensive parts of the country, which have also seen weaker employment and higher instances of residents moving to other areas,” said Lawrence Yun, NAR’s chief economist.

    Nearly all of the most expensive places to buy are in the West and half of the 10 most expensive cities are in California. Several of those places are seeing prices fall the most.

    San Jose, California, was the most expensive place to purchase a home in the United States in the fourth quarter. But that median price of $1,577,500 is actually down 5.8% from a year ago — and prices there have already dropped 17% from the peak $1,900,000 median price in the second quarter of last year, according to NAR.

    San Francisco had the biggest price drop in the country, year over year, last quarter, with the median price of $1,230,000 — down 6.1% from a year ago. Prices for San Francisco homes are already down 21% in the fourth quarter from the peak median price of $1,550,000 in the second quarter.

    Among the most expensive cities that saw prices falling are Anaheim, California, with the median price of $1,132,000, down 1.6% from a year ago; Los Angeles, with the median price of $829,100, down 1.3%; and Boulder, Colorado, with the median price of $759,500, down 2.0%.

    Other places with falling prices saw the big price increases during the frenzied home buying market of the past few years. They also tend to be appealing lifestyle destinations where people moved to as remote work provided more flexibility. These include Boise, Idaho, where prices fell 3.4% from a year ago and Austin, Texas, where prices are down 1.3%.

    The good news for buyers looking for price relief is that the 4% median price hike in the fourth quarter is less than the 8.6% increase in the third quarter. In addition, the price increases are smaller, with far fewer markets experiencing double-digit price gains in the fourth quarter.

    “A slowdown in home prices is underway and welcomed, particularly as the typical home price has risen 42% in the past three years,” said Yun, noting these cost increases have far surpassed wage increases and consumer price inflation since 2019.

    Throughout much of the pandemic, home prices across the country moved in a single direction: up. Some hotspots like Austin and Boise saw prices skyrocket. Other areas — particularly in the Midwest — saw prices go up more moderately. Yet, because mortgage rates were near historic lows, buyers came out in droves.

    That story changed last year, when mortgage rates spiked as a result of the Federal Reserve’s historic campaign to rein in inflation. Homebuying fell off a cliff. By the end of 2022, sales of existing homes were down nearly 18% from 2021 as would-be homebuyers left the market, according to NAR.

    Typically, a drop in demand to buy would mean excess supply and ultimately lead to prices coming down. But that’s not happening, broadly speaking, in the housing market.

    Instead, prices for single-family homes climbed in nearly 90% of metro areas tracked by NAR in the fourth quarter: 166 markets out of 186 saw prices still going up. The national median price of a single-family home increased 4% last quarter from one year ago to $378,700.

    How can this be?

    One main driver of this phenomenon is that there is a shortage of inventory due to chronic underbuilding of affordable homes in the United States, along with homeowners who don’t want to part with the ultra-low mortgage rate they secured over the past few years.

    “Even with a projected reduction in home sales this year, prices are expected to remain stable in the vast majority of the markets due to extremely limited supply,” said Yun.

    There are still places where home prices continue to climb at double-digit rates. The top 10 cities with the largest year-over-year price increases all recorded gains of at least 14.5%, with seven of those markets in Florida and the Carolinas, according to NAR.

    Farmington, New Mexico, saw the biggest price increase in the fourth quarter, up 20.3% from a year ago. It was followed by Sarasota, Florida, up 19.5%; Naples, Florida, up 17.2%; Greensboro, North Carolina, up 17.0%; Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, up 16.2%; Oshkosh, Wisconsin, up 16.0%; Winston-Salem, North Carolina, up 15.7%; El Paso, Texas, up 15.2%; Punta Gorda, Florida, up 15.2%; and Daytona Beach, Florida, up 14.5%.

    In the last quarter of 2022 a family needed a qualifying income of at least $100,000 to afford a 10% down payment mortgage in 71 markets, up from 59 in the prior quarter, according to NAR.

    Yet there were 16 markets where a family needed a qualifying income of less than $50,000 to afford a home, although that was down from 17 the previous quarter. Some of those included Peoria, Illinois, where a family can qualify for a loan with an income of $33,660; Waterloo, Iowa, with an income of $40,639; and Montgomery, Alabama, with an income of $48,172.

    Nationally, the monthly mortgage payment on a typical existing single-family home with a 20% down payment was $1,969 in the fourth quarter according to NAR. That’s a 7% increase from the third quarter of last year, when the monthly payment was $1,838, but a major surge of 58% — or a $720 monthly increase — from one year ago.

    This made the affordability picture even harder for many home buyers. Families typically spent 26.2% of their income on mortgage payments, which was up from 25% in the prior quarter and 17.5% one year ago.

    First-time buyers were evidently pushed to a breaking point on affordability. They typically spent 39.5% of their family income on mortgage payments, up from 37.8% in the previous quarter. A mortgage is considered unaffordable if the monthly payment, including principal and interest, amounts to more than 25% of the family’s income. Generally, a common financial rule of thumb is to not spend more than 30% of your income on housing costs.

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  • My fiancé and I are 60. His adult daughter is opposed to our marriage — and insists on inheriting her father’s $3.2 million estate. How should we handle her?

    My fiancé and I are 60. His adult daughter is opposed to our marriage — and insists on inheriting her father’s $3.2 million estate. How should we handle her?

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    What advice would you give to a widow and widower considering marriage on how to manage finances — and deal with adult children?

    We are both 60 years old and plan to work a few more years, mostly for health insurance. We both have about $1.5 million in retirement savings accounts. Our spouses’ 401(k)s and IRAs rolled into our accounts.

    I have another $500,000 in a brokerage and he has almost another $1 million. We both own homes with $300,000 mortgages. Mine is worth $500,000, Paul’s (not his real name) home is worth $1 million. We have no other debt.

    We both have one married, and one unmarried child that we help. We both have two grandchildren.

    We should be set up very well. Here’s the concern: His married, well-off daughter is very aggressive about inheritance. She wants the family home retitled in a trust. She wants all life insurance and brokerage beneficiaries in her name. Her brother has had drug-addiction problems, so she’s cutting him out even though it seems he’s the one who will need help.

    “‘She wants the family home retitled in a trust. She wants all life insurance and brokerage beneficiaries in her name.’”

    The daughter isn’t thrilled about our relationship and suggests we just live together. For religious reasons, I would never do this. Grandma shacking up? What example would I set for my grandchildren?

    As a widowed couple, we are realistic enough to plan for the time one of us is left alone. Paul has diabetes, high blood pressure and already sees a cardiologist. What if he has a heart attack? Stroke? Or if he dies?

    What’s a fair way to mingle finances and allow security for me should he predecease me while allowing Paul’s daughter to ultimately inherit?

    By the way, my children have never raised money as an issue. After we both cared for spouses through cancer, they know life is short and just want us to be happy.

    Happy to Have Found Love Again

    Dear Happy,

    She is overstepping the line, and overplaying her hand.

    The first rule of inheritance is that it’s not yours until the decedent’s money is sitting in your bank account. Your fiancé’s daughter can make all the demands she likes, but the only thing your fiancé has to do is say, “You don’t need to be concerned. My affairs are all in order. I’ve always taken care of my own affairs, and I am not changing now.”

    How your fiancé decides to split his estate is entirely up to him, and can be done in consultation with a financial adviser and attorney, taking into account each of his children’s individual needs. For instance, if you move in together, he could give you a life estate, allowing you to live in the home for the rest of your life, and dividing the property between his two children thereafter. 

    Given that you have your own home, however, you may decide to rent it out, and move back there in the event that he predeceases you. There are so many ways to split an inheritance. You could look at the intestate laws of your state, and follow them. In New York, the spouse inherits the first $50,000 of intestate property, plus half of the balance, and the kids inherit the rest.

    “Paul” may decide to set up a trust for his son, so he can provide an income for him over the course of his life. If he has or had issues with addiction, this will help him while not putting temptation in his way with a lump sum of money. The best kind of trust is the one that deals with any recurring issues directly, and takes into account the person’s circumstances.

    Martin Hagan, a Pennsylvania-based estate-planning attorney who has practiced for four decades, writes: “First, it would authorize distributions only if the beneficiary is actively pursuing treatment and recovery.  Second, it would limit distributions to paying only for the expenses incurred in carrying out the treatment plan that will have been developed for the beneficiary.”

    You have $2 million collectively in a retirement and brokerage account and $200,000 equity in his home, and you can use these next seven years or so to pay off your mortgage, while your fiancé has $2.5 million and $700,000 in equity on his home. You are both well set up for retirement, and let’s hope you have many years to spend together.

    The financial services industry has many opinions. You should, advisers say, have 10 times your salary saved by the time you’re 65 years old. You don’t mention your salary, but I would be surprised if many people in America had that much money saved, especially given all of the unexpected events — divorce, illness, job loss — that can occur in the intervening years.

    You also have other priorities than dealing with an aggressive daughter/daughter-in-law. AARP suggests that most people should look into long-term care insurance between the ages of 60 and 65, around the time most people are eligible to qualify for Medicare. If you do it earlier, it can serve as a savings account in the event that you never need long-term care, AARP says.

    As retirement columnist Richard Quinn recently wrote on MarketWatch, everybody’s circumstances are different. “Living in retirement isn’t about averages. It isn’t about what other people do or the opinions of experts, especially online instant experts who don’t know anything about you and have yet to experience many years of retirement themselves.”

    Don’t give too much oxygen or power to your future daughter-in-law. Her father should give her a stock answer, and be firm. If she persists, he can say, “The subject is closed. I need you to respect the decisions I make about my own life, respect my privacy on these matters, and it would be nice if you would be happy for us, and support us in our marriage together.”

    You can’t change people. But you can change wills.  

    You can email The Moneyist with any financial and ethical questions related to coronavirus at qfottrell@marketwatch.com, and follow Quentin Fottrell on Twitter.

    Check out the Moneyist private Facebook group, where we look for answers to life’s thorniest money issues. Readers write in to me with all sorts of dilemmas. Post your questions, tell me what you want to know more about, or weigh in on the latest Moneyist columns.

    The Moneyist regrets he cannot reply to questions individually.

    More from Quentin Fottrell:

    My boyfriend wants me to move into his home and pay rent. I suggested only paying for utilities and groceries. What should I do?

    My dinner date ‘forgot’ his wallet and took the receipt for his taxes. Should I have called him out for being cheapskate?

    My boyfriend lives in my house with my 2 kids, but refuses to pay rent or contribute to food and utility bills. What’s my next move?

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