BUSINESS HEADLINES

>>Trading Week Winding Down

(New York, NY) — The opening bell rings this morning on Wall Street after stocks closed mixed yesterday. It came as treasury yields have continued to move higher amid anticipation of further rate hikes from the Federal Reserve. Oil prices have also seen an uptick. At the closing bell, the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 161 points to 51-349. The S&P 500 fell 1 point to 77-04. The Nasdaq gained 3 points to 26-939.

>>Tech Giants Out In Force For State Dinner

(Washington, DC) — Giants of the tech industry were well represented at Thursday’s night White House state dinner for Chinese President Xi Jinping [[ she jeen-peeng ]]. Guests included Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk at the head table with President Trump and Xi, along with Nvidia’s Jensen Huang [[ hwahng ]] and former Apple CEO and current executive chairman Tim Cook. Others included OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Google co-founder Sergey Brin and CEO Sundar Pichai, along with Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and others. The room was also packed with business leaders from across American finance, media and industry.

>>Meta Surges

(Menlo Park, CA) — Meta has surged ahead of SpaceX to become the world’s seventh-largest publicly traded company by market capitalization, largely on the strength of excitement over its Muse AI agent. Meta’s market cap rose to one-point-seven-two trillion dollars on Thursday. That also followed the introduction of a new portable AI gadget that can fit on a keychain. During this week’s annual Meta Connect conference in Menlo Park, California CEO Mark Zuckerberg introduced a pocket-sized AI device called the Muse Charm. The black hand-held device has a small screen showing a customizable Muse character, and contains a 5G modem which allows access to Meta’s AI model, Muse, even without Wi-Fi. Meta is reportedly hoping to ship it in time for Christmas. Meta’s market cap rose to one-point-sevent-two trillion dollars on Thursday.

>>Illinois Governor Pritzker Isn’t Pursuing Data Moratorium In Illinois

(Monee, IL) — Illinois Governor JB Pritzker says he isn’t going to pursue a moratorium on new data centers. Pritzker says he’s still waiting for state lawmakers to pass a data center bill after the November election. The governor says the POWER Act will place tough regulations on the facilities. He added that he wants local communities in the state to have a say in where data centers go. His comments came after Mayor Brandon Johnson proposed a data center moratorium for Chicago earlier this week.

>>Poll: Nearly Half Of Young Voters Have Negative View Of Capitalism

(Washington, DC) — Nearly half of younger voters have a negative view of capitalism. That’s according to a new poll from NBC news, which shows that 47-percent of respondents between the ages of 18 and 29 viewed capitalism negatively. Forty-two percent said they view socialism positively. This comes amid a primary election season that saw the rise of some democratic socialist and progressive candidates.

>>Starbucks Closing Hundreds Of Cafes

(Seattle, WA) — Starbucks is planning to close approximately 250 stores across North America. It’s part of the company’s streamlining efforts under CEO Brian Niccol. His plan is to cut two-billion dollars in costs by the end of the 2028 fiscal year.

>>Mortgage Rates Top Seven Percent In A Blow To The Housing Market

(New York, NY) — Mortgage rates are over seven percent for the first time in nearly two years. According to data released by Freddie Mac, the average 30-year fixed mortgage rate went up to seven-point-zero-three percent this week. It’s the fifth-straight week of rising mortgage rates, putting more stress on housing affordability.

>>October 15th Tax Extension Deadline Nearing

(Undated) — The IRS says those who received an extension to file their 2025 federal income tax returns must submit their returns by October 15th. Any taxes owed were generally due this past April 15th. An extension provides taxpayers more time to file, but it does not give them more time to pay. Penalties may apply to unpaid balances dating back to that deadline.

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