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2020 Dems take aim at filibuster, say Senate tradition should 'go the way of history'

Add Beto O’Rourke to a growing list of Democratic presidential candidates who are considering scrapping long-standing Senate procedure in hopes of passing a sweeping progressive agenda should they make it to the White House.

Under siege is the filibuster, the longstanding Senate tradition requiring 60 votes in the 100-member chamber to advance a bill, effectively allowing the minority party to block legislation.

WHAT IS A FILIBUSTER?

“I think that that’s something that we should seriously consider,” O’Rourke told reporters on the campaign trail in New Hampshire earlier this week.

“We have to look at some of these institutional reforms, whether it’s the Supreme Court, the Electoral College, the filibuster in the Senate, we’ve got to get democracy and our institutions working again,” explained the former three-term congressman from Texas.

On the same day that O’Rourke entertained the idea, a rival for the Democratic nomination also opened the door to the idea of dispatching with the filibuster.

“When you talk about changing the filibuster rule I understand that we are heading, right now, we are heading that way,” Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey said in an interview on "Pod Save America." “I’m going to tell you that for me that door is not closed.”

The comments mark an increasing appetite in the 2020 Democratic field for challenging longstanding political traditions and institutions -- everything from the voting age to the Electoral College to the Senate filibuster. And for Booker, his comments mark a backtrack from previous statements.

Last month, Booker told NPR that he didn’t favor eliminating the filibuster. And in an interview with Politico in January – before he formally declared his candidacy – he said “we should not be doing anything to mess with the strength of the filibuster. It’s one of the distinguishing factors of this body. And I think it is good to have the power of the filibuster.”

The pro-Republican opposition research shop America Rising accused the senator of flip-flopping on the issue, saying in an email after the senator’s latest comments that “Booker has jumped on board with the latest liberal litmus test, abolishing the filibuster.”

TRUMP CALLS FOR SCRAPPING FILIBUSTER TO BUILD WALL

At the moment, the filibuster is actually helping the Democratic Party, enabling its members to slow or stall legislation that the GOP Senate majority and Trump White House might support. Trump himself has called for an end to the filibuster, only to be met with opposition from Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

But McConnell lowered the threshold to confirm Supreme Court nominees to a simple majority, and other federal judges and Cabinet nominees also are no longer subject to a 60-vote threshold. The filibuster on legislation is all that remains in terms of built-in brakes in the upper chamber that could slow the majority party.

And so Democrats hoping to pass a sweeping progressive agenda if they win back the White House are concerned their proposals could get bottlenecked in the Senate, where the Democrats have a shot at winning back control -- but have little chance of grabbing a 60-member, filibuster-proof majority.

“Everything stays on the table. You keep it all on the table. Don’t take anything off the table,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren said when recently asked on the presidential campaign trail about scrapping the filibuster.

Candidates proposing major changes to deal with climate change also see the filibuster as a major impediment.

"I don't believe you can be serious about saying you can defeat climate change unless you realize we need to have the filibuster go the way of history because Mitch McConnell has weaponized the filibuster," Washington State Gov. Jay Inslee told reporters on Wednesday. "You can't be serious about having major decarbonization legislation in any near-term without removing the filibuster."

But not all of the White House contenders are on board.

“Great question…Let’s change the subject!” joked Sen. Kamala Harris of California, when asked by a voter in Iowa about her stance on the issue.

The Harris campaign tells Fox News that their candidate has “said she's genuinely conflicted on this issue but everything is on the table.”

Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York told "Pod Save America" in January that “I think it’s useful to bring people together, and I don’t mind that you have to get 60 votes for cloture.”

“If you’re not able to get 60 votes on something, it just means you haven’t worked hard enough, talking to enough people and trying to listen to their concerns and then coming up with a solution that they can support. And so I’m not afraid of it one way or the other,” she added.

Sen. Bernie Sanders also opposes scrapping the filibuster.

"I'm not crazy about getting rid of the filibuster. I think the problem is, people often talk about the lack of comity and the anger. The real issue is that you have in Washington a system which is dominated in Washington by wealthy campaign contributors,” he said last month in an interview with CBS News.

Source: Fox News Politics

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Why an unbuilt Moscow Trump tower caught Mueller’s attention

FILE PHOTO: U.S. President Donald Trump participates in briefing on southern U.S. border in the Roosevelt Room at the White House in Washington
FILE PHOTO: U.S. President Donald Trump participates in a briefing on "drug trafficking on the southern border" in the Roosevelt Room at the White House in Washington, U.S., March 13, 2019. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst/File Photo

March 18, 2019

By Jan Wolfe

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – An intriguing area of focus in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into the Kremlin’s role in the 2016 U.S. election is a proposed Moscow real estate deal that Donald Trump pursued while running for president despite denying at the time any links to Russia.

The special counsel has revealed in court filings numerous details about the project, which never came to fruition. Further information has come from Michael Cohen, Trump’s former personal lawyer who was instrumental in the negotiations, in congressional testimony and in his guilty plea to a charge of lying to Congress about the project.

Mueller’s team said in a December 2018 court filing that “the Moscow Project was a lucrative business opportunity that sought, and likely required, the assistance of the Russian government. If the project was completed, the Company (the Trump Organization) could have received hundreds of millions of dollars from Russian sources in licensing fees and other revenues.”

The project is significant because it shows Trump was chasing a lucrative business deal in Russia at the same time that President Vladimir Putin’s government, according to U.S. intelligence agencies, was conducting a hacking and propaganda campaign to boost his candidacy. The project also coincided with Trump’s positive comments as a candidate about Putin and his questioning of U.S. sanctions against Russia.

Mueller is preparing to submit to U.S. Attorney General William Barr the report on his investigation into whether Trump’s campaign conspired with Russia and whether the Republican president has unlawfully tried to obstruct the probe. Trump has denied collusion and obstruction. Russia has denied election interference.

Here is an explanation of the Trump Moscow tower project and what the president has said about it.

WHAT IS TRUMP’S HISTORY IN MOSCOW?

Trump, a wealthy New York real estate developer, had discussed expanding his business empire into Russia for more than three decades. In 2013, after visiting Russia and hosting his Miss Universe pageant there, he wrote on Twitter: “TRUMP TOWER-MOSCOW is next.” The Trump Organization’s longtime partner in the project was Felix Sater, a Russian-born, Brooklyn-raised real estate developer, according to company emails released to congressional investigators.

WHAT WAS THE TRUMP TOWER MOSCOW PROJECT?

Trump in October 2015 signed a non-binding letter of intent to move forward with a Moscow tower project with a Russian development firm. The firm, I.C. Expert Investment Co, agreed to construct the skyscraper, and the Trump Organization agreed to license its name and manage the building’s operations. The letter of intent described a building in a Moscow business district with 250 luxury residential condominiums, at least 150 hotel rooms and a luxury spa.

Sater, who has served prison time in the United States for assault and later became an FBI informant on organized crime, assured Cohen in a November 2015 email he could get the Russian government to support a Trump property in Moscow.

“I know how to play it and we will get this done. Buddy our boy can become President of the USA and we can engineer it. I will get all of Putin’s team to buy in on this,” Sater told Cohen in that email.

Trump had announced his presidential candidacy in June 2015.

In testimony last month to the House of Representatives Oversight and Reform Committee, Cohen said Sater came up with a “marketing stunt” of offering Putin a free penthouse in the tower to drive up unit prices, “no different than in any condo where they start listing celebrities that live in the property.”

Cohen’s House testimony portrayed Trump as keenly interested in completing the deal even as he campaigned for president. “Mr. Trump knew of and directed the Trump Moscow negotiations throughout the campaign and lied about it. He lied about it because he never expected to win the election. He also lied about it because he stood to make hundreds of millions of dollars on the Moscow real estate project,” Cohen testified.

In his guilty plea, Cohen admitted he had lied to Congress in a 2017 letter that claimed he had only discussed the negotiations with Trump three times and that the project talks ended in January 2016. Cohen said he lied to Congress to minimize links between Trump and the project and give the false impression that the proposal had ended before key early milestones in the 2016 race to determine the Republican presidential nominee.

Cohen in his guilty plea said the project was discussed within the Trump Organization multiple times and that he spoke with Sater about obtaining Russian governmental approval as late as June 2016, after Trump had clinched the Republican nomination.

WHY DID THE NEGOTIATIONS END?

Legal filings in Cohen’s plea deal did not make clear why the negotiations ended. But June 2016 was the month when the Washington Post first reported that Russian hackers had penetrated the Democratic National Committee’s computers, a cyber operation that was a key part of Moscow’s interference in the presidential race, as described by U.S. intelligence.

One of Trump’s lawyers, Rudy Giuliani, indicated in January 2019 that the Moscow tower discussions had continued through the November 2016 election, though he later backtracked.

WHAT HAS TRUMP SAID?

Trump’s public statements about business dealings in Russia have evolved over time. In July 2016, Trump told a news conference: “I have nothing to do with Russia.” Nine days before becoming president, Trump wrote on Twitter, “Russia has never tried to use leverage over me. I HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH RUSSIA – NO DEALS, NO LOANS, NO NOTHING!”

In November 2018, after Cohen’s guilty plea, Trump told reporters that in 2016 he was in a position “to possibly do a deal to build a building of some kind in Moscow.” Trump added, “There would be nothing wrong if I did do it. I was running my business while I was campaigning. There was a good chance that I wouldn’t have won, in which case I would have gotten back into the business. And why should I lose lots of opportunities?” Cohen told the House panel Trump made clear to him that he should lie about when the negotiations ended.

Trump and his allies have called Cohen a liar trying to reduce his prison time after pleading guilty to a series of federal criminal charges.

WHAT ROLE DID TRUMP’S CHILDREN PLAY?

Cohen told the House panel that he briefed the president’s son and daughter, Donald Trump Jr. and Ivanka Trump, about the tower negotiations. Donald Trump Jr., an executive at the Trump Organization, told Congress in September 2017 he was only “peripherally aware” of the talks during the campaign. Ivanka Trump, a former Trump Organization executive, told ABC News last month she knew “literally almost nothing” about the project, saying there were “40 or 50 deals like that were floating around, that somebody was looking at.”

(Reporting by Jan Wolfe; Editing by Will Dunham)

Source: OANN

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Facebook Chief Product Officer Chris Cox to step down

FILE PHOTO: Silhouettes of mobile users are seen next to a screen projection of Facebook logo in this picture illustration
FILE PHOTO: Silhouettes of mobile users are seen next to a screen projection of Facebook logo in this picture illustration taken March 28, 2018. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic

March 14, 2019

(Reuters) – Facebook Inc Chief Product Officer Chris Cox will leave the social media network, Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg said in a blog post on Thursday.

Will Cathcart, vice president of product management, will now lead WhatsApp and Head of Video, Games and Monetization Fidji Simo will be the new head of the Facebook app, Zuckerberg said.

The company does not immediately plan to appoint anyone to fill Cox’s role in the near term, he said.

(Reporting by Tamara Mathias in Bengaluru; Editing by Sriraj Kalluvila)

Source: OANN

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Euro zone February factory activity declined, overall growth scant: PMI

An employee works on the automobile assembly line of Bluecar electric city cars at Renault car maker factory in Dieppe, western France
FILE PHOTO: An employee works on the automobile assembly line of Bluecar electric city cars at Renault car maker factory in Dieppe, western France, September 1, 2015. REUTERS/Philippe Wojazer/File Photo

February 21, 2019

Euro zone factory output unexpectedly slammed into reverse last month as activity in Europe’s manufacturing powerhouse Germany declined again amid trade tensions and struggles in the auto sector, surveys showed.

While that downturn was offset by a much faster than expected acceleration in services activity – which meant overall private sector growth picked up modestly – it will likely worry policymakers as factories also drive the bloc’s dominant service industry.

IHS Markit’s Flash Composite Purchasing Managers’ Index, which is seen as a good guide to economic health, rose to 51.4 this month from a final January reading of 51.0, above a Reuters poll median expectation for 51.1 but still below where it has been for much of the past four years.

“The euro zone economy remained close to stagnation in February. The general picture remained one of a more subdued business environment than seen throughout much of last year,” Chris Williamson, IHS Markit’s chief business economist said.

Williamson said the results pointed to first-quarter euro zone growth of just 0.1 percent, below the latest Reuters poll estimate for 0.4 percent. They come soon after the European Central Bank ended its more than 2.6 trillion euro asset purchase stimulus programme.

The flash manufacturing PMI tumbled to 49.2 this month, its lowest since mid-2013 and substantially below the 50-mark that separates growth from contraction.

A Reuters poll had predicted a modest dip to 50.3 from January’s final reading of 50.5. The lowest forecast in the poll of 38 economists was 49.6.

An index measuring output, which feeds into a composite PMI, dropped to 49.2 from 50.5, its lowest reading since May 2013. In a further sign of how manufacturers are struggling, the new orders index fell to a near six-year low of 46.2 from 47.8.

Adding to that gloomy picture, factories ran down old orders faster while also building up a stock of completed products.

Germany’s vast manufacturing sector contracted for a second month, only weeks before Britain, Europe’s second-largest economy, is due to leave the European Union and as uncertainty around the U.S.-China trade war continued and new pollution standards are still affecting car makers.

“The weakness is being led by manufacturing. With factory order books deteriorating at an increased rate, the rate of contraction in the goods-producing sector will likely worsen in coming months,” Williamson said.

In contrast, demand for services across the currency union picked up and firms were able to build up a backlog of work, so a PMI for the services industry jumped to 52.3 from 51.2, above a Reuters poll consensus for 51.4.

That helped optimism rise, with the business expectations index bouncing to a four-month high of 61.6 from 60.5 and firms taking on new workers at a faster rate.

Yet with overall demand falling and backlogs diminishing firms had to curtail by how much they raised prices. The output prices index fell to an 18-month low of 52.5 from 53.4.

With January inflation across the bloc expected to be confirmed at 1.4 percent when official figures are released on Friday, well below the ECB’s 2 percent target ceiling, a decline in inflationary pressure will also concern ECB policymakers.

(Reporting by Jonathan Cable; Editing by Hugh Lawson; jonathan.cable@thomsonreuters.com; +44 20 7542 4688; Reuters Messaging: jonathan.cable.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net)

Source: OANN

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Russia wants to borrow more, prepares new OFZ auction mechanism

Head of the state debt department at the Russian Finance Ministry Vyshkovsky speaks during an interview in Moscow
Konstantin Vyshkovsky, head of the state debt department at the Russian Finance Ministry, speaks during an interview in Moscow, Russia March 20, 2019. REUTERS/Andrey Ostroukh

March 29, 2019

By Darya Korsunskaya and Andrey Ostroukh

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia wants to borrow more in the second quarter this year, and it plans to implement a new bond-offering mechanism and take advantage of growing global demand for its debt, a senior ministry official said.

After months of uncertainty related to possible new U.S. sanctions on holdings of Russian debt, demand for OFZ treasury bonds soared this year. That’s led the finance ministry to rethink how it raises money for its budget needs.

The ministry has now scrapped offering limits at OFZ auctions after Moody’s rating agency in February lifted Russia’s sovereign rating, giving Russia an investment-grade rating by all three big international rating agencies.

The decision to stop setting offering limits at weekly auctions allowed the ministry to borrow more than planned, Konstantin Vyshkovsky, head of the state debt department at the Finance Ministry, told Reuters in an interview cleared for publication this week.

Russia has already borrowed more than 450 billion rubles ($6.90 billion) envisaged by the first-quarter plan, and “the target for the second quarter will certainly be higher,” Vyshkovsky said.

To raise more money, the ministry is now planning to alter the way it holds OFZ auctions on Wednesdays.

The ministry wants to give OFZ buyers one more chance to snap up the debt after the main session of the auction. Within 30 minutes after setting a cut-off price at the auction, the ministry will let OFZ buyers who placed bets close to that level purchase bonds at the cut-off price, Vyshkovsky said.

FOREIGN INVESTORS

Rouble-denominated OFZ bonds enjoyed strong demand recently as interest grew in emerging markets. A stronger rouble and expectations of no further rate increases by the central bank also helped, Vyshkovsky said.

The absence of more U.S. rhetoric on sanctions against Moscow also supported OFZ bonds.

“Some non-residents decided to take advantage of it as there is an understanding that if the sanctions occur, they are likely to impact new debt only,” Vyshkovsky said. “Now we see a serious inflow of non-residents at the auctions.”

Non-residents accounted for up to a half of all buyers at OFZ auctions in mid-March, he said.

Foreigners’ share among OFZ holders rose to 25.9 percent as of March 1, its highest since early September 2018, central bank data showed. Their share has probably grown as the finance ministry raised record funds in OFZ bonds in March.

“Sanctions risks are the normal reality. In any case, the market got used to it,” Vyshkovsky said.

NEW BONDS

Vyshkovsky said the finance ministry will diversify its OFZ offering this year by presenting new two-year bonds with coupon payments pegged to money-market rates, so-called floaters.

“Floaters are a defensive tool for an investor, demand for which is rising … when the market is expecting interest rates to grow,” Vyshkovsky said. Investors now are interested in buying bonds with a fixed coupon instead.

Vyshkovsky also said that Russia was still planning to issue OFZ bonds denominated in Chinese yuan this year, without elaborating on a possible timing or volumes of the issue.

(Writing by Andrey Ostroukh, editing by Larry King)

Source: OANN

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U.N. agency works to clamp down on illicit shipping practices

FILE PHOTO: Italian marines check a crew member as they patrol the British Royal navy vessel Echo, during the NATO Operation Sea Guardian in Mediterranean sea, off the coast of Taranto
FILE PHOTO: Italian marines check a crew member as they patrol the British Royal navy vessel Echo, during a practical demonstration of boarding on a suspect ship, during the NATO Operation Sea Guardian in the Mediterranean sea, off the coast of Taranto, Italy September 20, 2018. REUTERS/Alessandro Bianchi/File Photo

April 4, 2019

By Jonathan Saul

LONDON (Reuters) – The United Nations’ shipping agency is working on tougher measures to clamp down on rogue shipping companies trying to use flag registries fraudulently to conceal their activities, officials said.

All commercial ships have to be registered – flagged in a particular country – partly to comply with safety and environmental laws.

With international and U.S. sanctions imposed on countries including North Korea, Iran and Syria, some ships involved in such trade have used tactics to sidestep the measures including turning off their location transponders and falsely reporting their flag registry, also to secure insurance.

Drug and weapon smuggling are among other areas of trade in which front companies attempt to conceal their activities to avoid being detected.

The International Maritime Organization (IMO) agreed on a series of measures after a committee session last week which included the creation of a comprehensive database of registries and ways to improve information on the illegal registration of ships, the IMO said.

Other recommendations included enhanced verification of vessels through their unique IMO numbers and adherence to the requirement for an onboard record of a ship’s history.

The IMO will also work with the U.N. Security Council to create a searchable database that would show vessels subject to U.N. resolutions. The work is expected to be completed in 2021.

“Experience has shown that the raison d’être of fraudulent registries is to conceal illicit activity on board vessels, including activities prohibited by United Nations sanctions,” the United States said in one submission to the IMO.

Multiple countries have reported to the IMO that their registries had been used without the knowledge of the maritime authority for fraudulent purposes through fake documents or even maintaining the flag after it had been terminated.

Tanzania said it had experienced more than 20 cases of the fraudulent use of its flag since 2016, discovered after collaboration with other countries.

Ukraine, meanwhile, says shipments from Crimea violate Western sanctions and has complained to the IMO, asking member states to de-list any vessels involved. Crimea has been under Western sanctions since Russia annexed it from Ukraine in 2014.

In a statement to the IMO, Vitalii Moshkivskyi, Ukraine’s deputy permanent representative, pointed to “more than 80 ships unlawfully registered in the closed seaports in Crimea”.

Moshkivskyi said such activity had “grave implications for the safety and security of navigation”.

A spokesman with the Russian Federal Agency for Maritime and River Transport declined to comment.

(Additional reporting by Gleb Stolyarov in Moscow; Editing by Dale Hudson)

Source: OANN

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British PM May to request short delay to Brexit: Sky

Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May and her husband Philip leave church in Sonning
Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May and her husband Philip leave church in Sonning, Britain March 17, 2019. REUTERS/Henry Nicholls

March 20, 2019

LONDON (Reuters) – British Prime Minister Theresa May will request a short delay to Brexit in a letter to the European Union on Wednesday, Sky cited an unidentified senior government source as saying.

The delay, nearly three years since the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union, leaves the Brexit divorce uncertain with options including leaving with May’s deal, a longer delay, a disruptive exit, or even another referendum.

Just 9 days before the March 29 exit date that May set two years ago by serving the formal Article 50 divorce papers, May is due to write to European Council President Donald Tusk to ask for a delay.

But the ultimate length of the delay was unclear amid the political chaos in London. May had warned that if parliament did not ratify her deal, she would ask to delay beyond June 30, a step that Brexit’s advocates fear would endanger the entire divorce.

(Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge; editing by Kate Holton)

Source: OANN

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Cambodian authorities have ordered a one-hour reduction in the length of school days because of concerns that students and teachers may fall ill from a prolonged heat wave.

Education Minister Hang Chuon Naron said in an announcement seen Friday that the shortened hours will remain in effect until the rainy season starts, which usually occurs in May. The current heat wave, in which temperatures are regularly reaching as high as 41 Celsius (106 Fahrenheit), is one of the longest in memory.

Most schools in Cambodia lack air conditioning, prompting concern that temperatures inside classrooms could rise to unhealthy levels.

School authorities were instructed to watch for symptoms of heat stroke and urge pupils to drink more water.

The new hours cut 30 minutes off the beginning of the school day and 30 minutes off the end.

School authorities instituted a similar measure in 2016.

Source: Fox News World

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Explosions have rocked Britain’s largest steel plant, injuring two people and shaking nearby homes.

South Wales Police say the incident at the Tata Steel plant in Port Talbot was reported at about 3:35 a.m. Friday (22:35 EDT Thursday). The explosions touched off small fires, which are under control. Two workers suffered minor injuries and all staff members have been accounted for.

Police say early indications are that the explosions were caused by a train used to carry molten metal into the plant. Tata Steel says its personnel are working with emergency services at the scene.

Local lawmaker Stephen Kinnock says the incident raises concerns about safety.

He tweeted: “It could have been a lot worse … @TataSteelEurope must conduct a full review, to improve safety.”

Source: Fox News World

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The Wider Image: China's start-ups go small in age of 'shoebox' satellites
LinkSpace’s reusable rocket RLV-T5, also known as NewLine Baby, is carried to a vacant plot of land for a test launch in Longkou, Shandong province, China, April 19, 2019. REUTERS/Jason Lee

April 26, 2019

By Ryan Woo

LONGKOU, China (Reuters) – During initial tests of their 8.1-metre (27-foot) tall reusable rocket, Chinese engineers from LinkSpace, a start-up led by China’s youngest space entrepreneur, used a Kevlar tether to ensure its safe return. Just in case.

But when the Beijing-based company’s prototype, called NewLine Baby, successfully took off and landed last week for the second time in two months, no tether was needed.

The 1.5-tonne rocket hovered 40 meters above the ground before descending back to its concrete launch pad after 30 seconds, to the relief of 26-year-old chief executive Hu Zhenyu and his engineers – one of whom cartwheeled his way to the launch pad in delight.

LinkSpace, one of China’s 15-plus private rocket manufacturers, sees these short hops as the first steps towards a new business model: sending tiny, inexpensive satellites into orbit at affordable prices.

Demand for these so-called nanosatellites – which weigh less than 10 kilograms (22 pounds) and are in some cases as small as a shoebox – is expected to explode in the next few years. And China’s rocket entrepreneurs reckon there is no better place to develop inexpensive launch vehicles than their home country.

“For suborbital clients, their focus will be on scientific research and some commercial uses. After entering orbit, the near-term focus (of clients) will certainly be on satellites,” Hu said.

In the near term, China envisions massive constellations of commercial satellites that can offer services ranging from high-speed internet for aircraft to tracking coal shipments. Universities conducting experiments and companies looking to offer remote-sensing and communication services are among the potential domestic customers for nanosatellites.

A handful of U.S. small-rocket companies are also developing launchers ahead of the expected boom. One of the biggest, Rocket Lab, has already put 25 satellites in orbit.

No private company in China has done that yet. Since October, two – LandSpace and OneSpace – have tried but failed, illustrating the difficulties facing space start-ups everywhere.

The Chinese companies are approaching inexpensive launches in different ways. Some, like OneSpace, are designing cheap, disposable boosters. LinkSpace’s Hu aspires to build reusable rockets that return to Earth after delivering their payload, much like the Falcon 9 rockets of Elon Musk’s SpaceX.

“If you’re a small company and you can only build a very, very small rocket because that’s all you have money for, then your profit margins are going to be narrower,” said Macro Caceres, analyst at U.S. aerospace consultancy Teal Group.

“But if you can take that small rocket and make it reusable, and you can launch it once a week, four times a month, 50 times a year, then with more volume, your profit increases,” Caceres added.

Eventually LinkSpace hopes to charge no more than 30 million yuan ($4.48 million) per launch, Hu told Reuters.

That is a fraction of the $25 million to $30 million needed for a launch on a Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems Pegasus, a commonly used small rocket. The Pegasus is launched from a high-flying aircraft and is not reusable.

(Click https://reut.rs/2UVBjKs to see a picture package of China’s rocket start-ups. Click https://tmsnrt.rs/2GIy9Bc for an interactive look at the nascent industry.)

NEED FOR CASH

LinkSpace plans to conduct suborbital launch tests using a bigger recoverable rocket in the first half of 2020, reaching altitudes of at least 100 kilometers, then an orbital launch in 2021, Hu told Reuters.

The company is in its third round of fundraising and wants to raise up to 100 million yuan, Hu said. It had secured tens of millions of yuan in previous rounds.

After a surge in fresh funding in 2018, firms like LinkSpace are pushing out prototypes, planning more tests and even proposing operational launches this year.

Last year, equity investment in China’s space start-ups reached 3.57 billion yuan ($533 million), a report by Beijing-based investor FutureAerospace shows, with a burst of financing in late 2018.

That accounted for about 18 percent of global space start-up investments in 2018, a historic high, according to Reuters calculations based on a global estimate by Space Angels. The New York-based venture capital firm said global space start-up investments totaled $2.97 billion last year.

“Costs for rocket companies are relatively high, but as to how much funding they need, be it in the hundreds of millions, or tens of millions, or even just a few million yuan, depends on the company’s stage of development,” said Niu Min, founder of FutureAerospace.

FutureAerospace has invested tens of millions of yuan in LandSpace, based in Beijing.

Like space-launch startups elsewhere in the world, the immediate challenge for Chinese entrepreneurs is developing a safe and reliable rocket.

Proven talent to develop such hardware can be found in China’s state research institutes or the military; the government directly supports private firms by allowing them to launch from military-controlled facilities.

But it’s still a high-risk business, and one unsuccessful launch might kill a company.

“The biggest problem facing all commercial space companies, especially early-stage entrepreneurs, is failure” of an attempted flight, Liang Jianjun, chief executive of rocket company Space Trek, told Reuters. That can affect financing, research, manufacturing and the team’s morale, he added.

Space Trek is planning its first suborbital launch by the end of June and an orbital launch next year, said Liang, who founded the company in late 2017 with three other former military technical officers.

Despite LandSpace’s failed Zhuque-1 orbital launch in October, the Beijing-based firm secured 300 million yuan in additional funding for the development of its Zhuque-2 rocket a month later.

In December, the company started operating China’s first private rocket production facility in Zhejiang province, in anticipation of large-scale manufacturing of its Zhuque-2, which it expects to unveil next year.

STATE COMPETITION

China’s state defense contractors are also trying to get into the low-cost market.

In December, the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp (CASIC) successfully launched a low-orbit communication satellite, the first of 156 that CASIC aims to deploy by 2022 to provide more stable broadband connectivity to rural China and eventually developing countries.

The satellite, Hongyun-1, was launched on a rocket supplied by the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp (CASC), the nation’s main space contractor.

In early April, the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology (CALVT), a subsidiary of CASC, completed engine tests for its Dragon, China’s first rocket meant solely for commercial use, clearing the path for a maiden flight before July.

The Dragon, much bigger than the rockets being developed by private firms, is designed to carry multiple commercial satellites.

At least 35 private Chinese companies are working to produce more satellites.

Spacety, a satellite maker based in southern Hunan province, plans to put 20 satellites in orbit this year, including its first for a foreign client, chief executive Yang Feng told Reuters.

The company has only launched 12 on state-produced rockets since the company started operating in early 2016.

“When it comes to rocket launches, what we care about would be cost, reliability and time,” Yang said.

(Reporting by Ryan Woo; Additional reporting by Beijing newsroom; Editing by Gerry Doyle)

Source: OANN

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At least one person is reported dead and homes have been destroyed by a powerful cyclone that struck northern Mozambique and continues to dump rain on the region, with the United Nations warning of “massive flooding.”

Cyclone Kenneth arrived just six weeks after Cyclone Idai tore into central Mozambique, killing more than 600 people and displacing scores of thousands. The U.N. says this is the first time in known history that the southern African nation has been hit by two cyclones in one season.

Forecasters say the new cyclone made landfall Thursday night in a part of Mozambique that has not seen such a storm in at least 60 years.

Mozambique’s local emergency operations center says a woman in the city of Pemba was killed by a falling tree.

Source: Fox News World

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German drug and crop chemical maker Bayer holds annual general meeting
Werner Baumann, CEO of German pharmaceutical and chemical maker Bayer AG, attends the annual general shareholders meeting in Bonn, Germany, April 26, 2019. REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay

April 26, 2019

By Patricia Weiss and Ludwig Burger

BONN (Reuters) – Bayer shareholders vented their anger over its stock price slump on Friday as litigation risks mount from the German drugmaker’s $63 billion takeover of seed maker Monsanto.

Several large investors said they will not support aspirin investor Bayer’s management in a key vote scheduled for the end of its annual general meeting.

Bayer’s management, led by chief executive Werner Baumann, could see an embarrassing plunge in approval ratings, down from 97 percent at last year’s AGM, which was held shortly before the Monsanto takeover closed in June.

A vote to ratify the board’s actions features prominently at every German AGM. Although it has no bearing on management’s liability, it is seen as a key gauge of shareholder sentiment.

“Due to the continued negative development at Bayer, high legal risks and a massive share price slump, we refuse to ratify the management board and supervisory board’s actions during the business year,” Janne Werning, representing Germany’s Union Investment, a top-20 shareholder, said in prepared remarks.

About 30 billion euros ($34 billion) have been wiped off Bayer’s market value since August, when a U.S. jury found the pesticide and drugs group liable because Monsanto had not warned of alleged cancer risks linked to its weedkiller Roundup.

Bayer suffered a similar defeat last month and more than 13,000 plaintiffs are claiming damages.

Bayer is appealing or plans to appeal the verdicts.

Deutsche Bank’s asset managing arm DWS said shareholders should have been consulted before the takeover, which was agreed in 2016 and closed in June last year.

“You are pointing out that the lawsuits have not been lost yet. We and our customers, however, have already lost something – money and trust,” Nicolas Huber, head of corporate governance at DWS, said in prepared remarks for the AGM.

He said DWS would abstain from the shareholder vote of confidence in the executive and non-executive boards.

Two people familiar with the situation told Reuters this week that Bayer’s largest shareholder, BlackRock, plans to either abstain from or vote against ratifying the management board’s actions.

Asset management firm Deka, among Bayer’s largest German investors, has also said it would cast a no vote.

Baumann said Bayer’s true value was not reflected in the current share price.

“There’s no way to make this look good. The lawsuits and the first verdicts weigh heavily on our company and it’s a concern for many people,” he said, adding it was the right decision to buy Monsanto and that Bayer was vigorously defending itself.

This month, shareholder advisory firms Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) and Glass Lewis recommended investors not to give the executive board their seal of approval.

(Reporting by Patricia Weiss and Ludwig Burger; Editing by Alexander Smith)

Source: OANN

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