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Feds portray Avenatti as con man; he calls charges ‘bogus’

Federal prosecutors painted a picture of attorney Michael Avenatti on Thursday as a scheming operator who stole millions of dollars from clients, cheated on his taxes, lied to investigators and tried to hide money from debtors in bankruptcy proceedings.

A 36-count indictment returned late Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Santa Ana, California, offered the most damning and detailed account to date of Avenatti's apparent fall from grace a year after he seized the spotlight while crusading for porn actress Stormy Daniels in her legal battles against President Donald Trump.

Avenatti embezzled settlement funds and proceeds of other matters he handled from five clients and doled out small portions of what they were due to "lull" them into thinking they were getting what they were owed, prosecutors said.

"Money generated from one set of crimes was used to further other crimes," U.S. Attorney Nick Hanna said at a news conference. "Typically in the form of payments designed to string along victims so as to prevent Mr. Avenatti's financial house of cards from collapsing."

Avenatti denied the charges on Twitter, saying he had made powerful enemies and would plead not guilty and fight the case.

"I look forward to the entire truth being known as opposed to a one-sided version meant to sideline me," he tweeted.

The new charges do not include a New York extortion case alleging Avenatti demanded millions to stay quiet about claims he planned to reveal about Nike paying high school players.

Avenatti, 48, was arrested March 25 in New York on the Nike charge and federal prosecutors at the time announced he also faced single counts of wire and bank fraud in Southern California, where he lives and practices law.

The 61-page Southern California indictment details charges that carry a potential prison sentence of 335 years, prosecutors said. Even if convicted of all counts, such a term is highly unlikely.

Avenatti faces 10 counts of wire fraud for stealing from a paraplegic man and four other clients he allegedly deceived by taking their money and using it to fund a lifestyle that included living in multimillion-dollar homes, flying in a private jet and sponsoring an auto racing team, authorities said.

He was also charged with 19 tax counts, including lying to an Internal Revenue Service officer, not paying personal income taxes since 2010, failing to pay taxes for his businesses, including two law firms, and pocketing payroll taxes from the Tully's Coffee chain that he owned, the indictment said.

Between September 2015 and January 2018, Global Baristas US, the company that operated Tully's, failed to pay the IRS $3.2 million in payroll taxes, including nearly $2.4 million withheld from employees, the indictment said.

When the IRS later put tax levies on coffee company bank accounts to collect more than $5 million, Avenatti had Tully's employees deposit cash receipts in a little-known account for his auto racing team, authorities said.

Avenatti was also charged with submitting phony tax returns to get more than $4 million in loans from The Peoples Bank in Biloxi, Mississippi, in 2014. The tax returns he presented to the bank were never filed to the IRS, prosecutors said.

The charges are the latest blow to a career that took off when Avenatti represented Daniels in her lawsuit to break a confidentiality agreement with Trump to stay mum about an affair they allegedly had.

Avenatti became one of Trump's leading adversaries, attacking him on cable news programs and Twitter. At one point, Avenatti even considered challenging Trump in 2020.

Back home, his business practices had come under scrutiny from the IRS and a former law partner who was owed $14 million by Avenatti and the Eagan Avenatti firm, which filed for bankruptcy.

The indictment said Avenatti made false statements in bankruptcy proceedings by submitting forms that under reported income such as a $1.3 million payment his firm received.

The most glaring example of deception and fraud was described in the indictment as scheming Avenatti allegedly did to deprive clients of money they were due from court settlements, legal negotiations or sales of stock and actions he took to cover his tracks.

Avenatti on Thursday called the allegation "bogus nonsense" on Twitter.

Prosecutors said in one case, Avenatti funneled a $2.75 million settlement into his bank accounts and spent $2.5 million on a private jet that he co-owned. The aircraft was seized Wednesday, authorities said.

Although Avenatti was due a portion of the more than $12 million he received for the five clients, the charges said he turned over only a fraction.

"It is Lawyer 101: do not steal your client's money," Hanna said.

Avenatti allegedly drained a $4 million settlement he negotiated in 2015 on behalf of Geoffrey Johnson, who was paralyzed after trying to kill himself in the Los Angeles County jail, the indictment said. Johnson was referred to as "Client 1" in the indictment, but was named at a recent court hearing involving the money Avenatti was ordered to pay his former partner.

Until last month, Avenatti had only provided $124,000 to Johnson, the indictment said.

Two years after the settlement was reached, Avenatti allegedly helped Johnson find a real estate agent to buy a house. But when Johnson was in escrow to purchase the property, Avenatti falsely said he had not received the settlement funds, the indictment said.

In November, when the Social Security Administration requested information to determine if Johnson should continue to receive disability benefits, Avenatti said he would respond, but didn't because he knew it could lead to the discovery of his embezzlement, the indictment said. The failure to respond led to Johnson's disability benefits being cut off in February.

After Avenatti was questioned about the alleged embezzlement during a judgment-debtor examination in federal court March 22, the indictment said he fabricated a defense for himself.

Avenatti had Johnson sign a document afterward saying he was satisfied with his representation, which the lawyer told him was necessary to get the settlement that had in fact been paid four years earlier, the indictment said.

Avenatti's tweet Thursday included a "client testimonial" bearing a signature purportedly from Johnson that said Avenatti is "an exceptional, honest and ethical attorney and I feel fortunate to have had him represent me."

Source: Fox News National

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Mueller report more than 300 pages long: DOJ

Special Counsel Robert Mueller's report is more than 300 pages long, according to a senior Justice Department official.

The official told Fox News Thursday that Attorney General Bill Barr told House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., about the length of the report during a short phone call on Wednesday.

DEFIANT SCHIFF MAINTAINS RESULTS OF FBI'S ORIGINAL RUSSIA PROBE 'NOT YET' KNOWN, DESPITE MUELLER CONCLUSION

A spokesman for the special counsel declined to comment when asked about the length of the report.

Barr, on Sunday, released a four-page summary of the Mueller report, saying that the special counsel found no evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russians during the 2016 presidential election.

Barr's summary also revealed that Mueller decided not to rule on whether President Trump obstructed justice--kicking the decision back to the Justice Department. On Sunday, Barr and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein effectively cleared Trump, saying that the evidence from the case was not sufficient to establish that the president committed an obstruction-of-justice offense

The Justice Department is expected to release Mueller's full report, with redactions, in the coming weeks.

Congressional Democrats blasted Barr's short summary of Mueller's findings, and have called for full transparency, urging the release of the full report to Congress and the public by April 2.

TRUMP RECEPTIVE TO GRAHAM'S CALL FOR 2ND SPECIAL COUNSEL TO REVIEW RUSSIA PROBE ORIGINS, SOURCE SAYS

Barr has employed the help of Mueller, along with federal prosecutors in the special counsel's office, to help to determine which portions of the report can be made public, and which portions need to remain under seal due to sensitive grand jury materials and methods.

"How can I say this more clearly? Show us the report," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said Thursday, adding that she would support subpoenaing the Justice Department for the full report should officials fail to comply with the Democrat-imposed April 2 deadline.

Source: Fox News Politics

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Dollar rises as ebbing economic concerns boost bond yields

FILE PHOTO: An employee counts U.S. dollar bills at a money exchange office in central Cairo
FILE PHOTO: An employee counts U.S. dollar bills at a money exchange office in central Cairo, Egypt, March 20, 2019. REUTERS/Mohamed Abd El Ghany.

April 2, 2019

By Shinichi Saoshiro

TOKYO (Reuters) – The dollar hit a two-week high against the yen on Tuesday, as ebbing concerns about the global economy pushed U.S. bond yields up from 15-month troughs.

The greenback was steady at 111.37 yen after touching 111.46, its highest since March 20.

U.S. Treasuries were sold and their yields had surged overnight, with the benchmark 10-year rate rising more than 8 basis points, as encouraging manufacturing data out of the United States and China spurred some investors to scale back their holdings of safe-haven bonds.[US/]

The 10-year Treasury yield stood at 2.492 percent, pulling back from a 15-month low of 2.34 percent brushed last week when risk aversion driven by concerns towards a global economic slowdown gripped the financial markets.

“The dollar is benefiting from broader ‘risk on,’ with bonds sold and stocks being bought in light of the strong U.S. ISM data,” said Shin Kadota, senior strategist at Barclays in Tokyo.

The Institute for Supply Management (ISM) said on Monday that its index of national factory activity rose to 55.3 in March from 54.2 in February, which had marked the lowest level since November 2016.

The firm factory activity reading was enough to overshadow an unexpected drop in February U.S. retail sales.

“Seasonal flows also appear to be helping the dollar, with the currency drawing demand from participants kicking off the new quarter,” Kadota at Barclays said.

The euro was down 0.1 percent at $1.1205. The single currency brushed $1.1198, its lowest since March 8, and was headed for its sixth straight day of losses.

The pound continued to move back and forth on Brexit-related developments.

Sterling last traded at $1.3059, down 0.35 percent, after the British parliament on Monday failed to agree on any alternative to Prime Minister Theresa May’s divorce deal from the European Union.

The pound had rallied on Monday on expectations that an agreement would eventually emerge, leading to some sort of a trade agreement between the European Union and Britain.

The Australian dollar, sensitive to shifts in risk sentiment, was a touch lower at $0.7108 after edging up 0.2 percent the previous day.

Immediate focus was on the Reserve Bank of Australia’s monetary policy decision due at 0330 GMT.

The central bank is expected to stand pat on interest rates, but its policy views will be closely watched after the Reserve Bank of New Zealand shocked the markets last week by adopting a dovish policy stance.

(Reporting by Shinichi Saoshiro; Editing by Sam Holmes)

Source: OANN

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EU parliament leader under fire for praising Mussolini

European Parliament President Antonio Tajani has come under fire for comments praising Italian dictator Bettino Mussolini.

Tajani told Radio 24 Wednesday evening that Mussolini did some "positive things," including improving Italy's infrastructure, until "he declared war on the entire world, following Hitler, until he promoted the racial laws" that restricted the rights of Jews.

Tajani, who is a member of Silvio Berlusconi's Forza Italia party, was criticized from across the political spectrum, inside and outside of Italy.

Italy has struggled to come to terms with its fascist past and the rise of populism has brought reminders of Mussolini's two-decades in power until his execution in 1945.

Source: Fox News World

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Hurricanes create natural climate change labs in Puerto Rico

The hurricanes that pounded Puerto Rico in 2017, blasting away most of its forest cover, may give scientists clues to how the world will respond to climate change and increasingly severe weather.

Researchers at El Yunque, the only tropical rain forest overseen by the U.S. Forest Service, are running controlled studies on how plants respond to higher temperatures combined — since the cataclysmic blow from Hurricane Maria — with severe weather. Not far away, another group is looking at how hurricanes affect the forest environment.

"It's a once-in-a-century opportunity to look at these two aspects of climate change together," said Tana Wood, a research ecologist with the Forest Service.

Wood heads a team testing how plants themselves respond to higher temperatures. The 2017 hurricane season, with Maria following a lesser blow from Hurricane Irma, has given them a chance as well to see how storms affect the recovery of ecosystems already under stress, a key concern in the Caribbean, where scientists say warmer temperatures could lead to more intense hurricanes.

On a recent trek to the site, Wood brushed aside thick branches and leaves the size of laptops as she made her way to three plots surrounded by infrared panels that heat the air and soil by 4 degrees Celsius (7 degrees Fahrenheit). The vegetation there was shorter and a bit browner compared with the three unheated control plots. The warmed plots run on 480 volts of electricity, and while the lines are isolated from the soil, the scientists use insulated boots to avoid getting electrocuted in case of an accident.

Nearby, plant physiologist Rob Tunison clamped what looked like a small compact mirror around a dark green leaf to measure photosynthesis, spending 30 minutes to an hour per leaf.

Wood said they are looking at how temperatures affect basic processes such as photosynthesis — by which plants transform sunlight into energy while absorbing carbon dioxide and releasing that gas along with oxygen into the atmosphere — as well as how soils respond.

The researchers are also studying nutrients and microbes in the artificially warmed plots of land, keeping sending frozen samples to a lab in California for analysis.

Knowledge about tropical plants and soils could eventually be plugged into models to determine how vastly broader ecosystems respond to changes.

"We are also able to look at the potential for tropical plants and soils to acclimate to consistently warmer conditions over time," Wood said.

Tropical forests play a key role in recycling carbon dioxide, and they store about a third of the world's carbon, she said. They also help generate rainfall across the world by releasing water vapor, which in turn creates clouds.

"Anything that happens in these systems can have an effect on the world's climate," she said.

U.S., British and international climate agencies reported this month that 2018 was the fourth-warmest year on record, and global emissions of heat-trapping carbon dioxide saw their largest spike in seven years. Overall, global carbon dioxide emissions have increased 55 percent in the past two decades, and Earth has warmed on average about two-thirds of a degree Celsius, according to the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

British meteorologists said in early February that the next five years could see record-breaking temperatures. Scientists expect the world this year will spew 40.9 billion tons (37.1 billion metric tons) of carbon dioxide, up from 39.8 billion tons (36.2 billion metric tons) last year, according to studies by the Global Carbon Project.

Kim Cobb, a climate scientist at Georgia Institute of Technology who is not involved in the experiments at El Yunque, said she was not aware of any other long-term warming experiments in tropical rainforests.

"What will happen at their site is highly uncertain, because the rainforest itself controls so many aspects of the regional water cycle. It's not a system that we can model extremely well today, let alone under climate change scenarios," Cobb said. "But there is little doubt that these kinds of long-term monitoring sites are extremely valuable in advancing our understanding of the water and carbon cycle, and how they might change with climate change."

The $3 million project, partly funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, is in its fourth year and Wood said she hopes it can run indefinitely. Scientists took a one-year hiatus after Hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico on Sept. 20, 2017, so they could separate the effect of warming from the effect of the storm, which caused more than $100 billion in damage and toppled trees like dominoes.

A couple of miles from Woods' experiment, scientists including those from the International Institute of Tropical Forestry are looking at how hurricanes affect the tropical forest. They began by trimming away the canopy leaves above patches of forest to mimic the effects of a storm. They hired arborists to cut tree branches and spread them across the forest floor to study how light and water move through the changed ecosystem and the impact that the debris has on soil microbes. They also monitor cloud base heights to get a sense of how changes could affect rainfall.

Maria suddenly gave them a real-life test.

"It poses a lot of challenges but a lot of opportunities to move the science forward," said Grizelle Gonzalez, a project leader.

The experiments are expected to continue for several years, barring any interruptions from storms as the Caribbean prepares for another Atlantic hurricane season that starts June 1.

Cobb, the global warming scientist, praised the ongoing experiments.

"It is well worth the effort," she said. "The raw beauty of these environments is really only matched by their immense scientific potential."

Source: Fox News World

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Trump cuts aid to Central American countries as migrant crisis deepens

U.S. President Trump speaks to reporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida
U.S. President Donald Trump talks to reporters at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, U.S., March 29, 2019. REUTERS/Joshua Roberts

March 31, 2019

By Julia Harte and Tim Reid

WASHINGTON/EL PASO, Texas (Reuters) – The U.S. government cut aid to El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras on Saturday after President Donald Trump blasted the Central American countries for sending migrants to the United States and threatened to shutter the U.S.-Mexico border.

A surge of asylum seekers from the three countries have sought to enter the United States across the southern border in recent days. On Friday, Trump accused the nations of having “set up” migrant caravans and sent them north.

Trump said there was a “very good likelihood” he would close the border this week if Mexico did not stop immigrants from reaching the United States. Frequent crossers of the border, including workers and students, worried about the disruption to their lives the president’s threatened shutdown could cause.

At a rally on the border in El Paso, Texas, Democratic presidential hopeful Beto O’Rourke denounced Trump’s immigration policies as the politics of “fear and division.”

A State Department spokesman said in a statement it was carrying out Trump’s directive by ending aid programs to the three Central American nations, known as the Northern Triangle.

The department said it would “engage Congress in the process,” an apparent acknowledgement that it will need lawmakers’ approval to end funding that a Congressional aide estimated would total about $700 million.

New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, called Trump’s order a “reckless announcement” and urged Democrats and Republicans alike to reject it.

Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on Friday that the United States was paying the three countries “tremendous amounts of money,” but received nothing in return.

Mario Garcia, a 45-year-old bricklayer in El Salvador, said he was setting off for the United States regardless of the president’s threat to close the frontier.

“There is no work here and we want to improve (our lives), to get ahead for our families, for our children. I don’t give a damn (what Trump says), I’m determined,” Garcia said.

Garcia was one of a group of at least 90 people who left the capital San Salvador over the weekend on buses heading north, in what locals said was the tenth so-called caravan to depart for the United States since October.

The government of El Salvador has said it has tried to stem the flow of migrants.

Trump, who launched his presidential campaign in 2015 with a promise to build a border wall and crack down on illegal immigration, has repeatedly threatened to close the frontier during his two years in office but has not followed through.

This time, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and other U.S. officials say border patrol officers have been overwhelmed by a sharp increase asylum seekers, many of them children and families who arrive in groups, fleeing violence and economic hardship in the Northern Triangle.

March is on track for 100,000 border apprehensions, Homeland Security officials said, which would be the highest monthly number in more than a decade. Most of those people can remain in the United States while their asylum claims are processed, which can take years because of ballooning immigration court backlogs.

Nielsen warned Congress on Thursday that the government faces a “system-wide meltdown” as it tries to care for more than 1,200 unaccompanied children and 6,600 migrant families in its custody.

Trump has so far been unable to convince Congress to tighten asylum laws or fund his border wall. He has declared a national emergency to justify redirecting money earmarked for the military to pay for the wall.

Mexico has played down the possibility of a border shutdown. Its foreign minister, Marcelo Ebrard, said the country is a good neighbor and does not act on the basis of threats.

It was not clear how shutting down ports of entry would deter asylum seekers because they are legally able to request help as soon as they set foot on U.S. soil.

But a border shutdown would disrupt tourism and U.S.-Mexico trade that totaled $612 billion last year, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. A shutdown could lead to factory closures on both sides of the border, industry officials say, because the automobiles and medical sectors especially have woven international supply chains into their business models.

(Reporting by Julia Harte and Richard Cowan in Washington, and Tim Reid in El Paso; Additional reporting by Jose Luis Gonzalez in Ciudad Juarez, Julia Love in Mexico City, Omar Younis in San Diego, and Nelson Renteria in San Salvador; Writing by Daniel Wallis; Editing by Rosalba O’Brien)

Source: OANN

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US Deep State Behind Arrest And Persecution Of Assange

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Source: InfoWars

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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.)

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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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