Jimmy Carter, the 39th U.S. president who led the nation from 1977 to 1981, has died at the age of 100. The Carter Center announced Sunday that his father died at his home in Plains, Georgia, surrounded by family. His death comes about a year after his wife of 77 years, Rosalynn, passed away. The Carter Center will provide updates about ceremonies and activities to honor the life of President Carter as they become available here and soon on the official Carter Family Tribute Site ( https://t.co/Tg5UZt7kPV ). Read our statement: https://t.co/CNBUBpffPz — The Carter Center (@CarterCenter) December 29, 2024 Despite receiving hospice care at the time, he attended the memorials for Rosalynn while sitting in a wheelchair, covered by a blanket. He was also wheeled outside on Oct. 1 to watch a military flyover in celebration of his 100th birthday. The Carter Center said in February 2023 that the former president and his family decided he would no longer seek medical treatment following several short hospital stays for an undisclosed illness. Carter became the longest-living president in 2019, surpassing George H.W. Bush, who died at age 94 in 2018. Carter also had a long post-presidency, living 43 years following his White House departure. RELATED STORY: Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter: A love story for the ages Before becoming president Carter began his adult life in the military, getting a degree at the U.S. Naval Academy, and rose to the rank of lieutenant. He then studied reactor technology and nuclear physics at Union College and served as senior officer of the pre-commissioning crew on a nuclear submarine. Following the death of his father, Carter returned to Georgia to tend to his family's farm and related businesses. During this time, he became a community leader by serving on local boards. He used this experience to elevate him to his first elected office in 1962 in the Georgia Senate. After losing his first gubernatorial election in 1966, he won his second bid in 1970, becoming the state’s 76th governor. As a relative unknown nationally, Carter used the nation’s sour sentiment toward politics to win the Democratic nomination. He then bested sitting president Gerald Ford in November 1976 to win the presidency. Carter battles high inflation, energy crisis With the public eager for a change following the Watergate era, Carter took a more hands-on approach to governing. This, however, meant he became the public face of a number of issues facing the U.S. in the late 1970s, most notably America’s energy crisis. He signed the Department of Energy Organization Act, creating the first new cabinet role in government in over a decade. Carter advocated for alternative energy sources and even installed solar panels on the White House roof. During this time, the public rebuked attempts to ration energy. Amid rising energy costs, inflation soared nearly 9% annually during Carter's presidency. This led to a recession before the 1980 election. Carter also encountered the Iran Hostage Crisis in the final year of his presidency when 52 American citizens were captured. An attempt to rescue the Americans failed in April 1980, resulting in the death of eight service members. With compounding crises, Carter lost in a landslide to Ronald Reagan in 1980 as he could only win six states. Carter’s impact after leaving the White House Carter returned to Georgia and opened the Carter Center, which is focused on national and international issues of public policy – namely conflict resolution. Carter and the Center have been involved in a number of international disputes, including in Syria, Israel, Mali and Sudan. The group has also worked to independently monitor elections and prevent elections from becoming violent. Carter and his wife were the most visible advocates for Habitat for Humanity. The organization that helps build and restore homes for low- and middle-income families has benefited from the Carters’ passion for the organization. Habitat for Humanity estimates Carter has worked alongside 104,000 volunteers in 14 countries to build 4,390 houses. “Like other Habitat volunteers, I have learned that our greatest blessings come when we are able to improve the lives of others, and this is especially true when those others are desperately poor or in need,” Carter said in a Q&A on the Habitat for Humanity website. Carter also continued teaching Sunday school at Maranatha Baptist Church in his hometown well into his 90s. Attendees would line up for hours, coming from all parts of the U.S., to attend Carter’s classes. Carter is survived by his four children.
Natixis Advisors LLC grew its stake in shares of FMC Co. ( NYSE:FMC – Free Report ) by 21.3% during the third quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 79,217 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after buying an additional 13,898 shares during the quarter. Natixis Advisors LLC’s holdings in FMC were worth $5,224,000 at the end of the most recent quarter. Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of the company. Barnett & Company Inc. bought a new position in shares of FMC during the third quarter valued at about $2,265,000. Cetera Investment Advisers grew its stake in shares of FMC by 483.8% during the first quarter. Cetera Investment Advisers now owns 34,781 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $2,216,000 after buying an additional 28,823 shares during the last quarter. tru Independence LLC bought a new position in shares of FMC during the third quarter valued at about $5,323,000. Bayesian Capital Management LP bought a new position in shares of FMC during the first quarter valued at about $1,994,000. Finally, CWM LLC grew its stake in shares of FMC by 87.4% during the second quarter. CWM LLC now owns 17,662 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $1,016,000 after buying an additional 8,238 shares during the last quarter. 91.86% of the stock is owned by institutional investors. FMC Price Performance FMC stock opened at $58.74 on Friday. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $61.74 and a 200-day moving average price of $60.86. FMC Co. has a 52-week low of $50.03 and a 52-week high of $68.72. The firm has a market capitalization of $7.33 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 5.06, a PEG ratio of 1.46 and a beta of 0.85. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.65, a quick ratio of 1.09 and a current ratio of 1.48. Insider Activity at FMC In other FMC news, VP Jacqueline Scanlan sold 4,529 shares of FMC stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $59.67, for a total value of $270,245.43. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president now owns 28,649 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,709,485.83. The trade was a 13.65 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink . 0.85% of the stock is owned by insiders. Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades A number of brokerages have recently issued reports on FMC. BMO Capital Markets raised their price objective on FMC from $60.00 to $65.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research note on Friday, August 2nd. KeyCorp dropped their target price on shares of FMC from $81.00 to $79.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Friday, August 2nd. Royal Bank of Canada increased their target price on shares of FMC from $78.00 to $81.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, November 1st. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their target price on shares of FMC from $50.00 to $59.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Monday, August 12th. Finally, Citigroup started coverage on shares of FMC in a report on Wednesday, October 23rd. They set a “neutral” rating and a $67.00 target price for the company. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have issued a hold rating, four have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $68.00. Check Out Our Latest Analysis on FMC FMC Company Profile ( Free Report ) FMC Corporation, an agricultural sciences company, provides crop protection, plant health, and professional pest and turf management products. It develops, markets, and sells crop protection chemicals that includes insecticides, herbicides, and fungicides; and biologicals, crop nutrition, and seed treatment products, which are used in agriculture to enhance crop yield and quality by controlling a range of insects, weeds, and diseases, as well as in non-agricultural markets for pest control. Recommended Stories Want to see what other hedge funds are holding FMC? Visit HoldingsChannel.com to get the latest 13F filings and insider trades for FMC Co. ( NYSE:FMC – Free Report ). Receive News & Ratings for FMC Daily - Enter your email address below to receive a concise daily summary of the latest news and analysts' ratings for FMC and related companies with MarketBeat.com's FREE daily email newsletter .Spike in religious hate crimes over Middle East war and Southport killings branded deeply troubling
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Did you know with a Digital Subscription to Belfast News Letter, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. However, legal advice was that a policy that half of new recruits to the PSNI should be women was “not viable”, a memo from 2002 said. Stormont officials did seek legal advice that year on whether the new force's policy of recruiting 50% of all officers from the Catholic community could be challenged as discriminatory towards ethnic minorities. Advertisement Advertisement Details are contained in documents held at the Public Record Office in Belfast. Hundreds of the files are being opened for public viewing under the 30/20 year rule. The majority of the files deal with events in 2003, although some are from earlier years. The PSNI replaced the RUC in 2001 following a number of reforms proposed by Lord Patten. Advertisement Advertisement Catholics had been under-represented in the RUC, so a 50:50 recruitment policy ran for the first decade, meaning one Catholic recruit for every one person from a Protestant or other background. A file shows an exchange of emails between civil servants in the Office of the First Minister/Deputy First Minister (OFMDFM) following a PSNI human rights conference hosted in October 2002. One of the emails was seeking further information on comments at the conference about recruiting people from ethnic minorities to the force. A responding email said: “It's all about the Patten formula of 50/50 recruitment: 50% Roman Catholic and 50% Protestant and Others. Minority Ethnics fall into the Others. Advertisement Advertisement “The issue, at present, is that most applicants still fall into the latter category (around 65% from memory) so this increases the competition within this grouping and makes the candidate less likely to be successful – this could therefore disadvantage Minority Ethnics. “Joe (Stewart) suggested that options could be to move Minority Ethnics to the Roman Catholic Category or alternatively create a 3rd category, say of 2%. “The issue needs further consideration including how any requirement for change could be progressed.” Another email adds: “When the Race Directive was being negotiated, we drew NIO's ( Northern Ireland Office) attention to the 50/50 recruitment policy and suggested they might want to take this up as we thought it could potentially be discriminatory on the grounds of race (likely to be proportionally more non-RC ethnic minorities than RC). “NIO did not pursue.” Advertisement Advertisement Within the file there are clippings from media reports at the time where concern is being raised about the impact of 50:50 recruitment on police numbers after then PSNI chief constable Hugh Orde announced he was axing the force's band due to resource pressures. Another internal email was then sent on December 12 under the title ‘50/50 Recruitment and Race’. It says: “Consideration was also given to including women on a 50-50 basis but legal advice at the time was that this was not viable despite their severe under-representation in the police force.” It says the “50:50 split Catholic/non-Catholic has recently survived a legal challenge”. Advertisement Advertisement The email continues: “There may still be a point (although unpopular to argue) that the percentage ethnic minority is too small to claim disadvantage/indirect discrimination –- ironically the higher the percentage population of ethnic minorities, the stronger would be the claim for advantage/indirect discrimination because the lower the chance of recruitment to the PSNI (ie because the larger the share of the non-Catholic pool). “Interestingly, a stronger challenge could be brought by a young person for age discrimination whom statistics consistently show is more likely to be not religious and so in the 'non Catholic' pool. “Politically, there could be difficulties because there is a high profile agenda in GB at present to recruit ethnic minorities into the police service post-Macpherson/Lawrence.” There is also a draft note seeking legal advice on the issue which states that the 50:50 recruitment policy “would seem to be incompatible with the implementation of the (Race) Directive”.‘Desperate’: Horror for Aussie businesses25 years ago, it was hard to escape talk of the 'Y2K bug'
Over the past year, the price of Brent Crude, a key global oil benchmark, has been as low as $70.31 and as high as $93.12. Over the past three years, the swing from peak to trough was even greater, with the low at $69.53 and the high at a whopping $133.18. Talk about a roller-coaster ride! This is why the smartest oil stock for most investors right now will be reliable industry giant Chevron (NYSE: CVX) . Some key reasons to like Chevron Before getting into Chevron's business, it is worth looking at one of the biggest benefits investors get from owning the stock: its dividend. The dividend yield is around 4% right now, which is notably above the energy industry average of 3.3% and the S&P 500 's average of 1.2%. The dividend backing that high yield has been increased annually for 37 consecutive years. Note that this includes hikes when oil was trading at $133 and when it was trading at $69, or lower. Are You Missing The Morning Scoop? Wake up with Breakfast news in your inbox every market day. Sign Up For Free » Those dividend stats alone prove just how reliable a company Chevron is. And, in fact, that might be enough to get long-term dividend investors to buy this oil giant. But there's more to like here than just the yield. That's where the business comes in. Chevron is what's known as an integrated energy company, which means it has operations across the energy sector. That includes energy production (the upstream), energy transportation (the midstream), and chemicals and refining (the downstream). Each of these segments operates a little differently, and having all three in the portfolio helps to soften the peaks and valleys inherent to the commodity driven energy sector. It's also worth noting that 75% of Chevron's oil investments have a break-even point that is below $50 per barrel, which gives it a lot of operational leeway. On top of that, Chevron has an investment-grade-rated balance sheet. That alone, however, doesn't do justice to the importance of the company's financial strength. Chevron rides the cycle like a pro Chevron has been around a very long time and is well aware of the volatility of the sector in which it operates. That's why it has created a diversified business, so it can better weather the inherent ups and downs it will face. But the real key to the company's ability to continue rewarding investors with dividend increases -- even when oil prices swing wildly -- is its balance sheet. When times are good, Chevron keeps its leverage low. Right now the company's debt-to-equity ratio, a measure of leverage, is around 0.17 times. It is one of the lowest levels of leverage among the company's closest integrated energy peers. The company is, basically, preparing for what it knows is coming: another oil downturn. Management doesn't know exactly when, but it knows very well that the industry is volatile and lower oil prices are almost certain to arrive eventually. When that period does arrive, Chevron will have the financial leeway to take on more debt. That will, of course, increase leverage, but it will also allow the company to keep funding its business and paying a growing dividend to shareholders. The energy giant is comfortable taking on additional leverage right when it appears most risky to do so because it knows that oil prices have always recovered, historically speaking. And, when they do, Chevron will pay down debt and reduce leverage. This isn't particularly unique, since other energy companies do the same thing. However, Chevron's relatively low leverage compared to its peers puts it in a very strong position right now. The only company with a stronger balance sheet is ExxonMobil (NYSE: XOM) . But Exxon's yield is much lower at 3.3%. So, from a risk/reward standpoint, Chevron looks like a more attractive dividend stock in the oil space right now. Chevron is a great balance No company is perfect, and Chevron comes with its own list of warts. For example, its proposed acquisition of Hess could fall apart because of Hess' existing relationship with Exxon. That has some investors worried about Chevron's business. However, for long-term dividend investors with $500 or $5,000, Chevron looks like a good balance between risk and reward. All in, it is the kind of oil company you can hold through the entire energy cycle while still sleeping well at night. Don’t miss this second chance at a potentially lucrative opportunity Ever feel like you missed the boat in buying the most successful stocks? Then you’ll want to hear this. On rare occasions, our expert team of analysts issues a “Double Down” stock recommendation for companies that they think are about to pop. If you’re worried you’ve already missed your chance to invest, now is the best time to buy before it’s too late. And the numbers speak for themselves: Nvidia: if you invested $1,000 when we doubled down in 2009, you’d have $368,053 !* Apple: if you invested $1,000 when we doubled down in 2008, you’d have $43,533 !* Netflix: if you invested $1,000 when we doubled down in 2004, you’d have $484,170 !* Right now, we’re issuing “Double Down” alerts for three incredible companies, and there may not be another chance like this anytime soon. See 3 “Double Down” stocks » *Stock Advisor returns as of November 18, 2024 Reuben Gregg Brewer has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Chevron. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy . The Smartest High-Yield Oil Stock to Invest $500 in Right Now was originally published by The Motley Fool