UCF, LSU face off with improved focus in mindWASHINGTON (AP) — As a former and potentially future president, Donald Trump hailed what would become Project 2025 as a road map for “exactly what our movement will do” with another crack at the White House. As the blueprint for a hard-right turn in America became a liability during the 2024 campaign, Trump pulled an about-face . He denied knowing anything about the “ridiculous and abysmal” plans written in part by his first-term aides and allies. Now, after being elected the 47th president on Nov. 5, Trump is stocking his second administration with key players in the detailed effort he temporarily shunned. Most notably, Trump has tapped Russell Vought for an encore as director of the Office of Management and Budget; Tom Homan, his former immigration chief, as “border czar;” and immigration hardliner Stephen Miller as deputy chief of policy . Those moves have accelerated criticisms from Democrats who warn that Trump's election hands government reins to movement conservatives who spent years envisioning how to concentrate power in the West Wing and impose a starkly rightward shift across the U.S. government and society. Trump and his aides maintain that he won a mandate to overhaul Washington. But they maintain the specifics are his alone. “President Trump never had anything to do with Project 2025,” said Trump spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt in a statement. “All of President Trumps' Cabinet nominees and appointments are whole-heartedly committed to President Trump's agenda, not the agenda of outside groups.” Here is a look at what some of Trump's choices portend for his second presidency. The Office of Management and Budget director, a role Vought held under Trump previously and requires Senate confirmation, prepares a president's proposed budget and is generally responsible for implementing the administration's agenda across agencies. The job is influential but Vought made clear as author of a Project 2025 chapter on presidential authority that he wants the post to wield more direct power. “The Director must view his job as the best, most comprehensive approximation of the President’s mind,” Vought wrote. The OMB, he wrote, “is a President’s air-traffic control system” and should be “involved in all aspects of the White House policy process,” becoming “powerful enough to override implementing agencies’ bureaucracies.” Trump did not go into such details when naming Vought but implicitly endorsed aggressive action. Vought, the president-elect said, “knows exactly how to dismantle the Deep State” — Trump’s catch-all for federal bureaucracy — and would help “restore fiscal sanity.” In June, speaking on former Trump aide Steve Bannon’s “War Room” podcast, Vought relished the potential tension: “We’re not going to save our country without a little confrontation.” The strategy of further concentrating federal authority in the presidency permeates Project 2025's and Trump's campaign proposals. Vought's vision is especially striking when paired with Trump's proposals to dramatically expand the president's control over federal workers and government purse strings — ideas intertwined with the president-elect tapping mega-billionaire Elon Musk and venture capitalist Vivek Ramaswamy to lead a “Department of Government Efficiency.” Trump in his first term sought to remake the federal civil service by reclassifying tens of thousands of federal civil service workers — who have job protection through changes in administration — as political appointees, making them easier to fire and replace with loyalists. Currently, only about 4,000 of the federal government's roughly 2 million workers are political appointees. President Joe Biden rescinded Trump's changes. Trump can now reinstate them. Meanwhile, Musk's and Ramaswamy's sweeping “efficiency” mandates from Trump could turn on an old, defunct constitutional theory that the president — not Congress — is the real gatekeeper of federal spending. In his “Agenda 47,” Trump endorsed so-called “impoundment,” which holds that when lawmakers pass appropriations bills, they simply set a spending ceiling, but not a floor. The president, the theory holds, can simply decide not to spend money on anything he deems unnecessary. Vought did not venture into impoundment in his Project 2025 chapter. But, he wrote, “The President should use every possible tool to propose and impose fiscal discipline on the federal government. Anything short of that would constitute abject failure.” Trump's choice immediately sparked backlash. “Russ Vought is a far-right ideologue who has tried to break the law to give President Trump unilateral authority he does not possess to override the spending decisions of Congress (and) who has and will again fight to give Trump the ability to summarily fire tens of thousands of civil servants,” said Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, a Democrat and outgoing Senate Appropriations chairwoman. Reps. Jamie Raskin of Maryland and Melanie Stansbury of New Mexico, leading Democrats on the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, said Vought wants to “dismantle the expert federal workforce” to the detriment of Americans who depend on everything from veterans' health care to Social Security benefits. “Pain itself is the agenda,” they said. Trump’s protests about Project 2025 always glossed over overlaps in the two agendas . Both want to reimpose Trump-era immigration limits. Project 2025 includes a litany of detailed proposals for various U.S. immigration statutes, executive branch rules and agreements with other countries — reducing the number of refugees, work visa recipients and asylum seekers, for example. Miller is one of Trump's longest-serving advisers and architect of his immigration ideas, including his promise of the largest deportation force in U.S. history. As deputy policy chief, which is not subject to Senate confirmation, Miller would remain in Trump's West Wing inner circle. “America is for Americans and Americans only,” Miller said at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally on Oct. 27. “America First Legal,” Miller’s organization founded as an ideological counter to the American Civil Liberties Union, was listed as an advisory group to Project 2025 until Miller asked that the name be removed because of negative attention. Homan, a Project 2025 named contributor, was an acting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement director during Trump’s first presidency, playing a key role in what became known as Trump's “family separation policy.” Previewing Trump 2.0 earlier this year, Homan said: “No one’s off the table. If you’re here illegally, you better be looking over your shoulder.” John Ratcliffe, Trump's pick to lead the CIA , was previously one of Trump's directors of national intelligence. He is a Project 2025 contributor. The document's chapter on U.S. intelligence was written by Dustin Carmack, Ratcliffe's chief of staff in the first Trump administration. Reflecting Ratcliffe's and Trump's approach, Carmack declared the intelligence establishment too cautious. Ratcliffe, like the chapter attributed to Carmack, is hawkish toward China. Throughout the Project 2025 document, Beijing is framed as a U.S. adversary that cannot be trusted. Brendan Carr, the senior Republican on the Federal Communications Commission, wrote Project 2025's FCC chapter and is now Trump's pick to chair the panel. Carr wrote that the FCC chairman “is empowered with significant authority that is not shared” with other FCC members. He called for the FCC to address “threats to individual liberty posed by corporations that are abusing dominant positions in the market,” specifically “Big Tech and its attempts to drive diverse political viewpoints from the digital town square.” He called for more stringent transparency rules for social media platforms like Facebook and YouTube and “empower consumers to choose their own content filters and fact checkers, if any.” Carr and Ratcliffe would require Senate confirmation for their posts.None
Scottish Mortgage ‘£315m out of pocket’ after Northvolt collapseWarren Buffett's ability to consistently outperform the market has led many to think the billionaire investor has some sort of secretive edge. But the investing strategies Buffett and his top lieutenants over at Berkshire Hathaway employ are rooted in many simple concepts. In other words, making money in the market does not require outsized risks, speculative opportunities, or chasing the next big megatrend. Case in point: According to Berkshire's most recent 13F filing , Buffett's latest major investment is Domino's Pizza ( DPZ 1.68% ) . That's right, billionaires love pizza too! Let's look at how an investment in Domino's fits with Berkshire's investing philosophy, and assess whether now is a good opportunity to follow Buffett's lead. Why Domino's Pizza makes a great addition to the Berkshire portfolio Some institutional investors choose to own hundreds of different securities -- covering every major sector and myriad sub-markets within these industries. Berkshire is a bit different. Buffett and his team tend to invest in maybe 40 or 50 stocks at a time while holding onto their largest positions for years or even decades. Two of Berkshire's most successful investments have been major consumer brands, including beverage maker Coca-Cola and electronics specialist Apple . But why these companies? Consider Coca-Cola's iconic red soda cans and Apple's coveted iPhone. These two products have helped both companies build unparalleled moats . The perception of Domino's isn't much different in my opinion, as it's pretty hard to think about pizza and not have the Domino's brand come to mind. Another staple part of Buffett's philosophy is investing in businesses that generate steady cash flow. While free cash flow trends may be tougher to forecast for restaurant businesses, the big idea from the chart below is that Domino's has managed to grow its cash flow consistently over the course of the past decade. Data by YCharts . The company's rising cash flow has gone toward dividend increases too, which make up another pillar of Buffett's investing criteria. A resilient business in a tough market The restaurant industry is unbelievably intense. For national chains, customers expect quick, convenient service and affordable prices. One key metric for tracking a company's growth is same-store sales , which measures growth trends at existing locations. By excluding new restaurant openings, usually from the past year, same-store sales shed light on customer traffic and spending. The table below breaks down Domino's same-store sales over the last year: Category Q3 2023 Q4 2023 Q1 2024 Q2 2024 Q3 2024 Same-store sales (U.S.) (0.6%) 2.8% 5.6% 4.8% 3.0% Same-store sales (International) 3.3% 0.1% 0.9% 2.1% 0.8% Data source: Investor relations. Domino's has had a solid year with steady growth both inside and outside the U.S. But a skeptical investor may wonder if the company has only been able to generate this same-store sales growth through price hikes as inflation drives up the cost of materials and labor. However, this is far from the case with Domino's. On the latest earnings call, management said same-store sales in the U.S. have been experiencing rising transaction growth in addition to higher price mixes. It appears Domino's is seeing success from its rewards programs and marketing campaigns. Why Domino's should keep delivering The analysis below benchmarks Domino's against a peer set of other national restaurant stocks using the forward price-to-earnings (P/E) multiple. While there is a notable difference between Starbucks and the rest of this group, Domino's remains priced at a premium relative to its closest peer, Papa John's , and many other leading industry players. Data by YCharts . That said, I would argue that Domino's long-term track record warrants a premium valuation. Even though Domino's might not offer exposure to high-growth opportunities in emerging areas like artificial intelligence (AI) or big data, there is still a lot to like about the company. Buffett's recent investment is just another signal to consider Domino's stock as a compelling buy-and-hold opportunity.
CHICAGO (AP) — CHICAGO (AP) — Oil-Dri Corp. of America (ODC) on Monday reported earnings of $16.4 million in its fiscal first quarter. On a per-share basis, the Chicago-based company said it had profit of $2.25. The maker of products for soil in the agriculture, horticulture and sports sectors posted revenue of $127.9 million in the period. This story was generated by Automated Insights ( http://automatedinsights.com/ap ) using data from Zacks Investment Research. Access a Zacks stock report on ODC at https://www.zacks.com/ap/ODCCanada's Trudeau survives third no-confidence vote
Lanthanein Resources secures six-month extension for Lady Grey Project farm-in
Toggle3D.AI Announces Board Member ChangesEfforts by New Mexico to save and invest portions of a financial windfall from local oil production are paying off as state government income on investments surpasses personal income tax collections for the first time, according to a new forecast Monday. General fund income from the state's two, multibillion-dollar permanent funds and interest on treasury accounts is expected to climb to $2.1 billion for the fiscal year between July 2024 and June 2025, surpassing $2 billion in revenue from personal income taxes. The investment earnings are designed to ensure that critical programs — ranging from childcare subsidies to tuition-free college and trade school education — endure if oil income falters amid a possible transition to new sources of energy. At the same time, legislators this year revised personal income tax brackets to lower taxes in the nation's No. 2 state for oil production behind Texas . “We’re not a poor state anymore,” said Democratic state Sen. George Muñoz of Gallup. “We’ve got things that we can win on — free education, childcare ... low taxes for working families, for children. And that’s all because we’ve done a lot of the work to set this up for the future.” The comments came at a legislative panel Monday where economists from four government agencies announced an income estimate for the coming year. The figures are the baseline for budget negotiations when the Democratic-led Legislature convenes in January. State government income, which is closely linked to oil production in New Mexico, continues to grow, though at a slower pace, as legislators discuss new investments in social programs aimed at curbing crime and homelessness. Economists estimate the state will bring in a record-setting $13.6 billion in general fund income for the fiscal year that runs from July 2025 to June 2026, a 2.6% increase over the current period. This year’s income bump leaves room for an additional $892 million in state spending in the coming fiscal year, a 7% increase, according to the Legislature’s accountability and budgeting office. State income is forecast to exceed current bedrock annual spending obligations by $3.4 billion. New Mexico legislators are pushing to open new savings accounts. One proposal would set aside as much as $1 billion in a trust to underwrite spending on mental health and addiction treatment in response to public frustration with crime and homelessness. Legislators also are likely to revisit a stalled proposal to create a trust for Native American education that could expand Indigenous language instruction.None