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Bitcoin IV Author says Bitcoin is only commodity in human history whose supply is capped Inviting Bitcoin to Pakistan amounts to inviting cutting-edge, world-changing technology to Pakistan. Inviting Bitcoin to Pakistan amounts to inviting innovation to Pakistan. Embracing this groundbreaking technology will unlock a world of opportunities, driving economic growth, fostering financial inclusion, and positioning Pakistan as a forward-thinking player in the global digital economy. By leveraging Bitcoin, Pakistan can attract tech-savvy investments, create jobs, and modernise its financial infrastructure for a more inclusive future. Bitcoin is an extremely scarce asset. Bitcoin is the only commodity in human history -- along with certain other cryptocurrencies -- whose supply is capped. Bitcoin is digital gold. Bitcoin is borderless. Bitcoin is decentralised. Bitcoin is global. Bitcoin is peer-to-peer. Bitcoin is open-source. Bitcoin is pseudonymous. Bitcoin is immutable. Bitcoin is transparent. Bitcoin is a medium of exchange. Bitcoin is a unit of account. Bitcoin is resistant to censorship. Bitcoin is resistant to inflation. Bitcoin is programmable money. Bitcoin is community-driven. Bitcoin is an innovation catalyst. Bitcoin is a challenge to traditional finance. Bitcoin is about social change. Sovereign entities that hold Bitcoin include the United States, China, the United Kingdom, Ukraine, Bhutan, El Salvador, Venezuela, Finland, Georgia, Bulgaria, and Germany. The Bitcoin Act of 2024 (S 4912), a bill that proposes holding Bitcoins as a ‘Strategic National Reserve’, is pending in the United States Congress. RESBit, a similar bill to allocate up to five per cent of Brazil’s international reserves to Bitcoin, is pending at the Brazilian Congress. El Salvador has adopted Bitcoin as legal tender. Thailand, Philippines, Paraguay, Panama, South Korea, India, Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, South Africa, Australia, Canada, Germany, United Kingdom, Singapore, Hong Kong, Japan, Morocco, Tunisia, UAE, Qatar, France and Switzerland are all taking steps towards integrating cryptocurrencies into their financial systems. The State of Wisconsin Investment Board (SWIB) has invested $156 million in Bitcoin. The Florida State Board of Administration (SBA) is also exploring a similar investment. Additionally, the California State Teachers' Retirement System (CalSTRS), the Colorado Public Employees' Retirement Association (PERA), and several cities and counties in Texas, Wyoming, and New York are considering making similar moves into cryptocurrency investments. MicroStrategy, Marathon Digital Holdings, Tesla, Coinbase Global, Block, Inc., Galaxy Digital, the Tezos Foundation, iShares Bitcoin Trust, Grayscale, Fidelity, and several other major corporations collectively own Bitcoin holdings valued at nearly a trillion dollars. For Pakistan, Bitcoin offers the potential to serve as a hedge against inflation, providing a store of value not tied to traditional fiat currencies. For Pakistan, Bitcoin can bring much-needed diversification, reducing reliance on traditional assets. By embracing this digital currency, Pakistan can foster technological advancement, opening doors to blockchain innovation and the digital economy. For Pakistan, Bitcoin can drive financial inclusion by providing unbanked populations access to secure and efficient financial systems. It promises to stimulate economic growth by creating new industries, job opportunities, and investments. Finally, Bitcoin could play a role in addressing Pakistan's debt challenges by serving as a high-value reserve asset, potentially improving the country’s fiscal stability and global financial standing. To be certain, Bitcoin is now mainstream, having evolved from a niche experiment into a globally recognised asset class and technology. Pakistan cannot afford to be left behind in embracing this transformative financial innovation, as doing so risks missing out on significant economic and technological opportunities. The writer is a columnist based in Islamabad. He tweets/posts @saleemfarrukh and can be reached at: farrukh15@hotmail.com128th Common Stock Monthly Dividend Increase Declared by Realty Income
Trump Nominates Billy Long as IRS CommissionerSupreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson is checking off another item on her bucket list: Broadway. Jackson will appear in a one-night performance of the musical comedy “& Juliet” on Saturday, according to an Instagram post from the Broadway show. The role is a walk-on, which does not typically include any lines of dialogue. Jackson will also participate in a special “talkback” after the performance, according to the social media post. RELATED STORY | Could Democrats pressure Justice Sotomayor to step down for replacement? In her recently published memoir, "Lovely One," Jackson wrote about her dreams of becoming the first Black woman to serve on the Supreme Court and appear on a Broadway stage. Now, it seems that her once-teenage dreams will come true. The show begins at 8 p.m. ET on Dec. 14 at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre in New York City.Donald Trump is returning to the world stage. So is his trolling
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‘Saturday Night Live” alum Kyle Mooney’s directorial debut “Y2K” makes for a fascinating test case for Gen Z’s appetite for all things 2000s. His comedic sensibility, honed through throwback TV parodies on “SNL,” is at once broad and hyper-specific. In the nostalgia piece “Y2K,” he hits the big signposts that will delight the younger generation craving the simpler times of a pre-9/11 world, but he also gets granular with late-’90s music, fashion and culture in a way that one could only understand if they actually lived through it. Zoomers just won’t pick up everything he’s putting down, and that may work against this otherwise exuberant and somewhat messy teen horror-comedy. Mooney and co-writer Evan Winter fuse the “big party” teen-comedy formula to “The Terminator” for their “Y2K” script, but it also feels like they just wrote down everything they could remember from the late-’90s era and threw it at the wall: Enron, the Macarena, PalmPilots, Limp Bizkit, the swing revival. Some are quite obvious and on the nose, others more arcane. Add in some teen-movie tropes, a list of outrageous horror-movie kills and a “TRL”-friendly soundtrack, and that’s essentially the movie. Jaedan Martell, one of the preeminent horror-movie sad boys (see: “It,” “The Lodge,” etc.), plays Eli, a dorky kid who loves his ebullient best friend Danny (Julian Dennison) and has a crush on Laura (Rachel Zegler), whom he hopes to kiss at the big 1999-2000 New Year’s Eve party after he finds out she’s broken up with her college boyfriend (Mason Gooding). But in a bit of revisionist history, the Y2K bug is real — so real, in fact, that all electronic devices and appliances band together into freakish robotic monsters in order to kill the teens, enslave the parents and achieve “the singularity.” Despite the deep wealth of millennium culture on display, “Y2K” doesn’t necessarily feel lived-in — it’s a bit too wink-wink, nudge-nudge with it, and it feels forced, especially with the wall-to-wall needle drops. There are fun nods to era-specific tribes and trends with quick nods to the swing kids, ravers and rap-rock skater types, but where Mooney and Winter’s approach excels is in the deep cuts for the real ’90s-heads out there, like Daniel Zolghadri’s character as CJ, a conscious hip-hop kid, wearing baggy khakis and a bucket hat, scolding his peers for their “corporate” music taste. Mooney is also a standout as Garrett, a burnout video-store clerk with white-guy dreads, who represents jam-band stinky-hippie culture. But references like this will likely sail right over the heads of a Zoomer audience — you simply had to be there in order to get it. Still, there’s something kind of profound in contemplating the year 2000, even if it is refracted through this silly lens. In the 24 years since, it’s been decades of terrorism, war, political instability, a widening wealth gap and rapid technological advancements that have rewired our culture, our brains and how we relate to one another. Perhaps 2000 was indeed a fundamental switch, which Mooney has zeroed in on through the imperfect but amusing “Y2K.” Ultimately, his project is a success, because he made this millennial — who was age 16 in 1999 — profoundly nostalgic for what seems a more innocent time. Get local news delivered to your inbox!Bears general manager Ryan Poles was granted a reprieve complete with a second swing at hiring a head coach in Chicago. Poles will interview candidates and select a replacement for Matt Eberflus, who was fired Friday after the Bears' sixth consecutive loss and fourth of the season decided on a final play. "Ryan Poles is the general manager of the Chicago Bears, and he will remain the general manager of the Chicago Bears," president and CEO Kevin Warren said Monday. "Ryan will serve as the point person of our upcoming search for a head football coach. We will closely, we will work together on a daily basis to make sure we have the right person as our head football coach." Warren said the McCaskey family provided "all the resources" to build a championship environment. He confirmed that Thomas Brown, who a month ago was passing game coordinator before replacing Shane Waldron as offensive coordinator, will serve as interim head coach and shift from the press box to the sideline starting this week. Warren did not say whether Brown would automatically receive an interview for the full-time coaching position, which he said "will be the most coveted head coaching job in the National Football League." Poles said consideration will be given to candidates with the plan to develop rookie No. 1 pick Caleb Williams, but there are no set plans to involve the quarterback in the interview process. He said the Bears showed great progress through two seasons but couldn't sustain growth. "At the end of the day, we just came up short too many times," Poles said of firing Eberflus, his pick to be the Bears' head coach in January 2022. Brown promoted wide receivers coach Chris Beatty to interim offensive coordinator on Monday and announced that defensive coordinator Eric Washington will be the defensive play caller, a role Eberflus previously held. Trailing 23-20 on Thanksgiving Day, the Bears were within field-goal range when quarterback Caleb Williams was sacked. With 32 seconds remaining, Eberflus elected not to use his final timeout as Williams heaved an incompletion down the right sideline as time expired. "When you look at the end-of-the-game situations, detailing to finish in some of those moments. We all know a lot of games come down to those critical moments where we weren't able to get over the hump," Poles said. Eberflus said after the game that everything was handled properly and held a press conference via Zoom on Friday voicing confidence he'd have the team ready to play the 49ers this week. But three hours later, he was fired. Warren admitted the franchise could've handled the timing better, but clarified there was no decision on Eberflus' status at the time of his media session. "The decision was made to terminate the employment of head coach Matt Eberflus," Warren said 72 hours later. "We try to do everything in a professional manner. That decision was made on Friday." "Coach Eberflus had his press conference, we had not made a final decision. I think you know me, you know Ryan you know George McCaskey. One thing we stand for is family, integrity, doing it the right way. In retrospect, could we have done it better? Absolutely." Eberflus, 54, went 14-32 in two-plus seasons. The Bears (4-8) travel to San Francisco (5-7) in Week 1. --Field Level Media
Dangote Sugar Refinery has unveiled its Series 6 and 7 commercial paper offerings, seeking to raise up to N50 billion from the debt market. This follows the company’s successful issuance of its Series 4 and 5 commercial papers in mid-June, which collectively raised N42.79 billion at competitive rates of 23% and 25%, reflecting strong investor confidence. Series 4, with a tenure of 181 days, raised N12.93 billion, while Series 5, with a longer tenure of 265 days, raised a larger sum of N29.86 billion. Related Stories FMCGs record 133% increase in finance cost in 2024 Dangote Sugar posts N104.6 billion pre-tax loss in second quarter of 2024, amidst 140% rise in raw materials cost Building on this momentum, Dangote Sugar has now returned to the market as part of its N150 billion debt issuance program, aimed at bolstering its working capital. Announced in December 2024, the Series 6 and 7 papers highlight the company’s ongoing commitment to leveraging Nigeria’s capital markets for strategic financing. According to reports, the subscription window for Dangote Sugar’s Series 6 and 7 commercial papers closes on December 12, 2024, offering investors a chance to support its expansion goals. The series 6 and 7 commercial papers form part of Dangote Sugar’s N150 billion debt program. Series 6, with a 180-day tenor, is offered at a 24.9 per cent discount rate, providing an implied yield of 28.5% to investors. Similarly, Series 7, with a 270-day tenor, is priced at a 24.55 per cent discount rate, offering an implied yield of 30%. The offer remains open to the investing public until December 12, 2024. In mid-June 2024, Dangote Sugar Refinery successfully issued its Series 4 and 5 commercial papers, raising a total of N42.79 billion. These papers were offered under the company’s N150 billion commercial paper issuance program, with Series 4 and 5 carrying discount rates of 23% and 25%, respectively. Series 4 raised N12.93 billion with a 181-day maturity, while Series 5 raised N29.86 billion for a 265-day tenor. According to a notice from the company, the issuance attracted a diverse range of investors, including pension and non-pension asset managers, as well as institutional and individual participants. The company initiated its N150 billion debt issuance program in early 2024 with the launch of Series 1, which raised N39.39 billion. This issuance had a 266-day maturity and was offered at a 17.08% discount rate. Building on this, the company issued Series 2 notes, raising N6.15 billion with a 184-day maturity at a 19.84% discount rate. Series 3 marked a significant increase, generating N53.47 billion through 254-day notes at a 21.30% discount rate. With Series 1 to 5, Dangote Sugar has successfully raised a cumulative N141.8 billion, underscoring its ability to tap into Nigeria’s debt markets to fuel its growth and operational needs. In January, Dangote Sugar’s stock surged from an opening price of N57 to close at N67.90, driven by a robust trading volume of 95.1 million shares—a promising start to the year. Yet, the optimism was quickly dampened as bearish pressure took hold in February, pulling the stock back to N57.50, accompanied by a slightly lower trading volume of 81 million shares. The company’s stock faced a rocky period from February to October, as investment sentiment weakened in Nigeria’s industrial and consumer goods sectors. While a brief rally in May, with a trading volume of 35.2 million shares, hinted at recovery, the momentum fizzled out. By October, the stock had dipped to N30.80. Nonetheless, a glimmer of optimism appeared as the stock closed November in positive territory, suggesting a potential rebound from the October low. The company’s ongoing commercial paper program, part of its N150 billion debt issuance initiative, is expected to play a crucial role in stabilizing operations. By raising much-needed capital, Dangote Sugar aims to maintain smooth business activities, enhance performance, and bolster investor confidence, setting the stage for improved market sentiment moving forward.Unions score a major win in Wisconsin with a court ruling restoring collective bargaining rights
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CHESAPEAKE — Oscar Smith stood at a crossroads. After taking a 14-7 lead with 31 seconds left in a challenging first half, the Tigers saw Colonial Forge march downfield and get to the 2-yard line with 3 seconds left. The Eagles decided to go for it and try to tie the game instead of kicking a field goal. Forge quarterback Brock Brimhall took the snap and plunged forward. Zaire Ziglar and the Tigers’ defense stiffened. When the bodies were moved, the ball hadn’t crossed the goal line and momentum was squarely on Oscar Smith’s side. The Tigers built on the half’s final play and outscored the Eagles 28-0 in the second half en route to a 42-7 victory in a VHSL Class 6 state semifinal at Oscar Smith High School. The Tigers will face James Madison in the title game at 5 p.m. Saturday at James Madison University in Harrisonburg. “It was huge,” Oscar Smith head coach Chris Scott said. “Zaire played an unbelievable game, the whole game, and makes that play right there ... I couldn’t say enough about him or his performance today. It was a big stop and it allowed us to carry the momentum and have a big second half.” The Tigers pounced after halftime. After forcing a three-and-out, Oscar Smith drove 50 yards and scored on a 3-yard run by Brandon Nesbit. “Our coaches just told us not to get our heads down,” Nesbit said. “They told us to keep going and we knew we were playing a bit sluggish and playing down to their level. So we knew at halftime we had to come out and play Oscar Smith football and we did.” Forge tried to respond with a long drive, moving from its 20 and into Oscar Smith territory, but the two teams saw drives stall around midfield before Oscar Smith forced a turnover, setting the Tigers up at the Forge 40. Nesbit was the offense on the Tigers’ drive, moving Oscar Smith to the 11 before running in for his second touchdown and a 28-7 lead. Forge, finding itself down big, went to the air, but couldn’t get a first down. Oscar Smith took over at its 41 and struck fast. On first down, Lonnie Andrews hit Alvin Jones for a 41-yard touchdown and the Tigers led 35-7 with 11:21 left. The Eagles were able to get their offense moving again, but once it got to midfield, the Tigers stiffened. Decorey Cassell sacked Brimhall after the Eagles made it to the 49-yard line and Forge couldn’t recover. After taking over on downs, the Tigers put the nail in the coffin with an 11-play drove that ended with an Andrews pass to Charles McGlown. The score could have been worse. Oscar Smith had a touchdown waved off by a holding penalty and Nebit fumbled inside the 10-yard line. The Tigers in the fourth quarter had a punt return for a touchdown called back because of a penalty. “You could start to feel that little bit of frustration because we were moving the ball and moving the ball, but because of a call or a big-time play from their guy stopped the drive and we just didn’t finish it,” Scott said, noting that the coaches made some adjustments at halftime. “We came out with a mission mindset to complete and finish the game.” Now, it’s on to the state title game for the Tigers — their first since 2021. “It feels good, man, real good,” Nesbit said. “I’ve never been to state before, so it feels real good. We just have to finish this last one.” For Scott, it’s all about delivering a victory for the Oscar Smith community. “It feels unbelievable,” Scott said. “I know how important it is to this community. I know how important it is to those young men and how hard they’ve worked on the field and off the field, so we’re going to do everything we can to make sure they deliver this week.”Hologic Statement on USPSTF Draft Cervical Cancer Screening GuidelinesRAHWAY, N.J.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov 22, 2024-- Merck (NYSE: MRK), known as MSD outside the United States and Canada, has been notified that TRC Capital Investment Corporation (TRC Capital) has commenced an unsolicited “mini-tender” offer, dated November 12, 2024, to purchase up to 1,000,000 shares of Merck common stock at $96.38 per share. The offer price is approximately 4.32% below the closing price of the Merck common stock on November 11, 2024 ($100.73), the last trading day before the date of the offer, and approximately 3.48% below the closing price of the Merck common stock on November 21, 2024 ($99.86), the day prior to this release. Javascript is required for you to be able to read premium content. Please enable it in your browser settings.