On the other hand, in the realm of low-risk financial products, Triumvirate Aurora is considering options such as money market funds, certificates of deposit (CDs), and high-grade government bonds. These instruments are known for their stability and security, making them ideal for investors looking to preserve their capital while earning a modest rate of return. By adopting a conservative approach and diversifying across various low-risk assets, Triumvirate Aurora seeks to minimize volatility and enhance its overall risk-adjusted returns.
Moreover, the failure to secure Ormeo's services would not only be a blow to Barcelona's ambitions on the field but could also have wider implications for the club's reputation and standing in the football world. Fans and critics alike would question the competence of the club's management and the missed opportunity to strengthen the squad with a promising talent.
Rally House Opens New Arkansas Storefront in Fort SmithMaura Higgins ‘punished’ by I’m A Celebrity bosses with ‘birthday from hell’ in camp
Mr. Liu Yang also took the opportunity to thank the school administration, his colleagues, and his students for their unwavering support and encouragement throughout his tenure. He expressed his gratitude for the opportunities he had been given to grow and develop as an educator, and for the memorable experiences he had shared with the school community. He emphasized that his decision to resign was a personal one, and did not reflect any dissatisfaction with his role or the school itself.The University of Colorado Boulder has created a free resource to help people recover their loved ones’ digital accounts or make plans for their own after death. The Digital Legacy Clinic at CU Boulder is a pro-bono service offered to the public to help with issues around digital legacy and online data accounts. They can help family members recover photos, emails and social media accounts belonging to a deceased loved one, and they can help people make an end-of-life plan for their own digital accounts. Jed Brubaker, the founder of the clinic and a CU Boulder professor, said the average internet user has about 190 online accounts and produces 850 gigabytes of data each year. “That’s a whole lot of photos, letters and personal history, and it would be a shame if that were lost,” Brubaker said. “And the truth is, the technology platforms just haven’t kept up with our end-of-life needs, so at the clinic, we’re here to bridge that gap.” Brubaker’s work has focused on the digital afterlife for 15 years. His work has directly informed the design and development of Facebook’s Legacy Contact, a feature that allows a user to select someone to manage their memorialized profile after their death. Without a feature like that, social media accounts that are inaccessible to anyone but their owner can exist long after that person has died, sending out routine birthday notifications, friend anniversary notices and memories. However, most technology platforms don’t allow users to name a beneficiary like they would in a financial account. “I think the tech sector is in need of some help to figure out what the best practices are so that every platform has some kind of support for end-of-life planning because most of them don’t right now,” Brubaker said. The clinic, which has a research and education focus, is partly funded by a $550,000 National Science Foundation grant. A team of specially-trained students respond to inquiries from clients and help them navigate digital accounts. Master’s student Rory O’Flynn helped develop the website for the clinic and has helped support a client. The client she worked with had a brother who died but still had portfolios online. She helped the client archive the brother’s photos, shut down part of the accounts and memorialize the rest privately for his family. “It was actually really cool,” O’Flynn said, adding, “It’s really, really interesting because it’s not something many people think of until it happens to them.” Digitized photos, videos, art, music, stories, blogs or professional work can all be lost after death. Losing it can be a loss of memories, and it can be devastating for loved ones. “It’s not just data,” Brubaker said. “There are personal stories, there are personal histories, there are family heritage. It’s hard to overstate the symbolic value of this.” The logistical burden of not being able to access those accounts can worsen stress and suffering when loved ones are already grieving. “It’s about reducing suffering and reducing extra areas of stress when someone is grieving, whether it’s grieving their eventual death or grieving the loss of a loved one,” doctoral student and researcher Dylan Thomas Doyle said. “When someone dies, there’s so many tasks and there’s so many emotions that come up.” Brubaker said many people don’t know how to talk about death. He hopes the clinic will help by providing clarity. “We can take them through the process and take them step by step and reduce the ambiguities and uncertainties and show them how to do this,” Brubaker said. The clinic is open to anyone of all ages. For more information or to request support, visit colorado.edu/center/digital-legacy .
As the newly-named host of the 2034 World Cup in men's soccer , Saudi Arabia says it will construct or renovate 15 stadiums, create a futuristic city and expand airports in a massive buildout to accommodate millions of athletes, coaches and spectators. That will emit tons of planet-warming greenhouse gases as concrete and steel are manufactured and transported, diesel-powered excavators and trucks move material and new buildings are powered and cooled. When all the emissions associated with the world's buildings are grouped together, they are the largest contributor to climate change . Constructing so many new venues is “environmentally wasteful in the extreme” because so much carbon will be emitted and scarce resources used, said Andrew Zimbalist, an economics professor at Smith College in Massachusetts who has written several books about the economics of mega sporting events. Zimbalist said the World Cup should be held in countries with a developed soccer culture and industry. Seth Warren Rose, founding director of the research organization Eneref Institute, said the world will be even hotter a decade from now, and can’t afford this added warming. “I’m sorry, but we’re living in a different planet. We have to prepare for that,” Rose said. “By 2034, we’ll be living in a different climate and that’s not a metaphor." Rose said his message to organizers is: Make a genuine effort to reduce emissions or don't host at all. Saudi Arabia’s plans will rely heavily on concrete, which is responsible for about 8% of worldwide emissions that warm the planet, with iron and steel accounting for another 7% . Human rights groups are concerned that giving the 2034 World Cup to Saudi Arabia will endanger migrant workers . In a bid book detailing its plans for development across five cities ahead of the World Cup, Saudi Arabia said three new stadiums are currently under construction and eight more are planned, to accommodate 2034's first-ever 48-team games. Buildings constructed for international sporting events often end up becoming “white elephant” venues that sit idle once games are over. The Saudi Arabian Football Federation did not respond to request for comment. Saudi Arabia has proposed 134 accommodations for teams and referees, new hotels, several fan festival locations, transportation expansions, including high-speed rail and further investment in its futuristic city of Neom . Much of what the nation included in its bid book relates to its Vision 2030 strategic plan, which the government calls a plan to diversify its economy and unlock new business opportunities. The bid does include sustainability initiatives, said Karim Elgendy, a fellow at London’s Chatham House think tank. Among them are running stadiums on clean electricity such as solar, using energy-efficient natural ventilation and shading and mandating green building standards. But Elgendy said the sheer scale of Saudi Arabia's apparent plans for the event, plus the distances between host cities suggest this could become the most carbon-intensive World Cup in history. Elgendy said how they mitigate this undertaking will determine the environmental impact and without measures, the event could have a carbon footprint that is almost twice the record set in 2022. In contrast, organizers of this summer’s Paris Olympics said this week they met their goal of cutting the games’ carbon footprint by half compared to 2012 and 2016. They did this using renewable energy, recycled materials, plant-based food options that are less carbon-intensive than meat and even powering the famous Olympic cauldron with electricity and lights rather than burning gas. To critics who suggest FIFA ought to have chosen a different host country, like the United Kingdom which has dozens of stadiums, Walker Ross, a researcher of sport ecology and sustainability at the University of Edinburgh points out the Saudi bid was the only one in a fast-tracked process. Story continues below video The next World Cup, in 2026, will span 16 cities across North America. Ross said that could have a significant carbon footprint, too, as teams and fans travel across an entire continent. The same could be said for the 2030 World Cup to be played across six countries. If anyone is at fault, it's FIFA, he said, because it's their bid process. Ross said he thinks locations shouldn’t be ruled out because they are hot or there aren’t a lot of stadiums. “People kind of throw their hands up in the air and act like there are certain countries that should and shouldn’t host when it comes to these events,” he said. “But if this sport is truly for the world, then we have to be open to everyone hosting.” Qatar went on a $200 billion construction spree , building seven stadiums, a new metro system, highways, high-rise buildings and a new city ahead of the 2022 event there. Organizers and FIFA projected it would produce some 3.6 million metric tons of carbon dioxide over the decade spent preparing for the tournament, or about 3% of Qatar’s total emissions in 2019, according to World Bank data. Experts say the Qatar event had the highest carbon emissions to date. Skeptics and outside experts said Qatar’s accounting that it hosted a ‘carbon neutral’ World Cup didn't encompass the event’s full carbon footprint . FIFA accepted Saudi Arabia’s sustainability and climate promises in an evaluation released in November , noting that “whilst the extent of construction would have a material environmental impact, the bid provides a good foundation for delivering mitigation measures to address some of the environment-related challenges.” FIFA directed The Associated Press to the evaluation Thursday when asked for additional comment. Saudi Arabia's emissions have been growing; it emitted 533 metric tons of carbon dioxide in 2022 , or 1.6% of global emissions, according to the International Energy Agency, and its fossil fuel production is skyrocketing. Renewable energy remains nearly nonexistent. The country has a goal to source at least half of its power from renewables by 2030 . “It appears that FIFA has learnt very little from the debacle with the World Cup in Qatar," said Khaled Diab, a spokesperson at Carbon Market Watch. Read more of AP’s climate coverage at http://www.apnews.com/climate-and-environment The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org .The shooting death of high-ranking UnitedHealth Group Inc. executive Brian Thompson has uncovered a deep anger among Americans who say the health insurance industry has too often failed to cover large medical bills and stood in the way of necessary care. “There’s clearly a sense of real discontent and distrust of the industry revealed in social media,” said Brian Klepper, principal of the Healthcare Performance Inc. consulting firm. “That’s not a healthy environment for an industry to prosper.” The reaction to the shooting is a wake-up call for sprawling companies that have seen their profits and stock prices rise over the past few years. Social media has given millions of Americans the means to amplify their long-simmering dissatisfaction with health insurers, and in the wake of Thompson’s death, X, Reddit, TikTok and other platforms lit up with hatred aimed at the industry. Kevin Farmer, a University of Florida orthopedics and sports medicine professor who posted on X about the shooting, said frustration with insurance is something doctors see every day. “I mean, what that can do to someone’s emotional thought process and reaction,” Farmer said. “They feel helpless.” The motive for Thompson’s killing remains unclear. New York police released images Thursday of a man they said is wanted in connection with the shooting and searched a Manhattan hostel where the person is believed to have stayed. No direct evidence has emerged to connect the shooting with any dispute over UnitedHealth’s business, though a shell casing and live ammunition round inscribed with “delay” and “depose” were recovered from the sidewalk at the midtown hotel where Thompson, 50, was attacked. The words echo complaints many American consumers have aired about long waits for insurers to pay medical bills and legal fights over claims. While the inscriptions suggest the shooting might be tied to an insurance dispute, investigators also have to consider whether they may be a distraction designed to divert from the true motive, said Joseph Giacalone, a former New York Police Department sergeant who’s now a professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice. “They are going to take everything seriously but have to have an open mind that this could be a potential ruse,” he said. Though insurers have rarely discussed it publicly, concerns that a frustrated policyholder could turn to violence have long percolated within the industry. Former health-insurance executive Michael Sherman said when he worked at Humana Inc. more than a decade ago the company had built “safe rooms” for executives at its Louisville, Kentucky, headquarters. Later, when he became the chief medical officer at Point32Health, he said the nonprofit insurer based in Massachusetts installed a panic button under his desk and hired private security for the executive suite. Still, Sherman said the idea that an insurance executive could be targeted by a killer was largely unthinkable. “People are shocked,” he said. “This is shaking people up and causing them to think more about the implications of these decisions, and perhaps the need for more security.” Humana declined to comment on its security procedures. Security steps Thompson’s killing should compel insurers to reexamine their security measures, from increasing surveillance of executives’ parking spots to adding panic buttons and bullet-resistant safe rooms to their executive suites, said Paul Sarnese, the former president of the International Association for Healthcare Security and Safety, an organization dedicated to protecting the health-care industry. UnitedHealth had a security team at the New York Hilton Midtown hotel for its investor day, but it didn’t have anyone stationed outside where the executive was shot, according to a person familiar with the matter. The company didn’t comment on the security situation. Sarnese said threats against health-care workers in general have increased since the COVID-19 pandemic, when many Americans grew disillusioned with recommendations about masking, isolating while sick and vaccines. Health insurers, who in the routine course of their business make millions of decisions every year that can have profound effects on people’s physical and financial wellbeing, are especially likely to elicit emotional responses from the public. A Gallup survey last fall asked respondents what they thought of the services provided by health insurers. Sixty-eight percent gave ratings of “only fair” or “poor.” Only 5 percent said it was “excellent.” “Imagine having a pre-existing condition and being denied your medical care,” Sarnese said. “You’re not only putting all this stress on someone who has a medical condition, but now you’re putting financial stress on their families. That stress can really push someone to threaten executives or act upon their threats.” The online vitriol generated by the Thompson shooting spilled into policy decisions by other insurers. Former Washington Post writer Taylor Lorenz generated an outcry after she posted on Bluesky Wednesday about a policy change from some units of Elevance Health Inc. that doctors said would limit coverage if operations ran long. “And people wonder why we want these executives dead,” she wrote. On Thursday, Elevance backtracked. “There has been significant widespread misinformation about an update to our anesthesia policy,” Elevance spokesperson Leslie Porras said. “As a result, we have decided to not proceed with this policy change. To be clear, it never was and never will be the policy of Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield to not pay for medically necessary anesthesia services.” Several hours after the shooting on Wednesday, Sarah London, chief executive officer of health insurer Centene Corp. pulled out of a planned appearance at a conference sponsored by Forbes in New York. London canceled out of respect for Thompson, not because of security concerns, according to a person familiar with the matter. Centene’s investor day that was scheduled to be held in person next week was moved online. Centene declined to comment on its security procedures. Industry officials defended the role that insurers play in the health-care system and said that the wave of hate that bubbled up on social media in the aftermath of Thompson’s killing was unwarranted. “The people in our industry are mission-driven professionals working to make coverage and care as affordable as possible and to help people navigate the complex medical system,” Mike Tuffin, president and CEO of trade group America’s Health Insurance Plans, said in a statement. “We condemn any suggestion that threats against our colleagues — or anyone else in our country — are ever acceptable.” Lightning rod UnitedHealth is one of the largest health care conglomerates in the U.S., housing the UnitedHealthcare insurance business that Thompson led, as well as vast operations focused on managing drug benefits and doctors’ offices. As a result of that broad reach, it has become a frequent target for criticism. The company was among a group of insurers that was slammed in a Senate report earlier this year for using automated tools to increase claim denials. The rate at which the company denied prior authorization for post-acute care more than doubled from 2020 to 2022, the Senate report found. In February, Bloomberg reported that the Department of Justice had opened an antitrust investigation into the company. Last month, the U.S. sued to block its $3.3 billion purchase of Amedisys Inc. over concerns the deal would harm competition in the market for home-health and hospice services. Also this year, the company’s Change Healthcare technology business was the target of hackers who gained access to the medical and other personal information of millions of Americans.Gananoque council hears about Supportive Cabins
In contrast to the overall CPI trend, the NBS reported a 0.1% decrease in housing prices in November. This decline in housing prices could be attributed to various factors, including government policies aimed at stabilizing the real estate market and cooling off property speculation. Additionally, the ongoing impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the housing sector may have also played a role in moderating price growth.
Wang Chuqin's response to Ma Long's challenge demonstrates his commitment to upholding the principles of fairness and sportsmanship in his pursuit of excellence. By acknowledging the concerns raised by his opponent and expressing his willingness to work towards a more level playing field, Wang Chuqin is setting a positive example for the entire table tennis community.Get it before it's gone: LG's B4 OLED drops to $599.99 in unbelievable Black Friday deal