Chitkara University hosts 17th International Accreditation Conference
As the countdown to the BOJ's speech and press conference begins, market participants are closely monitoring developments and adjusting their investment strategies accordingly. Traders are preparing for potential volatility in the currency and bond markets, while equity investors are weighing the potential impact of a rate hike on Japanese stocks.
CLEVELAND (AP) — The NFL has closed an investigation into sexual assault allegations against Cleveland Browns quarterback Deshaun Watson, who is ending the season on injured reserve for the second year in a row. The league , trying to determine whether Watson should be punished. “The matter is closed,” league spokesman Brian McCarthy said Friday in an email to The Associated Press. “There was insufficient evidence to support a finding of a violation of the personal conduct policy.” Watson, who served an 11-game suspension in 2022, was accused of assault in Texas by a woman in September. She was seeking more than $1 million in damages before the sides reached a confidential settlement. Watson strongly denied the allegations through his attorney, Rusty Hardin. The 29-year-old Watson suffered a season-ending Achilles tendon rupture in October. He’s been rehabbing the injury in hopes of returning next season. The Browns still owe Watson $46 million in each of the next two seasons after they traded three first-round picks to Houston and signed him to a five-year, fully guaranteed $230 million contract that has backfired. Watson has only played in 19 games over three seasons due to the suspension and injuries. He was acquired by the Browns, who were comfortable with his character despite Watson being accused of sexual assault and inappropriate conduct during massage therapy sessions while he played for the Texans. While he’s in the clear with the league, Watson’s future with Cleveland isn’t so certain. His massive contract — and its salary-cap ramifications — has put the Browns in a bind in terms of trying to improve their roster. Cleveland has had a disappointing season after making the playoffs a year ago and could move on from Watson, but the cost would be exorbitant if the team just releases him. The Browns signed Jameis Winston for one season to be Watson’s backup. Winston has gone 2-3 as a starter since taking over and he’s put some life into Cleveland’s offense, which didn’t score 20 points or gain 300 yards with Watson before his injury. His 2023 season was ended by a broken bone in his shoulder, requiring surgery. Winston has indicated he would come back, and he could be a viable option as a starter even if the Browns draft a young QB. ___ AP NFL: Tom Withers, The Associated Press
Celebrating 10 Years of PlayStation in China, Giving Away a PS5 Every Five Minutes!Mumbai: The coastal belt of Maharashtra comprising the Konkan and the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) excluding Mumbai was once a stronghold of the Shiv Sena. Its founder Bal Thackeray enjoyed unparalleled clout in the region for decades, thanks to many leaders and cadres who lived there. But the 2024 assembly polls have shown that the hold of the Thackerays has weakened considerably. Out of 39 seats in Konkan and MMR, the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena (UBT) could win only one seat. The opposition Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) alliance, of which Shiv Sena (UBT) is a part, also fared poorly, with NCP (SP), Samajwadi Party and Communist Party of India (Marxist) [CPI(M)] winning one seat each. The remaining 35 seats were won by the ruling Mahayuti alliance, with BJP, Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena and Ajit Pawar-led NCP bagging 16, 16 and 3 seats respectively. In the Lok Sabha polls held earlier this year, the Narendra Modi-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) had bagged five out of six seats in the region. The BJP won in Ratnagiri-Sindhudurg and Palghar, the Shiv Sena in Thane and Kalyan, and the NCP in Raigad while the Bhiwandi parliamentary was bagged by NCP (SP). The Mahayuti’s stellar performance in the assembly polls could be attributed partly to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), which has a good network in the coastal belt. The RSS actively helped the BJP in Konkan and MMR, while CM Shinde, who started his political career in this belt, provided candidates with adequate funds and resources and played a key role in securing Shiv Sena’s hold over Thane and Palghar. The Mahayuti won 16 out of 18 seats in Thane district where Shinde’s men control most civic bodies, while the Kalwa and Bhiwandi seats were won by NCP (SP)’s Jitendra Awhad and Samajwadi Party’s Raees Shaikh, respectively. Shinde himself won by a massive margin of 120,000 votes from the Kopri-Panchpakhadi constituency while the Thane city and Ovala Majiwada seats were bagged by BJP’s Sanjay Kelkar and Shiv Sena’s Pratap Sarnaik, respectively. In Mira Bhayander, BJP’s Narendra Mehta defeated the Congress’s Muazaffar Hussain by a margin of over 144,000 votes despite the sitting Shiv Sena MLA Geeta Jain contesting as an independent. In Navi Mumbai, where the Naik family holds considerable clout, BJP’s Ganesh Naik won from Airoli while his son Sandeep Naik, who crossed over to the NCP (SP) prior to the polls, was defeated in Belapur by BJP’s Manda Mhatre by a slender margin of 377 votes. In Palghar district adjoining Gujarat, which has six assembly segments, the Bahujan Vikas Aghadi (BVA) lost in all seats despite having three sitting MLAs – Hitendra Thakur from Vasai, Kshitij Thakur from Nalasopara and Rajesh Patil from Boisar. On Tuesday, a day before polling, BVA chief Hitendra Thakur had alleged that senior BJP leader Vinod Tawde was camping in a hotel in Virar to distribute money among voters to help the Nalasopara BJP candidate Rajan Naik. While Tawde, Naik and their supporters were booked for violating the model code of conduct, on Saturday, Naik emerged victorious, defeating Kshitij Thakur by over 36,000 votes. Hitendra Thakur, who lost to BJP’s Sneha Dube Pandit in Vasai, said, “God alone knows what went wrong.” Of the six seats in Palghar, the BJP and Shiv Sena won three and two seats respectively, while the Dahanu seat was bagged by CPI (M)’s Vinod Nikole by over 100,000 votes. In the coastal district of Sindhudurg, where the undivided Sena’s clout reduced considerably after Narayan Rane left the party in 2005, the Mahayuti won all three seats. Rane’s elder son Nilesh, who crossed over from the BJP to the Shiv Sena prior to the polls and was fielded from Kudal, defeated two-time Shiv Sena (UBT) MLA Vaibhav Naik, while his younger son Nitesh, who contested from Kankavli on a BJP ticket, defeated Shiv Sena (UBT)’s Sandesh Parkar. The Sawantwadi seat was bagged by Shiv Sena leader and education minister Deepak Kesarkar. In Ratnagiri district, Shiv Sena leader and industries minister Uday Samant won his fifth straight term from the Ratnagiri segment while his brother Kiran Samant, a builder from Mumbai who made his electoral debut in this election, won from Rajapur. In Chiplun, sitting NCP MLA Shekhar Nikam defeated NCP (SP)’s Prashant Yadav while in Dapoli, sitting Shiv Sena MLA Yogesh Kadam defeated Shiv Sena (UBT)’s Vasant Kadam. Shiv Sena (UBT)’s Bhaskar Jadhav defeated Shiv Sena’s Ramesh Bendal in Guhagar, handing MVA the only seat in south Konkan. In Raigad district in the MMR, the Peasants and Workers Party bagged two seats while NCP state president Sunil Tatkare’s daughter Aditi Tatkare defeated NCP (SP)’s Anil Nagavane in Shrivardan. In Mahad, Shiv Sena chief whip Bharat Gogavale defeated Shiv Sena (UBT)’s Snehal Jagtap. In Karjat, sitting Shiv Sena MLA Mahendra Thorve defeated independent candidate Sudhakar Ghare while in Panvel, sitting BJP MLA Prashant Thakur defeated BD Patil from the Peasants and Workers Party. BJP’s Mahesh Baldi retained his seat in Uran.None
A second half brace from Sam Field ensured the home side collected all three points, but it was a tame attacking performance from United, who managed just one shot on target throughout the game. The U’s have now won just one of their last 14 Sky Bet Championship matches, and dropped to 20th in the table ahead of Saturday’s home clash against 12th-placed Sheffield Wednesday. Buckingham said after the Loftus Road defeat: “We played some really good football and got into the final third several times, and just lacked that cutting edge in the final third, which comes back to haunt you, whether it’s a mistake for the goal or otherwise. “You make it a bit more difficult for yourselves, but there were some really good moments, certainly in the first half when we got into the areas we wanted to get into. “There just wasn’t that crispness that we’ve seen in previous games. “When their first goal goes in, especially when we had what we felt was good control in the game, certainly in that first half until the 53rd minute when their goal went in. “It changes the momentum of the game and changes what the game looks like, and you almost feel like you’ve been hard done by. “It’s about making sure you keep doing what you’re good at, and what’s got you to that. “We concede a very sloppy second goal and then change a few things to try and get ourselves back in the game. “It becomes scrappy and it’s not the result that we wanted. What we do need to do is make sure that good build-up play that we had, we have to add that final third to it, and there’s an opportunity to do that on Saturday. “We don’t want to lose any game. We’ve come to a team that have picked up in the last four games and have picked up some good results. “We came here on Saturday and watched them play, they beat Norwich 3-0 and saw what they can do. “But we’ve got a long way to go this season. What we can’t do is sit and feel sorry for ourselves, and beat ourselves up. “We have to stick together and this is what this group is very good at. We need to make sure we add the final bits in. “From a performance point of view, the most important is the goalscoring element to it.”
DWP warn 318,000 households benefits may be cut by not doing one thingKroger and Albertsons' plan for the largest U.S. supermarket merger in history crumbled Wednesday, with Albertsons pulling out of the $24.6 billion deal and the two companies accusing each other of not doing enough to push their proposed alliance through. Albertsons said it had filed a lawsuit against Kroger, seeking a $600 million termination fee as well as billions of dollars in legal fees and lost shareholder value. Kroger said the claims were “baseless” and that Albertsons was not entitled to the fee. “After reviewing options, the company determined it is no longer in its best interests to pursue the merger,” Kroger said in a statement Wednesday. The bitter breakup came the day after two judges halted the proposed merger in separate court cases. U.S. District Court Judge Adrienne Nelson in Oregon issued a preliminary injunction Tuesday blocking the merger until an in-house judge at the Federal Trade Commission could consider the matter. An hour later, Superior Court Judge Marshall Ferguson in Seattle issued a permanent injunction barring the merger . Ferguson ruled that combining Albertsons and Kroger would lessen competition and violate consumer-protection laws. The companies could have appealed the rulings or proceeded to the in-house FTC hearings. Albertsons' decision to pull out of deal instead surprised some industry experts. “I’m in a state of professional and commercial shock that they would take this scorched earth approach,” said Burt Flickinger, a longtime analyst and owner of retail consulting firm Strategic Resource Group. “The logical thing would have been for Albertsons to let the decision sink in for a day and then meet and see what could be done. But the lawsuit seems to make that a moot issue.” Albertsons is unlikely to find another merger partner because it has significant debt and underperforming stores in most of its markets., Flickinger said. Consumers will feel the most immediate impact of the deal's demise, he said, since Albertsons charges 12% to 14% more than Kroger and other grocery rivals. “They had so much debt they had to pay it off it's reflected in their pricing and promotional structure,” Flickinger said. Albertsons CEO Vivek Sankaran testified during the federal hearing in September that his company might consider “structural options” like laying off employees, closing stores and exiting certain markets if the merger with Kroger didn’t go through. “I would have to consider that,” he said. “It’s a dramatically different picture with the merger than without it.” But in a statement Wednesday, Sankaran said Albertsons would “start this next chapter in strong financial condition with a track record of positive business performance." In the company's most recent quarter, Albertsons' revenue rose 1% to $18.5 billion and it reported $7.9 billion in debt. Kroger said it would also move forward in a strong financial position, with revenue down slightly to $33.6 billion in its most recent quarter. The company announced a $7.5 billion share buyback program Wednesday after a two-year pause. Kroger and Albertsons first proposed the merger in 2022 . They argued that combining would help them better compete with big retailers like Walmart, Costco and Amazon, which are gaining an increasing share of U.S. grocery sales. Together, Kroger and Albertsons would control around 13% of the U.S. grocery market. Walmart controls around 22%. Under the merger agreement, Kroger and Albertsons — who compete in 22 states — agreed to sell 579 stores in places where their locations overlap to C&S Wholesale Grocers , a New Hampshire-based supplier to independent supermarkets that also owns the Grand Union and Piggly Wiggly store brands. But the Federal Trade Commission and two states — Washington and Colorado — sued to block the merger earlier this year, saying it would raise prices and lower workers' wages by eliminating competition. It also said the divestiture plan was inadequate and that C&S was ill-equipped to take on so many stores. On Wednesday, Albertsons said that Kroger failed to exercise “best efforts” and to take “any and all actions” to secure regulatory approval of the companies’ agreed merger transaction. Albertsons said Kroger refused to divest the assets necessary for antitrust approval, ignored regulators' feedback and rejected divestiture buyers that would have been stronger than C&S. “Kroger’s self-serving conduct, taken at the expense of Albertsons and the agreed transaction, has harmed Albertsons’ shareholders, associates and consumers,” said Tom Moriarty, Albertsons’ general counsel, in a statement. Kroger said that it disagrees with Albertsons “in the strongest possible terms.” It said early Wednesday that Albertsons was responsible for “repeated intentional material breaches and interference throughout the merger process.” Kroger , based in Cincinnati, Ohio, operates 2,800 stores in 35 states, including brands like Ralphs, Smith’s and Harris Teeter. Albertsons , based in Boise, Idaho, operates 2,273 stores in 34 states, including brands like Safeway, Jewel Osco and Shaw’s. Together, the companies employ around 710,000 people. Kroger sued the FTC in August in federal court in Ohio, claiming that the federal agency’s in-house administrative hearings were unlawful because the FTC was also able to challenge the merger in federal court in Oregon. In paperwork filed Wednesday, the FTC said it expected to update the court on its next steps in that case by Dec. 17. In Colorado, which also sued to block the merger, Attorney General Phil Weiser said Tuesday that he still was awaiting a decision from a state judge. In that case, Colorado also was challenging an allegedly illegal no-poach agreement Kroger and Albertsons made during a 2022 strike. Shares of Albertsons fell 1.5% Wednesday, while Kroger's stock was up 1%.