Business, Financial & Legal News - Page 1

The end of the coronavirus pandemic is in sight, and as vaccinations roll out around the country, many are wondering when the spread of the virus will stop.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has predicted that over the next three weeks, an additional 92,000 Americans may die from COVID-19. With terrifying numbers such as these, many Americans are wondering when the pandemic will come to an end and normal life return.

According to one Food and Drug Administration (FDA) official, there is hope on the horizon, and it's not that far away. Dr. Paul Offit, a member of the FDA's Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee, recently appeared in an interview with CNN and said, "I really do think that by June, we can stop the spread of this virus." If you are interested in reading more about this story, check out this link here.

Coronavirus relief packages in the form of stimulus checks are being rolled out to Americans, but now more money will be heading into struggling American pockets.

Joe Biden has said that once Democrats control the Senate, the first thing on his priority list is pushing through $2,000 stimulus checks for Americans that have been affected by the coronavirus pandemic. Biden has said that once he takes office that there will be more relief on the way to Americans, and this week we will find out the details of that plan.

On Thursday, Biden unveiled a $1.9 trillion relief package that includes additional $1,400 stimulus checks for Americans. The reason that this package includes $1,400 checks is that eligible people have already received the $600 "down-payment", and this $1,400 will make up the remainder, equaling $2,000. Biden said during his speech Thursday, "We will finish the job of getting a total of $2,000 in cash relief to people who need it the most. The $600 already appropriated is simply not enough."

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) is going all-in on next-gen, with the company planning to spend $28 billion increasing the capacity of its plants -- amid the most demand for its technology ever.

TSMC said during a recent Q4 2020 earnings call that the company will see a 50% increase in capacity investments in 2021 compared to 2020. The demand for chips is at fever pitch -- AMD with countless products (Zen 3 + RDNA 2 + EPYC + Ryzen Threadripper) as well as the semi-custom designs for the Sony PS5 and Microsoft Xbox Series X/S products, new chips from Intel, chips for Apple, chips for Qualcomm, and chips for many of the world's largest tech companies.

Brian Bandsma, a portfolio manager at Vontobel Asset Management said: "Usually, historically, when you see TSMC's capital expenditure numbers, it's a good leading indicator of how they are seeing demand. They are very conservative about their capital expenditures number. They're not going to be overly aggressive".

• Read more: TSMC rumored to make Intel 5nm CPUs in 2021, high-end 3nm CPUs in 2022

Qualcomm has just acquired Nuvia for $1.4 billion, an acquisition that sees former engineers and chip experts from companies like Apple, moving into the warm arms of the Team Snapdragon.

Nuvia co-founders Gerard Williams, Manu Gulati, and John Bruno are joining Qualcomm through the acquisition, where Qualcomm will use its Nuvia chips "across Qualcomm Technologies' broad portfolio of products". Qualcomm has plans to use Nuvia technology inside of data centers, smartphones, laptops, vehicles, and more.

Qualcomm said in a statement: "5G is further accelerating the convergence of mobility and computing. The acquisition of Nuvia builds on Qualcomm Technologies' Snapdragon technology leadership, delivering step-function improvements in CPU performance and power efficiency to meet the demands of next-generation 5G computing".

Intel CEO Bob Swan joined the team 2 years ago now, but has just announced that he will be stepping down from his position on February 15, 2021.

The new CEO stepping up to the plate is the current CEO of VMWare and 30-year of Intel, Pat Gelsinger, who also helped design the original 80486 CPU. Intel Executive Chairman Omar Ishrak talks only praise of Gelsinger, saying he has a "distinguished track record of innovation, talent development and a deep knowledge of Intel". Ishrak adds that the Intel board is hoping the new CEO will use his expertise to hep the company through a "critical period of transformation" from a "CPU to a multi-architecture XPU company".

Gelsinger explained in a post on the Intel website: "I am thrilled and humbled to be returning to Intel as CEO. I was 18 years old when I joined Intel, fresh out of the Lincoln Technical Institute. Over the next 30 years of my tenure at Intel, I had the honor to be mentored at the feet of Grove, Noyce and Moore. Intel then helped me continue my education at Santa Clara University and Stanford University. The company also gave me the opportunity to work on the forefront of silicon innovation with the best and brightest talent in the industry".

You can read the rest from Pat, here.

If you are patiently waiting for your coronavirus stimulus check, you really need to pay attention to the most common scams that are going away now as you could lose your much needed stimulus within seconds.

An announcement from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has revealed that Americans have lost over $211 million to COVID-19 scams and stimulus payment fraud. Additionally, the FTC has said that since the beginning of January it has received 275,600 complaints regarding scams. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is expected to complete the $600 stimulus injections to struggling Americans by January 15th.

So, what kind of scams are going around now that could lose you your stimulus check? Well, many scammers are committing fraud and are impersonating government bodies such as the IRS. Through this impersonation people are handing over their critical information that leads to them being scammed out of their stimulus money. In the entirety of this article is a list that consists of the top five most common stimulus check scams.

GM is taking a very confident step into the future with a new modernized logo, changing up its 50+ year logo with underlined all-caps white letting on a blue square.

The new GM logo is a lowercase "gm" on a white background, insider of a square with newer, modernized rounded corners. Ooooh. There are three color variants -- ooooh again, with solid blue, solid black, and a blue gradient. You can see it above, while GM says the new logo evokes "the clean skies of a zero-emissions future" and the "energy" of its new Ultium battery tech.

Not only do we have a new GM logo, but the company has kick started the marketing campaign for its Ultium platform, with the company relaunching its website on January 11.

Parler CEO John Matze has confirmed that Amazon is shutting down all of their servers, which are connected to Amazon Web Services (AWS) and if it can't find a new host before then, Parler goes dark.

Apple has removed the Parler app from the Apple App Store, so too has Google from its Play Store -- and now Amazon removing Parler from AWS and being online at all. Amazon will pull their servers sometime today, unless Parler has a new host in the coming hours.

Why is Parler being wiped off of AWS? In an email received by BuzzFeed News, a member of Amazon Web Services Trust and Safety team told Parler "it violated its terms and services, adding that Amazon is unconvinced Parler will be able to effectively moderate its platform relying only on a team of volunteers".

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has limited time to send out the $600 coronavirus stimulus checks to struggling Americans, but if you live in this state, you may get a second $600 stimulus check.

The IRS has around a week to finish issuing $600 stimulus checks out to Americans that have been affected by the coronavirus pandemic. After the checks have been sent out, all eyes will be on Congress to see if President-elect Joe Biden's promise of $2,000 stimulus checks will happen once he takes office. While that may still be some time away, if you live in this state, you may get another $600 stimulus check much sooner.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom has issued a new budget proposal that would provide $600 stimulus payments to about 4 million low-income residents of the state. The proposal was announced this past Wednesday, and if passed, the criteria to receive a payment would be people who earn $30,000 a year or less. Additionally, the proposal would include undocumented immigrants who file state taxes. On top of the stimulus payments, Newson is called for an extension on the ban on evictions.

President Trump was banned from Twitter yesterday, with Twitter banning him for 12 hours -- and Facebook quickly following, banning President Trump for 24 hours.

Faceobok imposed the new restrictions on Donald Trump for 24 hours citing "two policy violations", with Facebook saying in a statement: "We've assessed two policy violations against President Trump's Page which will result in a 24-hour feature block, meaning he will lose the ability to post on the platform during that time".

An Instagram executive said that the Facebook ban would extend to President Trump and his Instagram account, since Facebook owns Instagram. In an earlier statement, Facebook said they were "appalled by the violence at the Capitol" and "treating these events as an emergency".