Town Hall News

By Amruta Khandekar and Ankika Biswas (Reuters) -Wall Street’s main indexes cut gains on Monday as investors assessed risks to the banking sector following a buyout deal for Silicon Valley Bank’s assets, while a rise in Treasury yields pressured rate-sensitive technology and other growth stocks. First Citizens BancShares Inc will acquire parts of Silicon Valley Bank, which collapsed earlier this month in the largest bank failure since the 2008 financial […]

By Scott Murdoch and Mehnaz Yasmin (Reuters) – U.S. regulators said on Monday they would backstop a deal for regional lender First Citizens BancShares to acquire failed Silicon Valley Bank, triggering an estimated $20 billion hit to a government-run insurance fund. The deal comes after the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) took over Silicon Valley Bank on March 10 after depositors rushed to pull out their money in a bank […]

By Kanishka Singh and Katharine Jackson WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Joe Biden would veto a Republican energy legislation package if it were to pass Congress, citing cost increases that the legislation could lead to, the White House said on Monday. “H.R. 1 (Lower Energy Costs Act) would double the cost of energy efficiency upgrades that families need to reduce household bills and would repeal the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund that […]

(Reuters) – Jounce Therapeutics Inc on Monday agreed to be acquired by privately held Concentra Biosciences for $96.46 million, while spurning a merger deal with British biotech firm Redx Pharma. The new Concentra deal also involves a workforce reduction of about 84% of Jounce’s employees, compared to about 57% as part of the Redx deal, Jounce said in a statement. The deal with Concentra, which is controlled by Jounce investor […]

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – BioNTech plans to spend up to about 1 billion euros ($1.1 billion) more on research and development and buy back up to $500 million more of its shares this year, drawing on more than 21 billion euros from the now waning commercial success of its COVID-19 vaccine. In a statement on Monday, Germany’s BioNTech, Pfizer’s partner on the Comirnaty vaccine, said it plans to spend 2.4 to […]

By Scott Murdoch, Susan Mathew and Amruta Khandekar (Reuters) – The sale of failed Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) to a regional U.S. peer and reports of a possible expansion of funding lifelines lifted banking stocks on Monday, easing worries about systemic stress and a looming credit crunch. The sudden collapse of start-up focused SVB earlier this month after a bank run has triggered the worst banking shock since the 2008 […]

By Francis Kokoroko ACCRA (Reuters) -The United States will provide $100 million to Ghana and four other West African countries to help them deal with violent extremism and instability, Vice President Kamala Harris said on Monday during a visit to Ghana. Harris was in Accra at the start of a week-long, three-nation African tour, the latest in a series of visits by senior U.S. officials as Washington seeks to counter […]

By Michael Holden and Sam Tobin LONDON (Reuters) -Britain’s Prince Harry and singer Elton John made a surprise appearance at London’s High Court on Monday as they and five others began a lawsuit against the publisher of the Daily Mail paper over years of alleged phone-tapping and privacy breaches. Harry, the younger son of King Charles, has brought a lawsuit against Associated Newspapers (ANL), along with John, his husband David […]

By Will Dunham (Reuters) – Glass beads spawned in violent impacts from space rocks on the lunar surface have been found to have water trapped inside, offering what scientists describe as a potential reservoir of this precious resource for future human activities on the moon. Scientists said on Monday an analysis of lunar soil samples retrieved in 2020 during China’s robotic Chang’e-5 mission showed that these spheres of glass – […]