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Ticker: Another rally sends Wall Street nearly 16% higher for the first half of the year

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:11:12 GMT

Wall Street blazed to another rally to cap a winning week, month and first half of the year after reports suggested pressure on inflation may be easing. The S&P 500 jumped 1.2% Friday to reach its highest level since April 2022.It surged 15.9% in the first half of the year. The Dow rose 0.8% and the Nasdaq composite added 1.4%. The market has rallied through 2023 in part because the economy has been able to avoid a long-predicted recession.Wall Street also hopes inflation is easing enough for the Federal Reserve to soon halt its hikes to rates, though an index monitored by the Federal Reserve tumbled last month to its lowest level since April 2021, pulled down by lower gas prices and slower-rising food costs.At the same time, consumers barely increased their spending last month, boosting it just 0.1%, after a solid 0.6% gain in April. The inflation index showed that prices rose 3.8% in May from 12 months earlier, down sharply from a 4.4% year-over-year surge in April.It’s almost...

Coach Marty Pierce, former players bid Matignon an emotional goodbye

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:11:12 GMT

CAMBRIDGE — The locks on the doors all around the recently-closed Matignon School were in the middle of getting changed out Friday afternoon, and access to a microphone was out of the picture.But all it took was a couple weeks of spreading the word, and a propped-open door, for several dozen former members of the historic boys hockey program to come together one last time inside the Warriors’ gymnasium – honoring everything the longtime power accomplished.Matignon athletic director Mike Lahiff spoke for a few minutes after the group of about 70 people took a photo together inside the small gym, and legendary retired coach Marty Pierce read a five-minute prepared speech.Pierce frequently describes his 40-year tenure – which included 10 state championships, 20 league titles and a large collection of sold-out games at the Boston Garden – as “magical times.”Add this moment to the list.“The old players, the new players, the more recent players at the end of my career; t...

MASN adds three broadcasters, including former Orioles Brad Brach and Mike Devereaux

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:11:12 GMT

The Mid-Atlantic Sports Network on Friday announced the addition of former Orioles Brad Brach and Mike Devereaux and Baltimore reporter Jason La Canfora to its broadcast team.Brach and Devereaux will join the booth for a select number of Orioles games as a second analyst alongside Ben McDonald or Jim Palmer, while La Canfora joins as a contributor on game broadcasts and the “O’s Xtra” pre- and postgame shows.Brach pitched 11 seasons in the major leagues with six teams, including the Orioles, with whom he was an All-Star in 2016. He recorded 32 saves and a 2.99 ERA in 288 games with Baltimore, helping the team win the American League East in 2014 and earn a postseason berth in 2016. He was traded to the Atlanta Braves during the 2018 season as the team started its rebuild and retired in 2022.Devereaux spent seven of his 12 MLB seasons in Baltimore, hitting .251/.307/.404 with 94 home runs, 138 doubles and 403 RBIs, and was inducted into the Orioles Hall of Fame in 2...

Revolution face big test at first-place FC Cincinnati

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:11:12 GMT

The New England Revolution will take their midterm exam at a hostile house in Ohio where making the grade is a problematic endeavor.The surging Revolution (10-3-6), winners of three straight and unbeaten in the last six, will engage Eastern Conference-leading FC Cincinnati (13-2-4) on Saturday night (7:30) at TQL Stadium. The Revolution just swept a three-game homestand where they outscored their opponents 8-3 and took over second place in the conference.“It should be a good game, they have been the best team in the conference to date,” said Revolution head coach and sporting director Bruce Arena. “They have a really good group of players and an exceptional one in (Luciano) Acosta.“Just a good overall team, a solid team. They work really hard for each other and they have a great stadium with a capacity crowd every game. They are 10-0 at home this season so it is going to be a challenge.”The Revolution and FC Cincinnati scuffled to a 1-1 draw in their first meeting on April 29 at Gil...

South Boston man charged with shooting, killing woman in Dorchester

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:11:12 GMT

A South Boston man was arrested and charged with shooting a 32-year-old woman to death in Dorchester last February, police said.Stepheon Wells, 20, was arrested Friday morning by members of the Boston Police Fugitive Unit on a murder warrant out of Dorchester District Court.Wells is accused of killing Diva Ayuso, of Sharon, on the evening of Saturday, Feb. 18.He was arraigned on murder and firearms-related charges Friday in Dorchester District Court, and was ordered held without bail, the Suffolk District Attorney’s office said.Boston Police said Ayuso was shot multiple times in the area of 15 Fermoy Heights in Dorchester, and was pronounced dead at the scene. Officers had responded to a “ShotSpotter activation” at approximately 8:46 p.m., the department said.“As the officers were looking for ballistic evidence, the officers were notified by a witness that a person was down in the Franklin Hill Green park,” the police report states. “The officers rushed to the victim and rendered ai...

Youths clash with French police, loot stores in 4th day of riots triggered by fatal police shooting

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:11:12 GMT

By SYLVIE CORBET, JOHN LEICESTER and ALEX TURNBULL (Associated Press)PARIS (AP) — Young rioters clashed with police and looted stores across France Friday in a fourth day of violence triggered by the deadly police shooting of a teen, piling more pressure on President Emmanuel Macron after he appealed to parents to keep children off the streets and blamed social media for fueling unrest.Despite repeated government appeals for calm and stiffer policing after successive nights of unrest, Friday saw brazen daylight unrest, too. An Apple store was looted in the eastern city of Strasbourg, where police fired tear gas, and the windows of a fast-food outlet were smashed in a Paris-area shopping mall, where officers also repelled people trying to break into a shuttered store, authorities said.The southern port city of Marseille, initially spared the violence that broke out first in the Paris region, was experiencing its second night of unrest. Even before nightfall, young people hurled...

First smoky air, now clouds of bugs. Winged aphids invade New York City

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:11:12 GMT

By BOBBY CAINA CALVAN (Associated Press)NEW YORK (AP) — By the time Martin DuPain got back home from a short walk Thursday afternoon, he was covered with a smattering of tiny flying critters. They were in his hair, on his shirt and in his nose.When he sneezed, the bugs came flying out.As if the smoke and haze sweeping in from wildfires in Canada weren’t enough, New York City has been invaded in recent days with plumes of flying insects that have become both a nuisance and a source of fascination — what were they, where’d they come from and will they ever go away? Another unwanted Canadian export?At first, DuPain, who lives in Queens, thought it might have been wind-driven ash, but he soon found out otherwise. Some were alive and flying. He quickly jumped in the shower.The startling scene was nothing short of a “gnatural disaster,” quipped a post on Twitter, which has been abuzz with reports of swarms in some neighborhoods, while others remain bug-...

Biden plots new course to get relief for student borrowers

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:11:12 GMT

(The Hill) – On Friday, President Biden announced the next actions his administration intends to take to protect student loan borrowers following the Supreme Court ruling that struck down his student debt relief plan.On Friday, Biden announced two prongs of the White House's next tactics for student debt, which include 1) a new approach of forgiveness under the Higher Education Act and 2) the creation of a temporary 12-month On-Ramp Repayment Program. Supreme Court blocks student loan forgiveness: What should borrowers do now? While details are slim so far, Biden explained that approaching student debt relief under the umbrella of the Higher Education Act will allow U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona to forgive "compromise, waive or release" certain student loans. Biden said that while this path will take much longer, the administration is "moving on it."This path will require a public comment and notice period before it could go into effect. Biden did not offer further de...

New California Assembly speaker pledges to tackle the state’s biggest issues

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:11:12 GMT

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Assemblymember Robert Rivas was sworn in Friday as the next speaker of California’s state Assembly, becoming the first lawmaker from a rural district to hold the powerful office in the state’s modern history. Rivas, a 43-year-old Democrat representing the agricultural Central Coast area, replaces former Speaker Anthony Rendon after a monthslong power struggle last year. Rendon, the second-longest serving speaker in state history, terms out at the end of 2024 after serving as the California lower house’s leader the last seven years. Rivas, who had a quick rise to power, pledged to lead with “urgency and unity.” At his inaugural ceremony in the Capitol, he said his priorities are to tackle the state’s housing and homelessness crisis, improve public services and infrastructure and combat climate change. Democrats hold more than three-quarters of the Assembly’s 80 seats. “California is still the greatest state in the un...

It’s almost time to resume student loan payments. What happens if you don’t?

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:11:12 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — After three years, the pandemic-era freeze on federal student loan payments will end this fall and more than 40 million Americans will have to start making payments again under the terms of a debt ceiling deal approved by Congress.Student loan interest will start accruing on September 1 and payments will restart in October. That means tough decisions for many borrowers, especially those in already-difficult financial situations.It might seem tempting, come autumn, to just continue not making payments, but the consequences can be severe, including a hit to your credit score and exclusion from future aid and benefits.Experts say that delinquency and bankruptcy should be options of last resort, and that deferment and forbearance — which pause payments, though interest may continue to accrue — are often better in the short term.WHAT HAPPENS IF I DON’T MAKE STUDENT LOAN PAYMENTS?Once the moratorium ends, borrowers who can’t or don’t pay risk delinquency and ev...