Author: Money Mechanics

Key Takeaways About 40 airports will reduce flight capacity by 10% beginning Friday in response to the government shutdown, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said.It’s unclear whether Republicans and Democrats will reach a deal to reopen the government and improve staffing at airports ahead of the holiday season. Airports can seem like zoos around the holidays. This year, capacity cuts stemming from the government shutdown could cause a little extra chaos. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy yesterday said flight capacity would be reduced by 10% at select airports beginning Friday to keep the workload sustainable for understaffed, and currently unpaid, air traffic…

When it comes to retirement planning, there’s one financial wildcard, one blind spot that can upend the best-laid plans: the high cost of long-term care — if you ever need it.Like many people, this reporter has not given much thought to the cash cushion or funding vehicles to pay for long-term care (LTC) later in life. My wife has an LTC insurance policy she got through work 15 years ago that will offset her costs. However, despite diligently building a retirement nest egg, I never really investigated whether I would need long-term care, how much it would cost, and, more…

Key Takeaways DoorDash’s quarterly earnings missed analysts’ estimates as its cost rose, sending shares tumbling Thursday.The delivery firm also gave a weaker-than-expected outlook, expecting its investments in new products and initiatives like delivery robots will squeeze profits. DoorDash (DASH) shares tumbled Thursday after the food delivery firm missed profit estimates and gave a weak outlook. The stock was down nearly 15% around $202 in recent trading, making it the worst-performing stock in the S&P 500 Thursday morning. Read Investopedia’s full daily markets coverage here. The company reported third-quarter earnings per share of $0.55, well below what analysts surveyed by Visible Alpha were looking for.…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Sometimes you just have to lean in. Britain’s Labour government has spent a lot of time trying to camouflage its essential character even from itself. Admirable talk of fiscal rules and the need to calm bond markets has been used to distract from a fundamental truth: this is a high-spending, high-taxing government.The subterfuge has been so successful that Rachel Reeves is widely seen as an austerity chancellor, best known for snatching pensioner fuel payments and cutting welfare, even though she committed the…

This government shutdown has officially become the longest in history. In addition to leaving many government workers without a paycheck, the prolonged shutdown is introducing ripple effects throughout the country.At airports, delays related to staffing issues surged 16% in October across major airlines, forcing an estimated 3.2 million passengers to face cancellations or long waits for delayed flights, according to reporting from Reuters.The Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) tracks on-time performance and causes of delays for dozens of major airlines. While the most recent available data only runs through July of this year, I took a look at the historical…

Put down the pumpkin pie and get ready for tax planning: These retirement tax moves could help you prepare for 2026.Retirees are in a unique planning position compared to other tax filers heading into the winter season. Not only are they faced with complex withdrawal rules on RMDs, but many have access to age-specific tax deductions, including the new $6,000 “senior bonus” deduction.Whether you leverage this time by making strategic money moves or wait until the last second to act can affect your financial position next year (and potentially this year). From just $107.88 $24.99 for Kiplinger Personal Finance Be…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Germany’s financial watchdog BaFin has imposed a record €45mn fine on JPMorgan Chase for shortcomings in its anti-money-laundering controls.JPMorgan’s Frankfurt-based subsidiary, from which it runs its wider European business, was found to have “systematically” failed to file suspicious activity reports on time between October 2021 and September 2022, BaFin said on Thursday.JPMorgan has grown to become Wall Street’s biggest bank, with an $850bn market capitalisation that exceeds that of its rivals Bank of America, Citigroup and Wells Fargo combined. The BaFin penalty…

We are now midway through the US quarterly earnings season, making it a good time to review the highlights so far. Several major names have disappointed investors, including (NASDAQ:MSFT) and especially (NASDAQ:META), whose shares have dropped more than 15% in the past week after its latest results. On the brighter side, (NASDAQ:GOOGL) and (NASDAQ:AMZN)—often seen as rivals to the Magnificent Seven—delivered strong third-quarter numbers, helping push their stocks to new highs on the back of solid growth. Meanwhile, the broader S&P 500 has pulled back slightly after touching record levels above 6,900 points. In this review, we’ll focus on a…

Homes are selling at the slowest pace for this time of year since 2019.  U.S. pending home sales ticked up 0.7% year over year during the four weeks ending November 2, the smallest increase in four months. Homes are also taking longer to sell: The typical home that sold in October went under contract in 48 days, the longest span for that month since 2019.  Home sales are slow despite declining mortgage rates. The weekly average mortgage rate has fallen to 6.17%, its lowest level in a year, pushing the median monthly housing payment down to $2,508, down 2.1% from…

Andrey Deryabin / iStock / Getty Images PlusFollow ZDNET: Add us as a preferred source on Google. ZDNET key takeaways Logging in as the root user should never be done on Linux.Using the root account could lead to disaster.Sudo is the preferred method of gaining elevated privileges.When I first started using Linux in 1997, there was one inevitability: at some point, you would have to either log in as root or switch to the root account. I did it. A lot. Also: Do you need antivirus on Linux?Anytime I needed to install a piece of software, change a config file…