Stock markets around the world are reeling from Reddit traders' volatile trading over the past week. How the speculative activity continues could determine whether the trend pops with little lasting impact or sparks a new discussion over economic equality.
What began as an effort to profit from a short squeeze has since exploded into a national debate on market access. Retail traders coordinating on Reddit forums like r/wallstreetbets lifted GameStop, AMC, and other highly shorted stocks, hoping to profit as funds covered their short positions.
The group ultimately beat Wall Street at its own game. Their trades drove billions of dollars in losses across short-selling hedge funds and left Wall Street's old guard reeling.
Actions taken Thursday by several brokerages further stoked the day-trader movement. Robinhood, Interactive Brokers, and others restricted trading of the volatile stocks, arguing the moves protected them and their clients from outsize risk. Congress is now set to hold hearings on the matter as members allege the trading platforms stifled the individual investor for the benefit of the Wall Street establishment.
Join us Tuesday, February 2, 2021 at 1:00 p.m ET as deputy editor Joe Ciolli and markets and economy reporter Ben Winck discuss the GameStop phenomenon, Wall Street Bets' influence, and how the Reddit-fueled trade might end.
Former President Donald Trump's baseless warnings about antifa and far-left extremist threats caused federal authorities to divert federal authorities' attention from credible right-wing threats, The New York Times reported.
Trump's interest in the group and demand for authorities to investigate them did not stop the Justice Department and Federal Bureau of Investigation from pursuing cases of right-wing extremism but it did divert key resources away from the threat when it was growing, the Times reported.
This included sending dozens of agents to Portland, Oregon, leaving some FBI and Justice Department officials limited resources to combat more pressing concerns, including the 1,000 domestic terrorism cases that were open at the time.
Trump's aides attempted to suppress the use of the phrase "domestic terrorism" and White House and Justice Department officials stopped efforts to talk about right-wing threats publically, the Times reported.
Additionally, agents and prosecutors felt "pressured" to uncover a left-wing extremist criminal conspiracy that never ended up existing, while funding that was requested for analysts to examine social media posts for threats was denied.
In 2019, former Attorney General William Barr began an FBI briefing by asking what the agency was doing about antifa. Barr told the Times that there was no prioritization given to threats from the left and all threats were equally considered.
"The F.B.I. already had a robust program to combat violence driven by white supremacy and nationalism," Barr said. "I wanted there to be a comparable one for antifa and antifalike groups."
During the spring and summer, despite finding the right-wing boogaloo movement more of a threat, the FBI opened the same amount of investigations into both them and Antifa, 40 each.
In this Wednesday, April 17, 2019 photo reviewed by U.S. military officials, the control tower is seen through the razor wire inside the Camp VI detention facility in Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, Cuba.
Alex Brandon, File/Associated Press
The Department of Defense is pausing a plan to offer COVID-19 vaccines to Guantanamo Bay prisoners.
The plan drew criticism from GOP lawmakers who said it prioritized terrorists.
Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby said the department is reviewing measures to keep troops safe.
The Department of Defense is pausing a plan to offer COVID-19 vaccines to detainees at Guantanamo Bay.
John Kirby, the Pentagon press secretary, made the announcement in a tweet Saturday, saying that no detainees at the prison have been vaccinated.
"We're pausing the plan to move forward, as we review force protection protocols," he said. "We remain committed to our obligations to keep our troops safe."
The plan to offer vaccines to prisoners at Guantanamo was reported by The New York Times on Thursday.
Republican lawmakers criticized the announcement, saying that the plan was prioritizing terrorists over average Americans.
Guantanamo Bay currently has 40 prisoners, according to the Times. One of them is Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, who has been accused of being the principal architect of the 9/11 attacks.
"President Biden told us he would have a plan to defeat the virus on day 1. He just never told us that it would be to give the vaccine to terrorists before most Americans," Rep. Kevin McCarthy, the GOP leader in the House, said in a tweet Saturday morning.
McCarthy also tweeted the news that the plan would be paused, saying "Good."
Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York also criticized the plan in a tweet, calling it "inexcusable" and "un-American."
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines encourage vaccinating correctional staff and incarcerated people at the same time to avoid outbreaks. The CDC also highlights the increased risk of becoming ill in a prison facility due to being inside in close quarters.
Some restaurants in Michigan are refusing to abide by state-mandated measures to quell the spread of the coronavirus, claiming the virus is over-politicized and the science untrustworthy, the Washington Post reported.
"I don't think it's as bad as they're saying it is," David Koloski owner of the Sunrise Family Diner told the Post. "The whole thing with the coronavirus is political. I think Democrats are dug in and unwilling to move on this."
The state is currently on lockdown, but last week Gov. Gretchen Whitmer announced that restaurants can reopen at 25% capacity on February 1.
Stand Up Michigan, a group of business owners who have held protests against COVID-19 restrictions, has been keeping a running list of restaurants that are defying the order to close indoor dining. Right now there are more than 60 restaurants in 33 counties defying the order.
For weeks, restaurants like the Sunrise Family Diner have remained open for indoor dining with limited enforcement of mask use or social distancing, in part because law-enforcement officials support them and some residents are willing to drive long hours just to publicize their rebuke of Whitmer, the Post reported.
Koloski told the Post that he simply can't afford to do takeout-only orders.
"If we didn't open, we would have shuttered. Doors closed. Out of a house, out of a job, out of a car. Me and the rest of my staff," Koloski said.
He added: "I'm not holding a gun to anybody's head and making them come here."
While the state has seen a decrease in cases, 17 of the state's hospitals are at 90% capacity.
Lansing's Sparrow Hospital has had several ICU expansions, the Post reported. The facility normally has five to 10 free ICU beds, but 30 to 40 people who need them.
"You see that and you know that there's a percentage of these folks, once they get COVID, some of them will die. And it doesn't have to be that way," Sparrow president Alan Vierling told the Post. "This isn't like getting leukemia, where you can do everything right and get leukemia and die. With this, you have a choice."
The overload of patients has meant that Vierling has to have an additional 90 travel nurses who work 12-hour shifts, five days a week.
Last week, the state recorded 12,535 new cases and 487 deaths compared to 16,452 new cases and 430 deaths the week before, the Detroit News reported. On Saturday, the state had 1,358 new cases.
Two months after the lockdown was enacted in November, health department spokeswoman Lynn Sutfin told the Post that cases per million people decreased by 70%.
Five attorneys have abandoned former President Donald Trump's impeachment defense team just days ahead of his trial in the Senate, CNN reported Saturday night.
The departures reportedly occurred after disagreements over the defense strategy.
Trump had wanted his legal team to focus on false claims that the election had been stolen from him, rather than the question of whether it was legal to convict a president no longer in office, both CNN and the New York Times reported, citing sources familiar with the matter. The Times added that one person close to Trump disputed that characterization.
Former Trump campaign adviser Jason Miller responded to news of the departures on Saturday, tweeting that the legal team hadn't yet been finalized.
"We have done much work, but have not made a final decision on our legal team, which will be made shortly," he said.
CNN identified the departed lawyers as Butch Bowers, Deborah Barbier, Johnny Gasser, and Greg Harris of South Carolina, and Josh Howard of North Carolina. Bowers and Barbier parted ways from the defense team in a "mutual decision," according to the Associated Press, citing a person familiar with the situation.
Trump has since struggled to attract defense lawyers, in part due to his baseless allegations of widespread election fraud and his actions during the Capitol siege.
But Senate Democrats still face an uphill battle in their effort to convict Trump. Only five Republican senators joined them in a vote to proceed with the impeachment trial scheduled for February 9.
Motorists line up to receive inoculation at a COVID-19 vaccination site at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, California, the United States, Jan. 15, 2021.
Xinhua/Xinhua via Getty Images
A mass vaccination site at Dodger Stadium briefly shut down Saturday after protesters arrived.
The protesters included people from anti-vaccine and right-wing groups.
People in line for vaccines had already been waiting for hours before the disruption.
A mass COVID-19 vaccination site at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles temporarily shut down Saturday after protesters gathered near the entrance.
The protesters included people from anti-vaccine and far-right groups, according to the Los Angeles Times. A reporter from the Beverly Hills Courier said there were about 40 demonstrators. No incidents of violence have been reported.
Officials told the Times the Los Angeles Fire Department closed the gate as a precaution at around 2 p.m., but it was reopened about an hour later.
In photos and videos shared on Twitter, protesters were carrying signs that said, "COVID=SCAM," "I only like muzzles in the bedroom," and "Tell Bill Gates to go vaccinate himself."
People in a long line of cars hoping to get the vaccine had been waiting for hours before the disruption, the Times reported. The protesters could also be seen in videos trying to hand out flyers to the people in line and speaking over a megaphone about the vaccine.
Despite some Americans expressing concerns over vaccines, the two coronavirus vaccines authorized for use in the US did not raise any major safety concerns during large clinical trials conducted with diverse groups of volunteers. Experts have said that anti-vaccination groups could slow the end of the pandemic.
Dodger Stadium has served as a COVID-19 testing site since May, and was recently turned into the city's first mass vaccination center. It's one of the largest mass vaccination sites in the US, and will be able to vaccinate about 12,000 people per day.
