Booming power demand means longer wait for GE Vernova customers - The Boston Globe (2025)

RETAIL

The pastor of a Georgia megachurch who led a nationwide 40-day “fast” boycott of Target stores over the retail chain’s commitment to diversity initiatives is now calling for that effort to continue as a “full Target boycott.” The Rev. Jamal Bryant said this week that the Minneapolis-based retailer has not met all of the boycott effort’s demands. Among them: Restoring its commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion principles and pledging money to Black-owned banks and businesses. Target announced in January that it would phase out a handful of DEI initiatives, including a program designed to help Black employees build meaningful careers and promote Black-owned businesses. Conservative activists and President Trump have sought to dismantle DEI policies in the federal government and schools. — ASSOCIATED PRESS

CRYPTOCURRENCY

The flashy online announcement called it “the most EXCLUSIVE INVITATION in the World,” a chance to have “an intimate private dinner” with President Trump at his members-only golf club in Virginia, followed by a tour of the White House. A seat would be reserved for each of the top 220 investors in $TRUMP, a cryptocurrency that Trump launched on the eve of his inauguration. In an astonishing escalation of the Trump family’s efforts to profit from cryptocurrencies, a website promoting Trump’s so-called meme coin announced Wednesday that the coin’s largest buyers would be invited to meet with him. The effort was, in effect, an offer of access to the White House in exchange for an investment in one of Trump’s crypto ventures. For months, Trump’s forays into the crypto industry have created ethical conflicts with little precedent in presidential history. As he markets digital currencies to the public, Trump has also appointed regulators who are scaling back crypto enforcement and called for legislation that would boost the industry’s prospects in the United States. As news of the dinner invitation spread on social media, the meme coin’s price surged more than 60 percent, suggesting that investors were rushing to accumulate the coin to qualify for a seat at the dinner. “This is really incredible,” said Corey Frayer, who oversaw crypto policy for the Securities and Exchange Commission during the Biden administration. “They are making the pay-to-play deal explicit.” A business entity linked to Trump owns a large tranche of the coins, meaning that the president personally profits every time the price increases, at least on paper. Trump and his business partners also collect fees when the coins are traded, a windfall that amounted to nearly $100 million in the weeks after the coin debuted in January. Early this year, the SEC issued official guidance saying that meme coins, a type of cryptocurrency based on an online joke or celebrity mascot, would not be subject to oversight by the agency. Crypto skeptics criticized the policy as a risky move that could open the door to rampant abuse and fraud by meme coin promoters. — NEW YORK TIMES

GENDER

Japan’s biggest financial firms are abolishing decades-old employment practices that kept women off the corporate ladder. Nippon Life Insurance Co., Japan’s largest insurer, and MUFG Bank Ltd., a unit of the nation’s biggest banking group, are among firms that in recent months scrapped a clerical job category that consisted almost exclusively of women, who were paid less than those on the career track. Merging the two job types may increase opportunities for women to advance to more senior positions. Japan’s latest move to catch up with the West comes even as US companies start to reverse some of their diversity policies, under pressure from President Trump’s administration. The divided system was long used in other industries too, resulting in Japan having some of the biggest pay gaps between women and men in the world, but the financial sector is one of the worst offenders and has been slow to change. Work was often structured in the past so that women were expected to stay at their jobs for just a few years, marking time before marriage. That’s become rare recently, but the system has stayed in place. — BLOOMBERG NEWS

MANUFACTURING

Boeing said on Wednesday that it was making progress toward increasing production of its commercial planes and stabilizing its business after a quality crisis, but the company is facing new threats of disruption from President Trump’s trade war. The company lost $31 million in the first three months of this year, a smaller loss than analysts had expected. In the same period last year, the company lost more than $350 million. Boeing’s most recent crisis began when a poorly installed panel blew away from a relatively new plane during a flight in January 2024. A two-month worker strike in the fall also stalled production of the 737 Max, Boeing’s bestselling plane. The company delivered 130 planes in the first quarter, up from 83 in the same period a year ago. It also secured a contract to build the Air Force’s newest fighter jet, the F-47, and brought in $19.5 billion in revenue during the quarter, 18 percent more than last year. “There is a lot of good work happening across our teams, and we are seeing positive results,” Boeing’s CEO, Kelly Ortberg, said in a message to employees, describing 2025 as “our turnaround year.” — NEW YORK TIMES

TECH

European Union watchdogs fined Apple and Meta hundreds of millions of dollars Wednesday as they stepped up enforcement of the 27-nation bloc’s digital competition rules. The European Commission imposed a 500 million $571 million fine on Apple for preventing app makers from pointing users to cheaper options outside its App Store. The commission, which is the EU’s executive arm, also fined Meta Platforms $227 million because it forced Facebook and Instagram users to choose between seeing ads or paying to avoid them. The punishments were smaller than the blockbuster multibillion-dollar fines that the commission has previously slapped on Big Tech companies in antitrust cases. The decisions were expected to come in March, but officials apparently held off amid an escalating trans-Atlantic trade war with US President Trump, who has repeatedly complained about regulations from Brussels affecting American companies. The penalties were issued under the EU’s Digital Markets Act, also known as the DMA. It’s a sweeping rulebook that amounts to a set of do’s and don’ts designed to give consumers and businesses more choice and prevent Big Tech “gatekeepers” from cornering digital markets. — ASSOCIATED PRESS