Mexico begins to reopen despite COVID-19 crisis

Deputy health minister is leading the response – but his methods have been controversial as the country sees a surge in daily cases and deaths.

Mexico has begun to reopen despite a surge in daily coronavirus cases and deaths.

The deputy health minister is leading the response – but his methods have been controversial.

Al Jazeera’s John Holman sat down with Hugo Lopez Gatell and asked him if Mexico is on a knife-edge.

New Xbox is still ‘on track’ to hit stores in time for the holidays

The next Xbox is still slated to hit store shelves this holiday season — coronavirus be damned.

In an interview with Time, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said that despite the pandemic forcing employees to work from home, the next-generation gaming system will keep its original launch window.

“Yes, we are on track,” Nadella said. “The head of our Xbox did say that one of the challenges in remote work is some of the content creation: there are certain things that do need people to come into studios that might have an impact in our first-party and third-party games.”

The comments come as video game industry saw its best March sales in more than a decade thanks to millions of gamers being locked indoors due to the pandemic.

The holiday window is traditionally one of the most lucrative quarters of the year for video game makers. Sony’s PlayStation 5 is also set to come out in December.

Sony Interactive Entertainment CEO Jim Ryan last week told gamesindustry.biz that his team, as well as its game developer partners, are well positioned to meet their deadline.

“We are going to launch this holiday and we’re going to launch globally,” Ryan said. “We’re really looking forward to it and it’s going to be a blast.”

Paris prosecutor opens probe into handling of COVID-19 crisis

PARIS (Reuters) – The Paris prosecutor’s office has opened a preliminary inquiry into the authorities’ response to the coronavirus epidemic, to determine whether any criminal offences might have been committed.

The prosecutor said in a statement the court had received 62 complaints about the handling of the crisis by public bodies, including government ministries, local authorities and nursing homes.

In France, 29,209 people have died from coronavirus infection and there are 154,188 confirmed cases.

Brazil unemployment insurance claims jump 53% in May to almost 1 million

BRASILIA, June 9 (Reuters) – Formal unemployment insurance claims in Brazil in May rose to 960,258, the Economy Ministry said on Tuesday, an increase of 53% from the same month last year and a clear sign of the hit to jobs from the coronavirus crisis.

The total number of claims registered in the first five months of the year rose 12.4% to 3.3 million. (Reporting by Jamie McGeever Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)

Jenna Bush Hager Commemorates 'Ganny' Barbara Bush's Birthday with Sweet Throwback Photo

And though she never met her youngest great-grandson, Hager’s son Hal, Mrs. Bush was thinking of him — of all the great-grandchildren she would likely never meet — as she embroidered stockings to be “reserves” for the kids who grew up after she died in April 2018.

Hal was “the first baby that won’t get to meet these people that were such an important part of my life,” Hager told PEOPLE in November.

“What a beautiful blessing and what a beautiful thing that she did so that all three of my kids will have made,” Hager added then. “[Hal] will never meet her, but they’re so ingrained, I mean, literally in this case, in the fabric of our family — that he’ll have a stocking that his great-grandmother sewed.”

Stock Alert: Advanced Micro Spikes 4%

Shares of semiconductor company Advanced Micro Devices are climbing more than 4% Tuesday morning at $55.32, close to its 52-week high of $59.27. There are no company-specific news to move the stock up.

Even during the coronavirus pandemic, although AMD reacted with the broader market, it bounced back strongly and rose nearly 40% in less than 3 months.

When the company reported first-quarter results in April, revenue had increased 40% year-on-year at $1.79 billion. In the second quarter, although the company expects weaker demand due to Covid-19, it still sees revenue growth of about 25%.

Discover Says 80% of Skip-a-Payment Clients ‘Back on Their Feet’

Forbearance appears to be working for Discover Financial Services.

More than 80% of the card company’s customers who opted to skip payments ended up making them a month later, Chief Executive Officer Roger Hochschild told investors at a virtual conference Tuesday. Borrowers may have been helped by the record government stimulus pumped into the economy in April and May, he said.

“The re-enrollment rate is relatively low,” Hochschild said, adding that the company had about $3.3 billion of card loans in the forbearance program at the end of May. “A lot of people took one month and are not renewing for a second month.”

Discover was battered as the coronavirus pandemic stifled economic activity, leaving spending on the Riverwoods, Illinois-based company’s cards down about 30% at the depth of the crisis. Spending has begun to improve, dropping 12% to 13% at the end of May from a year earlier, Hochschild said.