Andrew Yang Offers Scathing Explanation For Donald Trump’s Racist ‘Kung Flu’ Slurs

Former presidential contender Andrew Yang said Donald Trump’s repeated use of the racist term “kung flu” to refer to the coronavirus “is the desperate thrashing around of a losing candidate.” 

Trump uses derogatory and offensive slurs to “distract attention from the fact that the administration has completely botched and mishandled the coronavirus pandemic,” Yang, who quit the race for the 2020 Democratic nomination in February, told CNN’s Anderson Cooper.

Trump’s divisive rhetoric is “like the desperate thrashing around of a losing candidate,” argued Yang, who is Asian American.

Trump revived his “kung flu” slur during his underattended rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on Saturday, and repeated it at a rally in Arizona on Tuesday.

“He shows up to a rally that has a small fraction of the people they are projecting and he’s somewhat desperate, in my opinion,” Yang continued. 

Trump is “just degrading himself and the office of the president further by grasping at straws that aren’t actually keeping him afloat,” said Yang, who said he wished the president could “figure out a path that did not involve racist comments that end up throwing millions of Americans under a rhetorical bus.”

Stock Alert: Maxar Technologies Rises 9% On Plan To Acquire Vricon

Shares of Maxar Technologies Inc. (MAXR), a provider of earth intelligence and space infrastructure solutions, are higher by almost 9 percent or $1.54 in Thursday’s morning trade at $19.11.

Tuesday, the company said it intends to buy the full ownership of 3D data and analytics firm Vricon Inc. for about $140 million, or approximately $115 million net of estimated cash at closing. Maxar intends to exercise its call option to take control of Vricon on or about June 25, 2020, and expects the transaction to close in July.

Vricon was formed as a joint venture between Maxar and Saab in 2015 to combine patented Saab IP with Maxar commercial satellite imagery to build 3D products at scale. To fund the transaction, Maxar plans to issue $150 million of senior secured notes.

The company has also agreed to repurchase $150 million in aggregate principal amount of existing notes using the proceeds of the recent sale of its MDA business.

The stock has traded in a range of $6.06 to $21.45 in the past 52 weeks.

Supreme Court Backs Trump Administration on Quick Deportations

The U.S. Supreme Court bolstered the government’s ability to quickly deport people who enter the country illegally, siding with the Trump administration and refusing to give asylum seekers a broad right to make their case to a federal judge.

A federal appeals court had said the Constitution guarantees a Sri Lankan man arrested near the Mexican border a “meaningful opportunity” to show he met the criteria for asylum. But the Supreme Court reversed that ruling on a 7-2 vote Thursday.

Stock Alert: Accenture Touches New 52-week High After Q3 Results

Shares of Accenture plc (ACN) are rising than 7 percent or $15.16 in Thursday’s morning trade at $217.00, after touching a new 52-week high of $217.86 earlier as the consulting, technology and outsourcing services provider’s first-quarter financial results beat analysts’ estimates.

Thursday, Accenture reported net income for the third quarter of $1.23 billion or $1.90 per share, down from $1.25 billion or $1.93 per share in the year-ago quarter. On average, analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected the company to earn lesser earnings of $1.85 per share. Analysts’ estimates typically exclude special items.

Revenue for the quarter declined 1 percent to $10.99 billion from $11.10 billion last year, but better than the Street estimate of $10.87 billion.

For fiscal 2020, Accenture now expects better earnings in the range of $7.57 to $7.70 per share on revenue growth of 3.5 to 4.5 percent in local currency. This compares with its earlier view of $7.48 to $7.70 per share on revenue growth of 3 to 6 percent in local currency.

Accenture also declared a 10 percent higher quarterly cash dividend of $0.80 per share, payable on August 14 to shareholders of record on July 16.

The stock has traded in a range of $137.15 to $217.86 in the past 52 weeks.

UK will not agree to EU right to use retaliatory tariffs, says negotiator

LONDON, June 25 (Reuters) – Britain will not agree to any European Union proposal which gives the bloc the right to respond with tariffs to changes in British law following Brexit, chief negotiator David Frost said on Thursday.

“The government will not agree to ideas like the one currently circulating giving the EU a new right to retaliate with tariffs if we chose to make laws suiting our interests,” he tweeted.

“We could not leave ourselves open to such unforeseeable economic risk.” (Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge, writing by William James, editing by Elizabeth Piper)

Stock Alert: Vaxart Gains 50%

Shares of Vaxart, Inc. (VXRT) are climbing more than 50% Thursday morning and touched a new high of $4.83. Vaxart, a clinical-stage biotechnology company, develops oral recombinant vaccines that are administered by tablet rather than by injection.

Today the company said it signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Attwill Medical Solutions Sterilflow, LP (AMS) to use AMS’ resources for lyophilization development and large scale manufacturing including tableting and enteric coating for Vaxart’s oral COVID-19 vaccine.

“We believe our oral vaccines, generated on our proven platform, have the potential to offer superior protection against airborne viruses such as SARS-CoV-2 by triggering both mucosal and systemic immunity while being administered by a room temperature-stable tablet, an enormous logistical advantage in large vaccination campaigns,” said Andrei Floroiu, chief executive of Vaxart.

Wednesday the company said it joined the broad-market Russell 3000Ò Index at the conclusion of the 2020 Russell indexes annual reconstitution, effective Monday, June 29.

The stock jumped nearly 14-fold from early this year since the company entered into Covid-19 vaccine development.