The Wall Street Journal - 06.03.2020

***** FRIDAY, MARCH 6, 2020 ~ VOL. CCLXXV NO. 54 WSJ.com HHHH$4.

DJIA26121.28g969.58 3.6% NASDAQ8738.60g3.1% STOXX 600380.76g1.4% 10-YR. TREAS.À22/32, yield 0.924% OIL$45.90g$0.88 GOLD$1,666.40À$25.30 EURO$1.1236 YEN106.

WSJ.

MAGAZINE

a$ap rocky

Dimon Has

Emergency

Heart

Surgery

JPMorgan Chase & Co.

Chief Executive James Dimon

was recovering in a hospital

following emergency heart

surgery Thursday.

The procedure to repair an

acute aortic dissection was

successful, and Mr. Dimon was

alert and “recovering well,”

the bank said in a memo to

employees.

Mr. Dimon, 63 years old,

checked himself into a Man-

hattan hospital early Thursday

after experiencing chest pains

while getting ready for work,

according to a person familiar

with the matter. The medical

staff made a quick diagnosis,

the person said, and Mr. Di-

mon spent the morning send-

ing emails before the surgery,

which lasted several hours.

An aortic dissection is an

abnormal separation of tissues

in the wall of the aorta, the

large blood vessel that carries

blood from the heart to the

rest of the body. It is a rare

but very serious condition that

occurs most commonly in men

in their 60s and 70s, according

to the Mayo Clinic. The inner

layer of the aorta suddenly

tears. Blood then flows

through the opening, causing

the inner and middle layers of

the aorta to separate.

Its symptoms are similar to

those of a heart attack, mak-

ing it sometimes hard to diag-

nose. The condition is often

fatal, but can be treated if

caught early. Actor John Ritter

died of an aortic dissection in

2003, when he was in his 50s.

“The good news is that it

was caught early,” the memo

said of Mr. Dimon’s illness.

Mr. Dimon was diagnosed

with throat cancer in 2014 and

made a full recovery.

JPMorgan’s co-presidents,

Daniel Pinto and Gordon

Smith, are leading the bank

while Mr. Dimon recuperates,

they said in the memo. Mr.

Pinto runs JPMorgan’s invest-

ment bank, and Mr. Smith

heads its sprawling consumer

Please turn to page A

BYDAVIDBENOIT

ANDBETSYMCKAY

benefit local people who

helped collect pieces of the

wreckage and remains. Many

will travel on Boeing Co.’s

dime to Addis Ababa to com-

memorate the first anniver-

sary of the crash next week.

The result is that families

are caught in a grim partner-

ship with the two companies

that have been the source of

their pain.

Nobody involved has a

playbook to follow. The fami-

lies, spread over some three

dozen countries, are still

reeling from their losses.

Ethiopian Airlines has never

had to deal with a tragedy of

this magnitude, and Boeing

has little experience working

directly with families of

crash victims.

Boeing has been slow to

acknowledge the role its de-

sign and engineering mis-

takes played in the Ethiopian

disaster and the similar acci-

dent off the coast of Indone-

Please turn to page A

Boeing, Families

Forge Tense Ties

In Year After Crash

Victims’ kin in Ethiopia want a memorial, so

they must work with plane maker, airline

Everyone Wanted to Touch the Orb. Then It Was Gone.

iii

Glowing globe was displayed for Trump’s visit to Saudi Arabia

touch it.”

What people like Mr. Ber-

man and most others didn’t

know is that the famous Orb

isn’t at the center. It is locked

up, largely forgotten, in storage

at the U.S. Embassy in Riyadh.

The story of the Orb’s jour-

ney from iconic photo to dip-

lomatic obscurity is almost as

surreal as its viral interna-

tional debut. After the sum-

mit, the Orb was carted to the

U.S. Embassy, where it was

kept in a hallway before being

quickly spirited away by diplo-

mats who worried it could

steal attention from the new

American president on his

first international trip, accord-

Please turn to page A

RIYADH—President Trump

produced one of the most

memorable photos of his pres-

idency when he placed his

hands on a glowing Orb at the

opening of a new center to

combat Islamic extremism

during a visit to Saudi Arabia

nearly three years ago.

A flood of memes, jokes,

tweets and photoshopped im-

ages followed. Some compared

the moment to scenes from

“The Lord of the Rings,” “Star

Wars,” “Star Trek” and “The

Wizard of Oz.” The Church of

Satan tweeted to let people

know it wasn’t a satanic ritual.

To this day, visitors from

BYDIONNISSENBAUM

TOMORROW

GARA BUKAN, Ethiopia—

In the remote fields where

an Ethiopian Airlines Boeing

737 MAX crashed a year ago,

the ground is still littered

with shards of metal, bolts

and colorful bunches of

wires that once kept Flight

302 aloft. A solitary hiking

boot protrudes from the

ground.

“It’s a graveyard,” said

Nadia Milleron, whose

daughter Samya Rose Stumo

died there on March 10. Ms.

Milleron received her daugh-

ter’s remains in 122 formal-

dehyde-soaked bundles with

labels like “arm,” or “hair.”

Some relatives didn’t even

get that much.

The grieving families of

the 157 dead want to mark

that ground with a perma-

nent memorial and a paved

road to reach it. They envi-

sion a hospital or school to

BYALISONSIDER

ANDALEXANDRAWEXLER

around the world come to Ri-

yadh’s Center for Combating

Global Extremist Ideology in

hopes of laying their hands on

the glowing Orb.

“Everybody wants to see it,”

said Ilan Berman, vice presi-

dent of the American Foreign

Policy Council think tank, who

toured the Saudi center in mid-

February. “Everyone wants to

Sphere of influence

home buyers on the sidelines

during what is usually a busy

spring selling season.

The greater Seattle area,

home to the first major U.S.

coronavirus outbreak and one

of the country’s hottest hous-

ing markets, could offer some

clues about what is to come,

said Tendayi Kapfidze, chief

economist at loan-comparison

website LendingTree.

“If people don’t want to go

out and see houses, that’s go-

ing to put a damper on de-

mand,” Mr. Kapfidze said.

If the virus hobbles the

U.S. economy as it has

China’s, workers could lose

their paychecks—albeit tem-

porarily—and their ability to

make big purchases.

The shutdown of many Chi-

nese factories already has dis-

rupted the supply chains of

Please turn to page A

Mortgage rates fell to their

lowest level on record Thurs-

day, pulled down by fears that

the spread of coronavirus could

weigh on the U.S. economy.

The average rate on a 30-

year fixed-rate mortgage fell

to 3.29% from 3.45% last week,

mortgage-finance giant Fred-

die Mac said. Mortgage rates

are closely linked to yields on

the 10-year Treasury, which

this week dropped below 1%

for the first time following an

emergency Federal Reserve

rate cut.

A decline in mortgage rates

typically boosts home sales. But

a worsening coronavirus epi-

demic and the efforts to con-

tain it—quarantines, business

shutdowns and travel restric-

tions—could keep would-be

BYORLAMCCAFFREY

ANDBENEISEN

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, speaking outside her Cambridge,

Mass., home, said she was dropping out of the Democratic

presidential race after disappointing primary results. A

Warren Ends Run for President

STEVEN SENNE/ASSOCIATED PRESS

Mortgage Rates Fall

To Lowest Level Ever

remain unclear.

The number of canceled con-

ferences and travel has contin-

ued to rise as more people have

fallen ill, potentially crimping

business activity and spending

while roiling the outlook for

global growth. Investors and an-

alysts have slashed their out-

looks for corporate profits, and

many have worried the virus

will harm consumer sentiment

and business investment.

Schools have shut down in

the Seattle area. Facebook Inc.

closed one of its Seattle offices

after a contract worker was di-

agnosed with the virus and Am-

Please turn to page A

Painful market turbulence

resumed Thursday, pulling ma-

jor stock indexes down more

than 3% and government-bond

yields to record lows as fears

grew over the spread of the

coronavirus in the U.S.

The declines continued what

has been a dizzying two weeks

on Wall Street as investors

tried to gauge how the epi-

demic will affect global growth

and whether governments

would be able to combat it. The

S&P 500 has risen or fallen at

least 2% for four consecutive

sessions, the longest such

stretch since August 2011—

when the European debt crisis

rocked markets—according to

Dow Jones Market Data.

Many investors expect the

stock gyrations to continue as

the ramifications of the virus

BYGUNJANBANERJI

Stocks Drop

As Virus Fears

Stir Volatility

 Epidemic sparks scrutiny of

labs handling pathogens..... A

 Virus turmoil snarls shipping,

exports........................................... B

 Market volatility shakes

pension funds............................ B

Refugee Crisis Mounts Amid New Cease-Fire

PRESSURE: Migrants waited in the buffer zone at the Turkey-Greece border on Thursday.

Russia and Turkey agreed to a cease-fire in northwestern Syria, where intense fighting has

triggered a flood of refugees, many seeking to enter the European Union via Turkey. A

CONTENTS

Banking & Finance B

Business News.. B3,

Crossword............... A

Heard on Street.. B

Life & Arts....... A10-

Mansion............. M1-

Markets................... B

Opinion.............. A13-

Sports........................ A

Technology............... B

U.S. News............. A2-

Weather................... A

World News....... A6-

s2020 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.

All Rights Reserved

>

What’s

News

New coronavirus cases

continued to increase in the

U.S. and abroad, underscoring

the difficulty of containing the

pathogen now that infections

are spreading within many

communities. The U.S. Senate

passed a roughly $8.3 billion

emergency spending bill to

combat the virus.A5, A6, A

Elizabeth Warrenended

her bid for the Democratic

presidential nomination af-

ter a weak showing across

a number of states.A

Facebook removedTrump

campaign ads that referred

to a census, saying they vio-

lated a company policy aimed

at preventing confusion

around the 2020 census.A

Russia and Turkeyagreed

to a cease-fire in northwest-

ern Syria after a meeting be-

tween Putin and Erdogan.A

The ICC ruledits chief

prosecutor could probe alleged

war crimes in Afghanistan

that may have been committed

by U.S. and other forces.A

A federal judge accused

Barr of a lack of candor and

questioned his credibility in

his handling of the release

of the Mueller report.A

Schumer walked back

comments about Supreme

Court justices “paying the

price” for their potential

rulings on abortion.A

The administration said

it is making an additional

35,000 seasonal guest-worker

visas available this year ahead

of the summer season.A

U

.S. stocks sankand

government-bond

yields dropped to fresh

lows, resuming a stretch of

painful market turbulence

amid worries about the cor-

onavirus. Major U.S. stock

indexes lost more than 3%.A

Mortgage rates fellto

their lowest level on record,

pulled down by fears that

the spread of the virus could

weigh on the U.S. economy.A

OPEC reacheda prelimi-

nary agreement to cut crude

output by 1 million barrels a

day to support oil prices.B

JPMorgan’s Dimon was

recovering in a hospital

following emergency heart

surgery on Thursday.A

Former UAW President

Gary Jones was accused of

conspiring with other

union officials to embezzle

more than $1 million.B

Twitter’s Dorseyappeared

to back off plans for a sojourn

in Africa as he tries to fend

off a push by activist Elliott

to possibly replace him.B

Greg Lindberg wasfound

guilty on bribery charges af-

ter jurors determined he

had tried to sway a state in-

surance commissioner.B

HP rejectedXerox’s $

billion bid, again deeming the

takeover offer as too low.B

Amazon is strugglingto

stamp out price-gouging by

third-party sellers of virus-

killing cleaning supplies.B

Two activist investors

have taken a stake in Big

Lots and are seeking to

shake up the firm’s board.B

Business&Finance

World-Wide

JOURNAL REPORT

Workplace Technology:

Office Pet Peeves.R1-

BULENT KILIC/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES