The Boston Globe - 30.08.2019

B8 Business The Boston Globe FRIDAY, AUGUST 30, 2019

25

THEBOSTONGLOBE

Indexof publicly traded companiesin Massachusetts

Stocks gained broadly, driving the Dow up 326 points. The
buying spree, spurred by fresh hope that new US-China
talks can lead to progress in the trade war, gave the market
its second straight gain. The S&P 500 is now on track for its
first weekly gain in five weeks. Yet Sam Stovall at CFRA said
that ‘‘all the market is trading on today is optimism, not on
reality.’’ Major indexes have stemmed some of their losses
from this month but remain down about 2 percent for Au-
gust, which may bring the second monthly drop this year,
after May. The glimmer of hope over trade gave investors a
reason to shift some of the money they’ve been putting into
government bonds back to stocks. Still, long-term bond
yields remained below short-term ones, a so-called inver-
sion that has predicted previous recessions. Tech compa-
nies accounted for much of Thursday’s gains: Microsoft
rose 1.9 percent, Apple 1.7 percent. Financial, industrial,
and communication services stocks also gained. JPMorgan
climbed 2.3 percent, and American Airlines added 3.9 per-
cent. But Best Buy lost 8 percent; its strong quarterly profit
was overshadowed by disappointing revenue growth.

Markets

Hopes for trade talks spur buying

DOW JONES industrial average

NASDAQ Composite index

S&P 500 index

Globe 25 index

SOURCE:BloombergNews

people of color around the state because of the high rates of police action and incarceration in minority communities. Dozens of child-care workers have reached out to Lawyers for Civ- il Rights about the enhanced background checks — some of whom have also lost their jobs, all of them black or Latino — said Sophia Hall, an attorney at the law firm who is part of the team working on the case pro bono. “EEC’s background check policy is unconstitutional, violates state anti-discrimination laws, and is all- around a poor business practice,” another of Gregory’s attorneys, Har- old Lichten, said in a statement. “The Commonwealth through this regulation is eliminating a talented and diverse workforce on the basis of stale juvenile justice histories that bear no relation to current fitness.” The Department of Early Educa- tion and Care said it does not com- ment on pending litigation.

uBACKGROUND CHECKS Continued from Page B

In Massachusetts, young African- Americans are at least 10 times more likely to be incarcerated as are white youth; it’s one of six states where the disparity is that high, according to a 2017 report by the Sen- tencing Project. The divide grew 66 percent from 2001 to 2015. In addition to unfairly punishing employees who may have faced juvenile charges decades before, Hall said, the state law is hurting child- care providers, who risk losing funding if they don’t comply with the new regulation on background checks. “They’re really short-staffed in the child-care field,” she said. “This is really problematic for employers.” The fact that the state imposed a lifetime ban on child-care workers with juvenile offenses is “unbeliev- able,” said Steve O’Neill, an organiz- er at the Massachusetts Communi- ties Action Network who specializes in criminal justice reform — espe- cially given last year’s overhaul of the state’s criminal justice system, which made it easier for juvenile of-

fenders of nonviolent crimes to ex- punge their records. “It goes against everything we know about rehabilitation, and about juveniles, for that matter,” he said. “The idea that this is going to comebackandhauntyou10, 2 0, 25 years later, and end your career... It’s just pushing people farther and farther from the center of society.” Since she was let go in the spring, Gregory has been trying to find another job, and relying on her mother and grown daughter for help. But because she has been banned for life from working in a state-regulated child-care facility, her work experi- ence doesn’t apply to many of the jobs she is most qualified for. So she has been driving for Uber, where, she notes, she easily passed the background check. “After twentysomething years,” she said, “for me just not to be able to work in the field that I’ve been in is unfair to me.”

Katie Johnston can be reached at [email protected].

’86casecostschild-carestafferherjob

By Steve Karnowski and Scott McFetridge ASSOCIATED PRESS LACONA, Iowa — When Presi- dent Trump levied tariffs on China that scrambled global markets, farmer Randy Miller was willing to absorb the financial hit. Even as the soybeans in his fields about an hour south of Des Moines became less valuable, Miller saw long-term promise in Trump’s efforts to rebal- ance America’s trade relationship with Beijing. ‘‘The farmer plays the long game,’’ said Miller, who grows soybeans and corn and raises pigs in Lacona. ‘‘I look at my job through my son, my grandkids. So am I willing to suffer today to get this done to where I think it will be better for them? Yes.’’ But the patience of Miller and many other Midwest farmers with a president they mostly supported in 2016 is being put sorely to the test. The trigger wasn’t Trump’s China tariffs, but waivers the administration granted this month to 31 oil refineries so they don’t have to blend ethanol into their gasoline. Since roughly 40 percent of the US corn crop is turned into ethanol, it was a fresh blow to corn producers already struggling with five years of low commodity prices and the threat of mediocre harvests this fall after some of the worst weather in years. ‘‘That flashpoint was reached and the frustration boiled over, and this was the straw that broke the camel’s back,’’ says Lynn Chrisp, who grows corn and soybeans near Hastings, Neb., and is president of the National Corn Growers Associa- tion. ‘‘I’ve never seen farmers so tired, so frustrated, and they’re to the point of anger,’’ says Kelly Nieuwen- huis, a farmer from Primghar in

northwest Iowa who said the waivers were a hot topic at a recent meeting of the Iowa Corn Growers Association. Nieuwenhuis said he voted for Trump in 2016, but now he’snotsurewhohe’llsupportin 2020. While Iowa farmer Miller saw Trump’s brinkmanship with China as a necessary gamble to help Amer- ican workers, the ethanol waivers smacked to him of favoritism for a wealthy and powerful industry — Big Oil. ‘‘That’s our own country stabbing us in the back,’’ Miller said. ‘‘That’s the president going, the oil companies need to make more than the American farmer.... That was just, ‘I like the oil company better or I’m friends with the oil company more than I’m friends with the farmer.’ ’’ The Environmental Protection Agency last month kept its annual target for the level of corn ethanol that must be blended into the na- tion’s gasoline supply under the Re- newable Fuel Standard at 15 billion gallons (56.78 billion liters) for

That was a deep disappoint-
ment to an ethanol industry that
wanted a higher target to offset ex-
emptions granted to smaller refin-
ers.
Those waivers have cut demand
by an estimated 2.6 billion gallons
(9.84 billion liters) since Trump
took office, according to the Renew-

able Fuels Association. The oil industry, citing government data and other sources, disputes that figure and contends the waivers have not reduced ethanol consumption. At least 15 ethanol plants already have been shut down or idled since the EPA increased waivers under Trump, and a 16th casualty came Wednesday at the Corn Plus ethanol plant in the south-central Minneso- ta town of Winnebago. The Renew- able Fuels Association says the clo- sures have affected more than 2, jobs. The 31 new waivers issued this month came on top of 54 granted since early 2018, according to the association. While the waivers are intended to reduce hardships on small oil refiners, some beneficia- ries include smaller refineries owned by big oil companies. The administration knows it has a problem. US Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue said at a farm policy summit in Decatur, Ill., on Wednes- day that Trump will take action to soften the effects. Geoff Cooper, head of the renew- able fuels group, said Perdue, EPA chief Andrew Wheeler and key White House officials have been dis- cussing relief measures that could include reallocating the ethanol demand lost from the exempted smaller refiners to larger refiners that would pick up the slack. But many key details remain unclear.

Ethanolrule

testsloyalty

offarmers

toTrump

Kings’ headquarters in the Back Bay, rely in part on DraftKings’ staff for support, and trade on the DraftK- ings name. But it’s not a direct sub- sidiary and has roughly a half-dozen staffers of its own. Holian and Wil- liams secured funding from three venture capital firms in Boston: General Catalyst, Accomplice, and Boston Seed Capital. The three VC firms and DraftKings are all minority investors in Drive. Williams says he already has more than 100 athletes lined up to participate, predominantly current or former pro basketball players. They’re all interested in learning more about investing with venture capitalists or launching a VC fund or their own startup. (Drive just start- ed accepting applications from startups for its venture studio on Thursday.) Drive’s first course for athletes kicked off this week: Twenty or so athletes, including Celtics rookie Grant Williams and former Patriots star Matt Light, visited various companies in Boston to kick off a five- week “internship” to teach them more about VC investing. (Most of

uCHESTO Continued from Page B

the coursework will take place on- line.) Among the places they visited: Whoop, a 70-employee firm in the Fenway that focuses on using data to improve athletic performance. The firm sells something akin to a high- end FitBit, available through a monthly subscription, that provides 24/7 monitoring and assessment of physical activities, recovery, and sleep. It’s exactly the kind of startup that Drive wants to encourage in Boston. Whoop vice president Kristen Holmes says she hopes her firm can get more involved with Drive, in part for the feedback from the athletes. The Drive launch is just the latest reason Holmes thinks Boston is a great place for a sports tech business. She also cited the city’s sports teams, its universities, and its venture capital community. About those VC firms. Their big- gest motivation for investing in Drive appears to be bolstering the local startup ecosystem. Ryan Moore of Accomplice says he wants to share what he’s learned over two decades of working with entrepreneurs; he doesn’t think there’s a city better primed to be a

sports tech hub than Boston. Olivia Lew at General Catalyst agrees: Along with the pro sports franchises and their ardent fans, Lew points to the concentration of sneaker companies here — Reebok, Converse, New Balance, and Puma among them — and all the tech talent. Plus, there’s the MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Con- ference, considered one of the most important events in the emerging field. The VC firms aren’t investing in Drive for direct profits, at least not right away, though this represents a sweet networking opportunity. Ho- lian says Drive won’t charge entrepreneurs or athletes for services. Eventually, she says, the hope is to monetize this group after a critical mass is built, perhaps through spon- sorships or other revenue opportu- nities. But they also have this goal in mind: Maybe Boston can beat out Silicon Valley to be the reigning Title Town in sports tech. That type of vic- tory would bring benefits that last long after the confetti gets cleaned up and the duck boats drive away.

Jon Chesto can be reached at [email protected].

DraftKings spinoff aims to create sports tech hub

JULIE PACE/ASSOCIATED PRESS

‘Itgoes

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rehabil-

itation,

andabout

juveniles,

forthat

matter.’

STEVE O’NEILL Massachusetts Communities Action Network

The

athletes

involved

areall

interested

in

learning

about

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launching

aVCfund,

or

launching

theirown

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Farmer Randy Miller at his farm in Lacona, Iowa, with his soybeans, recently. Miller, who also farms corn, is among farmers unhappy with President Trump over waivers granted to oil refineries that have sharply reduced demand for corn-based ethanol. Miller called it “our own country stabbing us in the back.”

The Boston Globe - 30.08.2019

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