Los Angeles Times 11/26/2020

A10 THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 26, 2020 S LATIMES.COM

BUSINESS

Stocks gave back some of
their recent gains Wednes-
day as a batch of discourag-
ing economic data
prompted investors to take a
pause a day after the mar-
ket’s record-setting climb.
The Standard & Poor’s
500 index dropped 0.2% a
day after setting an all-time
high. The Dow Jones indus-
trial average slipped below
30,000, a day after crossing
that milestone for the first
time. Industrial, energy and
healthcare companies ac-
counted for much of the de-
cline. Technology compa-
nies rose, driving the
Nasdaq composite to a
record high.
The selling followed re-
ports showing the number of
Americans seeking unem-
ployment aid jumped last
week to the highest level in
more than a month. A sepa-
rate report showed con-
sumer spending posted the

weakest gain since April.

Despite the pullback,

Wall Street closed up shop

for the Thanksgiving holi-

day with the benchmark

S&P 500 still up 11% this

month.

The S&P 500 fell 5.

points to 3,629.65. The Dow

gave up 173.77 points, or 0.6%,

to 29,872.47. The tech-heavy

Nasdaq gained 57.62 points,

or 0.5%, to 12,094.40. The in-

dex, which is on a three-day

winning streak, last hit an

all-time high Sept. 2.

Stocks have been push-

ing higher this month as in-

vestors have grown more

hopeful that the devel-

opment of coronavirus vac-

cines and treatments will

help pave the way for the

economy to recover next

year.

This week, traders have

also been encouraged by

signs that the transition of

power in the U.S. to Presi-

dent-elect Joe Biden has be-

gun.

Still, signs that the pan-

demic continues to weigh on

the economy remain in the

forefront. On Wednesday,

the government said the

number of Americans apply-

ing for unemployment ben-

efits rose last week to

778,000, the highest level in

five weeks.

The downbeat economic

reports spurred the rally in

technology stocks, which

traders have consistently

bet on this year. Big Tech

names such as Apple, Micro-

soft and Amazon have been

favored because the compa-

nies tend to have strong bal-

ance sheets and are ex-

pected to continue doing

well once the pandemic sub-

sides.

The yield on the bench-

mark 10-year Treasury rose

to 0.88% from 0.87% late

Tuesday.

U.S. markets will be

closed Thursday for the

Thanksgiving holiday. They

will be open for half the day

Friday, closing at 1 p.m.

Eastern.

MARKET ROUNDUP

Stocks mixed after jobless report

associated press

Index

Dow industrials

S&P 500

Nasdaq composite

S&P 400

Russell 2000

EuroStoxx 50

Nikkei(Japan)

Hang Seng(Hong Kong)

Close

Daily

change

Daily % YTD %

29,872.47 -173.77 -0.58 +4.

3,629.65 -5.76 -0.16 +12.

12,094.40 +57.62 +0.48 +34.

2,201.56 -16.28 -0.73 +6.

1,845.02 -8.51 -0.46 +10.

3,083.12 -2.58 -0.08 -9.

26,296.86 +131.27 +0.50 +11.

26,669.75 +81.55 +0.31 -5.

Major stock indexes

change change

Associated Press

Every day during Octo-
ber, 66-year-old Los Angeles
resident Mitch Besser
stepped outside to his Con-
cept2 rowing machine,
muscling out a total for the
month of 500,000 meters, or
nearly 311 miles.
Besser accomplished
that feat — rowing an aver-
age of 10 miles each day — as
part of a virtual fundraiser
for Mothers2mothers, a
charity he founded in 2001
when he was a doctor in
South Africa to provide edu-
cation and support for HIV-
positive mothers and chil-
dren. The organization usu-
ally raises money with a
sponsored group bike ride,
which every two years
reaped as much as $250,
and familiarized donors
with the people and places
helped by their contrib-
utions.
Perhaps fortunately,
Besser had limited knowl-
edge of the sport and no idea
that on some days he was
rowing 10 times the length of
Olympic rowing events.
“I had nothing to com-
pare it to. Sometimes, if you
think too much, you never
try,” said Besser, who kept
himself on pace with music,
including the Eurythmics’
“Would I lie to you?” — not a
surprising choice given that
he’s married to group mem-
ber Annie Lennox. She
rowed too.
“In any other situation
rowing would seem like an
absolutely ridiculous idea as
a fundraiser,” said Emma
France, global and strategic
engagement director for
Mothers2mothers. “But in
these strange times are ide-
as that we have to consider
and pursue.”
At-home volunteers
raised $325,000 — more than
the usual bike event —
through rowing, plus addi-
tional remote fundraising
through bicycling, walking
and running. It’s a successful
tale in an otherwise trou-
bling year for many nonprof-
its.
Donors are giving heavily
to organizations dealing
with the novel coronavirus
and its economic fallout —
developing vaccines, im-
proving treatment and sup-
plying food and other neces-
sities to those suddenly un-
employed, for instance. The
tally reached $16.5 billion
this week for wealthy corpo-
rations, foundations and in-
dividuals, according to Can-
did, a nonprofit that tracks
philanthropy.
But many other charities
are struggling because the
pandemic has shut down all
in-person events. In addi-
tion, regular donors who ar-
en’t wealthy but make small
contributions may have lost
work because of co-
ronavirus-related restric-
tions and can no longer give.
The California Assn. of
Nonprofits said that a third

of its members have cut

services by more than 50%.

Nearly 4 in 10 nonprofits

could close for lack of fund-

ing in the next three years,

Candid has projected.

Nonprofits are respond-

ing with innovative ways to

raise money, such as Moth-

ers2mothers’ virtual feats of

strength.

Hilarity for Charity put

on an online game show for

Alzheimer’s education, pre-

vention and caregiver sup-

port. The Florence Immi-

grant & Refugee Rights

Project hosted a remote doc-

umentary viewing party.

It doesn’t always work

out. New Jersey-based JAR

of Hope, for instance, had

begun to raise funds for

Duchenne muscular dystro-

phy research with an online

raffle but had to stop after

the state’s attorney general

ruled that charities can’t op-

erate remote raffles.

Here are four nonprofits

that are finding a way during

the pandemic.

Hilarity for Charity

The Santa Monica Pier

was packed on a September

day before the pandemic ar-

rived in the U.S., with ticket-

holders lining up for rides

and celebrity-run carnival

games during Hilarity for

Charity County Fair 2019.

It was a big fundraiser for

the charity, which focuses on

Alzheimer’s disease and

helping people caring for a

family member with the af-

fliction. The nonprofit is a

passion project for actor

Seth Rogen and his wife,

Lauren Miller Rogen, whose

mother has Alzheimer’s.

This kind of event

couldn’t be held in 2020 be-

cause of the surging pan-

demic, but the organization

was already accustomed to

gathering groups in a virtual

setting.

“Our support group

model has never been in per-

son and has always been run

through virtual meeting

rooms,” Miller Rogen said.

And so we’ve always known

that people can come to-

gether in a really supportive

way, digitally and virtually.”

Rogen said they brain-

stormed about “a virtual

event that would be fun and

exciting. And we came up

with the idea of a virtual

game show.”

The comedian hosted it

in the gaudiest of suits — yel-

low, orange, brown and

black plaid — and worked

with teams led by actresses

Anna Faris and Elizabeth

Banks, and comedy veter-

ans Jim Gaffigan, Craig Rob-

inson and Billy Eichner. The

show was sponsored by

biotech firm Biogen.

The game show raised

about $325,000, which the

Rogens said was roughly

one-third to one-half the

amount their typical in-per-

son events bring in. But the

big surprise was the size of

the Zoom crowd that

showed up, about 2,000 peo-

ple from around the world,

larger than the crowd at the

Santa Monica Pier last year.

“I think we’ve seen that

there are ways of bringing

large groups of people to-

gether virtually that are very

effective,” Rogen said, “And

that doesn’t mean we re-

place in-person events, but I

think we can simply add

these types of things

throughout the year.

They’re fun and easy for peo-

ple to commit to.”

Florence Immigrant

& Refugee Rights

Project

Despite the coronavirus

outbreak, the Florence Im-

migrant & Refugee Rights

Project has remained busy

with services that include

providing legal representa-

tion in immigration pro-

ceedings for detained adults

and children and reuniting

families.

The project helps asylum

seekers hoping to settle in

the U.S. Patricia, who asked

that her last name not be

used because she fears for

her safety, was a refugee

from Nicaragua, where she

said she was persecuted for

her support of the “blue and

white movement” pro-

democracy protests. The

project helped her win asy-

lum, and she now lives with

an aunt in Florida.

The pandemic created

new problems for the Arizo-

na-based nonprofit to

tackle.

“Arizona detention cen-

ters had the worst outbreaks

in the country,” said Gabri-

ela Corrales, the project’s di-

rector of philanthropy. “And

so we sued multiple times for

people to be released, espe-

cially the medically vulnera-

ble. We are always pivoting

because of COVID-19.”

A crucial pivot began in

2019 when, at the persistent

and prophetic advice of their

philanthropy consultant,

the project’s leaders had

started to back off from its

busy calendar of in-person

fundraisers, which can be

expensive to put on, as a way

to save money.

“We had an art show last

year. We had a pro bono

event where we had our at-

torneys attend from all

across the state,” Corrales

said. “We had planned this

year to visit several cities. In-

stead, we’ve had to shift to

virtual events, and that’s

been a big change.”

When the Netflix docu-

mentary “Immigration Na-

tion” premiered in July, the

Florence Immigrant & Ref-

ugee Rights Project hosted

an online viewing party for

more than 70 donors, fol-

lowed by a discussion of the

film’s examination of the

U.S. immigration system.

“We were also sharing

how the numbers of deten-

tions and family separations

were climbing,” Corrales

said. “We asked people to

please keep sharing this in-

formation, keep talking

about this because we don’t

want people to forget.”

Online gatherings re-

quire few personnel, no ven-

ue, caterer and other event

necessities. As a result, the

net amount the project re-

ceives from donations is

down just slightly compared

with 2019, Corrales said.

No Kid Hungry

Bill Shore, executive

chairman of No Kid Hungry,

has an enviable pandemic

problem: handling more

funding from donations

than the 10-year-old organi-

zation has ever seen by a fac-

tor of several million dollars.

By early November, No

Kid Hungry had used the

generosity to regift $34.5 mil-

lion to more than 1,

schools, food banks and

community organizations,

with plans to distribute an

additional $28 million by the

end of the year, said Shore,

who founded the nonprofit.

“I think there was a mo-

ment early on in the pan-

demic when people were

desperate to make some

kind of difference,” Shore

said.

“You couldn’t cure it. You

couldn’t invent a vaccine.

You couldn’t donate to a vac-

cine, really. So I think in

some ways, we were the next

best way for folks who felt

like ‘I’ve got to do some-

thing, because this is so ter-

rible.’ ”

When No Kid Hungry

had to shift its message from

in-person events, Shore

found help from many

sources.

“We’ve had the fitness

trainer Isaac Calpito raising

more than $1 million on his

livestream workout every

day, seven days a week, at 11

a.m. on Instagram. We had

Broadway actors creating

alternative theatrical events

called the Homebound Proj-

ect. They were livestream,

one-person, one-actor short

plays.”

Hollywood agent Rich-

ard Weitz and his teenage

daughter, Demi, raised mon-

ey for No Kid Hungry with

the aptly named Quaran-

tunes, which featured big

names including John May-

er, Josh Groban and Boy

George Zoom-casting from

their homes.

“Every Saturday night,

they were doing this very ex-

clusive livestream invita-

tion-only, password-pro-

tected event to raise money.

One of those raised a really

significant amount of money

for us,” Shore said.

No Kid Hungry also had

celebrities reading short

stories streamed on various

social media platforms, in

partnership with Save the

Children, to drive more in-

terest in donating. The read-

ers included actresses

Lupita Nyong’o, Jennifer

Garner and Amy Adams.

“We also, for the first

time, launched a direct-re-

sponse TV campaign that

featured actor Jeff Bridges,”

said Andrea Holliday, senior

manager for national con-

sumer media for No Kid

Hungry and its parent or-

ganization, Share Our

Strength.

Corporate donations

came from Taco Bell,

Williams-Sonoma, Verizon,

NBCUniversal and others.

“The level of generosity

has been astonishing,” he

said, acknowledging that he

was somewhat worried dur-

ing the early days of the virus

lockdowns, “but then the

funds really just started to

flow in. They haven’t

stopped. They’ve slowed

down, but they haven’t

stopped.”

Mothers2mothers

Besser, who was rowing

10,000 to 20,000 meters a day

by the end of the month, had

prepared himself for the po-

tential — perhaps even likeli-

hood — of failure of his goal

to convince volunteers to

row 1 million meters for

Mothers2mothers.

Besser, who has stepped

in as interim chairman for

the charity’s South Africa of-

fice, was counting on the or-

ganization’s track record:

Creating over 11,000 jobs for

women living with HIV and

providing services and edu-

cation. Most important,

women are giving birth to

babies free of HIV, Besser

said. Mothers2mothers gets

half of its money from the

U.S. government and has a

budget of $25 million, Besser

said.

But it was a bad time to

be asking anyone for money,

he thought, particularly for a

cause involving a distant

continent when there was so

much to be done in the U.S.

His fallback hope was just

for “some proof of concept,

that the idea might work,”

he said.

He was wrong. Volun-

teers rowed more than 2.

million meters for Moth-

ers2mothers.

“We had 41 rowers alto-

gether, aged 6 to 66, includ-

ing my wife, Annie,” Besser

said. “We had three Olympi-

ans who rowed for us. We

had a U.K. team that be-

longed to a rowing gym

called Rowbots.”

The effort was boosted by

one of Britain’s most popu-

lar soccer players, who has a

whopping 43.7 million follow-

ers on Instagram.

Gareth Bale, a soccer

player for Tottenham Hot-

spur, reached out to his fol-

lowers and asked people to

participate.

Despite the success of the

remote events, the semian-

nual bicycle ride was sorely

missed. This year was sup-

posed to be in Uganda for

five days in October.

“It’s more than just a

ride,” Besser said. “We go to

our sites, we meet the site

staff. It’s half riding and half

exposure to Mothers2moth-

ers in the field. We always go

to where we’re program-

ming so that the riders can

really feel what we’re doing.”

Besser said future fund-

raising probably will become

a hybrid of live and virtual

events.

“I imagine the beauty of

being able to raise $200,

to $300,000 every other year,

and now we’re going to be

able to do that every year,”

Besser said. “The proof of

concept worked very nicely.”

Charities get creative amid COVID

With no in-person

fundraising, nonprofits

are coming up with

ideas such as a rowing

event and game show.

By Ronald D. White

MITCH BESSER, husband of Eurythmics singer Annie Lennox, at his Los Angeles home’s rowing machine,

where he stroked out 500,000 meters in a fundraising event for the charity Mothers2mothers.

Annie Lennox

SETH ROGENand his wife, Lauren Miller Rogen,

run Hilarity for Charity to provide Alzheimer’s aid.

Gregg DeGuireGetty Images