fortune--2020-10-15--Dear Joe Biden: Rich Americans like me should pay even higher taxes than you’re proposing

Earlier this fall, Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden did something almost no other major presidential candidate has done on the campaign trail—he promised to raise people’s taxes. Bucking decades of conventional wisdom that talking about raising taxes is a surefire way to lose an election, Biden promised to raise taxes on America’s richest corporations “on day one” of his presidency.
As a wealthy individual and a former managing director at BlackRock, I would argue the former Vice President’s open endorsement of a once-taboo subject is not just a welcome change from four years of fictional trickle-down economics under President Trump. It’s also an acknowledgment that decades of politicians prioritizing the needs of the rich and powerful has left America with a growing inequality crisis that limits our ability to respond to emergencies like the COVID-19 pandemic.
In previous presidential administrations, both Republican and Democratic, wealthy individuals and corporations successfully beat back any serious discussion of taxing the rich while simultaneously lobbying Congress for deeper tax cuts and special privileges. Decades of tax policies favoring the rich have resulted in the highest levels of wealth inequality since the Census Bureau started tracking that figure in the 1960s, peaking after the Trump administration’s 2017 tax overhaul that amounted to a $1.9 trillion giveaway to corporations and the top 1% of income earners. That bill solidified our country’s vast wealth inequality, with corporations and billionaires each now paying a lower effective tax rate than the working class for the first time in our history.
Biden has commendably taken aim at this bill often on the campaign trail, pledging to not only do away with the Trump tax cuts, but reform the tax code altogether.
As with any major campaign promise, however, the devil is in the details.
Biden’s tax plan has plenty of great policy ideas to ensure a more equitable tax code, but there are a few key places where he could improve. In the interview where he pledged to raise corporate tax rates on day one, for instance, Biden proposed raising the rate to 28%. That is an improvement upon the current level of 21%, but still lower than it was anytime between World War II and the 2017 Trump tax cuts.
Biden is also promoting the “Amazon Rule,” which involves a 15% minimum tax rate on net annual income for corporations making over $100 million a year. This tax is a way of forcing companies that use a dizzying array of loopholes and special breaks to avoid paying a single dime in federal income taxes into coughing up at least something to the Treasury. Nearly 100 major companies like Netflix, Starbucks, Chevron, and the rule’s namesake, Amazon, have gotten away with paying no federal taxes whatsoever for years despite earning sky-high profits. Although this idea is a good start, Biden needs to consider taking a hard look at the loopholes and tax breaks that allow these companies to pay nothing in the first place.
On the individual tax policy side, Biden has committed to raising the capital gains tax rate, a special rate only for investors that essentially cuts their tax burden in half. Equalizing this tax rate would drastically shrink our inequality gap and ensure that people who work for a living aren’t paying a higher tax rate than rich folks like me who are just moving money around. He also proposes raising the income tax rate on the top bracket of earners, or folks who earn over $400,000 a year, from 37% to just under 40%.
These policies are a great start, but Biden can—and should—expand upon them. Though the primaries were filled with discussions of a wealth tax, Biden’s campaign has dismissed the idea outright, but it’s worth deeper consideration. Much of the wealth currently held by America’s 600-plus billionaires is untouchable under current income tax laws. But a wealth tax laser-targeted towards only the tip-top of the top 1% could easily skirt this issue and force these ultrarich folks to pay their fair share.
Biden’s tax plan maps out an equitable future for America, one that shifts the tax burden from the middle and working class up to the top 1% and ensures that my wealthy peers stop getting away with robbing the country blind.
There’s some room for improvement, but if implemented, a Biden tax code could be one of the most progressive tax codes this country has ever had. Like any presumptive presidential candidate, Biden will face constant pressure to cave into the demands of tax-averse monied interests. For the sake of our country’s future and the livelihoods of millions of working Americans, we urge Vice President Biden to stand by his commitments and tax wealthy folks like me on day one. No exceptions.
Morris Pearl is chair of the Patriotic Millionaires and former managing director at BlackRock.


fortune--2020-10-15--As COVID cases spike in Europe, Italy stands out—but this time for doing things right

The polls are wrong .
The U.S. presidential race is a near dead heat , this A.I .
‘ sentiment @ @ @ @

Italy without its beloved calcetto—pickup soccer game—would have seemed a cruel and unusual punishment not long ago. In the age of the novel coronavirus, it’s the new normal.
On Monday, the Italian government decreed a new series of measures to combat a rise in COVID-19 cases. The list included a prohibition on contact sports for amateur athletes and no school-organized trips. Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte’s government also mandated smaller wedding receptions and said it may unveil a new range of fines for households that throw big dinner parties. That last one caused a bit of a stir on Twitter.
Despite the zingers from Italian speakers on Twitter, the new restrictions came as little surprise to those who were paying attention. The government has been pushing hard data on the population, reporting last week, for example, that 77% of new infections had occurred between family members who picked up the virus at social gatherings such as birthday parties, weddings, and baptisms.
Elsewhere in the latest emergency decree, benign tweaks were made to existing rules, including the move to trim the coronavirus self-quarantine period from 14 days to ten.
In all, the measures looked methodical—tame, even—compared with elsewhere in Europe. Strict 9 p.m. curfews go into effect this weekend in Paris along with eight other French cities.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is going a step further, dividing the country into three tiered zones: hot, hotter, hottest. Johnson’s handling of the crisis is also dividing his biggest allies, and, more worryingly, his scientific advisers. The government’s chief medical officer, Chris Whitty, pronounced very publicly that he was “not confident” the latest U.K. plan could stop the disease’s spread.
A diss heard across Europe
In Italy, they’re watching Johnson’s crisis management skills with concern and a bit of bemusement. The U.K. and Johnson himself have been fairly critical of Italy’s handling of the pandemic since the outset. Johnson caused a big stir when he leaned on a bit of jingoism to explain why the U.K. is falling behind Italy and Germany in keeping infections down. (Because, he said in Parliament, Britain is “a freedom-loving country.”) His diss came through loud and clear across the Channel to Germans and Italians—that somehow, in Johnson’s mind, they are not.
That kind of criticism rankles the Italians. In early March, Italy was the first country to impose a nationwide lockdown, closing businesses and schools as deaths spiked in northern Italy. Officials had to choose between the health of an already vulnerable economy and the health of its citizens. It chose the latter, a choice it continues to defend.
In no way “did we abrogate the democratic rights of the people when we decided the lockdown measures,” says Franco Locatelli, the head of Italy’s supreme health council, a team of researchers, scientists, and doctors who have advised the Italian government throughout the COVID-19 public health crisis. “There is no violation of democracy in trying to protect the health of the people.”
Fortune spoke to Locatelli, who is also director of oncology-hematology and cell and gene therapy at the Bambino Gesù Pediatric Hospital in Rome. “We were convinced it was the only way to win the battle against COVID-19,” he says of that national lockdown order in March that drew attention from around the planet.
“From global pariah to a model”
Within days, Italy’s groundbreaking move seemed less and less extreme. Other democracies around the world soon followed the Italian model. And, in almost all cases, the effects have succeeded in blunting deadly outbreaks, giving health care officials precious time to assess what worked, what didn’t, and prepare for future waves.
By late summer, Italy was being lauded by the international public health community and by the press, including the New York Times, saying the country had “gone from global pariah to a model.”
Italy has hardly dodged the latest autumn wave of contagion hitting Europe, but it’s holding up better than neighboring countries. The number of infections per 100,000 in Italy is less than one-third the rate seen in Britain, Spain, and France.
As infection numbers climb across Europe, the region is once again splitting into two groups: those who are managing the latest wave with some level of efficiency (Germany, Denmark, and Italy) and those that are seeing alarming numbers (France, Spain, the Netherlands, and Great Britain).
In Italy, this latest wave comes as testing (rapid testing facilities are now operational at airports) and contact tracing (there’s an app that’s seeing a boom in downloads) have kicked into high gear across the country. It’s also come as schools and businesses have fully reopened. If there’s a silver lining in the latest numbers it’s that there are far fewer hospitalizations and deaths, always a lagging indicator. So far, that is.
The Immuni app is the tracking system managed by the government to counter the COVID-19 emergency. It’s been downloaded more than 8 million times. (Wire photography: Stefano Guidi—Getty Images)
Locatelli believes the Italian playbook—lock down quickly, open gradually—was effective in restoring some level of normalcy to everyday life by the early summer. The country reopened its borders to tourists in June along with much of the rest of the European Union. The usual cast of German, Dutch, and British tourists were easy to spot in Italy’s town squares this summer, though fewer in numbers.
Locatelli attributes the diminished wave of COVID lethality to the work they did on the fly in those hectic early months. Resources and staffing at hospitals and testing centers have increased, and there’s still a strong working partnership between scientific advisers and government officials—between those who suggest the safety measures and those who ultimately inscribe them into law. It’s helped that the messaging between the experts and politicians has been more or less in lockstep since day one.
No hyped-up cures or U-turns
Italian politics can seem like a zoo sometimes, but during the COVID outbreak government officials have looked clear-eyed and coordinated. There have been no rambling endorsements of untested COVID cures like hydroxychloroquine or embarrassing U-turns.
“Let me put it this way,” says Locatelli, “some decisions taken by other countries would not have been taken in Italy.”
That might explain why the level of public trust remains relatively strong in Italy, which you can see on the streets. More than four in five Italians are “very or quite willing” to wear a face mask (they have to; it’s the law). That level of compliance is among the highest in Europe.
To be sure, there are plenty of signs of fatigue. The negazionisti movement of COVID deniers have held a series of public demonstrations. But the last one, held on Oct. 10 in Rome, was so poorly attended, the media branded it “un flop.” It now appears destined to fade into the fringe.
Italy is hardly out of the bosco (woods). An Italian doctors’ union on Tuesday warned that Italian hospitals would quickly get overwhelmed should the number of COVID hospitalizations in Italy spike to the levels currently seen in France. But so far, that’s not a concern. On Wednesday, the number of Italians in the ICU stood at 539. In April, there were more than 4,000 in intensive care.
And then there’s the always shaky Italian economy. Italian GDP is expected to shrink 10.6% this year as the pandemic has devastated the twin engines of manufacturing and foreign tourism. It’s a slump the highly indebted economy could ill afford.
But the markets see something in Italy’s handling of the crisis that gives investors reason for optimism. For the first time in living memory, the Italian Treasury this week sold Italian bonds that carried a zero coupon.
It was oversubscribed, astounding market watchers.
I recommend the Italian Treasury for Nobel Prize in Economics. https://t.co/w0SRdQQLLl — Michael Harris (@mikeharrisNY) October 13, 2020
Even with the tables turned, and Italy no longer considered Europe’s COVID hot zone, Locatelli still preaches caution. Until an effective vaccine arrives, he cautions, the public will have to adhere to strict social distancing rules and hygiene guidelines.
“We don’t want to underestimate the numbers,” he says. “That would be a great mistake.”


fortune--2020-10-15--Adam Neumann makes his next real estate play

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Adam Neumann, the WeWork co-founder who stepped down after a botched attempt at an IPO last year, is not done with venture capital yet.
His family office, 166 2nd LLC, led a $42 million round in Alfred, a startup that offers a residential building management platform (where residents can submit apartment maintenance requests or pay rent each month) as well as more advanced concierge services (where they can book a cleaner or dog walker). Existing investors Spark Capital, New Enterprise Associates, and Greystar Real Estate Partners participated in the round.
While Alfred is no WeWork, the thinking behind Neumann’s investment echoes ambitions from his time leading the coworking space, with dreams of expanding beyond offices and into residential spaces.
Among other projects, WeWork under Neumann launched WeLive, a kind of long-term hotel or hostel-living setup aimed at young professionals with housekeeping, yoga classes, and the draw of communal living. And if Neumann continues to invest in line with his WeWork bets, there could be quite the diverse roster: Under the founder, WeWork also launched WeGrow, an education offshoot aimed at teaching young children—and a separate smart cities project that kicked off in early March, just before the company’s IPO filing upended plans.
A VC UNICORN: On Thursday, GV, formerly known as Google Ventures, promoted its first Black female partner. At 26, Terri Burns will be the firm’s youngest ever partner.
Burns is a rarity in an industry long dominated by white males. Just one Black woman was named a partner at any VC firm in 2019. And Black people made up just 0.67% of all entrants to the industry between 2010 and 2015.
Burns, who spent three years at GV as a principal and cut her teeth as an associate product manager at Twitter before that, has already made out checks through GV—one soon to be announced, and another in HAGS, an app created by Gen-Z founders that started out as a digital yearbook and is looking to transform into broader social site for high schoolers.
Read more.
Lucinda Shen
Twitter: @shenlucinda
Email: lucinda.shen@fortune.com
VENTURE DEALS
- 98point6, a Seattle-based on-demand digital primary care service, raised $118 million in Series E funding. L Catterton and Activant Capital led the round and was joined by investors including Goldman Sachs.
- Extend, a San Francisco-based fintech focused on product warranties, raised $40 million in Series B funding. Meritech Capital led the round and was joined by investors including PayPal Ventures, Great Point Ventures and Shah Capital Partners.
- Cribl, a San Francisco Bay area-based data observability company, raised $35 million in Series B funding. Sequoia Capital led the round and was joined by CRV.
- Ori Biotech a London-based company focused on cell and gene therapy manufacturing, raised $30 million in Series A funding. Northpond Ventures led the round and was joined by investors including Octopus Ventures, Amadeus Capital Partners, Delin Ventures, and Kindred Capital.
- Argyle, a San Francisco-based maker of a way to track and verify employment records, raised $20 million in Series A funding. Bain Capital led the round and was joined by investors including Bedrock and F-Prime.
- Agility Robotics, an Albany, Ore.-based robotics company, raised $20 million in Series A funding. DCVC and Playground Global led the round.
- Vivun, an Oakland, Calif.-based presale software maker, raised $18 million in Series A funding. Accel led the round and was joined by investors including Unusual Ventures.
- DYPER, a Scottsdale, Ariz.-based maker of eco-friendly diapers, raised $20 million in funding. The Craftory led the round and was joined by investors including HCAP.
- Dataloop, a Tel Aviv-based platform for A.I. data management and annotation, raised $11 million in Series A funding. Amiti Ventures led the round and was joined by investors including F2 Venture Capital, OurCrowd, NextLeap Ventures and SeedIL Ventures.
- FOSSA, a San Francisco-based open source management company,raised $23.2 million in Series B funding. Investors included Bain Capital Ventures, Canvas Ventures and Costanoa Ventures.
- River, a New York-based content discovery platform, raised $10.4 million in seed and Series A funding. Investors include Founders Fund, .406 Ventures, Box Group, Scooter Braun, Josh Kushner, and Raised in Space.
- Playbook, a New York-based marketplace for fitness and athletics instructors to turn content into subscription income, raised $9.3 million in Series A funding. Investors included E.ventures, Michael Ovitz, Abstract, Aglae Ventures, Porsche Ventures and FJ Labs.
- Azitra, a Branford, Conn.-based dermatology company, raised $8 million in funding. Leaps by Bayer led the round.
- Findem, a San Francisco-based maker of an HR recruiting and retention platform, raised $7.3 million in Series A funding. Wing Venture Capital.
- Twentyeight Health, a New York-based health tech company offering access to women’s sexual and reproductive healthcare, raised $5.1 million in seed funding. Third Prime led the round and was joined by investors including Town Hall Ventures, SteelSky Ventures, Aglaé Ventures, GingerBread Capital, Rucker Park Capital, and Predictive VC.
- Aumni, a Salt Lake City-based investment analytics company for the private capital markets, raised $3 million in additional Series A funding. Investors included Donnelley Financial Solutions, DLA Piper and Orrick.
- Coa, a San Francisco-based online fitness and online therapy studio, raised $3 million in seed funding. Crosslink Ventures led the round and was joined by investors including RedSea Ventures and Alpaca VC.
- NeuraLegion, a San Francisco-based application security platform, raised $4.7 million in seed funding. DNX Ventures led the round and was joined by investors including Fusion Fund, J-Ventures, and Incubate Fund.
- Balsa, a San Francisco-based startup building tools for builders, raised $4.5 million in seed funding. Andreessen Horowitz led the round and was joined by investors including Operator Collective, BoxGroup, 20VC, Chapter One, Work Life Ventures, Stewart Butterfield, Drew Houston, Howie Liu, April Underwood, Scott Belsky, and Jason Warner.
- Arist, a Boston-based text message learning platform, raised $1.9 million in funding. Investors included Acadian Ventures, Global Founders Capital and Craft Ventures.
- Vidafuel, a New York-based company developing nutrition products, raised $1.1 million in funding. True Wealth Ventures led the round and was joined by investors including Boxcar Partners co-founders Joseph Kekst and Peter Feinberg.
- Secret Double Octopus, a Tel Aviv-based startup focused on passwordless authentication, raised an undisclosed amount of funding from SC Ventures.
PRIVATE EQUITY
- Alantra acquired a 49% stake in Indigo Capital, a Paris-based debt asset manager. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Arena Capital Partners invested in Retro Fitness, a West Palm Beach, Fla.-based gym franchise. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- WellSky, a portfolio company of TPG Capital and Leonard Green & Partners, agreed to acquire CarePort Health, a Boston-based maker of care coordination software, from Allscripts (NASDAQ: MDRX) for about $1.3 billion.
- Cherry GmbH, a portfolio company of Argand Partners, acquired Theobroma Systems Design and Consulting GmbH, a Vienna, Austria-based developer and manufacturer of embedded platform systems. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Arcadia Consumer Healthcare, a portfolio company of Avista Capital Partners, acquired NATURELO, a brand of vitamins, minerals, and supplements. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
BREAKUPS AND HANGUPS
- YogaWorks, the California-based yoga chain owned by Great Hill Partners, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
EXITS
- Emmi Group acquired Indulge Desserts Holdings, a St. Paul, Minn.-based maker of gourmet desserts, from AUA Private Equity Partners. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
OTHERS
- Huawei is considering a sale of a part of its Honor smartphone business. A deal could fetch as much as 25 billion yuan ($3.7 billion), per Reuters. Read more.
- Stripe is acquiring Paystack, a Lagos, Nigeria-based payments services startup, for an estimated $200 million. Read more.
- PineBridge Investments acquired Benson Elliot Capital Management , a London-based private equity real estate fund manager with over $3.5 billion of equity. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- UserTesting, backed by Openview Venture Partners and Greenspring Associates, acquired th technology assets of usabiliTEST, an Austin-based provider of information architecture testing solutions. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Pluralsight (NASDAQ: PS) acquired DevelopIntelligence, a Louisville, Colo.-based provider ofskills consulting and virtual instructor-led training for IT. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
IPOs
- Array Technologies Inc., the solar company, raised $1.1 billion alongside shareholder Oaktree Capital in its IPO. Read more.
- Datto, a Norwalk, Conn.-based cloud backup company, plans to raise $561 million in an offering of 22 million shares priced between $24 to $27. Investment Group of Santa Barbara and Dragoneer Investment Group plan to acquire $112 million worth of shares in the offering. Vista Equity Partners backs the firm. Read more.
- Miniso Group Holding Ltd, a Chinese retailer, raised $608 million in an offering of 30.4 million ADSs priced at $20. The company posted revenues of $1.2 billion in the 12 months ending June and a loss of $35.9 million. Tencent backs the firm. Read more.
F+FS
- HarbourVest Partners closed the Dover X Street secondaries fund at $8.1 billion.
- Arbor Investments closed its fifth fund with $1.5 billion.
- Menlo Ventures launched Menlo XV with $500 million in commitments.
- True Ventures closed its seventh early stage fund with $465 million and its fourth Select Fund with $375 million.
- OpenView Venture Partners closed its sixth fund with $450 million in commitments.
- Brighteye Ventures, a European edtech focused firm, raised $54 million upon the first close of its second fund.
PEOPLE
- Information Venture Partners named Hasan Basrai as an associate and Peter Carrescia as a venture partner.


fortune--2020-10-15--NordicTrack maker sues Peloton over new exercise bike design

Peloton Interactive on Thursday was sued for patent infringement by Icon Health & Fitness, the maker of the NordicTrack bike, escalating the legal tussle between the two fitness equipment giants.
Logan, Utah-based Icon filed a lawsuit in a Delaware district court that is built around patent infringement claims for two features Peloton added to an exercise bike released in September: a swiveling touchscreen and the ability for the bike to automatically change resistance levels during classes.
In the lawsuit, Icon claims that it was issued a patent for the resistance level feature, which Peloton calls Auto-Follow, in 2007 and a second issued last year that allows for a seamless mix of aerobic and anaerobic exercise. Both are part of the Bike+, Peloton’s latest offering, and are also present across several of Icon’s NordicTrack products.
“Some companies, like Peloton, have built (at least in part) entire businesses on the back of Icon’s patented technology,” the filing claimed.
Peloton shares dropped by 3.7% when markets opened Thursday and were trading down 0.7% at $130.54 at 9:59 a.m. in New York.
The two companies have crossed swords before. New York-based Peloton sued Icon in May, claiming that the company copied its patented feature for making prerecorded online classes seem live. Peloton said at the time that Icon “attempted to free ride off Peloton’s innovative technology.” Icon had previously sued Peloton when its first bike was launched and again when Peloton launched its first treadmill.
In Thursday’s lawsuit, Icon fired back by saying it obtained “hundreds of patents on these systems before Peloton was founded.” It said that Peloton Chief Executive Officer John Foley met with Icon in 2013 in an attempt to use some of its patents and that Icon declined the opportunity to grant him a license.
“Foley was warned at that meeting and subsequent meetings against infringing Icon’s patents,” according to the lawsuit.
The latest development in the Peloton and Icon saga comes amid major growth in the home fitness market, as consumers looked for ways to stay fit with many gyms across the U.S. remaining closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Icon reached a $7 billion valuation in a new funding round, Bloomberg News reported earlier this month.
In its latest lawsuit, Icon is seeking unspecified damages and an injunction against sales.


fortune--2020-10-15--A fine kettle: How fishing became the issue that could sink a post-Brexit U.K.-EU trade deal

Fishing rights have emerged as a major sticking point in negotiations between the European Union and United Kingdom over a post-Brexit trade deal.
Last week, David Frost, the chief U.K. trade negotiator, told the British Parliament that fishing was perhaps the biggest impediment remaining to an agreement after the U.K. signaled it was prepared to give ground on the issue of state support for businesses, which had been another major stumbling block.
Boris Johnson, the British Prime Minister, has threatened to quit the trade negotiations completely if a deal is not in sight at a crucial EU Brexit summit taking place in Brussels today.
The EU’s chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier, for his part, has tried to urge European politicians, particularly in France and Belgium, to moderate their demands for access to British waters after the end of the Brexit transition period on Jan. 1.
But so far, Barnier’s pleas seem to be falling on deaf ears. France’s Europe minister, Clément Beaune, said this week that France “will not accept a bad deal and a bad deal in fisheries in particular. We will have no weakness on this issue of fisheries, that is clear.” Belgium said some of its fishermen had been granted rights to fish in British waters by King Charles II of England as far back as 1666.
A drop in the bucket
Fishing represents a minuscule portion of both the U.K. and EU economy—just 0.1% of gross value added and about 0.05% of jobs for Britain and even smaller fractions for the EU. So how did fishing become the issue that might scuttle a trade deal?
One is that the issue is highly emotive and symbolic for both sides. While it represents a tiny and declining portion of economic activity, fishermen are still closely associated with English identity.
Fishing rights were one of the principal areas that Brexit campaigners pointed to when they said they wanted to “take back control” from Brussels. English fishermen made up one of the most vocal blocks of Brexit voters too. So Johnson, who was one of the leaders of the drive to get the U.K. out of the EU, is sensitive to claims that he’s now abandoning fishermen.
In addition, Johnson may see fishing rights as one of the few areas where the U.K. might be able to score a “win” that the government can then tout as evidence of Brexit’s success, says Matt Bevington, an analyst with the think tank U.K. in a Changing Europe, which is affiliated with King’s College London.
Meanwhile, while fishing represents just 0.06% of the French economy overall, the industry is important to some cities in Brittany and the region around Calais that are likely to be important battlegrounds for French President Emmanuel Macron in the 2022 presidential election.
And access to British waters is crucial for fishermen in those regions. A third of France’s entire North Atlantic catch comes from U.K. waters. The percentage is even greater for fishermen from Denmark, Belgium, the Netherlands, Ireland, and Germany. If they were to lose access entirely, many of these EU fishermen would struggle to stay in business.
But Bevington points out that the U.K. fishing industry, particularly the market for species such as mackerel and herring, is heavily dependent on market access to the EU too. Just two species—herring and mackerel—account for about half of all fish landed in British ports, and yet U.K. consumers hardly eat them. Two-thirds of British mackerel and most of its herring catch is exported to the EU. In the absence of a deal, these fish would be hit with an additional 15% tariff.
Holy mackerel!
And it is not just the U.K. that needs to worry about the effect of these tariffs. Much of the pain of them is likely to be borne by EU consumers, who eat a lot of the fish caught in British waters.
Given this dynamic, Bevington says, there ought to be plenty of room for compromise. But, he says, within the dynamics of the overall trade negotiations, tactical and political considerations make it difficult for either side to offer concessions—until the very last minute.
“The U.K. knows it is in a strong position when it comes to fish, which it is not in other areas, so it wants to leave fish for last to exert leverage in other areas,” he says.
The tactic, though, risks backfiring, as French EU minister Beaune points out. “The British want their waters back, and they believe this gives them leverage,” he told French newspaper Le Monde. “But they forget that for everything else they are negotiating; they have a lot more to ask than to offer.” He also reiterated that France would “not sacrifice” the interests of its fishermen for the sake of a deal.
So far, the EU has staked out an absolutist position, demanding continued access to U.K. waters for its fishing fleet on the basis of the EU’s Common Fisheries Policy, which set quotas largely based on each country’s historical catch totals from the entirety of EU territorial waters. The U.K. says it wants to move to a system of “zonal attachment,” where foreign fleets would still have some access, but with quotas based on the actual stocks of each species found in a particular part of the sea.
Bevington says he thinks the EU will eventually blink. “There is going to have be movement,” he said. “The EU is unrealistic, and the zonal attachment would still give the EU a quota. So there is room for movement, and it is just a matter of where they land.”
But he cautions the EU is distrustful of the U.K., and as in any game of diplomatic chicken, there is always a risk that the two sides will wait too long, resulting in the failure of the entire trade deal.


fortune--2020-10-15--Facebook is now an arbiter of truth

Facebook is now an arbiter of truth

Good morning, Data Sheet readers. Tech writer Danielle Abril here. You may remember me from the various occasions in which I filled in for Adam Lashinsky.
Though the team will miss Adam dearly, we are turning to the next chapter of Data Sheet. I’m excited to begin delivering the latest tech news to your inbox every Thursday as an official author of the newsletter.
One of the things I’ve been watching is the recent backpedaling on the part of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
In January, Zuckerberg passionately defended free speech at the Silicon Slopes Summit in Salt Lake City, Utah. “This is the new approach,” he said. “I think it’s going to piss off a lot of people.”
But perhaps Zuckerberg has pissed off enough people to reconsider that statement. In recent weeks, Facebook has debuted new rules banning posts, groups, pages, and accounts related to QAnon, a conspiracy theory tied to the far-right. Facebook also recently said it plans to crack down on presidential candidates or political parties that claim election victory before the official result has been determined.
The service added another new rule this week, banning ads that discourage people from getting vaccinated—though it’s leaving anti-vaxx posts from users untouched. And following pressure it received from Holocaust survivors around the world, Facebook said it will remove posts that deny or downplay the mass murder of about six million Jews in Nazi Germany.
In announcing that ban, Zuckerberg admitted he’s had to rethink how he views free speech. “I’ve struggled with the tension between standing for free expression and the harm caused by minimizing or denying the horror of the Holocaust,” he said in Facebook post on Monday. “My own thinking has evolved.”
On Wednesday, Facebook reduced the distribution of a New York Post story about an alleged email that connects presidential candidate Joe Biden to corruption in Ukraine. In a tweet, company spokesman Andy Stone said Facebook chose to take the action because the story needed to be fact-checked by the service’s third-party partners.
In all fairness, for years Facebook has had rules against certain types of speech. Users have been prohibited from threatening someone with violence, for example. But Zuckerberg repeatedly has said he doesn’t want Facebook to be the arbiter of truth. Yet with its most recent changes, the company is doing just that.
Danielle Abril
Twitter: @DanielleDigest
danielle.abril@fortune.com
NEWSWORTHY
Deniers begone. Twitter on Wednesday said that it will remove posts that deny or diminish the Holocaust, joining Facebook, which reversed its stance on the matter and rolled out a similar policy on Monday. Though Twitter’s policy doesn’t explicitly prohibit posts that deny the Holocaust, the company said the posts violate its hateful conduct policy.
Warehouse woes. Amazon warehouse workers in New York say the company has “recklessly” reinstated quotas that are dangerous during the coronavirus pandemic. The workers had previously filed a lawsuit in July alleging that the company failed to follow proper COVID-19 prevention recommendations from health authorities. In the latest complaint, workers say that Amazon has started reinforcing productivity quotas leading up to Prime Day, despite telling a judge in July it had suspended those measures.
Rebranding the rebrand. The parent company of the money-losing co-working space WeWork has decided to ditch the name it introduced last year and go back to its roots. The We Company is now WeWork again, according to Reuters. The change comes as the company focuses on its core business of co-working spaces, distancing itself from WeWork co-founder and former CEO Adam Neumann, who intended to broaden the business.
Race against the clock. In the latest news on the TikTok saga, a U.S. appeals court agreed to expedite the appeal of a recent ruling that blocked the government from banning downloads of the social media app. On Sept. 27, TikTok found reprieve in a preliminary injunction that allowed the app to remain on the Google and Apple app stores. Meanwhile, TikTok faces another looming deadline on Nov. 12, at which time the government could ban the usage of the app in the U.S. The government claims the app, owned by Chinese-based ByteDance, poses a national security risk.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
The New York State Department of Financial Services on Wednesday released a report following an investigation into the July Twitter hack that compromised the accounts of several cryptocurrency companies and public figures.
In the report, the department said that Twitter lacked the cybersecurity protections at the time of the hack and recommended a “new cybersecurity regulatory framework for giant social media companies.”
“Social media platforms have quickly become the leading source of news and information, yet no regulator has adequate oversight of their cybersecurity. The fact that Twitter was vulnerable to an unsophisticated attack shows that self-regulation is not the answer,” Linda A. Lacewell, the department’s superintendent, said in a release.
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Facebook moves to limit spread of dubious Biden laptop story by Jeff John Roberts
Zoom’s newest feature will provide a marketplace for virtual events and services by Aaron Pressman
GV, formerly known as Google Ventures, elevates its first Black female investing partner by Lucinda Shen
‘We have to change who the investors are’: How women VCs are working to fund Black and female founders by Anne Sraders
Facebook A.I. researchers push for a breakthrough in renewable energy storage by Jeremy Kahn
Apple’s 5G iPhone debut didn’t go as planned in the world’s biggest 5G market by Grady McGregor
How the NBA kept the bubble from bursting by Adam Lashinsky and Brian O'Keefe
BEFORE YOU GO
I’ve recently learned I’m not the only person who loves getting my “I Voted” sticker on voting day. Over the years, it’s actually become a bit of a social media trend—posting a photo of your sticker after voting.
Perhaps that's why some cities are redesigning their stickers to better represent the local community. For example, in my hometown of El Paso, Texas, this year voters’ stickers don the Franklin Mountains with the signature El Paso star on the side. More than 3,500 miles away, Alaska voters may receive one of 13 new stickers that highlight the diversity and strength of women in their communities. Those stickers are available in 10 languages, including several Native languages.
Have you gotten your sticker this year? That’s my subtle way of telling you to vote.


fortune--2020-10-15--‘You get to be twice as good:’ This investor urges Black female founders to turn an unfair axiom on

‘You get to be twice as good:’ This investor urges Black female founders to turn an unfair axiom on its head

This is the web version of the Broadsheet, Fortune’s daily newsletter for and about the world’s most powerful women. To get it delivered daily to your in-box, sign up here.
Good morning, Broadsheet readers! Anita Hill’s Hollywood Commissions has new findings about bullying and harassment, Audrey Gelman apologizes to her former staff at The Wing, and investors offer advice for female founders. Have a thoughtful Thursday.
– Twice as good. We already know the ugly facts: that the amount of venture capital dollars that go to female and Black founders is far too small.
And amid the pandemic, it’s getting smaller. Recent PitchBook data shows that VC funding for female founders just hit its lowest quarterly total in three years.
At Fortune’s Most Powerful Women Next Gen conference yesterday, four investors addressed the alarming trend and how we might reverse it.
Inspired Capital’s Alexa von Tobel said that who’s at the top—who is holding the checkbooks—needs to change. “When you have different archetypes at the top of a firm and you have different investors out there, … you simply have different deal flow,” she said. “So we have to change who the investors are.”
But Cleo Capital managing director Sarah Kunst also offered a reality check, as Fortune‘s Anne Sraders reports. Black female founders don’t have to put off fundraising until that change happens.
“You certainly don’t have to be diverse to invest in diverse founders,” Kunst said. For women of color who are fundraising now, it’s a matter of understanding the saying in the Black community that “you have to be twice as good to get half as much,” Kunst said.
The axiom is undoubtably unfair, but women don’t have to see it as a burden, Kunst says. She advises founders to “flip that and internalize it as, you get to be twice as good…If you are a person of color, if you are a woman, when you do get funded, you should feel pretty good that you probably are better statistically” than the average white man raising funding.
Claire Zillman
claire.zillman@fortune.com
@clairezillman
Today’s Broadsheet was curated by Emma Hinchliffe.
MORE FROM MPW NEXT GEN
- Family business. Actor and producer Yara Shahidi has partnered with her mother, Keri Shahidi, on a recently launched production company. The pair described their relationship and what they've learned from each other through work and outside of it: Fortune
- Do you Zoom? Zoom CMO Janine Pelosi unveiled a forthcoming feature: "On Zoom," a way for everyone from yoga teachers to tax preparers to charge for their services directly via the videoconferencing platform. Fortune
- Dress for success. Retailers—and particularly clothing retailers—have had to adapt to changing consumer preferences during the pandemic. Execs from Good American, Stitch Fix, and more share what they've learned: Fortune
MOVERS AND SHAKERS: GV promoted principal Terri Burns to investing partner; she is the first Black woman at the firm to hold that title. Global Philanthropy Group CEO Maggie Neilson will become VP of philanthropy for The Wonderful Company. CEO of the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers Raquel Tamez joins the board of Girls in Tech. Getaround hires former NerdWallet CFO Laura Onopchenko in the same role; former Google director, people operations Tia Gordon as VP, people and culture; and former OYO VP, customer experience Ruth Yankoupe in the same position. FanDuel Group hired former Groupon chief product officer Sarah Butterfass in the same role. EY named Janet Truncale vice chair and regional managing partner of its Americas Financial Services Organization. Leslie Kurkjian Crowe joins Bain Capital Ventures as talent partner.
ALSO IN THE HEADLINES
- Under threat. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer's Elle op-ed about the foiled plot to kidnap her is a broadside against President Donald Trump and the violent threats female politicians disproportionately face. "It is no coincidence that after months of attacks from the president, I became the target of a multi-state domestic terrorist plot," she writes. Elle
- Survey says. Anita Hill's Hollywood Commission for Eliminating Sexual Harassment and Advancing Equality found in a new report that women are twice as likely as men to experience bullying in entertainment work environments—and that bullying can be a gateway to sexual harassment. Variety
- Calling back. Prosecutors say that Amy Cooper, the white woman who called the police on Christian Cooper, the Black birdwatcher in Central park, made a second, as-yet-unreported 911 call in which she falsely reported that a Black man tried to assault her. New York Times
- Audrey's apology. Audrey Gelman, the cofounder and former CEO of The Wing, responded to protests by her former employees more than four months after those workers called for her resignation. Gelman posted on Instagram yesterday a letter addressed to Flew the Coup, the collective of former staff of the women's coworking chain's physical locations who had spoken out about their experiences with racism and other problems at work. Fortune
ON MY RADAR
Takeaways from day 3 of the Amy Coney Barrett confirmation hearings CNN
Going Sohla Vulture
Simone Leigh is first Black woman to represent U.S. at Venice Biennale New York Times
PARTING WORDS
"Everybody has a voice in the sewer."
-Newsha Ghaeli and Mariana Matus, cofounders of Biobot Analytics, on the importance of studying wastewater. The duo appeared at MPW Next Gen to discuss their company and its response to COVID-19.


fortune--2020-10-15--‘A curfew at nine o’clock is like closing restaurants’: For the French, the latest COVID measures cr

‘A curfew at nine o’clock is like closing restaurants’: For the French, the latest COVID measures cross a line

Steps from Paris’s Notre-Dame Cathedral sits one of the city’s oldest restaurants, Au Vieux Paris D’Arcole, a medieval jewel whose stone walls and chandeliers (not to mention fine cuisine) have wowed visitors for decades. Built in 1512, it has withstood the French Revolution, two World Wars, the Nazi occupation, and much else.
But after nearly 500 years, the restaurant is battling to survive the newest calamity: the pandemic. After a two-and-a-half month nationwide lockdown earlier this year, and a ban since March on American tourists—a major source of revenue for Paris—the restaurant recently laid off six of its eight employees.
Then on Wednesday night came the latest blow, when French President Emmanuel Macron announced a four-week curfew in Paris from 9 p.m. until 6 a.m., beginning Saturday night. The measure extends to eight other cities and came after weeks in which the French returned from their long summer break and poured into the parks, markets, and restaurants, reveling in cities that have suddenly come alive with action—and with no tourists, all their own.
Within weeks, coronavirus cases began soaring and this week hit about 20,000 new cases a day. In the Paris region, about 46% of all ICU beds are now filled with COVID-19 patients, according to Paris’s public-health officials on Thursday. Reassuring the alarmed public, Macron said in a televised address on Wednesday night that it would be “disproportionate to lock down the country again.” The curfew, he said, was a targeted measure: “With this, it is our objective, in a very concrete manner, to halt the virus.”
But to many Paris restaurants, Macron’s curfew might just as well be another total lockdown.
“To have a curfew at nine o’clock is like closing restaurants,” Georges De La Rochebrochard, the owner of Au Vieux Paris D’Arcole, told me on Thursday morning. “The French begin eating dinner at about 8.30 p.m.,” he says. “Only Americans eat at seven o’clock, and they are not here.”
Last blast of freedom
To us Paris residents, that has long been clear. In normal times, hordes of tourists jam the streets during the day around the Louvre Museum, and the Champs-Elysées and other major shopping districts; tourism represents about 11.7% of Paris revenue, and Americans contribute by far the biggest share, with nearly 2.26 million U.S. visitors to the city last year.
But it feels like real Paris comes alive at nighttime. On Wednesday night, as Macron made his televised address to the nation, I was at a book launch attended by about 20 women, many of them American. Midway through the evening, our phones began buzzing with news of the curfew. “Come for dinner Saturday night, we’re cooking,” said a friend as I was leaving, before hearing about the curfew. Suddenly robbed of her dinner plans, she seemed stumped for an alternative.
On the walk home through my Left Bank neighborhood, I sidestepped a restaurant that was packed both inside and at the tables set up along the sidewalk. Several people were browsing the menu, seemingly in no rush to decide what to eat for dinner. It was 9.30 p.m.
Less visible, of course, was that the pandemic has hit hardest among those lower-income Parisians cooking in the kitchen and serving tables, and whose commute often involves long train rides from peripheral suburbs.
Like countless other families around the world, mine has struggled to define how exactly to behave during the pandemic. My son, 14, returned to school on Sept. 1—masked in class—and now zips around the city on the Paris Metro, to tennis lessons and his jazz-music school. Last Saturday night, he met four friends in the old Le Marais district, where they ate falafel and then walked two miles home. With the pandemic’s second wave raging, was it a fun night out, or a life-threatening act? Without clear rules imposed upon us—like a nationwide lockdown—it has been difficult for us parents to set our own. We ultimately decided it might be his last blast of freedom, before the walls close in again.
“We are very skeptical”
For the restaurant industry, those walls feel like a catastrophe. De La Rochebrochard says his revenues so far are down more than 80% this year, from about $1.18 million in 2019, to about $234,000, but estimates that could drop to about $134,000 by the end of the year—a figure that the restaurant might not be able to survive. Will it recover in the end? I ask. “We are very skeptical,” he says.
He is hardly alone. The sense of doom among restaurateurs reached a peak on Thursday. “The government does not say they are closing restaurants, but this is the same thing,” says Christine Fabre, co-owner of five restaurants and one bar, most around the busy Montparnasse district on the Left Bank. She says half of her restaurants would likely close the whole day, while the others will attempt to survive the four-week curfew. It will not be easy. “Our rush is between 9 and 11 p.m.,” she says.
De La Rochebrochard says he does not know whether he can keep the old treasure, Au Vieux Paris D’Arcole, going. Generations of his extended family have run the restaurant for about 200 years.
At 67, he is getting ready to retire, and until COVID-19 hit, one of his three children had been interested in taking over the restaurant. But now, he says, “not at all.” He and his wife are weighing what to do. If their revenues plunge further, they will struggle to pay utility bills. “If someone comes to me now wanting to buy, I would sell immediately,” he says. “Many restaurants are for sale. But there are no buyers.”
More must-read international coverage from Fortune :


fortune--2020-10-16--How 2020 Best Small Workplace YNAB recruits and retains great people

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Only 32% of the U.S. workforce have a 401k plan, and as little as 14% of U.S. companies even offer one. This is troubling for the financial of future of Americans, and it should be a concern for companies, too. Financially stressed workers miss more work and incur higher healthcare costs than their peers.
One of the biggest barriers to financial security is financial literacy. Employees often struggle to navigate a convoluted landscape. Many plans are harder to understand than a William Faulkner novel.
Among the 2020 Best Small and Medium Workplaces, though, wellness perks include considerations of employees’ financial health.
These companies are also doing an exceptional job of managing effective remote teams during a pandemic. Their transparent and open leadership is giving them the competitive advantage to thrive among the large multinationals.
Nothing is hidden in the fine print from employees at this year’s number-one best small workplace. You Need A Budget (YNAB) knows a thing or two about financial wellness and remote work.
While other financial services firms are baffling consumers with opaque “terms and conditions,” YNAB is empowering people—including their employees—with knowledge. And with over 100 team members spread across 33 states and some overseas, YNAB has been a remote workplace since its beginning.
YNAB
Chance Gurr has been the chief operations officer at YNAB for the last eight years. Gurr spends most of his 9-to-5 building what he calls the “team experience.”
“In the same way that we obsess over how customers experience our product, we’re every bit as focused on our employees’ experience working at YNAB,” Gurr said.
Employees at YNAB gave their workplace remarkably high praise in the Great Place to Work employee survey. Taking the average of all 60 survey statements, 99% of employee responses were positive.
This survey measures levels of trust, camaraderie, collaboration, leadership effectiveness, innovation, organizational purpose, and many other apsects of company culture.
To compile this list, Great Place to Work data scientists and culture experts collected and analyzed confidential survey feedback representing 189,000 employees working in small- and medium-sized businesses in the U.S.
We interviewed Gurr to find out how YNAB successfully creates a culture that translates to high employee satisfaction marks.
Financial wellness perks
Financial fitness is integral to YNAB’s overall employee wellness, and not just because the company is in the budgeting business.
“Whether you’re a fintech company or not, I think financial wellness should be in every company’s culture,” Gurr said. “Because as your team members gain control of their money and improve their financial situation, they miss fewer days at work, they produce more while they’re at work, they smile more, they don’t jump to work for your competitor for a dollar more an hour. It’s just good business. And I think a great culture builder.”
Growing awareness of how financial health can help employees has led to a rise in money-management benefits. According to a study by Prudential, in 2017, the percentage of employers offering financial wellness programs rose to 83 percent, up from 20 percent in 2015.
Having a good financial wellness plan also sends a clear message to employees about how a company values not just their current situation, but their long-term well-being.
“Having a good 401k and other financial wellness plans is part of the story of how you value your employees. If done right, it can really have a big impact on your team,” Gurr said.
A humble recruitment strategy
The phrase “humbly confident” introduces every job ad on YNAB’s careers page. This is one of the company’s core values and sets the tone for what kind of people will thrive at the company.
“This describes confident people who are true experts in their craft, but still very humble in their interactions. People who are open to feedback and other ideas and don’t take critique personally. People who give and share credit easily; who are great at admitting their own mistakes.”
YNAB job descriptions are about three to four times longer than most job listings. This unconventional approach is part of how YNAB attracts the right candidates.
“We try to show them what life is like at YNAB and give a behind the scenes look into the real-life experience. In the job description we introduce the people they’d work with. We describe in-depth the work that they’d do. We paint a picture of a typical day at work for the role and what success would look like.”
The strategy has been working. YNAB attracts quality candidates who resonate strongly with the company culture before they even get in the door, Gurr said. The resulting camaraderie and community is reflected in their employee survey scores. Across Great Place to Work survey statements that measure camaraderie, 99% of YNAB employees were having a positive experience.
“We’ve gotten more and more comments about the job description and how it really helped people to get a feel for what it would be like to work here and how that attracted them. Often we’ll hear, ‘I was not looking for a job. I didn’t even know who YNAB was but, I read the job description and I had to learn more.’”
Onboarding in a remote world
As seasoned telecommuters, YNAB has many creative ways to give new teammates a warm welcome.
Welcome packs with company swag and a gift card for dinner out are delivered to new members—and if a coworker lives nearby, the packaged is hand delivered. New recruits are also assigned an onboarding buddy or mentor and get welcome notes from all the members of their team.
It’s a company culture busting the notion that virtual relations must be devoid of connection.
Scaling or flailing
Just as the pandemic has forced many companies to lay off employees, others have enjoyed an inverse trajectory. YNAB is one of the lucky ones. The company has scaled from just 10 people in 2012 to over 100 today. And Great Place to Work research shows that scaling can be hard on a culture.
Gurr said he and the founders were worried YNAB wouldn’t feel the same as the company ballooned to its current size. But with full marks in caring (100% of employees report a positive experience) and hospitality (99% report a positive experience), among others, clearly the tight-knit community hasn’t been shattered.
The secret? Gurr believes that the family feel can and should “happen on a team level.” While you may not feel 100% connected to everyone at the company, you can feel a deep connection with your own, smaller team, Gurr said.
Building on culture strengths
But the real key to maintaining a strong culture as you grow is something much deeper. “And some might say more difficult,” Gurr said. The key, he said, is identifying what makes your company’s culture unique and keeping it alive.
Core values shouldn’t be aspirational, they should be a genuine reflection of who you already are. “It’s not something that you hope to become. It’s about looking inward and recognizing what you already are. What it is that makes you a great team already.”
How does a small company choose its company values? YNAB looked at people within the company who were examples of what they wanted to be and defined what it was about them that made the culture so great.
“Once you feel you’re really good at a particular value, then it can become a core value. Until then, it’s something that you’re working on.”
Once the values are in place, the trick is to live up to them and regularly call them out. “Make sure you’ve got people that already have those attributes, be great examples of them yourselves, and then be sure to publicly recognize it when you see them exhibited throughout the company.”
Personal well-being should be the number-one priority
It’s also important to acknowledge that this season of remote work looks drastically different for everyone than it did before. So many of us added personal and family obligations to our everyday lives and routines in 2020.
”It’s been really important for us to publicly acknowledge that right now people have way more [going on]. They have added stressors in their lives beyond work, and that will require more personal time to create that mental margin and to allow them to focus on themselves,” Gurr said.
“Life is super out of the ordinary right now. And that time for personal well-being for team members, that should be a number-one priority for companies,” he said.
Small- and medium-sized businesses that put employee wellness, both financial and personal, first, win the fight for talent. The bottom line is that the best companies are made up of good people who are about their people. Just take it from what one of YNAB’s employees told us:
“I’ve been continuously surprised at the openness and authenticity of the executive team when they’ve said, ‘Yep, it’s hard to focus’ when COVID hit, ‘Yep, please take some time off if you need it’ in the depths of the craziness of COVID, ‘Yep, I need to confront my own privilege’ during the protests that were happening over George Floyd’s death. I know ‘humble confidence’ gets thrown around a lot as a company core value buzzword, but it really happens here.”
NerdWallet
A “Best Medium Workplace” helping employees with financial wellness
NerdWallet is another company that sees a clear line between financial health and employee well-being and productivity. A first-time winner, the firm is number 18 on the list of the Fortune Best Medium Workplaces.
Tim Chen, co-founder and CEO, told us how financial wellness is a core part of helping employees reach their full potential.
“Cultivating a strong company culture starts with listening and investing in employees. This means supporting and encouraging their well-being,” Chen said.
“We’re on a mission to provide everyone with clarity for all of life’s financial decisions, and it starts with our Nerds (NerdWallet employees). Nerds are our greatest asset and we are committed to investing in their financial well-being by providing them the support and access needed to be financially savvy.
“We know financial wellness begins with education, so we host frequent ‘NerdTalks’ and Brown Bags where we invite experts in the industry (both at Nerdwallet and outside) to share their knowledge, provide tips and advice, give their perspective on the industry and where it’s headed, and answer general questions.”
Click here to see the full lists of the 100 Best Small Workplaces and 100 Best Medium Workplaces of 2020.
Claire Hastwell is the Content Marketing Manager at Great Place to Work.


fortune--2020-10-16--CEO confidence in the recovery is declining

This is the web version of CEO Daily. To get it delivered to your inbox, sign up here.
Good morning.
CEO confidence about the recovery seems to have declined ever-so-slightly since June, according to a new poll conducted by Fortune Analytics, in collaboration with Deloitte. Of the CEOs surveyed, 47% said they expected revenues to be fully recovered by January 2021, down from 51% who said the same in June. And 35% don’t see revenues recovering until 2022, while 23% said they plan to reduce the size of their work force in the next 12 months.
But the picture is an uneven one and varies by company and industry. Forty percent of CEOs say their revenues have already recovered or never dropped, and 50% say their employment levels already have recovered or never dropped.
There is broader agreement as it relates to commercial real estate: 76% say they will need less office space than they had before the pandemic. And 28% said they’ll need a lot less office space.
The survey also found that 96% of CEOs say that diversity, equity and inclusion is a “strategic priority/goal for me as CEO,” and 81% say their “DEI efforts have significantly accelerated in the wake of the death of George Floyd and injustices toward other Black individuals.” You can receive the Fortune Analytics newsletter by subscribing to our premium plan.
More news below. And a correction from yesterday: There were 207 companies whose top executives signed the Business Roundtable statement on corporate purpose in the last year, and of those, 152 were included in Just Capital’s rankings of 1000 companies. All but 19 ranked in the top half of the rankings, reinforcing my point: By Just Capital’s metrics, the Business Roundtable signatories are like children of Lake Wobegon—nearly all above average.
Alan Murray
@alansmurray
alan.murray@fortune.com
TOP NEWS
Boeing 737 MAX
Good news for Boeing: Europe's aviation safety regulator EASA is set to green-light the 737 MAX's return to the skies, according to executive director Patrick Ky. Ky says his agency will likely issue a draft airworthiness directive next month, even though a software-based "synthetic sensor" EASA recommended will take up to two years for Boeing to implement. Bloomberg
Tax evasion
The largest-ever criminal tax case involving an individual has been launched in the U.S., with the target being Robert Brockman, CEO of automotive software firm Reynolds & Reynolds. Brockman has been charged with hiding around $2 billion in income, largely in the form of gains made through Vista Equity Partners, in which he is the sole investor. Wall Street Journal
Foxconn ambitions
Foxconn, manufacturer of iPhones and numerous other gadgets, wants to become the "Android of electric vehicles"—meaning it's come up with a platform upon which companies can design and market electric cars that would be made by, you guessed it, Foxconn. The analogy doesn't quite scan (Google doesn’t make phones for other companies) but it's based on the idea that, like Android, Foxconn's platform will be "open" and allow a high degree of customization. CNBC
Remdesivir disappointment
Remdesivir, the antiviral drug that was developed for diseases such as Ebola and hepatitis C, unfortunately does not cut COVID-19 deaths at all. That's the conclusion of a large, international, WHO-sponsored study (which, it should be noted, has not yet been peer-reviewed.) Remdesivir is the only antiviral to have been authorized for use against COVID-19 in the U.S., on the basis that it modestly reduces inpatient stays for severely ill patients. New York Times
AROUND THE WATER COOLER
Instagram shilling
The U.K.'s Competition and Markets Authority has forced Facebook's Instagram to crack down on the phenomenon of influencers getting paid to market stuff in their posts and not disclosing that fact. As part of the crackdown, businesses will be given tools to monitor when their products and services are being promoted on Instagram, so they can't plead ignorance when disclosure rules are being flouted. Fortune
Fukushima water
Japanese authorities are reportedly planning to release into the sea over a million tons of contaminated water from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, which was struck by a tsunami in 2011. Local fishermen are not thrilled, as they have spent years trying to rebuild trust in their catch. If the release goes ahead, it will start in 2022 at the earliest and take decades to complete. Guardian
Town halls
Last night President Trump and Joe Biden held separate televised town hall events, in lieu of a second debate that was cancelled due to Trump's infection with the novel coronavirus. Trump's performance was particularly notable for three things: his long-awaited denunciation of white supremacy, his refusal to denounce the QAnon conspiracy theory about Trump leading a revolt against Democratic cannibal pedophiles—he said adherents "may be right" in their beliefs—and his assertion that he would accept a peaceful transfer of power in the event of a Biden win. Fortune
JPMorgan commitment
JPMorgan Chase co-president Daniel Pinto has written a piece for Fortune about how the bank plans to work towards meeting the Paris Agreement climate accords. He says it will achieve this in part by monitoring the “carbon intensity” of the companies it finances in the energy and automotive sectors: “We do business with most Fortune 500 companies, including many in the energy sector, so we believe our capacity to make an impact is considerable." Fortune
This edition of CEO Daily was edited by David Meyer.


fortune--2020-10-16--Influencers beware: The U.K. is cracking down on undisclosed Instagram shilling

Facebook’s Instagram unit has bowed to the demands of British regulators and agreed to crack down on hidden advertising in influencers’ posts.
It’s a long-standing issue. Influencers are, well, influential, and that makes them useful for endorsing products and services. But it’s often far from clear when they’re being paid for these endorsements. In the U.S., the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has for years been trying to rein in such misrepresentation, and in the U.K. the same task falls to the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA).
Last year, the CMA pressured popular Instagram influencers such as Zoella and Ellie Goulding into properly disclosing the payments, gifts, and loans they receive in exchange for promoting products. And now Instagram itself is falling in line.
“Instagram will prompt users to confirm if they have been incentivized in any way to promote a product or service and, if so, require them to disclose this fact clearly,” the watchdog said Friday. It added that the company will extend its “paid partnership” tool to all users, so they can clearly label posts that are essentially advertising.
“For too long, major platforms have shied away from taking responsibility for hidden advertising on their site,” said CMA CEO Andrea Coscelli in a statement. “So, this commitment to tackle hidden adverts and overhaul the way people post on Instagram—making it difficult for users to ignore the law—is a welcome step forward.”
The influencers aren’t the only targets here—the advertisers themselves will also have to play ball.
Instagram will “use technology and algorithms designed to spot when users might not have disclosed clearly that their post is an advert and report those users to the businesses being promoted,” the CMA said, while businesses will also get a new Instagram tool that helps them monitor how their products are being promoted on the platform.
So if companies spot that an influencer is shilling for their products and services without disclosing as much—perhaps because of an unscrupulous agency organizing the promotion—they are supposed to “take action where appropriate, including asking the platform to remove posts if necessary.”
“These changes mean there will be no excuse for businesses to overlook how their brands are being advertised either—making life a lot harder for those who are not upfront and honest with their followers,” said Coscelli.
The CMA said the changes will apply only to users in the U.K. and those who direct their Instagram posts at them.
Instagram confirmed to Fortune, however, that its new product and policy changes will apply around the world, though it will only be reporting to the CMA about unlabeled branded content posts from U.K. users.
“We’re pleased to be working with the CMA on our continued efforts to help people be transparent about when they are paid to post content on Instagram,” the Facebook property said.
Hidden advertising on the platform is hardly an exclusively British problem.
Earlier this year, the FTC said it was considering updating its nonbinding endorsement guides for advertising. In February, FTC Commissioner Rohit Chopra said it may be necessary “to create new requirements for social media platforms and advertisers and whether to activate civil penalty liability”—particularly as enforcement of the informal rules has let companies essentially get away with undisclosed advertising, without incurring any penalty.
This article was updated to include Instagram’s statement.


fortune--2020-10-16--Boeing shares soar after European regulator appears to give the green light to 737 Max

Europe’s top aviation regulator said he’s satisfied that changes to Boeing’s 737 Max have made the plane safe enough to return to the region’s skies before 2020 is out, even as a further upgrade his agency demanded won’t be ready for up to two years.
Boeing shares advanced as much as 2.6% in pre-market U.S. trading. Through Thursday, they had lost half their value this year.
After test flights conducted in September, EASA is performing final document reviews ahead of a draft airworthiness directive it expects to issue next month, said Patrick Ky, executive director of the European Union Aviation Safety Agency.
That will be followed by four weeks of public comment, while the development of a so-called synthetic sensor to add redundancy will take 20 to 24 months, he said. The software-based solution will be required on the larger Max 10 variant before its debut targeted for 2022, and retrofitted onto other versions.
“Our analysis is showing that this is safe, and the level of safety reached is high enough for us,” Ky said in an interview. “What we discussed with Boeing is the fact that with the third sensor, we could reach even higher safety levels.”
The comments mark the firmest endorsement yet from a major regulator of Boeing’s goal to return its beleaguered workhorse to service by year-end, following numerous delays and setbacks. The Max, the latest version of the venerable 737 narrow-body, was grounded in March 2019 in the wake of two accidents that took 346 lives, setting into motion a crisis that’s cost Boeing billions of dollars and then-CEO Dennis Muilenburg his job.
While the Federal Aviation Administration, Boeing’s main certification body, is further along in its review, it has held back from making predictions about the timing. FAA chief Steve Dickson flew the Max late last month and said he was “very comfortable,” but the process wasn’t complete.
A spokeswoman for the Chicago-based company declined to comment.
EASA’s views also carry outsize weight in light of flaws in the original certification process that dented the U.S. regulator’s once-sterling reputation.
Ky said the synthetic sensor would simplify the job of pilots when one or both of the mechanical angle-of-attack sensors on the Max fails. The device, which monitors whether a plane is pointed up or down relative to the oncoming air, malfunctioned in both crashes — the first off the coast of Indonesia in October 2018 and the second one, five months later, in Ethiopia.
“We think that it is overall a good development which will increase the level of safety,” Ky said. “It’s not available now and it will be available at the same time as the Max 10 is expected to be certified.”
New Beginning
The Max episode strained the rapport between the FAA and global aviation authorities including EASA which acted faster to bench the jet and have made demands that go beyond U.S. requirements to clear its return. Ky said the relationship between the European agency, home regulator to Boeing rival Airbus SE, and its U.S. counterpart needs to be rebuilt in a way that enhances safety while not slowing down progress.
“For the FAA, the Max accident has been a tragedy,” he said. “In terms of the way in which they perceive their own roles, the way they were attacked by different stakeholders in the U.S., the way they have been criticized, it must have been extremely difficult.”
The FAA’s relationship with Boeing has also shifted, after the planemaker was accused of hiding changes that magnified the differences between the Max and earlier 737 models in order to reduce costs and minimize training requirements.
“At the end of the day,” Ky said, “we have a lot of respect for the technical expertise at the FAA, we have a lot of respect for our colleagues and I’d like to believe it is the same on their side. That is the real important foundation for the relationship to grow again, it has to be based on respect.”
Another question mark for the Max is China, where aircraft demand surged prior to this year’s coronavirus pandemic. China has participated in some of the Max reviews but hasn’t been involved in the flight testing that includes regulators from Canada and Brazil along with the FAA and EASA, Ky said. “I honestly don’t know where they are” with their evaluation, he said.
New Challenges
While Ky’s comments are positive for Boeing and suppliers like Safran SA and Spririt AeroSysems Holdings Inc., the airframer “still has a mammoth task on its hands,” said Jeremy Bragg, an analyst at Redburn.
In addition to returning the aircraft to service, Boeing must also unwind inventories of about 450 Max jets that have been built but are awaiting delivery to customers, he said. “This must be achieved against a backdrop of very weak underlying demand, due to Covid-19, which will almost inevitably result in very weak pricing on the Max for the next few years.”
As the Max saga winds down, EASA is working with other regulators to apply the lessons learned to future certifications. One area has to do with evaluating derivative models like the Max that bolt modern technology onto older platforms. The challenge is finding the right balance and making sure pilots have the knowledge they need to fly the planes safely, he said.
One coming derivative is Boeing’s 777X, the next version of its 25-year-old wide-body which will have folding wings. Like many Boeing planes, it has two angle-of-attack sensors (Airbus jets have three or more). When discussing the Max, Ky said that the important question when one of two AOA sensors fails was its impact on the safety of the plane.
While the 777X doesn’t feature the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System that played a role in the Max crashes, Ky said EASA will closely study the new 777’s flight control systems and analyze any potential points of failure as part of its review.
As to whether this would slow the European approval process for the wide-body: “It depends a lot on whether Boeing is able to give us the right solutions and the right analysis on the risk assessment,” he said. “There may be other problems; we are really looking into this new aircraft and we are making sure that ours and Boeing’s safety assessment is done properly and doesn’t leave any questions unanswered.”
Hydrogen, Drones
Here are some of Ky’s comments on other topics including drones, new software and technologies such as hydrogen propulsion:


fortune--2020-10-16--Daryl Morey ostracized the NBA in mainland China. Now, some fans there are reveling in his resignati

Daryl Morey ostracized the NBA in mainland China. Now, some fans there are reveling in his resignation

Just over a year ago, Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey sent a tweet supporting Hong Kong protesters that put the NBA at odds with China, its largest foreign market. This week, Morey announced he is stepping down, and many users on the Chinese Internet feel vindicated.
On Thursday, Morey said in a statement that he decided to leave the Rockets organization after discussing his “thoughts with family and friends.” Morey has not indicated whether the fallout from his tweet influenced his decision to quit the organization, but he abruptly left an interview with the New York Times after a reporter asked about it.
On Monday morning, many netizens in mainland China celebrated Morey’s departure on China’s Twitter-like Weibo. “Today is a day for celebration,” wrote an account for a mainland basketball–focused publication with over 2 million followers on the platform. The news also became the third-most-searched topic on Chinese search engine Baidu.com on Friday morning.
An anchor for CCTV sports, a state-backed television station in mainland China, spoke about Morey’s departure on Friday morning.
“We have learned of Morey’s resignation and will not comment on this,” the anchor said on Friday. “[But] we hereby reiterate that any attempts to hurt the feelings of Chinese people would have to pay the price.”
In early October 2019, Morey shared a picture on his Twitter account stating, “Fight for Freedom, Stand with Hong Kong.” At the time, the Hong Kong protest movement was in full force, with regular demonstrations opposing Beijing’s increasing influence over the city’s affairs. American brands like the coffee chain Starbucks, tech giant Apple, and shoe retailer Vans struggled to stay out of the fray since Beijing viewed any perceived support for the protests as a direct affront to its national sovereignty. Meanwhile, Hong Kong protesters lashed out at companies that appeared to support Beijing.
Protesters display posters at the Southorn Playground in Hong Kong on Oct. 15, 2019, during a rally in support of NBA basketball Rockets general manager Daryl Morey and against comments made by Lakers superstar LeBron James. Anthony WALLACE—AFP/Getty Images
Beijing immediately condemned Morey’s remarks; Chinese sponsors left the NBA in droves; and television stations and streaming services dropped NBA games. In total, the NBA estimates that it lost $400 million due to the fallout from Morey’s tweet.
Morey’s tweet carried extra weight because the Houston Rockets, in large part, are responsible for the NBA’s enormous China fanbase. The Rockets’ onetime star Yao Ming, a China native, helped inspire a new generation of Chinese basketball fans and paved the way for NBA players to make annual trips to the mainland. On its own, the team lost roughly $20 million in Chinese sponsorship revenue.
In response to the controversy, the NBA said in a statement that it was “regrettable” that Morey’s tweet offended fans in mainland China, but it also said it values the right of employees to weigh in on “matters important to them.”
Chinese sponsors have been slow to return to the NBA, but there are signs that the two sides are beginning to repair their relationship.
In February, the NBA publicly demonstrated support and donated medical equipment to Wuhan while the city was in the throes of the first COVID-19 outbreak. CCTV also decided last week to resume airing NBA games with two games remaining in the NBA Finals.
For now, it’s unclear whether Morey’s departure will spur a return of Chinese sponsorships and other deals.
NBA league commissioner Adam Silver says he remains adamant that the league will not compromise its values as it continues to pursue business in China.
“What came from the NBA with those last two finals games on CCTV were images of players wearing T-shirts that say ‘vote’ and ‘equality’ and ‘liberty,’ not necessarily values people have traditionally associated with China,” Silver told Fortune in a story published Thursday. “We are who we are. We are exporting American values.”
In bidding a farewell to Morey, a CCTV sports anchor used a four-word phrase that state media translated to “we wish Mr. Morey well on his journey.”
Observers noted the phrase’s more common meaning: “Rest in Peace.”


fortune--2020-10-16--Google makes finding voting locations easier

Google wants to help people to figure out how and where to vote.
The search engine on Friday unveiled new features aimed at getting more people to the polls.
Users who enter “early voting locations” or “ballot drop boxes near me” will see a “where to vote” box at the top of their results. They can enter their addresses to find polling locations for Election Day, early voting locations, as well as where they can drop off mail-in ballots.
Google Maps and Google Assistant, the company’s voice-activated helper, will also get new features for finding polling locations.
The updates were developed with help from the Voting Information Project, the voter advocacy nonprofit Democracy Works, and state election officials. In all, Google will provide information about more than 200,000 voting locations nationwide. For people in areas where voting locations are still undetermined, Google will guide users to state and local election websites—and then update that information after it becomes available.
Courtesy of Google
The new features come after Google searches for “how to vote” hit an all-time high in September, according to Google. It also follows previous features Google released in August to help people more easily access information about registering to vote, registration deadlines, and how people can vote in their respective states this year.


fortune--2020-10-16--Earnings were supposed to lift the markets. What happened?

This is the web version of the Bull Sheet, Fortune’s no-BS daily newsletter on the markets. Sign up to receive it in your inbox here.
Happy Friday, Bull Sheeters. Global stocks and U.S. futures are moving in opposite directions with the latter pointing to a weak open. COVID and labor market jitters are weighing heavily on investor sentiment as the stimulus talks bog down. Earnings beats, so far, are failing to lift risk appetite.
Let’s check in on the action.
Markets update
Asia
The major Asia indexes were mostly higher in afternoon trading with the Hong Kong Hang Seng bouncing back, up 0.9% .
were mostly higher in afternoon trading with the bouncing back, up . Chinese retailing giant Minoso began trading with a bang on the NYSE yesterday. It’s losing money, but its ambition is to go global.
began trading with a bang on the NYSE yesterday. It’s losing money, but its ambition is to go global. In the EM world, Indian stocks have been outperforming the pack since April. Morgan Stanley is still bullish on Indian equities, and it’s overweight some surprising sectors, including energy.
Europe
The European bourses are in the green with the Europe Stoxx 600 up 0.7% two hours into the trading session.
are in the green with the up two hours into the trading session. Will he or won’t he? Today is Boris Johnson’s self-imposed deadline on whether he walks away from post-Brexit trade negotiations . One of Johnson’s few areas of leverage is a fishy one. Quite literally.
self-imposed deadline on whether he walks away from . One of Johnson’s few areas of leverage is a fishy one. Quite literally. Daimler shares were up more than 2% at the open after the carmaker reported a huge bottom line beat, posting a preliminary operating profit of €3.07 billion ($3.6 billion), a sign Europe’s auto sector may be turning a corner (helped by subsidies).
U.S.
U.S. futures are in the red. That’s after the three major indexes pared their losses late in yesterday’s session on the slimmest of hopes—stop me if you’ve heard this one—the stimulus talks might not be dead. Okay, they’re probably dead. But not buried.
are in the red. That’s after the pared their losses late in yesterday’s session on the slimmest of hopes—stop me if you’ve heard this one—the stimulus talks might not be dead. Okay, they’re probably dead. But not buried. Meanwhile, the U.S. labor market is looking bleaker every Thursday. The jobless claims number came in yesterday at a worse-than-expected 898,000 . Warning: the stock market is beginning to pay attention to this number.
number came in yesterday at a worse-than-expected . Warning: the stock market is beginning to pay attention to this number. Shares of Boeing were up 2.6% in pre-market trading following a Bloomberg report that a European regulator has deemed the 737 Max “safe” to fly.
Elsewhere
Gold is ticking up, trading around $1,915/ounce .
is ticking up, trading around . The dollar is down slightly.
is down slightly. Crude is down. Brent continues to trade in a range just below $43/barrel.
***
By the numbers
898,000
New weekly applications for unemployment benefits are going in the wrong direction: up. For the second straight week, the claims number came in above analyst expectations at 898,000. To put that in perspective, the pre-pandemic high was 695,000. “The worsening of the pace of UI claims this week reinforces the message from the latest September jobs report that the economy’s pace of recovery is slowing down amid the ongoing pandemic,” says Glassdoor Chief Economist Andrew Chamberlain. “America is unlikely to see a full recovery and a return to low unemployment until the pace of weekly UI claims dials back significantly. As the virus remains in the driver’s seat, today’s elevated claims cast a shadow over the fate of the U.S. labor market in the next half year.”
69.31
The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed yesterday at 28494.20—that’s a gain of a mere 69 points (+0.2%) over the past five trading days. After closing down three straight sessions, the blue chip index appears to be losing momentum as COVID cases climb, and labor market numbers deteriorate. Meanwhile, the big carrot—a stimulus deal—is looking less likely by the day.
15%
COVID is climbing on both sides of the Atlantic. And the markets have noticed. The infection numbers are bad, but the big metric to watch is hospitalizations and deaths, two ominous lagging indicators that have the power to torpedo economic recovery, particularly as curfews and regional lockdown measures are enacted. And the hospitalization figures in the U.S. are flashing red at the moment. They’re up 15% over the past two weeks. Paradoxically, the outbreak is surging in some of America’s least populous states.
***
Have a nice weekend, everyone. I’ll see you here on Monday.
Bernhard Warner
@BernhardWarner
Bernhard.Warner@Fortune.com
As always, you can write to bullsheet@fortune.com or reply to this email with suggestions and feedback.
Today's read
Pandemic boost. Here's one of those surprising—or maybe not—segments of the economy that's proving to be pandemic-proof: sports betting. According to New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement, New Jersey's sports betting market hit a record in September, taking in more than $748 million. Most of it was in the form of in-person betting.
Bellwethers. Morgan Stanley was the latest of the big banks to report Q3 results yesterday, and it dazzled the markets with a big fat bottom line beat. But the sector as a whole is having a rocky year as big sectors of the economy are missing out on the recovery.
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Market candy
Quote of the day
There was no playbook or blueprint for this.
That's Kelly Flatow, executive vice president for events for the National Basketball Association, and one of the key architects behind the pro basketball league's successful move to play out the conclusion of the COVID-struck season in a "bubble." Fortune's Adam Lashinsky and Brian O'Keefe get the scoop from league insiders. It's a fascinating read.


fortune--2020-10-16--How one of the world’s biggest banks plans to tackle climate change

The COVID-19 pandemic has been a tragedy for many, a crisis for millions more. It has exacerbated age-old inequities and taken a heavy toll on economic growth.
Its long-term effect on our lives is still unclear, but that uncertainty must not induce paralysis. This can be a moment for change, a chance to reset priorities.
Climate change is among the most urgent problems facing humanity; businesses and governments have an imperative to act. Achieving the goals of the Paris Agreement, which aims to restrict a rise in the world’s average temperature, would enable us to take a giant step toward a safer, greener, more sustainable future.
Meeting those goals will demand great reserves of human energy and ingenuity. For the world to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, there needs to be an acceleration of emerging technologies that are not yet widely commercially available or economically viable. That means fossil resources such as oil and gas, which currently supply 80% of the world’s energy, will continue to play a significant role in satisfying future energy needs—from fueling factories to warming our homes.
Another stumbling block is data. While recent private sector commitments have focused on accounting measures to quantify banks’ contributions to the climate challenge, there remains an urgent need to improve the availability of accurate and verifiable emissions data reported by companies. Better data would make it easier to measure results, track progress, and drive accountability in a concerted way, enabling financial markets to make more informed decisions about climate risk.
These hurdles are significant but not insurmountable.
Our company, JPMorgan Chase, announced this month that we will start aligning our financing portfolio to meet the Paris goals. We will focus on three sectors in particular: oil and gas, electric power, and automotive manufacturing, because they collectively generate a significant share of global emissions. As a global financial services firm, we do business with most Fortune 500 companies, including many in the energy sector, so we believe our capacity to make an impact is considerable.
Working to overcome the difficulty of capturing accurate data, the approach we are developing will include the measurement of carbon intensity, which tracks emissions relative to a unit of output. In the power industry, for example, the calculation would evaluate metric tons of carbon dioxide per megawatt hour of electricity produced.
Measured over time, in conjunction with other indicators, carbon intensity will provide insights about efficiency and business strategy, identifying producers who are improving their performance, and those who are not. As measurements improve and evolve, we will adopt best practices. In the meantime, we are establishing sector-by-sector intermediate emission targets for 2030 for these three industries that will go into effect during 2021.
Additionally, our firm is committing to becoming carbon neutral in our own operations beginning this year, going beyond our original promise to source renewable energy for our entire company.
There will be skeptics, we know, and those who choose to delay. But now is the time to act, to forge an economy that has sustainability and efficiency at its core and reduces pressure on the planet’s resources.
We want to be part of the solution. Our employees along with our many stakeholders want to help drive change. The vast majority of our clients do too, as many have announced action plans of their own. We believe it’s our obligation to help them, and the economy, transition from traditional energy sources and develop cleaner alternatives. It isn’t just good for the planet, it’s good for business and more attractive to key constituents such as investors, customers, and prospective employees.
Reaching the goals of the Paris Agreement won’t be easy. It’s a massive undertaking and demands a sustained effort. In addition to bold, cross-border government policies that remove barriers to a low-carbon world, companies must continue to advance sustainability through innovation.
The clock is ticking. The world is not on track to limit average temperatures from rising more than 1.5 ̊C–2.0 ̊C above preindustrial levels, which is the goal of the Paris accords, and we are running out of time to prevent long-term devastation to our planet and our communities.
It has taken a global pandemic to prompt dramatic changes to the way we work, live, and consume. We’re optimistic that industry and governments will harness the momentum and rise to the challenge. Our bank intends to, and our shared future depends on it.
Daniel Pinto is copresident of JPMorgan Chase and CEO of its Corporate & Investment Bank. Ashley Bacon is the chief risk officer of JPMorgan Chase.