fortune--2020-05-21--What the post-coronavirus dealmaking world looks like

Dealmaking is showing signs of life once again, bankers at JP Morgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley say.
Bolstered by stabilizing equity markets and returning liquidity in the debt space, some deals are coming back. Liberty Global and Telefonica tied up their U.K. telecommunications businesses in a $39 billion deal in early May, completing the transaction even as negotiation moved online and into Zoom. Uber meanwhile is reportedly seeking a deal with Grubhub.
But the post-coronavirus M&A environment is certainly different from what it looked like before. Some companies are taking the opportunity to double down on verticals whose toplines are getting an injection in the middle of the coronavirus (à la Grubhub), but have been seeking consolidation for months.
A few takeaways from my conversations with bankers about the future of deals:
JPMorgan Chase’s co-head of Global M&A Anu Aiyengar says well-capitalized, large companies still have an opportunity to find deals in this uncertain environment. She would not be surprised to see acquisitions of venture-backed tech companies that may have been on a path to an IPO.
Morgan Stanley’s Global Head of M&A Robert Kindler cautions that regulatory scrutiny means investors should expect smaller deals at lower prices. “I think there are going to be a lot of sellers that lower their price expectations not only because they are worried about a reoccurrence [of a pandemic], but also because there is uncertainty about if this market is too high,” he told me.
Goldman Sachs’ co-head of Global M&A Dusty Philip has seen clients shift their M&A priorities toward technology and ESG as the lockdowns shift everything online. Philip is expecting to see more stock-for-stock deals, which allow sellers to ride the upside when the economy rebounds.
One thing that is certain: Private equity is looking to play a big role. On Wednesday, Apollo Global Management led an $1.75 billion investement in Albertsons Companies, a U.S. supermarket chain that was struggling with its debt burden—but found relief in a pandemic that has pushed consumers to grocery stores over restaurants. The deal values Albertsons at about $10 billion excluding debt, and gives the company time to pursue an IPO that would give owners such as Cerberus Capital Management an exit route.
Speaking of ESG: Aspiration, a Los Angeles-based fintech company that offers environmentally-conscious deposits and savings products, raised $135 million in Series C funding, per my colleague, Rey Mashayekhi. Aspiration CEO Andrei Cherny told him that March and April were the bank’s “two biggest months ever” in terms of debit card transactions.
Existing venture capital investor Alpha Edison led the round and was joined by the likes of UBS O’Connor, DNS Capital, Radicle Impact, Sutter Rock, and Social Impact Finance.
Lucinda Shen
Twitter: @shenlucinda
Email: lucinda.shen@fortune.com
VENTURE DEALS
- ByteDance, the Chinese company behind TikTok, is now valued at $100 billion following trading in secondary markets, per Bloomberg citing sources. The value implies a 33% premium to its last round of funding. Read more.
- Atea Pharmaceuticals, a Boston-based biopharmaceutical company developing therapies for severe human viral infections, raised $215 million in Series D funding. Bain Capital Life Sciences led, and was joined by investors including A Capital Management, Perceptive Advisors, Rock Springs Capital, Adage Capital Management, T. Rowe Price Associates, Redmile Group, and Omega Funds.
- Amwell, a Boston-based telehealth firm, raised $194 million in Series C funding. Early and strategic investors Allianz X and Takeda participated.
- States Title, a San Francisco-based firm using AI to close on real estate deals, raised $123 million in Series C funding. Greenspring Associates led the round.
- Rapid Micro Biosystems. a Lowell, Mass.-based maker of a contaminant testing platform, raised $120 million in Series C funding. Ally Bridge Group led, and was joined by investors including Endeavor Vision and existing investors Bain Capital Life Sciences, Longitude Capital, Xeraya Capital, and Asahi Kasei. Read more.
- Couchbase, a Santa Clara-based maker of a NoSQL cloud database, raised $105 million in Series G funding. GPI Capital led, and was joined by investors including Accel, Sorenson Capital, North Bridge Venture Partners, Glynn Capital, Adams Street Partners, and Mayfield.
- MasterClass, a San Francisco-based startup that sells celebrity-taught classes digitally, raised $100 million in Series E funding. Fidelity Management & Research Company led, and was joined by investors including Owl Ventures, 01 Advisors and existing investors NEA, IVP, Atomico and NextEquity Partners. Read more.
- Nautilus Biotechnology, a Seattle and San Carlos, Calif.-based startup focused on human proteomics, raised $76 million in Series B funding. Vulcan Capital led the round, and was joined by investors including Perceptive Advisors, Bezos Expeditions, and Defy Partners. Previous investors AME Cloud Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz, Bolt, and Madrona Venture Group also participated in the round.
- BetterCloud, a New York-based platform for managing and securing the digital workplaces, raised $75 million in funding. Warburg Pincus led the round, and was joined by investors including Accel, Bain Capital Ventures, Flybridge Capital Partners, New Amsterdam Growth Capital, Greycroft and e.ventures.
- Imperfect Foods, a San Francisco, Calif.-based grocery delivery service of imperfect produce, raised $72 million in Series C funding. Insight Partners led the round, and was joined by investors including Norwest Venture Partners.
- Day One Biopharmaceuticals, a South San Francisco cancer treatment maker, launched with $60 million funding. Canaan, Access Biotechnology, and Atlas Venture were the investors. Read more.
- Omada Health, a maker of virtual and in-person tools for managing chronic disease, raised $57 million from Perceptive Advisors. It will also use funds to acquire digital health start-up Physer. Read more.
- Amplitude, a San Francisco-based product intelligence platform, raised $50 million in Series E funding. GIC led, and was joined by investors including Sorenson Capital and existing investors including Sequoia Capital, Benchmark, Battery Ventures, IVP, and Lead Edge Capital.
- Ecwid, a San Diego-based e-commerce company, raised $42 million in funding. Morgan Stanley Expansion Capital and PeakSpan Capital led the round.
- Xwing, a San Francisco-based company focused on autonomy in aviation, raised $10 million in Series A funding. R7 Partners led the round, and was joined by investors including Thales, Alven, and Eniac Ventures.
- Directly, a startup training customer service chatbots, raised an additional $11 million to close out its Series B at $51 million. Triangle Peak Partners and Toba Capital were the investors. Read more.
- Human Interest, a San Francisco-based 401(k) provider for small and medium-sized businesses, raised an additional $10 million in Series C funding for a round total of $50 million. Glynn Capital led the extension.
- Cinchy, a Toronto-based data collaboration company, raised $10 million in Series A funding. Information Venture Partners led the round, and was joined by investors including ScaleUp Ventures, Techstars, and Manulife Venture Capital.
- Apollo Agriculture, a Nairobi-based financing platform for small-scale farmers, raised $6 million in Series A funding. Anthemis Exponential Ventures led the round, and was joined by investors including Leaps by Bayer, Flourish Ventures, Sage Hill Capital, To Ventures Food, Breyer Labs, Accion Venture Lab and Newid Capital.
- Clara Insurance, a New York-based supplemental benefits provider, raised $5.5 million in seed funding. Two Sigma Ventures led, and was joined by investors including Founder Collective, RGAX LLC, and SymphonyAI.
- Datrix, an Italy-based analytics solution for companies, raised €2.3 million ($2.5 million) in funding. United Ventures led the round, and was joined by Wellness Holding.
- Hudl, a Lincoln, Neb.-based provider of sports video analysis and scouting software solutions, raised an undisclosed amount of funding from Bain Capital Tech Opportunities.
PRIVATE EQUITY
- Lion Capital invested in REX Homes, an Austin-based real estate marketplace for residential real estate buyers and sellers. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Bain Capital Double Impact invested in Broadstep Behavioral Health, a Raleigh, N.C.-based provider of programs and services to individuals living with intellectual, developmental or behavioral disabilities. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Dyal Capital Partners, a unit of Neuberger Berman, is seeking to raise an initial $2 billion to acquire minority stakes in National Basketball Association teams, per Barron’s. Read more.
OTHERS
- Alibaba, will invest 10 billion yuan ($1.41 billion) into an AI and IoT system centered around its Tmall Genie smart speaker. Read more.
- Lufthansa, the airliner, is in talks with the German government’s economic stabilisation fund over a rescue package of up to 9 billion euros ($9.9 billion), including the state taking a 20% stake in the company. Read more.
IPOS
- SelectQuote, an Overland Park, Kan.-based which provides an online DTC insurance platform, raised $570 million in an offering of 28.5 million shares (37% insider sold) at $20 apiece. It posted $337.5 million in revenue for the year ending June, and income of $72.3 million. Brookside Equity Partners backs the firm. It plans to list on the NYSE as SLQT. Read more.
EXITS
- SoftBank Group plans to sell a 5% of its domestic telecommunications business SoftBank Corp worth $3.1 billion, as part of a program to raise $41 billion through asset sales. Read more.
- Intel acquired Rivet Networks, a maker of WiFi and wireless products. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Team Whistle acquired Tiny Horse, a marketing services firm focused on helping streamers. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
F+FS
- Oceanpine Capital Fund II held an initial close of its Fund II with $200 million.
- Founder Collective, a seed-stage fund, closed its newest fund with $85 million. Read more.


fortune--2020-05-21--Genesis expands crypto footprint with custody acquisition

What to do if your employer stops matching your 401 ( k ) contributions

Genesis Capital, a New York–based cryptocurrency firm that caters to institutional investors, announced on Thursday it has acquired London-based custodian Volt for an undisclosed sum.
The deal is significant because it paves the way for Genesis to become a prime brokerage—akin to Goldman Sachs in the traditional financial world—that offers its clients a full suite of services, including crypto storage.
Custody is an unglamorous but important part of the crypto industry, in which hackers are constantly trying to steal digital assets like Bitcoin. Offering a custody service also provides an opportunity to attract a broader array of institutional clients, many of which are required to hold their assets with certified custodians.
Volt is not a big name in the crypto custody world and counts only six employees. But Genesis CEO Michael Moro told Fortune that he is impressed by the firm’s technology and that he regards the acquisition as a strategic step.
“My view on the custody space is that it’s not a great stand-alone business. There’s a lot of competition, and it’s race to zero on fees,” Moro said, explaining that Genesis will treat custody as a complementary service to offer alongside its trading and lending products.
The Volt deal also coincides with a wave of consolidation in the crypto industry, where once-niche firms like BitGo are likewise trying to position themselves as full-service firms, offering everything from lending to insurance.
The acquisition also portends growing competition between Genesis and industry giant Coinbase, which came to dominate the custody space after acquiring the storage business of Xapo last year for $55 million.
A key component of the Xapo deal was Coinbase taking on the custody needs of Grayscale—another crypto giant that reportedly owns over 300,000 Bitcoins, which are currently worth around $10,000 each. Like Genesis, Grayscale is a subsidiary of crypto conglomerate Digital Currency Group, meaning the latter will likely transfer its hoard to its sister company.
Moro said he could not comment on Grayscale’s custody arrangements, saying only they are governed by long-term contracts.
All of this offers further indications that the cryptocurrency industry is coming to resemble the traditional finance industry, where a handful of large players are locked in fierce rivalries.
More must-read finance coverage from Fortune:
—Saving lives vs. saving the economy is a false tradeoff, economists say
—Real unemployment rate soars past 24.9%—and the U.S. has now lost 33.5 million jobs
—17% of unemployed workers aren’t looking for work—and that’s warping the official unemployment rate
—Does Apple’s stock buyback strategy make sense in this market?
—Goldman Sachs doubts there will be a Round 3 of PPP loans for small businesses
—Listen to Leadership Next, a Fortune podcast examining the evolving role of CEOs
—WATCH: Why the banks were ready for the financial impact of the coronavirus
Subscribe to How to Reopen, Fortune’s weekly newsletter on what it takes to reboot business in the midst of a pandemic.


fortune--2020-05-21--38.6 million have filed for unemployment during the pandemic—greater than the combined population of

38.6 million have filed for unemployment during the pandemic—greater than the combined population of 21 states

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Another 2.4 million initial unemployment claims were filed last week, marking the ninth straight week with jobless claims topping at least 2 million.
Since mid-March more than 38.6 million Americans have filed unemployment claims, according to the U.S. Department of Labor—a figure greater than the total population of the country’s 21 smallest states.
The 2.4 million jobless claims is down from last week’s 2.7 million claims and represents the seventh straight week of a decline in the overall number of claims. But this figure is still more than four times the previous pre-coronavirus record of 695,000 claims in October 1982.
“There are fewer people filing for unemployment insurance claims, but we’re still seeing millions [of claims]. This is not a sign of relief,” says Pavlina Tcherneva, an associate professor of economics at Bard College and author of the upcoming book The Case for a Job Guarantee.
The Federal Reserve projects the number of unemployed Americans could top out at 47 million. But since 38.6 million have filed claims already, unemployment levels could be “way worse than the Fed projects,” Tcherneva says.
The number of jobless claims—2.4 million—was right in line with most economists’ forecasts, which were between 2.3 million and 2.4 million.
With each passing week, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ 14.7% official unemployment rate looks all the more dated; its count covered the period through mid-April. Since then, another 12.2 million Americans have claimed unemployment benefits. When those 12.2 million are added to the already 23.1 million unemployed Americans in the latest jobs reports, it brings the total unemployed over 35 million. That would be a real unemployment rate of 22.5%, just below the 25.6% peak unemployment rate during the Great Depression.
The official unemployment rate doesn’t match up with the number of unemployment claims because only out-of-work Americans who are searching for new positions are categorized as unemployed and in the labor force. And many jobless workers are choosing to wait out the virus and stay-at-home order before starting their search.
Americans on the unemployment rolls are receiving an additional $600 weekly in benefits on top of their state benefits, but unless extended, the additional unemployment benefit payments will end on July 31.


fortune--2020-05-21--The challenge of plumbing the toilet-paper pipeline

This is the web version of Data Sheet, Fortune’s daily newsletter on the top tech news. To get it delivered daily to your in-box, sign up here.
Let’s talk about toilet paper.
I know what you’re thinking. What does TP have to do with tech? Bear with me, and I’ll get to that.
First, let me direct you to Jen Wieczner’s “The case of the missing toilet paper” in the current issue of Fortune. I encourage you to read it for many reasons. It answers some of the existential questions of our time, including: What happened to all the TP and shouldn’t it be fully stocked by now? It speaks to the treacherous challenge of forecasting in a time of crisis.
And finally, it includes some of the driest and uproariously funny potty humor I’ve ever read in the august pages of our 90-year-old magazine. (Examples: Wieczner writes that “major companies are now absorbing the reality that something as mundane as toilet paper represents a uniquely complex supply chain challenge,” and that Amazon, which has had a devil of time keeping the stuff stocked, has been “flushing away potential sales of other items while it plumbs its TP pipeline.”
This is serious stuff, of course. Amazon’s very prowess at stocking only as much as its customers need has turned into a weakness, toilet paper-wise. What’s more, building a new paper line is orders of magnitude more expensive than ramping up detergent production. Who knew?
All companies have to learn to forecast better by watching for inputs they never knew existed. (Where were the A.I.s when we needed them?) P&G, for one, says it will use data to generate earlier demand-shock warnings, Wieczner writes.
If they can get it right, what Wieczner calls the Great Toilet Paper Panic of 2020 will be a distant memory.
***
Like many who’ve passed through Washington, D.C., at some point in their careers, I once spent plenty of time at Kramerbooks & Afterwords in DuPont Circle. The store, at least at its historic location, is closing. Like many things these days, that just doesn’t feel right.
Adam Lashinsky
@adamlashinsky
adam.lashinsky@fortune.com
This edition of Data Sheet was curated by Aaron Pressman.
NEWSWORTHY
I can dream about you, if I can't hold you tonight. After years of development and delays, Virgin Orbit is ready to go into orbit. The company's Boeing 747 launch platform, called Cosmic Girl, will haul a demonstration payload airborne on Sunday. If all goes well, it will boost the 70-foot-long LauncherOne rocket to 35,000 feet, where the rocket will drop off and head for the heavens under its own power. Next week comes an even bigger milestone for the private space industry. SpaceX is scheduled to launch the first private mission with a human crew on May 27.
Word play. Speaking of drop offs, AT&T will drop its advertising campaign around "5G Evolution," the carrier's confusingly named flavor of 4G that is definitely not 5G. The move comes after a division of the Better Business Bureau that regulates the ad industry ruled AT&T's ads could mislead consumers. But the possibly still confusing "5GE" icon will still appear on customers' phones.
Is that a mask on your face or are you just glad to see me? Apple's latest iOS update includes the coronavirus exposure notification system that the company has been working on with Google. The Bluetooth-based warning system, which includes some tweaks requested by health authorities, requires users to download an app from local health authorities to function. The update also helps iPhones detect if a user is wearing a mask to bring up the keypad login screen more quickly.
Cancel culture. On Wall Street, Expedia reported the kind of quarterly earnings you might expect for a travel web site in the midst of a pandemic. Revenue declined 15% to $2.2 billion and the company lost a staggering $1.3 billion versus a loss of $103 million a year ago. Still, that wasn't as bad as some expected and Expedia shares, down 26% in 2020, gained 2% in pre-market trading on Thursday. Booming video-game plays did not help game publisher Take-Two Interactive quite enough. The publisher of Grand Theft Auto and Red Dead Redemption said its net bookings jumped 49% to $729 million. But Take-Two's shares, up 20% on the year previously, dropped 4% pre-market.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
Most of the reporting about remote learning has focused on the negative, but for some students, the chance to learn in an isolated environment is a benefit. Elizabeth Harris reports for the New York Times on the experience of special education and other students who find traditional school a challenge.
For some, the avoidance of distractions like disruptive classmates, or simply not being in a room filled with other children, has been a boon. Others have taken advantage of the ability, when offered by their teachers, to work at their own pace and take breaks when they want. Some students have found it easier to participate in remote classes without the social pressures of a physical classroom. Introverts who are the last to volunteer an answer in class, even when they know it, are now making themselves heard.
“Kids who would not have put a hand up at the end of a lesson are now emailing me,” said Mike Drosos, a seventh-grade math teacher at Voice Charter. He said that it seemed to help those students “when the teacher isn’t making direct eye contact six inches from their desk.”
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Can I write off my rent? What you need to know about tax write-offs while working from home during the coronavirus By Lee Clifford
Everyone wants a piece of Jio Platforms By Lucinda Shen
Exclusive: Neo-bank Aspiration raises $135M in Series C funding round By Rey Mashayekhi
What happens to an investor’s shares when a company delists? By Eamon Barrett
This $350 cocktail machine wants to bring the bar to you By Nicole Goodkind
Photo essay: Italy reopens museums and churches By Alex Scimecca, Mia Diehl, and Bernhard Warner
(Some of these stories require a subscription to access. There is a 50% discount for our loyal readers if you use this link to sign up. Thank you for supporting our journalism.)
BEFORE YOU GO
The latest winning diversion in the Pressman household is Hulu's wacky yet compelling series The Great starring Elle Fanning as Russian leader Catherine the Great. Nicholas Hoult is also brilliant as Catherine's doomed husband Peter. Now I just have to stop saying "Huzzah" all the time.
Aaron Pressman
@ampressman
aaron.pressman@fortune.com


fortune--2020-05-21--The coronavirus stimulus package has a newborn loophole. She’s trying to close it

Good morning, Broadsheet readers! Michigan’s secretary of state spars with the President, Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen’s second inauguration sets off a U.S.-China spat, and Sen. Tammy Duckworth talks to Fortune about closing a stimulus package loophole. Have a good Thursday.
– Closing the newborn loophole. Under normal circumstances, federal legislation in the U.S. is susceptible to loopholes. Factor in an unprecedented $2 trillion price tag and an accelerated journey through Congress and there are bound to be some significant gaps.
The first coronavirus relief package did, in fact, have an oversight—a big one that constituents flagged to Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D–Ill.). New parents told her they were unable to claim a promised $500 credit for their babies. The reason? Stimulus checks to individuals are based on 2019 tax returns, so the government didn’t have a system set up to get payments to parents of infants born in the first few months of 2020.
“As far as the IRS is concerned, those newborns don’t exist yet,” Duckworth told Emma.
Duckworth is proposing a bill, the Newborn CARES ACT, that would close the loophole, allowing new parents to claim the credit now, rather than having to wait until they file 2020 taxes.
Duckworth, of course, is well suited to take on this issue. The veteran, who briefed the Pentagon on global pandemics during her military service, became the first senator to give birth while in office in 2018. She has a 2-year-old and a 5-year-old at home.
Asked why lawmakers hadn’t caught the loophole sooner, Duckworth said: “We’re all moving very quickly…But then also, it’s an issue where—not many of my colleagues are claiming newborn tax credits right now.”
You can read Emma’s full interview with Duckworth here.
Claire Zillman
claire.zillman@fortune.com
@clairezillman
Today’s Broadsheet was curated by Emma Hinchliffe.
ALSO IN THE HEADLINES
- Two women from Michigan. First, there was "that woman from Michigan" (that would be Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, as she was called by President Trump and later immortalized on a t-shirt). Now there's "a rogue Secretary of State" whom Trump said on Twitter "illegally and without authorization" sent out absentee ballots. Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson responded that she "[has] a name," and that she sent applications, not ballots, "like my GOP colleagues in Iowa, Georgia, Nebraska and West Virginia." Politico
- Coffee break. The chain Luckin Coffee fired CEO Jenny Qian last week over an accounting scandal. Now the 3-year-old company once seen as a potential rival to Starbucks in China is being delisted by the Nasdaq stock exchange. Under Qian, the company went public last year with a $600 million IPO. Fortune
-A unicorn loses its horn? Rent the Runway, led by CEO Jenn Hyman, is reportedly close to raising $25 million or so in new funding. The catch? The deal would value the startup at around $750 million—well below its previous $1 billion valuation. Bloomberg
- Inaugural issue. Tsai Ing-wen was sworn into her second term as President of Taiwan on Wednesday (she won re-election in January). But the ceremony has set off a U.S.-China row after U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo congratulated Tsai on her "courage and vision" in leading democracy in the region. In her own inaugural address, Tsai objected to "Beijing authorities’ use of ‘one country, two systems’ to downgrade Taiwan." Guardian
MOVERS AND SHAKERS: Elizabeth D. Bierbower, former president of Humana’s group and specialty division, will join Innovaccer’s strategic advisory board. Allianz SE head of digital regulation Catharina Richter will be global head of the Cyber Center of Competence for Allianz Group.
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
- Once in a blue moon. Annie Glenn was thrust into public life when her husband, John Glenn, became the first American astronaut to orbit the Earth in 1962. Then, after a lifetime with a severe stutter, she became an advocate for people with speech disorders. Glenn died at 100 of complications from the coronavirus on Tuesday. New York Times
- Family planning. The U.S. birthrate fell to a record low last year: 58.2 births per 1,000 women ages 15 to 44. American women also gave birth to the lowest number of babies—3.75 million—in 35 years. The only group that saw an uptick in births was women over 40, suggesting that some births are being delayed as women wait to establish careers. Wall Street Journal
- Signed, sealed, and delivered. Sen. Amy Klobuchar is leading a group of senators calling for an antitrust investigation into Uber and Grubhub if the companies end up merging. The lawmakers worry that the potential deal would "create a sector in which the top two players control 90% of sales." The Verge
ON MY RADAR
How Brooke Baldwin—newly recovered from COVID-19—spent her first day back in the anchor chair Glamour
The many masks of Nancy Pelosi New York Times
How the Call Her Daddy feud boiled over New York Times
PARTING WORDS
"We're not letting up in the fight to ensure that our communities are safer for young people everywhere—pandemic or not."
-March for Our Lives co-founders Delaney Tarr and Tyah Amoy-Roberts, who are turning their attention to gun violence and domestic violence in homes while schools are closed


fortune--2020-05-21--Can snoring be cured? It’s surprisingly difficult

To hear James Fallon tell it, there’s one product that is improving relationships—and, ahem, intimacy—across America. It’s a snore guard, and if you don’t buy one, he thinks your significant other just might.
Fallon is the founder of Apnea Sciences, the California-based creator of the SnoreRx, a plastic mouthguard that bears a resemblance to the kind you might use for a hockey game. It works by pulling your jaw forward, keeping your tongue from falling backward and blocking your airway. It will mean you’ll probably drool all night, but if you’re lucky—it doesn’t work for everyone—it will stop your snoring, winning back your spot in the bed.
The SnoreRx is just one of a rising number of products designed to stifle snoring, the widespread but little-addressed nighttime rumbling that stymies proper sleep and torments romantic partners—and often falls between the cracks of critical medical care and the more aesthetics-conscious wellness industry. It’s not a niche issue: About 44% of men and 28% of women between 30 and 60 snore, according to Harvard Medical School.
Snoring is now so common, in fact, we forget it shouldn’t be happening at all.
“Sleeping is inherently dangerous [to animals],” says Dr. Rafael Pelayo, a physician and sleep expert at the Stanford Sleep Center. “You shouldn’t be tipping off a predator by making noise.”
Because snoring is a symptom of obstructed breathing, rather than a condition itself, the causes range from low risk (a cold, a few too many beers), to high risk (obstructive sleep apnea).
That means silencing your snoring without medical consultation isn’t generally a good idea—Pelayo compares it to “disconnecting a fire alarm, and saying there’s no fire.”
Snoring-relief products include (clockwise from top left): SnoreRx; Snooor wearable stickers; Snorestoppers nasal dilators; and Zeeq by Rem-Fit smart pillow. Courtesy of SnoreRX; Snoor.; Snorestoppers.co.uk; Patrick T. Fallon—Bloomberg via Getty Images
But once you’ve established the cause, the options are nearly endless: from mouth guards to products to widen your nostrils and suction your tongue; to apps that track your snoring and high-tech stickers and pillows that “nudge” you to roll onto your side; to prescribed CPAP machines, which use face masks to help deliver a steady jet of air, keeping your airways open.
“There’s no silver bullet” for fixing snoring, says Nancy Markley, the president of Calgary-based MPowrx Health and Wellness Products, which makes a product called the Good Morning Snore Solution, which pulls the tongue forward so it doesn’t block the airway. “You have to have a big toolbox to see what product will work for what person.”
Apps and other technology that helped people track their own health have been part of the explosion in anti-snoring products, says Michiel Allessie, an Amsterdam-based dentist who specializes in sleep problems. He is the CEO of Side Sleep Technologies, which uses a vibrating sticker product called Snooor to remind snorers to switch onto their side, which frequently eases snoring.
Technology and other over-the-counter options allowed people to “start actually looking at their own problems” outside the doctor’s office, he pointed out—at a time when increasing obesity, which has been linked to the tendency to snore, means that the number of snorers is rising.
Snoring-related companies attracted $284 million worth of venture capital funding across the biotech and consumer field from 2015 to 2019, according to PitchBook. Snore tech is also just one part of the growing sleeping and sleep tech sector, which attracted more than $1.2 billion in VC funding over that same period.
Now, the question of how well someone can breathe has taken on added significance.
Though it’s too early to say whether snoring, as a symptom of larger sleeping or respiratory problems, is linked to vulnerability to COVID-19, the similarities between CPAP machines and medical-grade ventilators have already gained attention.
Projects launched by both the University of Rhode Island and Berkeley have solicited donations of the machines to tweak to be used as ventilators. Meanwhile, major CPAP manufacturers like Netherlands-based Royal Philips, which already made medical ventilators, quickly pledged to increase their output.
That doesn’t mean you should attempt to jury-rig your CPAP machine at home, says Pelayo. Because the machines pump air both in and out of the system—unlike a ventilator, which is a closed system—using an unadapted CPAP machine as a ventilator would likely spread the virus further, he notes.
But for snorers and non-snorers alike, there are increased arguments for taking your ability to sleep seriously, he says.
“If we let our bodies sleep,” he says, “our immune system bounces back.”


fortune--2020-05-21--Tammy Duckworth wants new parents to claim their $500 coronavirus relief check

After Congress passed its first coronavirus relief package, Illinois Sen. Tammy Duckworth began hearing from constituents: They had young children, so why couldn’t they claim the extra $500 in federal aid for those dependents?
As it turned out, their children were too young. Stimulus checks to individuals are based on 2019 tax returns, so the government didn’t have a system set up to get payments to parents of infants born in the first few months of 2020. “As far as the IRS is concerned, those newborns don’t exist yet,” Duckworth says.
Duckworth, a Democrat, was well-positioned to respond to this problem. In 2018 she became the first senator to give birth while in office; her daughter, Maile Pearl, is now 2. She also has a 5-year-old at home. Factor in her military background briefing the Pentagon on global pandemics, and Duckworth had the experience to approach this issue from all sides. Earlier this month she introduced the Newborn CARES Act, which would allow parents to claim their $500 dependent credit now rather than waiting until filing 2020 taxes. Duckworth didn’t have to secure additional funding for the proposal, instead just moving up the distribution of the existing funding—helping the bill to gain bipartisan support in the Senate.
“Not many of my colleagues are claiming newborn tax credits right now,” Duckworth says, explaining how this issue has slipped through the cracks. She spoke to Fortune about the bill and her experience caring for her family through an intense period of work in Congress. This interview has been lightly edited and condensed.
Fortune: Why was this issue important to you?
Sen. Tammy Duckworth: It’s important to me because so many working families are struggling right now. When you have a child, it should be a joyous moment. Right now, for so many families who’ve had children this year, it’s also a lot of fear involved. Many new parents have been laid off from work, are seeing their finances stretched thin—and then they have a newborn. You’ve got to buy a car seat and the diapers and medicines—then to find out the stimulus payment allows you $500 per dependent, but you can’t access it. My Newborn CARES Act will allow parents of children born this year to access that $500 payment.
Had you heard from constituents who encountered this problem?
The idea for this did come from talking to constituents who reached out and asked, “How come I can’t claim my daughter?” We realized it’s because the stimulus payments are based on the tax year, and as far as the IRS is concerned, those newborns don’t exist yet. That’s something that can be fixed, and I’m proud we were able to get bipartisan support for it.
Did your own experience as a new mother influence your interest in tackling this issue?
Definitely. My younger daughter is just 2 years old. I’m experiencing a lot of things that other moms and dads of young children are experiencing right now. I’m homeschooling my 5-year-old, and the Senate got called back to work. Now that I’m having to go into the Senate, there’s no one here to homeschool my daughter. This is what those grocery store cashiers and first responders and janitors around hospitals [are facing]—they have to go to work, but who’s going to take care of their kids? I have a lot more help; my mom lives with me, for example. But it does make me more attuned to what folks are struggling with during these scary times.
It’s why I jumped on it right away. When we first saw the issue, we said, we have to do something. With my first daughter, she didn’t breastfeed well, so she was on both breast milk and bottle feeding—I remember how difficult it was trying to get the formula for her. I’m just getting over the Caesarean—it’s very scary times. I empathize with the families going through that right now.
Why hadn’t members of Congress caught this loophole earlier?
We’re all moving very quickly. We wanted to get that CARES package out the door as quickly as possible. But then also, it’s an issue where—not many of my colleagues are claiming newborn tax credits right now. I’m pleased I was able to take the lead on it.
What sort of response have you had to this proposal from your colleagues in the Senate?
Sen. Mike Braun (R-Ind.), Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), and Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) are signed on. At first they were kind of leery because they asked, “Is this going to cost more money?” Once I said no, there’s no additional cost—once we explained that—Tim Scott signed on right away. We stood six feet apart, and I explained it to him.
How do you think Congress has done on other family issues during this crisis?
We have a long way to go. We need national paid family leave. So many people who were forced to quarantine for 14 days had to do it unpaid, and they can’t afford that. This pandemic has shown us how lacking we are in the United States. We’re the leader of the free world, and yet we don’t have paid family leave, we don’t have universal childcare, we don’t have safety systems in place to protect and support the most vulnerable, the children in our midst, and we need to do better.
What has childcare been like for you, both when you were quarantining at home and once you had to go back to Capitol Hill?
It’s been exhausting. The first weeks when we were fully from home—I was even busier than I had been before because I was homeschooling my daughter Abigail. I’m terrified, because I watch her and I can see that she’s regressing with her ABCs and her basic math, and I don’t want her to regress. But then I’ve been on conference calls nonstop. I’m on the phone 10 hours a day.
I’m like a lot of Gen X women—I also have a 79-year-old mom who lives with me. She’s great with helping with childcare, but I’m also helping to arrange her medical appointments. Like a lot of working moms out there, especially those in the sandwich generation, and if we’re the one person in our family who still has a job and hasn’t been laid off—working families are really struggling right now. With respect to all the working dads out there, I think working moms are carrying a lot heavier of a load.


fortune--2020-05-22--China’s Xi Jinping tightens his grip

China’s Xi Jinping tightens his grip

Why Shopify is betting small business can get in on the coronavirus e-commerce boom

This is the web version of Eastworld, Fortune’s newsletter focused on business and technology in Asia. Subscribe here to get future editions in your inbox.
In most years, the annual gathering of China’s two largest parliamentary bodies is elaborately scripted political theater.
The conclave is known as the lianghui, or Two Sessions, because it convenes delegates from the Chinese People’s Consultative Conference and the National People’s Congress. Neither assembly has much real power. To outside observers, it can appear that the main point of the proceedings is to furnish an audience to applaud party leaders as they extoll past achievements and outline grand goals to come.
But this year’s event, which commenced in Beijing on Thursday, offers genuine drama.
First came a surprise announcement Thursday that members of NPC’s powerful standing committee are drafting a new national security law for Hong Kong. That revelation suggests Chinese President Xi Jinping has lost patience with increasingly violent anti-government protests in the former British colony, and isn’t concerned about global condemnation for overriding the city’s system of self-governance.
Then on Friday, Chinese premier Li Keqiang declared that Beijing would dispense with a formal economic growth target for 2020, citing “great uncertainty” caused by the coronavirus pandemic. That decision departs from nearly a quarter-century of Chinese tradition and tacitly acknowledges the party may not achieve a high-profile poverty alleviation target meant to burnish Xi’s image ahead of next year’s centenary of the founding of the Chinese Communist Party.
Both moves are a measure of Xi’s determination to tighten his hold on power in the wake of the pandemic. The virus, which originated in the Chinese city of Wuhan, brought China’s economy to a temporary standstill, and continues to wreak havoc in the rest of the world.
As Xi takes center stage in the Great Hall of the People this week, he confronts enormous domestic and global challenges. China’s economy, which expanded 6% in 2019, shrank 6.8% in the first quarter of this year. Full-year growth will slump to 1.8%, according to a Bloomberg survey of economists.
Xi faces global criticism for his early handling of the outbreak. China is sparring with Australia over that nation’s call for an international probe of origins of the virus and squabbling with Europe over the quality of medical products sent by China to cope with the outbreak. Its relationship with the United States is in freefall.
This isn’t the narrative Xi intended, and yet it may still play to his advantage. He can blame the virus for the sluggish economy. And whatever the failings of his initial response to the outbreak, he can tout his decisive steps to contain it in late January, ordering an almost total lockdown of an area encompassing more than 100 million people. The subsequent failure of governments in Western Europe and especially the United States to do likewise have bolstered Xi’s stature by comparison, and enabled China to restart its economy more quickly and with more confidence than the West.
In this week’s Eastworld Spotlight conversation, Matthews Asia investment strategist Andy Rothman, argues China is headed for a V-shaped recovery in the year’s second half, and unemployment rates are rapidly falling.
Xi, now midway through his second term as president, may emerge from the crisis stronger than ever, and poised to extend his reign for an unprecedented third term in 2023.
More Eastworld news below!
Clay Chandler
clay.chandler@fortune.com
This edition of Eastworld was curated and produced by Grady McGregor. Reach him at grady.mcgregor@fortune.com.
Eastworld news
A 'Great Firewall' in Greater China?
Beijing's promise on Thursday to enact a new national security law in Hong Kong, its latest exertion of power on the Special Administration Region, sent Internet users in the city into a race for privacy. Nord VPN, a company that allows users to mask their Internet activity and location, reported that demand for its services in Hong Kong rose by a factor of 120 after the news. Hong Kong's Internet remains free from the Great Firewall restrictions imposed in mainland China. Hong Kong citizens, however, may feel that their digital buffer from the mainland is under threat. Bloomberg
Running out of luck
Nasdaq may make life harder for Chinese-listed companies. Reuters reported on Tuesday that the exchange is preparing new rules that will tighten requirements for Chinese IPOs hoping to list on the U.S. exchange. The crackdown follows a crisis at Luckin Coffee, a Chinese coffeehouse chain that became Starbucks’s largest competitor in China. The company was found to be fraudulently reporting its financial numbers in early April, and Nasdaq froze Luckin's stock for over a month. The company's shares began trading again this week, with its stock in free fall. Fortune’s Eamon Barrett dug into the crisis at Luckin and what it could mean for the future of Chinese companies hoping to list in the U.S. Fortune
The world’s largest democracy meets digital health surveillance
India’s government launched a COVID-19 contact tracing app, Aaroygya Setu, meaning ‘bridge to health,’ six weeks ago. It lets users know their risk of contracting COVID-19 based on their proximity to people infected with the virus and has been downloaded over 100 million times. The app is not mandatory for all citizens, but it is required by some localities and private employers. There are now growing concerns among users about sharing personal information and location data on the app. At least one user hacked the system (he was able to mark himself as always safe from the virus), plus there's India's checkered history of protecting digital privacy to consider. BBC
‘Bloom and bust’
In the northern Chinese province of Inner Mongolia, government officials thought they could boost local revenue with a major push into sunflower production. The effort, however, cost local government coffers millions, and ended in the conviction of two county officials who led the failed initiative. In a feature published this week, the independent Chinese outlet Caixin gives us an in-depth look into where the doomed flower effort went wrong and the pressure local governments face in trying to find innovative ways to meet national production and poverty alleviation targets. Caixin
Breaking bad
As governments in Southeast Asia focused on containing COVID-19, narcotics makers ran rampant. On Monday, government authorities in Myanmar announced Asia's largest ever drug bust, seizing nearly 200 million methamphetamine tablets and thousands of liters of derivative of the dangerous narcotic fentanyl. A UN official in Southeast Asia said of the bust, “While the world has shifted its attention to the COVID-19 pandemic, all indications are that production and trafficking of synthetic drugs and chemicals continue at record levels in the region.” Southeast Asia Globe
Coronavirus by country
Japan’s coronavirus response is a puzzle. In February and March, Japan seemed to dismiss the threat of the virus, keeping the country largely open even as neighbors like China went into lockdown and others like Taiwan and South Korea took aggressive measures to combat the spread.
At the time, Japan had yet to report a major outbreak, though the Diamond Princess cruise ship became a vector for the disease just off the country's shores. In late March, Japan announced the postponement of the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo. Japan averaged dozens of cases a day during March, but cases spiked into the hundreds following the announcement, and the country regularly reported over 500 new cases per day in April. The sudden surge raised concerns that the country had been covering up the scale of its outbreak in hopes that the 2020 Olympics would go on as planned.
Now, after the steady rise in new infections in April, Japan’s COVID-19 curve seems to be leveling off at 17,000 confirmed cases. Japan enacted a state of emergency starting in early April, yet measures like closing non-essential businesses were more recommendations than enforceable policy. Still, data shows that the majority of Japanese citizens adhered to social distancing guidelines, even if crowds still formed at some establishments like gambling parlors. This week, Japan Prime Minister Shinzo Abe lifted a state of emergency in much of the country, and announced that he hopes the five remaining provinces that remain under emergency state will reopen soon. As Foreign Policy states, "it is difficult to know if [Japan] has just been lucky or if it’s a matter of good policy."
Markets and movers
TikTok – Kevin Mayer, Disney’s streaming chief, is moving to TikTok. On Monday, Mayer announced that he will become the Chief Operating Officer of Bytedance. He will also be named the Chief Executive Officer of TikTok, which Bytedance owns, as of June 1. Fortune
Alibaba – On Wednesday, the Chinese tech giant Alibaba announced a $1.4 billion investment into its existing smart speaker system Tmall Genie. The company hopes to expand Tmall Genie's existing capabilities and incorporate it better into company’s vast e-commerce system. SCMP
Softbank – The Japanese conglomerate has been struggling and is looking for cash. On Thursday, the company announced that it was selling off 5% of its shares in its domestic telecom company, Softbank Corp, which are valued at $3.1 billion. The company is aiming to raise an additional $41 billion by selling off its stakes in companies like T-Mobile and Alibaba. Deal Street Asia
Muddy Waters – This week, the activist research firm Muddy Waters took a short position in GSX Techedu, a Chinese online education startup, and published a report claiming that over 70% of the company’s users were bots meant to boost the company’s performance. GSX responded, claiming Muddy Waters lacked “a basic understanding” of its business. Muddy Waters' report, however, led to a sell-off; GSX stock has dropped 15% since the claims. Investors are likely taking the activist investing firm's report more seriously than in the past since it published an incriminating report about Luckin Coffee (see above) in January, months before its allegations proved true. SCMP
Final figure
–
In a first (and likely last) time for Eastworld, our final figure this week is the absence of one. On Friday, China announced that it will not be setting a GDP target for 2020 at the government’s annual Two Sessions meeting. It's a remarkable break in precedent for a country that has elevated economic growth targets to gospel during its ascent to become a global power. China was projected to grow at a rate of roughly 6% this year, before the pandemic caused a 6.8% contraction in the first quarter. “We have not set the specific [gross domestic product] target mainly due to the global pandemic and big uncertainties in the economy and trade,” a government paper said. Fortune


fortune--2020-05-22--China’s new national security law threatens Hong Kong’s friendly business climate

Fortune 500 CEOs still want to invest in the U.S.—and China

On Thursday, China’s parliament, the National People’s Congress (NPC), announced that the central government would impose a national security law on the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR). The law would target behavior deemed antithetical to China’s sovereignty.
“National security is the bedrock underpinning the stability of a country. Safeguarding national security serves the fundamental interest of all Chinese,” Zhang Yesui, spokesman for the NPC, said at a news briefing on Thursday.
Although details of the law are still emerging, the proposal is seen as a threat to free speech and political expression in Hong Kong. Since protests over a proposed extradition law began last year, Beijing has increasingly viewed unrest in the region as “subversion” of its sovereignty.
Critics argue Beijing’s decision to implement the law itself—rather than leaving it to Hong Kong’s local government—also breaches the legislative divide at the core of the “one country, two systems” principle that has allowed Hong Kong to flourish as a hub for international business.
“Hong Kong today stands as a model of free trade, strong governance, free flow of information, and efficiency,” said Robert Grieves, chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong. “No one wins if the foundation for Hong Kong’s role as a prime international business and financial center is eroded.”
“One country, two systems” was the guiding principle devised when Hong Kong was returned to Chinese sovereignty in 1997. It maintains that Hong Kong will enjoy a “high degree of autonomy” from Beijing and be responsible for its own governance.
As such, Hong Kong has typically maintained a robust judiciary—as opposed to mainland China’s murky and opaque legal system—which has made the special administrative region an appealing location for businesses seeking a gateway to China. The new national security law puts that position in jeopardy.
“What they’re doing completely undermines the legal system that makes Hong Kong an appealing place for business,” said Jeffrey Halley, senior market analyst for Asia Pacific at OANDA. “What’s to stop Beijing from changing other laws? What’s to stop Beijing from changing commercial laws?”
Article 23
Hong Kong is actually long overdue to pass a national security law itself. Article 23 of the Basic Law, implemented in 1997, requires the local legislature to “enact laws on its own to prohibit any act of treason, secession, sedition, subversion against the Central People’s Government.”
The Hong Kong government’s first attempt to do so in 2003 was struck down by widespread protests. Citizens were concerned that the law would undermine their civil and human rights, creating an environment tantamount to that in mainland China where political persecution is rife.
Sales assistants stand behind a store gate during a protest inside the International Finance Centre mall in Hong Kong in April. A new law proposed by Beijing is seen as a clampdown on the city’s simmering protests and longtime freedom, perhaps at the expense of its reputation as an international business hub. Justin Chin/Bloomberg via Getty Images
The Chief Executive who attempted to introduce the bill, Tung Chee-hwa, resigned two years later, halfway through his second term. Successive governments avoided the hot-button topic, but the current administration, headed by Chief Executive Carrie Lam, has faced pressure from Beijing to push Article 23 legislation through.
Last week Lam told reporters, “It has been almost 23 years since the handover and [the passing of Article 23] is still not achieved, which is disappointing.”
Beijing’s decision to impose the national security law itself—sidestepping Hong Kong’s government by inserting the clause into Annex III of the Basic Law—shows the central government, too, has tired of the SAR government’s inability to pass the law.
“I’m concerned by the procedure being adopted,” said Philip Dykes, chairman of the Hong Kong Bar Association. “What seems to be proposed here is a ready-made law for Hong Kong without any input from the Hong Kong side. And that is troubling because you don’t know what they’re going to put in.”
The proposed law will be presented to the National People’s Congress—which is meeting this week—for approval. Once it is approved, Beijing’s legislature will have to fill in the details on what is to be outlawed and how it will be enforced. Nationalist tabloid Global Times reports the law could be completed within half a year.
U.S action
Last year, the U.S. passed the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act, which requires the State Department to review the SAR’s relative autonomy from Beijing annually. Hong Kong’s privileged trade status with the U.S. could be revoked if the city’s autonomy is found wanting.
Security guards stand inside the Great Hall of the People at the National People’s Congress on May 22 in Beijing. At the meeting, Beijing announced a new national security law seen as clamping down on Hong Kong’s democratic freedoms and jeopardizing its reputation as a hospitable environment for international business. Andrea Verdelli/Getty Images
Reaction Thursday from U.S. senators suggests the State Department will be under pressure to reach a negative conclusion. Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) called the law an attempt to “end what is left of Hong Kong’s autonomy.”
Meanwhile, Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) and Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) said they would introduce a bill authorizing sanctions “on entities that violate China’s obligations to Hong Kong under the Sino-British Joint Declaration and the Basic Law.”
“We would impose penalties on individuals who are complicit in China’s illegal crackdown in Hong Kong,” Van Hollen said. The bill, which was prepared before Beijing made its move Thursday, would also “impose mandatory secondary sanctions on banks that do business with the entities in violation of the Basic Law.”
Stocks tumble
Last year, Hong Kong’s economy was pummeled by nine months of protests that closed roads, shops, schools, and even the airport. In August of 2019, the government released $2.4 billion in stimulus to bolster the economy, but the SAR’s annual GDP contracted 1.2%, sending Hong Kong into its first recession in a decade.
“The very real threat now is the return of mass protests to the streets of Hong Kong, a downgrade in trade status with the U.S., and potentially an exit of large companies from the SAR,” Halley said.
Hong Kong citizens already are organizing more protests in opposition to Beijing’s ruling, and markets are reacting to the news. Japan’s Nikkei 225 dipped 0.8%, and Singapore’s Straits Times Index dropped 2.18% at the time of writing, while Hong Kong’s benchmark Hang Seng Index tumbled more than 5% to its lowest level since 2015.
“It’s a time of great uncertainty when all eyes will be upon Hong Kong,” Dykes said. “But the way the law is being pushed through we should have answers very soon.”


fortune--2020-05-22--Fortune 500 CEOs still want to invest in the U.S.—and China

Good morning.
One final insight from our annual Fortune 500 CEO poll: We asked the CEOs where in the world they saw the best opportunities to invest. Seventy-five percent of them said the U.S. was still number one on their list—the same as last year. Only 10% said China was the best place to invest—roughly the same as last year’s 11 percent.
That suggests that the pandemic hasn’t really changed the investment preferences of the 500. Some pundits had predicted rising nationalism after the pandemic would lead to a new look at Chinese supply chains. Others predicted China’s success in combating the virus would cause their economy to return to health first. But either those trends offset each other, or they had no measurable effect on the CEOs’ plans.
And since it is Friday, some feedback. I received a lot of response to my post on Geoffrey Colvin’s fine piece on Net Promoter Scores. A sampling:
“The number is almost an afterthought. The thought process, the mentality, the actions driven by customer verbatim comments, are paramount.” –J.D.
“I recommend that users of NPS modify their question with context and I propose that they’ll get even better response rates and more valid responses. For example, the new question might be something like this:
On a scale of zero to 10, if a friend or colleague expressed an interest or need in a service or product similar to XX, how likely is it that you would recommend XX to them?” —J.P.
“Net Promoter Score is about treating your customers right. The metric I think CEO’s should pay attention to first is treating their people right. As long as that does not rise to the top of their priority list, all other metrics will be impacted.” –J.G.
More news below.
Alan Murray
@alansmurray
alan.murray@fortune.com
TOP NEWS
China drops GDP guidance
China has dropped a longstanding tradition of giving a target for GDP growth, at least for this year, according to an annual address given on Friday. The break from decades of tradition was due to "factors that are difficult to predict" around the fall-out of the COVID-19 pandemic and the resulting economic crash. Fortune
Hong Kong security law
Mainland China is expected to tighten its grip on Hong Kong, with authorities planning to write a new national security law into the island's constitution. The law seeks to curb anti-government sentiment that incited widespread protests last year, but could also threaten to reignite those tensions. Markets in Asia sank Friday morning on the news. Fortune
21 states
U.S. jobs data came out on Thursday, and it marked a rise to 38.6 million people registered as unemployed across the country—or roughly the population of 21 states. The 2.4 million weekly filings were down from last week, but experts warned that was not a sign of relief, with the Fed's unemployment estimates starting to look outdated. Fortune
Facebook Works From Home
Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg says the company's staff will move en masse to working remotely, in one of the highest-profile examples of a major company making some of the lockdown changes permanent. Zuckerberg said that over time he expects half of the company's current staff of 45,000 to work from home—but the program will be rolled out to senior engineers and high performers first, suggesting even Facebook thinks working from home is a privilege. WSJ
AROUND THE WATER COOLER
Open for business
As businesses reopen across the U.S., companies—especially small businesses—say that being open is almost as hard as being closed. Keeping workers and customers safe, including constant cleaning, comes with its own set of costs, even as prices of food and other staples have risen—with some businesses questioning how and whether they can pass those costs onto their customers. WSJ
Can Snoring Be Cured?
It's surprisingly hard. But with the number of snorers growing, a vast constellation of products designed to muffle (if not exactly address) snoring—for the good of snorers' partners—has sprung up over the last ten years. Those tools range from "snore guards," to pillows and stickers, and contraptions to wear on your tongue or in your nose. Fortune
EasyJet Feud
EasyJet has not been having a good year. The pandemic has wiped out air travel—particularly the budget, European tourism—and it is reeling from a massive cyber attack. It's also in the midst of a feud between its founder, Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou, and its director—with the founder offering a GBP 5 million reward for information that would result in the carrier's orders for Airbus planes to be cancelled. He says the airline can't afford them. FT
Toilet paper party
When the great toilet paper panic buy of 2020 began, even toilet-paper start-ups were baffled. But they couldn't argue with demand: No. 2, a bamboo-based toilet paper brand popular on Instagram, saw its month-over-month sales on Amazon rise over 5000% in March, and over 3000% on its own site. After selling out, the brand came back with 15 times the production—and the company's founder says its growth means consumers are considering sustainable options, even in a pandemic. Fortune
This edition of CEO Daily was edited by Katherine Dunn.


fortune--2020-05-22--Burberry shares climb on improving China sales, another sign of recovery for the luxury sector

Burberry Group Plc said mainland Chinese stores have returned to growth, joining luxury rival LVMH in pointing to light at the end of the tunnel even as a lockdown-induced slump deepens elsewhere.
Burberry shares rose as much as 4.3% on some signs of a rebound in the fashion industry’s key market. Since the start of April, the company’s sales have returned to growth in South Korea, too, as some consumers catch up on purchases thwarted by the virus.
“It will take some time for luxury to recover from Covid-19 and for consumer confidence to return to pre-virus levels,” Chief Financial Officer Julie Brown said on a call with reporters, adding that growth in China and Korea has reached double-digit percentages recently. “We’re seeing very encouraging signs.”
About half of the British trenchcoat-maker’s 421 stores remain closed, putting pressure on sales for the three months through June. Burberry said Friday that store closures would likely remain at their peak throughout the period.
The coronavirus pandemic and lockdown measures to contain it have snarled Burberry’s attempts revive sales under designer Riccardo Tisci and Chief Executive Officer Marco Gobbetti, both formerly of luxury conglomerate LVMH and its French fashion house Givenchy. After two years of broadly flat business, Gobbetti’s turnaround plan was supposed to lead to accelerating sales and margin expansion starting this year.
Some of the rebound in mainland China may be due to consumers repatriating their luxury shopping due to travel restrictions. Prior to the crisis, about half of Chinese luxury spending took place abroad.
The key to a recovery is countries balancing social distancing and controlling the virus, Brown said.
“China and Korea are showing very good signs of being able to do this,” the CFO said. “In terms of durability, it looks very promising.” Retail sales fell 3% on a comparable basis in the 12 months ended March 28. Analysts had expected a decline of 4.6%.
“A 245 million-pound writedown in fiscal 2020 to March on store impairments and stock provisions resulting from Covid-19 is just the beginning for Burberry and other luxury brands in transition phase, in our view,” says Deborah Aitken, BI luxury goods analyst.
Burberry suspended dividends and share buybacks and is accelerating its cost-cutting program to help weather the downturn. The company had 887 million pounds ($1.1 billion) in cash on hand as of the end of March.


fortune--2020-05-22--Global stocks plunge as tensions flare between Hong Kong and China

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, everyone. Tensions between the Chinese government and Hong Kong are rattling global markets. It looks like we’ll be closing off the week on a down note.
Let’s check in on the action.
Markets update
Asia
The major indices are falling hard this morning, led down by Hong Kong’s Hang Seng, off 5% , the biggest one-day drop since 2015.
this morning, led down by Hang Seng, , the biggest one-day drop since 2015. Investors are spooked by Beijing’s move to clamp down on Hong Kong with a new security law designed to muzzle the pro-democracy movement . Cue U.S. sanctions .
with a designed to muzzle the . Cue . Meanwhile, China surprisingly abandoned its usual practice of setting an economic growth target for 2020. Scores of companies around the world have done so during the pandemic. Add the world’s No. 2 economy to the list. Even still, China appears to be seeing a V-shaped recovery.
Europe
The European bourses crashed out of the gates. The bluechip Stoxx Europe 600 was down 1.5% at the open.
was down at the open. Forza! Italy sold a record €22.3 billion ($25 billion) worth of “COVID-19 emergency” bonds , the brunt of which were gobbled up by retail investors, a sign of confidence in the embattled Conte government.
($25 billion) worth of , the brunt of which were gobbled up by retail investors, a sign of confidence in the embattled Conte government. Vladimir Putin wants to run Russia through at least 2036, a power play that’s been thrown off course by the coronavirus crisis. Until now. He’s expected to announce a snap ballot to change the constitution allowing him to sidestep term limits.
U.S.
The Dow , S&P 500 and Nasdaq futures are trading lower, looking to extend yesterday’s losses.
, and futures are trading lower, looking to extend yesterday’s losses. Retailers have been in the spotlight as we reach the end of earnings season . Best Buy saw a hit to its top-line last quarter, but it’s found a new popular feature for customers: appointment-only “concierge” pickup.
have been in the spotlight as we reach the end of . Best Buy saw a hit to its top-line last quarter, but it’s found a new popular feature for customers: appointment-only “concierge” pickup. When a few trillions aren’t enough—Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin says Congress may need to pass more stimulus legislation to help out America’s struggling businesses and families. After yesterday’s jobless numbers, that discussion should heat up.
Elsewhere
Gold is up, as is the dollar . Yep, it’s a risk-off day.
is up, as is the . Yep, it’s a risk-off day. Crude is falling, hurt by the Beijing-Hong Kong volatility. Brent is down 4%, below $35/gallon.
By the Numbers
38.6 million. Jobless numbers again kick off our weekly data roundup. 38.6 million workers in the United States have now filed for unemployment benefits over the past nine weeks. Yesterday’s tally of roughly 2.4 million jobless claims was roughly 300,000 lower than the prior week, but bang in line with analysts’ consensus. It’s now fallen seven straight weeks, but not fast enough to come anywhere near pre-crisis levels. The real unemployment rate could be as high as 22.5%, well above the lagging official rate (14.7%) announced earlier this month.
1 in 4. I’m borrowing this data point from Lance Lambert’s great Fortune Analytics newsletter, available to Premium subscribers. Every week I pore through it as he packs it with all kinds of proprietary data and sharp analysis… Nearly one-quarter of business leaders see more employees continuing to work-from-home even once operations fully reopen. Companies on both sides of the Atlantic—from Twitter and Facebook to the UK bank, RBS—are giving staff this option. This will create a profound shift in the way we work, the way companies recruit talent and manage operations.
3.9%. The Nasdaq closed at 9,284.51 yesterday, but the tech-laden index is up nearly 4% over the past five trading sessions. Crossing the 9,000 mark this past week was a big deal as it’s solidly in the green for the whole of 2020. The uncertainty over the Chinese government’s actions in Hong Kong is sure to rattle global markets. It will be interesting to see whether that pushes even more investors back into Big Tech.
Postscript
For 10 long weeks, we here in Rome have been living in a kind of purgatory: a city full of masterpieces—from Michelangelo’s The Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel to Bernini’s sculpture Apollo and Daphne to Marcel Duchamp’s urinal—all off-limits to the public. That changed this week as the government finally eased lockdown measures, allowing museums, churches, restaurants and bars to re-open.
For the occasion, I teamed up with my colleagues in New York to develop a photo essay of what life looks like here in Rome. Take a look.
A man wearing a protective mask sands with his back to the sculpture “Apollo and Daphne” realized by the Italian Artist Gian Lorenzo Bernini, at the Galleria Borghese in Rome. Bernini captures Daphne’s transformation into a laurel tree in a stunning sculpture. Wire photography: Antonio Masiello—Getty Images.
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Have a nice weekend, everyone. I’ll see you here on Tuesday. Bull Sheet is off on Monday for the Memorial Day (U.S.) and the Spring Bank Holiday (U.K.)
Bernhard Warner
@BernhardWarner
Bernhard.Warner@Fortune.com
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Today's reads
Delisted. Worrying that a company in your portfolio is to be delisted isn't an everyday investment risk. Thankfully. But there's a chance a big number of listed companies could get relegated after the U.S. Senate overwhelmingly approved a bill that could boot all kinds of companies from U.S. exchanges. What would happen to those investors should the bill become law? For starters, do the shares lose their value overnight? Fortune's Eamon Barrett explains.
Race for a cure. The markets are increasingly trading on any news that points to a breakthrough in the creation of a coronavirus vaccine. We had a big rally on Monday around Moderna. Yesterday, news broke that British drugmaker AstraZeneca received more than $1 billion from the U.S. government to scale up production of an experimental vaccine. AstraZeneca shares closed up nearly 3%.
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Market candy
Quiz time
It's Friday, time for my final Fortune 500-themed "Market candy" item of the week. A reminder: the list went live on the site on Monday. Ready for the quiz?
Question: How many female CEOs now run Fortune 500 companies?
a) 22
b) 29
c) 37
Answer: yes, it's 37—up four from last year. That's the highest number of female CEOs in Fortune 500 history.


fortune--2020-05-22--‘The Chinese consumer is back:’ This analyst says China is experiencing a V-shaped recovery

The shape of China’s economic recovery has been up for debate since early 2020, as Beijing shut down much of the economy and put huge swaths of its population under lockdown from late January through April in a largely successful effort to contain COVID-19.
Economists initially predicted it would resemble a V, with the bounce-back coming as quickly as the decline. But as China’s lockdowns dragged into their second and third months, a more gradual recovery in the form of a U looked increasingly likely. Then there are those in the “Nike swoosh” camp, who predict the recovery will follow a tick-shaped trajectory, in which an initial bounce back slows down before the economy fully recovers. The threat of a second wave of infections has sparked fears among analysts that a W-shaped rebound is possible, with the economy spiking and sinking alongside infection rates. Finally, experts have raised the possibility of an L-shaped recovery; a depression, in other words, or little recovery at all.
Amid all that speculation and as new economic data rolls in, Andy Rothman, an investment analyst at the mutual fund company Matthews Asia, says China is in fact experiencing a V-shaped recovery. He argues that China’s April consumer data puts the country squarely on track for a quick economic rebound.
“The Chinese consumer is back, and we are well on a way to a pretty broad consumer recovery,” he said.
In a discussion with Fortune’s Clay Chandler on Wednesday, Rothman expanded on that analysis and tackled other topics, such as how businesses are navigating the escalating U.S.-China feud, how the U.S.’s struggle with COVID-19 threatens its economic future, and the always looming question of decoupling. The Q&A below has been edited for length and clarity.
Fortune: What’s your take on the health of China’s economy?
Andy Rothman: The recovery after the pandemic has been considerable. China’s economy is clearly not back to normal and probably won’t get back to normal this year, but we’re in the early stages of a V-shaped recovery right now. I think the real challenge is going to be for the last 20%.
But what we’re seeing is the Chinese consumer is back, and we are well on a way to a pretty broad consumer recovery. Compared to the rest of the world, China is going to be the world’s best consumer story. The rebound of big-ticket items like home and car sales indicate that a big part of the country has not only enough money, but enough confidence in the future to make a purchase like that.
In the U.S., there is a lot of political debate about pulling out of the Chinese market and decoupling. But can multinationals afford to sacrifice the growth they could get in China?
No. This whole conversation about decoupling is, in my mind, just nuts. We’re talking about the two largest economies in the world decoupling, how does that make sense for either economy? If a U.S. company is in China, they’ve done it for business reasons. Now, isn’t that kind of a bedrock foundation of how we work here in the United States; that companies should make decisions based on what’s good for business?
Is there a risk that the January phase 1 trade agreement between China and the U.S. will come apart as a result of the pandemic?
Definitely there is a risk. The United States’s initial purchasing targets from China were completely unrealistic from the get-go, even if the pandemic did not come. But it’s really clear to me that Chinese President Xi Jinping really wants the deal to work. He has significantly increased Chinese purchases of agricultural products from the United States.
I think those numbers give the U.S. President an option. He can say, “Yeah, because of COVID-19, they weren’t able to meet the targets, but they were doing their best.” Or he can say, “They are not even close to meeting their targets, and therefore I’m going to break the deal because they haven’t lived up to their end of it.” So, this is really a political position for him.
The U.S. government recently announced a rule change that would block the Chinese tech giant Huawei from accessing semiconductor chips from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., or TSMC, one the world’s leading chipmakers. How do you see this standoff between the U.S. government and some of China’s biggest tech giants playing out?
I think it is likely to continue to get worse over the next six months, at least through the next presidential election. Right now, I’m puzzled as to what the objectives are.
Engineers here in California tell me that as long as Huawei gear and 5G is installed on the periphery of the network, and that Nokia and Sony Ericsson equipment is installed at the core, the risks are not that great and can be significantly mitigated.
American chipmakers are also getting a significant share of their revenue from China Qualcomm, for example, gets about two-thirds of its global revenue from China. If these chipmakers were to lose the China market, what would that do to their research and development budgets and overall financial health?
Do you see the pandemic as encouraging Asia to trade more with itself and less with the United States?
I think the biggest risk of the U.S. falling behind China right now is related to the virus. If I’m thinking longer term, reopening in a smart way in the United States is probably more important to our economic competitiveness vis-à-vis China and the rest of the world than worrying about semiconductor sales or Huawei.
This story and video are part of Eastworld Spotlight, a series of conversations on matters of business, tech, and finance with executives, experts, entrepreneurs, and investors in Asia. Subscribe to Fortune’s Eastworld newsletter to get them in your inbox.


fortune--2020-05-22--China abandons longstanding practice of setting GDP growth target amid coronavirus turmoil

China has abandoned its usual practice of setting a numerical target for economic growth this year due to the turmoil caused by the coronavirus pandemic, according to the text of Premier Li Keqiang’s annual policy address on Friday.
“I would like to point out that we have not set a specific target for economic growth this year,” the report said. “This is because our country will face some factors that are difficult to predict in its development due to the great uncertainty regarding the Covid-19 pandemic and the world economic and trade environment.”
The shifting away from a hard target for output growth breaks with decades of Communist Party planning habits and is an admission of the deep rupture that the disease has caused in the world’s second-largest economy. With the growth outlook depending also on the efforts of trading partners to rein in the pandemic, the government is shifting its focus to employment and maintaining stability.
Li’s address also contained announcement of plans to impose a national security law in Hong Kong, a development that pushed stocks there lower. The yuan was steady while the details on bond issuance helped drive yields on benchmark Chinese 10-year government bonds down to 2.625%, heading for the lowest in two weeks.
Li said the government is setting a target for urban job creation of over 9 million jobs, lower than the 2019 target of around 11 million, and a target for the urban surveyed unemployment rate of around 6%, higher than 2019’s goal, according to the document.
Reflecting recent controversy over the ‘phase one’ trade deal with the U.S. signed earlier this year before the pandemic broke out, Li said China will work with the U.S. to implement the agreement.
The budget deficit target was widened to more than 3.6% of GDP, implying a significantly larger shortfall than 2019’s target of 2.8%. Greater spending on efforts to restart the economy and control the spread of the coronavirus will be funded by the issuance of 1 trillion yuan ($141 billion) in sovereign debt.
To help finance infrastructure investment, local governments will issue 3.75 trillion yuan in local special bonds this year. That is an increase from 2019’s quota of 2.15 trillion. Economists had forecast an issuance of up to 4 trillion yuan.


fortune--2020-05-22--Social distance, party of one: Photos showing how the coronavirus is changing how we dine out

What it ’ s like to fly with new pandemic guidelines : Heightened anxiety and not enough masks

Mannequins. Cardboard cut-outs. Plastic blow-up dolls (including some of an adult nature). Not so long ago, propping one of these items up at a dining table in public might have seemed like a farcical element straight out of a sitcom.
Now, even the strangest of socializing concepts seems like just another day in the life of living through a pandemic. But restaurants are brainstorming every safe social distancing strategy possible to reopen their doors to diners, and no idea is off the table—whether that be installing plexiglass between seats or asking guests to don pool noodle hats to ensure they stay six feet apart.
As wacky as these props might seem, restaurant managers and owners have no time left to waste.
The global hospitality industry—restaurants and bars, especially—has been particularly devastated by the shutdowns imposed to curb the spread of COVID-19. In the U.S. alone, more than 8 million restaurant workers have already been furloughed or laid off, with the risk spreading to more than 11 million as the economic crisis progresses. The restaurant and foodservice industry lost more than $80 billion in sales over the course of March and April, according to the National Restaurant Association, and that figure is projected to reach $240 billion in losses by the end of 2020.
Possibly the most dire forecast: based on a recent survey covering a third of the restaurants in its network, OpenTable estimates one in four restaurants will close before the pandemic is over—whenever that may be.
In the meantime, restaurant dining will look quite different from ever before, as these photos show, and that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. At the very least, it could be a new source of entertainment.
EtenRestaurant, part of the Mediamatic Biotoop centre in Amsterdam, is testing greenhouse-like booths for customers to eat in, keeping them protected from other diners. Willem Velthoven for Mediamatic Amsterdam/Cover Images/Getty Images
This Starbucks in Hong Kong assures social distancing by taping off-limits areas, April 2, 2020. Tyrone Siu—Reuters
As restaurants in Sydney, Australia were beginning to open in mid-may Five Dock Dining restaurant owner Frank Angeletta had the novel approach of creating ambiance for his limited number of patrons with cardboard cutouts along with a taped background noise recording to simulate guest “chatter.” James D. Morgan—Getty Images
At the Penguin Eat Shabu hotpot restaurant in Bangkok people eat in between maze-like plastic partitions, May 5, 2020. Lillian Suwanrumpha—AFP/Getty Images
Workers sit at individual tables as they practice social distancing measures during a break at the Airbus SE assembly plant in Broughton, U.K., on April 30, 2020. Paul Thomas/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Employees, wearing protective face masks, sit at tables with plastic barriers to maintain social distancing as they take breaks from their work on the automobile assembly line at the recently reopened Renault auto factory in Flins, France May 6, 2020. Gonzalo Fuentes—Reuters
Fish Tales restaurant and bar in Ocean City, Maryland, offer a more whimsical approach to secure proper social distance is maintained for their customers, “bumper tables,” inflatable inner tubes on wheels, May 16, 2020. John Middlebrook—Reuters
As Virginia will allow restaurants to reopen at only 50 percent capacity in order to maintain social distancing the chef at the Inn at Little Washington, a Michelin three star restaurant in the Virginia countryside, Patrick O’Connell, plans to seat mannequins costumed in 1940’s era clothing rather than let the tables sit vacant when diners return on May 29, 2020. Win McNamee—Getty Images
As Italy moves to the second phase or re-opening employees of a restaurant in Milan give a demonstration of one approach to welcome customers with plexiglass dividers between tables. Claudia Greco—AGF/Universal Images Group/Getty Images


fortune--2020-05-22--Disinfected dice: Las Vegas casinos getting ready to roll

Social distance , party of one : Photos showing how the coronavirus is changing how we dine out

Free parking, but no valet service. Bartenders, blackjack dealers and waiters wearing masks. Hand sanitizer everywhere.
Yes, dice will roll, cards will be dealt and slot machines will beckon. But poker rooms? Closed.
Tourists returning to Las Vegas will see changes since gambling stopped in mid-March for the first time ever to stem the spread of the coronavirus.
The stakes could not be higher, said Robert Lang, executive director of the Brookings Mountain West think tank at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
“Las Vegas can never be known as the place where people go and get sick,” he said.
Democratic Gov. Steve Sisolak has not set a restart date, but could at any time. Resort owners have submitted health and safety rules to state regulators in anticipation of the end to the shutdown. A workshop with operators and the state Gaming Control Board is set Tuesday.
“We all know what we’ve gone through for the last 10 weeks. No one’s having fun,” said Bill Hornbuckle, acting chief executive and president of casino giant MGM Resorts International. “The simple idea that I could get out, come to a resort, lay at a pool, enjoy a nice dinner, sit at a blackjack table. There’s something to be said for all of that.”
Many properties have aimed for a June 1 restart in the gambling mecca closed almost overnight in the middle of a hot streak — three consecutive $1 billion months in statewide casino winnings. The city had been drawing more than 40 million annual visitors.
One given the green light, the marquees and the managers will welcome people back to this 24/7 town built for crowds, excitement and excess. But not every resort will be open. Nightclubs, dayclubs and large venues will remain closed. Cirque du Soleil shows will stay dark, at least for now.
Signs everywhere will remind guests of new rules: Wash your hands; keep distance from others; limit your elevator ride to your sanitized room to just four people.
“You’re going to see a lot of social distancing,” said Sean McBurney, general manager at Caesars Palace. “If there’s crowding, it’s every employee’s responsibility to ensure there’s social distancing.”
Dice will be disinfected between shooters, chips cleaned periodically and card decks changed frequently. At some resorts guests will be encouraged to use cellphones for touchless check in, as room keys, and to read restaurant menus.
Wynn Resorts properties and The Venetian, owned by Las Vegas Sands, plan to use thermal imaging cameras at every entrance to intercept people with fevers. Smaller operators in Las Vegas and Reno will offer hand-sanitizer.
“A gondola pilot wearing a face mask will be on board to steer the vessel,” a Venetian protocol says. “Gondoliers stationed along the canal will serenade passengers from an appropriate distance.”
New state Gaming Control Board regulations require surfaces to be disinfected according to federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines and “increased attention” to high-touch hotel items like television remote controls and light switches.
Guests will get free masks at large resorts, but won’t be forced to use them. For blackjack dealers, bellhops, reservation clerks, security guards, housekeepers and waiters, masks are mandatory.
“That’s the most visual thing. Every employee will be required to wear a mask,” McBurney said.
His footsteps echoed walking with a reporter past marble statues in the lobby toward a gilded casino vacant for the first time since it opened in 1966. A slot machine cried “Wheel of Fortune!” in the void. Seats on both sides of the game had been removed.
“Visually, you’ll still see a lot of color and activity, but you won’t be able to play every machine,” McBurney said.
At the neighboring Bellagio, Hornbuckle showed new hand-washing stations installed where banks of slot machines were removed. His company is losing almost $10 million a day during the shutdown, he said.
Other rules: four players only at roulette, six at craps. Plastic partitions will separate dealers from players and players from each other at the Bellagio, three at each table.
MGM Resorts plans to open just two of its 10 Strip properties at first: Bellagio and New York-New York.
Hornbuckle promised Bellagio’s iconic dancing fountains will restart as soon as the governor sets a date. Still, just 1,200 of the hotel’s 4,000 rooms will be rented and casinos will be limited to 50% of capacity.
“You’re going to see less people, by control and by design,” he said.
Caesars Entertainment plans to open Caesars Palace and the Flamingo Las Vegas at first, followed later by Harrah’s Las Vegas and the casino floor at the LINQ hotel-casino.
Lang called it unlikely that big crowds will return quickly, and said resort operators with deep pockets “will probably allow a bargain moment” until business improves. “First will be residents of Las Vegas. Then people getting here by car from California. Then domestic air flights. Then international,” the researcher predicted.
McBurney said that with nearly 4,000 rooms at Caesars Palace, he expected just one of six towers will be occupied. “Once people know there’s an opening date … demand will increase,” he said. “How much? I can’t speculate.”


fortune--2020-05-22--How the post-pandemic workplace will operate

What will businesses be like, after all of this?
We’ve seen firsthand how the pandemic is uprooting business. For me, today marks 10 weeks of remote work. But when we go back to the office, what will the new normal look like?
Fortune Analytics got an exclusive look at Salesforce’s proprietary data to learn how the pandemic is impacting businesses during and after the crisis.
The Customer & Market Insights group within Salesforce regularly conducts surveys among decision makers (director level or higher) on a number of hot business topics. Fortune Analytics got exclusive access to the results of three surveys conducted in April and May.
Here are some of the findings from that data.
The numbers to know
30%
… of business leaders say their company’s priorities have changed a great deal due to COVID-19. 58% said they’ve changed somewhat, 10% said very little, and only 2% said no change.
48%
… of business leaders say their top concerns over returning to business as usual are health and safety. That was followed by 38% who cited financial management and cash flow and 27% who cited new laws and regulations.
26%
… of business leaders think their organization’s “new normal” will mean more employees working from home.
25%
… of business leaders say the biggest challenge to working remotely is productivity and motivation. That was followed by 24% who said connectivity with coworkers and 19% home-office setups.
48%
… of business leaders think technology spending at their company will increase because of the pandemic. Only 14% think tech spending will decrease.
The big picture
Tech spending and remote working are set to grow. As the economy contracts, 48% of business leaders say tech spending will increase versus 14% who say it will drop. Much of tech spending will increase because of burgeoning remote workforces. Speaking of WFH: As things return to normal, the No. 1 biggest change businesses see remaining is that work-from-home structure.
Staying connected with staff is the big challenge. Productivity (25%) and communication (24%) issues are the business roadblocks to WFH, decision makers say. Meanwhile, just 16% said access to technology systems was an issue.
A few deeper takeaways


fortune--2020-05-22--Tech privacy firm warns contact tracing app violates policy

A contact tracing app pushed by the governors of North Dakota and South Dakota as a tool to trace exposure to the coronavirus violated its own privacy policy by sharing location and user identification information with third party companies, according to a report from a tech privacy firm.
The Care19 app, developed by ProudCrowd, of North Dakota, was one of the first contact tracing apps endorsed by state governments in response to the coronavirus. Governors from both states promoted it as a way to help health officials stop outbreaks and retrace the steps of people with infections, while assuring people that their data is protected. But tech privacy firm Jumbo Privacy reported this week that developers included lines of code that send users’ location and identification data to third-party companies including Foursquare, BugFender and Google.
Concerned citizens have been eyeing the tradeoff between controlling outbreaks using apps and intrusions on personal privacy. Civil liberty groups and tech watchdogs have warned about contact tracing apps, saying governments and companies should not be able to access personal data.
The Care19 app shared location data with Foursquare, an advertising company that markets to people based on their location.
ProudCrowd CEO Tim Brookins said his company sends data to Foursquare to determine which businesses a user has visited, but the data is discarded and not used for commercial purposes.
“The simple overarching fact here is that we have stated, and Foursquare has confirmed, that they have not, nor will not, collect data from Care19 users. Period,” Brookins said.
The app generates an anonymous code for every user. The Jumbo Privacy report noted that the code, along with the phone’s identification, was sent to BugFender, a Barcelona-based company that helps developers track malfunctions. The app also sent an advertising identifier linked with the user’s phone to Google’s Firebase service. That adds up to “serious privacy risks,” Jumbo said.
“It’s really an oversight from them,” said Jumbo Privacy CEO Pierre Valade. “It’s not a bad intention. They were rushing to build this product.”
Until Friday, Care19′s privacy statement told users their location data would “not be shared with anyone, including government entities or third parties, unless you consent or ProudCrowd is compelled under federal regulations.”
A revised statement says third parties “may have temporary access to aspects of your data for their specific data processing tasks. However, they will not collect this data in a form that allows themselves or others to access or otherwise use this data.”
South Dakota Secretary of Health Kim Malsam-Rysdon said the Care19 app doesn’t violate the privacy statement and that users always had to grant permission for the app to use their data. The South Dakota version of the app has been downloaded more than 18,000 times, but hasn’t been used to trace an active infection yet.
“This is a voluntary, opt-in app,” she said.
The North Dakota Department of Health, which has seen over 33,000 downloads of the app, hasn’t responded to a request for comment.