The big picture: Sciorra recounted her sexual assault at the trial Thursday. Perez told the jury Sciorra called her multiple times about her experience and him harassing her.
Taylor Swift says in a forthcoming Netflix documentary that she wishes she commented on politics for the first time in 2016 to help defeat President Trump, rather than breaking her silence ahead of the 2018 midterm elections, per The Daily Beast.
What happened: A pivotal scene in "Miss Americana" shows Swift holed up with her family and public relations staff, preparing to endorse Democrat Phil Bredesen for Senate in Tennessee on Instagram. Told that the move might prompt the public to think she's simultaneously condemning the president, Swift responds, "I don’t care if they write that. I'm sad I didn't say it two years ago."
Corporate pledges to address climate change poured out of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, this week, where the mood was surprisingly optimistic. Dan digs into if the words will match actions with Axios' David Lawler.
Four years after the federal government recalled tens of millions of Takata airbags for dangerous defects, about 28% of those vehicles remain unrepaired.
Why it matters: The Takata airbag recall is the largest and most complex safety recall in U.S. history, with roughly 56 million defective airbags recalled in approximately 41.6 million vehicles.
Goldman Sachs announced Thursday that it won't help take European and North American companies public unless they have at least one "diverse" board director, effective July 1.
The big picture: In general, this is a positive development. Board diversity has been shown to improve company performance, per numerous academic studies, and far too many issuers continue to rely on bogus "pipeline" or meritocracy excuses for their boardroom homogeny.
The number of companies around the world that had their credit ratings downgraded from investment grade to speculative grade — so-called fallen angels — hit the lowest level in 23 years, S&P Global reported Thursday.
Context: There were only 19 fallen angels last year, which marked the fourth consecutive year the number has declined, the longest stretch on record.
Growth slowed for local economies virtually everywhere in the U.S. last year, and is declining again at the start of this year as consumers pare back spending and business growth stalls.
What they're saying: So says business directory service Yelp, which used data from its more than 100 million users to track the number of businesses opening or closing and consumer demand.
Actress Annabella Sciorra took the stand at Harvey Weinstein's trial on Thursday to confront the media mogul over his alleged rape of her in the 1990s.
What they're saying: Sciorra told the jury that Weinstein barged into her apartment in the mid-1990s and raped her, AP reports. She recounted trying to force him off by kicking and punching him. Roughly a month later, Sciorra says she ran into Weinstein and confronted him over the incident, to which he responded: "That’s what all the nice Catholic girls say," adding, "This remains between you and I."
"PBS NewsHour" co-founder and longtime anchor Jim Lehrer died Thursday at 85, according to a statement from his colleague, Judy Woodruff.
Why it matters: Lehrer co-founded "NewsHour" in 1975, which he anchored for 36 years before retiring in 2011. He also moderated 12 presidential debates, more than any other person in American history. He received the National Humanities Medal from President Clinton in 1999 and was inducted into the Television Hall of Fame that same year.
Global equity prices have largely bounced back from the selloff after the first reports of the coronavirus outbreak in China, but traders are still punishing companies tied to Wuhan, China, the city at the center of the outbreak.
What happened: "Wuhan Department Store Group, which operates several malls in Wuhan, lost 3.1% to head for a weekly drop of 16%. Hubei Heyuan Gas Co., which generates all of its revenue from Hubei province, extended its two-day drop to 10%, the biggest on record," Bloomberg reports.
Investors have gotten very bullish in the past two weeks, but it's not stocks they're buying, it's bonds — especially highly rated, low-yielding investment grade corporate bonds.
Why it matters: Unlike in past market rallies when cash flooded into traditionally risky assets like stocks and high-yield bonds, money is flocking to traditionally safe alternatives even after 2019's stellar gains.
S&P 500 companies are poised to see a 2.1% decline in earnings along with net profit margins of 10.7% , FactSet data show, based on reports from the companies that have so far reported their results from the fourth quarter of 2019.
Why it matters: Both numbers suggest overall weakness in 2019, analysts say.
Labor union membership in the U.S. continued to drop in 2019, new data released Wednesday from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows.
The big picture: Amid this slight dip in union membership — which decreased 0.2% from 2018 — the United Auto Workers led the largest demonstration by any union against any U.S. business since UAW's last strike against General Motors in 2007.
