The transactions were "lawful," a spokesman for Black told BI.
A Senate committee investigating $158 million in payments that private equity investor Leon Black made to Jeffrey Epstein has brought Bank of America into the mix.
Oregon Senator Ron Wyden, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, sent a letter to the bank earlier this month asking whether it had followed proper protocols in clearing the payments, The New York Times reports.
The payments were related to tax work done by Epstein for Black — the former CEO of Apollo Global Management — between 2012 and 2017, according to the Times.
The letter asked whether the payments — which included fees for Epstein's advice on a trust that helped Black save massively on taxes, according to the Times — had raised any concerns at Bank of America.
It also inquired whether any art transactions involving Epstein and Black had flagged concerns.
"The transactions the Committee reviewed were both lawful and conceived, vetted and executed by reputable law firms and tax advisors," Whit Clay, a spokesman for Black, told Business Insider in a statement. "Mr. Black has paid all taxes owed to the government and has provided detailed information on these matters to the Committee."
Bank of America declined to comment. The Senate Finance Committee did not immediately respond to BI's request for comment.
The Senate Finance Committee said in July it was looking into the $158 million that Black had paid Epstein as part of a larger investigation into tax avoidance strategies used by the uber-wealthy, according to the Times.
Earlier this month, Black told Puck that he hadn't realized he'd paid the convicted pedophile — who died in jail shortly after being arrested on federal sex trafficking charges in 2019 — $158 million.
Former US President Donald Trump attends the second day of his New York criminal trial on April 16, 2024.
JUSTIN LANE/POOL/AFP via Getty Images
Jury selection continues Tuesday in Donald Trump's Manhattan hush-money trial.
Trump gave reporters a preview of his potential defense before he entered the courtroom.
The former president blamed "some accountant."
Day two of jury selection in Donald Trump's Manhattan hush-money trial began Tuesday, with the former president giving reporters a preview of his potential defense: the hush-money payment actually was a legal expense — as far as he knew.
And "some accountant" at Trump Organization handled the paperwork he's now on trial for.
"I was paying a lawyer and marked it down as a legal expense," Trump said in the hallway outside the courtroom in response to a shouted question by a pool reporter.
"Some accountant, I didn't know, marked it down as a legal expense," Trump rattled on.
"That's exactly what it was. And you get indicted over that?" he continued.
The Manhattan district attorney's indictment alleges that he falsified 34 Trump Organization business records to cover up an illegal scheme to interfere with the 2016 election.
The falsified records hid a $130,000 hush money payment to Stormy Daniels, a porn star who was about to publicly allege that back in 2006, she and the then-Apprentice star had sex — a claim Trump has denied.
Trump's hallway remarks suggest his lawyers will argue at trial that he was in the dark about what prosecutors say are falsified documents.
Also Tuesday morning, prosecutors made good on the previous day's promise to demand that Trump be held in contempt of court for violating his gag order."
"Defendant willfully violated this Court's order by publishing several social media posts attacking two known witnesses, Michael Cohen and Stormy Daniels," prosecutors wrote in a new motion.
The defense has until Friday to file a response explaining why Trump should not be held in contempt. Should state Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan find Trump in contempt, potential penalties include fines and, in the extreme, jail time.
Meanwhile, jury selection continued for a second day on Tuesday.
Just under three dozen anonymous prospective jurors will take turns on Tuesday answering questions on a jury questionnaire as lawyers for Trump and District Attorney Alvin Bragg listen intently.
It also asks prospective jurors to say if they've read any of Trump's books, if they are supporters of QAnon or Antifa, and whether they have "strong opinions or firmly held beliefs about former President Donald Trump."
Trump looked at a random court officer and winked as he entered the room, mouthing "How are you?" before taking his seat at the defense table.
He has appeared to struggle to stay awake during the sometimes tedious jury selection process. His eyes have been closed for minutes at a time as he sits at the defense table, and on occasion, he appears to jolt awake.
That means immigrants, specifically foreign-born workers, are responsible for most of the US job growth of recent years. Foreign-born workers' share of the US workforce rose from 16.8% in January 2020 to 19.3% in March 2024, according to a Business Insider analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics data.
Supporters of immigration say these newcomers have provided the US economy a huge boost and not taken Americans' jobs — a common argument made by those against immigration. With many boomers reaching retirement age and young people having fewer children than they used to, immigration might be the best way for US labor force levels to sustain and grow.
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However, some people have argued that immigrants are, in fact, taking Americans' jobs, in addition to reducing wages and contributing to high housing prices. Many also have broader concerns about how some immigrants are coming to the US. Last December, illegal border crossings from Mexico resulted in a record number of arrests, and cities like New York and Chicago are struggling to accommodate the influx of migrants to their cities.
Who are these immigrant workers who have come to the US in recent years? They're likely to be young, male, working in one of three industries, making less than $40,000 a year, and living in one of four states, according to a Goldman Sachs report published in April and based on an analysis of government data.
The typical recent immigrant is more likely than the US-born population to have a college degree
The Goldman Sachs report said much of the recent uptick in immigrationto the UShas been tied to a rise in "unauthorized immigration" — foreign-born people coming into the USwho aren't legal US residents.
The report said many of these people came from South America, Central America, and Mexico — and that the number of immigrants from these regions likely tripled in 2023 compared to its pre-pandemic average.
In recent years, over half of immigrants settled in one of four states: Florida, California, Texas, and New York. The next most popular states were New Jersey, Illinois, Massachusetts, and Georgia. Accommodative policies toward immigrants and proximity to the Southern border have both impacted their destinations.
Among immigrants aged 16 and older who came to the US within the last three years, nearly 90% of them were between the ages of 16 and 54, compared to 62% of the US-born population aged 16 and older.
Roughly 64% of these recent immigrants were working or looking for work, compared to 62% of US-born workers. Recent immigrants had an unemployment rate of 6.3%, compared to 3.8% for US-born workers.
Among recent immigrants aged 16 and older, about 55% were male, compared to 46% of US-born individuals in the same age group.
Recent immigrants were much less likely than the US-born population to have graduated from high school. Nearly a quarter of recent immigrants aged 16 or older had less than a high school education, compared to 10% of the US-born population.
However, recent immigrants were more likely than US-born Americans to have a college degree. Over 39% of recent immigrants aged 16 or older had a bachelor's or advanced degree, compared to 34% of the US-born population. The biggest disparity was in the share of workers with only "some college" education: about 13% of recent immigrants and 28% of the US-born population.
The typical recent immigrant is likely to make less than $40,000 a year
The most common industries for recent immigrant workers were construction, professional and business, and accommodation and food services.
Over 16% of recent immigrants worked in the construction industry, compared to 6.4% of US-born workers. Among the most common jobs in this industry are construction laborers, carpenters, and electricians, per the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Roughly 17% of immigrants worked in the professional and business industry, compared to 12% of US-born workers. Among the most common jobs in this industry are janitors, security guards, and landscaping and groundskeeping workers.
About 12% of recent immigrants worked in the accommodation and food services industry, compared to 7% of US-born workers. Among the most common jobs in this industry are "food preparation and serving workers," waiters and waitresses, cooks, and hotel desk clerks.
Per Goldman Sachs, the typical recent immigrant worker made about $39,000 a year in 2023, compared to $54,000 for the typical US-born worker.
Have you recently moved to the US and found work? If so, reach out to this reporter at jzinkula@businessinsider.com.
Many young people aren't using the VR headsets they own, according to a new Piper Sandler survey.
DAVID SWANSON
Virtual-reality headsets still are trying to prove their use case.
You'd think teens would be early adopters of devices like the Apple Vision Pro and Meta's Quest.
But a new Piper Sandler survey shows 56% of teen VR device owners rarely use them.
The vibes on Apple's Vision Pro are mixed, at best: People like the tech but aren't sure why they should use it, which is a problem for a device that sells for $3,500 and up.
But what about high-tech goggles that don't cost that much, and do have things you can do with them — like play games?
Well, those have issues, too. On the one hand, people are buying them: As of 2023, Meta had sold more than 20 million of its Quest headsets, which start at around $500. But they're not using them that much.
More specifically: Teenagers — the group you think would have the most time and inclination to monkey around with headsets — can't be bothered to put on the devices they already own, according to a new survey from Piper Sandler.
Piper's semi-annual report says that 33% of teens report owning a VR device of some sort. But 56% of them say they rarely use it — that's up from 48% two years ago. (The firm surveyed 6,020 US teens with an average age of 16.1)
Piper Sandler
But if you're a VR/AR/whatever device fan and you're looking for someone to make lemonade out of this data, I've got something for you: Piper says its survey respondents expect to spend $225 on video games in the first half of 2024 alone.
Now, the trick is getting them to spend that money and time on a VR device instead of a console or their phone.
Messier 74, nicknamed "the Phantom Galaxy" for its dimness, comes to life when Chandra revealed its X-ray activity (purple) alongside observations from Hubble and Webb.
X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO; Optical: NASA/ESA/STScI; IR NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI, J. Lee and the PHANGS-JWST Team; Image Processing: N. Wolk and K. Arcand
NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory faces budget cuts that may end its mission.
The Chandra X-ray Observatory has been orbiting Earth for 25 years, peering at the universe in X-ray light that's invisible to the human eye.
Through its stunning images, the telescope has revealed that the cosmos is teeming with black holes, discovered direct evidence for the existence of dark matter, and spotted the light of colliding neutron stars that warped space-time.
Check out some of Chandra's best photos, including collaborations with the Hubble and James Webb space telescopes.
The Chandra X-ray Observatory is one of NASA's flagship space telescopes.
The Tarantula Nebula, imaged by the Chandra and Webb space telescopes. Chandra's X-ray observations (in royal blue and purple) reveal gas that was heated to millions of degrees by shock waves from the wind of massive stars.
X-ray: NASA/CXC/Penn State Univ./L. Townsley et al.; IR: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI/JWST ERO Production Team
The observatory cost NASA about $2.2 billion to build and launch, and it has paid off.
"For many years it was the most productive mission in NASA's program if measured in publications/dollar spent," Thomas Zurbuchen, who was the Associate Administrator of NASA's Science Mission Directorate from 2016 to 2022, told Business Insider in an email.
But in its budget request for the 2025 fiscal year, NASA slashed Chandra's funding from $68 million to $41 million.
Combined data from Chandra and Webb revealed new details of the supernova remnant Cassiopeia A.
X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO; Optical: NASA/ESA/STScI; IR: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI/Milisavljevic et al., NASA/JPL/CalTech; Image Processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/J. Schmidt and K. Arcand
Over the ensuing years, the budget proposes to give the observatory $26.6 million annually until a drastic plummet to $5.2 million in 2029.
That budget plan is not enough to keep the telescope running at full capacity.
Chandra revealed X-ray emissions (pink) on Uranus for the first time, either from its rings, from auroras on the planet, or from its atmosphere scattering the sun's X-rays.
X-ray: NASA/CXO/University College London/W. Dunn et al; Infrared: W.M. Keck Observatory
In fact, Chandra's operating team says that's just the amount it would need to decommission the telescope and end its operations.
The observatory still makes new discoveries, like the record-setting black hole in this image.
The James Webb and Chandra telescopes teamed up to produce this X-ray image of the most distant black hole ever discovered.
Chandra also complements Webb and Hubble photos by imaging ultra-hot material that's invisible to those telescopes.
The "Pillars of Creation," a formation of dusty clouds where new stars are born, as imaged by the James Webb and Chandra space telescopes.
X-ray: NASA/CXO/SAO; Infrared: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI; Image processing: L. Frattare.
For example, Chandra revealed a sea of young stars burning bright in X-rays across the above Webb image of the iconic Pillars of Creation, a cloud formation constantly birthing new stars.
"Often you get like a gas cloud that's glowing, and then there's this X-ray source in the middle that's pumping the energy into it that's causing it to glow," Jonathan McDowell, an astrophysicist who leads science data systems for Chandra, told Business Insider. "If you don't have Chandra, you can't see that. So you're missing a big part of the story."
For instance, take the bright X-ray footprint at the center of the Milky Way in this image.
Chandra spotted Sagittarius A*, the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way.
Chandra is also key to studying explosive, fleeting cosmic events like supernovae or the collisions of dead stars.
Here Chandra made the first X-ray detection of a gravitational wave source — a collision of neutron stars called GW170817.
X-ray: NASA/CXC/Northwestern U./W. Fong & R. Margutti et al. & NASA/GSFC/E. Troja et al.; Optical:NASA/STScI
The telescope clearly captured the X-ray emissions of a neutron-star collision in 2017. It was the first — and, so far, only — time that anyone had seen the light from a violent cosmic collision that sent gravitational waves (ripples in space-time) through Earth.
Scientists expect to discover thousands more such mysterious flash-in-a-pan events with the advent of the Rubin Observatory, which is set to begin scanning the entire southern sky next year.
Rubin will open an entirely new field of astronomy.
Chandra joined forces with other telescopes to map this remnant of a supernova explosion that suddenly appeared in the night sky 800 years ago.
X-ray: (Chandra) NASA/CXC/U. Manitoba/C. Treyturik, (XMM-Newton) ESA/C. Treyturik; Optical: (Pan-STARRS) NOIRLab/MDM/Dartmouth/R. Fesen; Infrared: (WISE) NASA/JPL/Caltech/; Image Processing: Univ. of Manitoba/Gilles Ferrand and Jayanne English
When Rubin discovers an explosion unfolding rapidly in the distant universe, telescopes worldwide will have to turn their lens to capture the phenomenon in visible light, infrared, radio, gamma rays, and X-rays. Without Chandra, a piece of the puzzle will be missing.
Losing Chandra would be "a devastating blow" and "a disaster" for X-ray astronomy, astrophysicists said after the budget announcement, according to Space.com.
NASA had to trim down somewhere.
A mosaic of the center of the Milky Way, using data from Chandra (shown in orange, green, and purple) and the MeerKAT radio telescope in South Africa (gray).
Congress put a cap on its spending for 2024 and 2025, slashing its science budget by half a billion dollars while the agency invests more in its Artemis moon program.
In the astrophysics division, most missions escaped the cuts this year. In fact, plans for the ambitious alien-life-hunting Habitable Worlds Observatory for the 2040s got a boost. To offset that, NASA proposed a 5% cut to Hubble's budget and the extreme cuts to Chandra.
NASA's budget document suggested Chandra should scale down to "minimal operations."
Chandra captured the two tails of superheated gas (in blue) that this galaxy leaves behind as it barrels through space at 1.5 million miles per hour.
X-ray: NASA/CXC/Univ. of Alabama, Huntsville/M. Sun et al.; H-&alpha: ESO/MUSE; Optical/IR: NASA/STScI/HST
The document said the spacecraft has degraded over time, requiring more intense management to keep its temperatures low enough to operate. That complicates scheduling and increases mission costs beyond what NASA can afford, the document says.
Patrick Slane, director of the Chandra X-ray Center, took issue with that explanation.
Chandra revealed mysterious clumps throughout the Tycho supernova remnant.
X-ray: NASA/CXC/RIKEN & GSFC/T. Sato et al; Optical: DSS
In a letter to Chandra astronomers, he wrote that "there has been only one instance in which the cost has increased to help manage temperatures," and that was a 1% increase in costs so the project could hire two additional people for the flight team.
"I'm unclear whether I still have a job in October, or whether I can keep it one more year," McDowell said.
This Chandra image of a galaxy cluster shows a clear separation between the normal matter seen as hot gas in X-rays (pink) and where astronomers find most of the mass in the cluster (blue). The blue regions must be dark matter.
X-ray: NASA/CXC/CfA/M.Markevitch et al.; Optical: NASA/STScI; Magellan/U.Arizona/D.Clowe et al.; Lensing Map: NASA/STScI; ESO WFI; Magellan/U.Arizona/D.Clowe et al.
If the current budget proposal holds, and Chandra has to begin its end when the 2025 fiscal year starts in October, that will likely lead to layoffs.
That's another crisis for X-ray astronomy. If Chandra ends, many jobs in the field will disappear until NASA launches its next major space-based X-ray telescope, Lynx, in about a decade at the earliest.
"There are just simply not going to be people who can do this," X-ray astronomer David Pooley told USA Today.
Astronomers are pushing to save Chandra.
The Kepler supernova remnant is the remains of a white dwarf that exploded after undergoing a thermonuclear explosion. Chandra (blue) shows a powerful blast wave that ripped through space after the detonation.
During April, Chandra is undergoing a review to assess its options within the new budget, including any possibilities for restructuring the mission to avoid its end.
Astronomers are taking the opportunity to push for NASA to amend its proposal, writingletters to NASA leadership.
NASA's 2025 budget won't be final until Congress approves it later this year.
Chandra's data (pink) reveals over a dozen individual X-ray sources, mostly young stars, in the "Cosmic Cliffs" formation of the Carina Nebula.
X-ray: NASA/CXC/Univ. Observ. Munich/T. Preibisch et al.; IR: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI
"We will continue to strongly make the case for the continued full support of Chandra, which the astrophysics community recognizes as a highly functioning facility that provides transformational science and crucial support to many of NASA's primary astrophysics goals," Slane wrote.
As a high school jock, I couldn't imagine not playing sports in college.
But at my Division III college, I was forced to focus too much on my sports.
After injuring myself for life, I regret being a college athlete.
I love sports. If you give me a ball and an open field, I'll play for hours. Give me wings and a TV with a game, that's all I need.
My love for sports started when I was young, and I developed my passion as a high school jock. I decided to continue that passion in college when I enrolled in a Division III school. There, I played both soccer and track and field.
But I didn't love my time playing sports in college. In fact, I wish I hadn't played in college at all.
Collegiate athletics was less competitive than I thought
On my first day of soccer preseason my freshman year, I was nervous my new team would eat me for lunch. But once we scrimmaged, I discovered I was among the best players. I hadn't expected it.
I thought playing in college meant playing at a higher level of competition than I ever had, but some players on my team would have ridden the bench at my high school.
I chalked up the level of play to Division III, but I at least thought if the play wasn't as competitive as I had hoped, the team would be more committed since we were actively choosing to continue our athletic careers. But there was never any intensity in our drills or fire in our practices.
On my team, soccer felt more like an unwanted activity than a conscious commitment. We couldn't even keep people from quitting throughout the season.
I put too much pressure on myself and ruined my college experience
As captain of the soccer and track and field teams — which finished poorly in the conference standings — I felt I had to do something to improve us.
And I tried, but the truth is I tried too hard and gave too much to my teams. That means I didn't study abroad in college because I played sports every semester. I didn't make deep friendships with people in my classes because I had a schedule that didn't allow it. I didn't even party the way I should have. I sacrificed my last chance just to be a kid trying new things and meeting new people because I was too worried about giving my best to a college athletic department that wasn't giving its best to me. I wish I understood that leading my peers wasn't my responsibility.
I spent half my nights in college lying wide awake, replaying practice repeatedly in my head. My worries were never about soccer or track. Instead, I agonized over intense personal dynamics that I was too young and inexperienced to navigate.
Naively, I thought all of this would lead to a better job. But in the corporate world, no one cared about my leadership experience of captaining two college teams. Once I became a manager at a Fortune 500 company, I was dogged by the turbulence and failure I had experienced as a college athlete and struggled to find the confidence to lead a team in the real world.
The physical cost also wasn't worth it
Because I felt a responsibility to improve our teams, I physically pushed myself too hard. During my freshman soccer season, I played every minute of every game and took nearly all our free kicks.
I had pain, but I played through it. I ended up with an overuse injury that nearly ended my athletic career, cost me my sophomore year of soccer and track, and caused me to take toxic amounts of ibuprofen.
After graduation, I never got to compete in the triathlons I always imagined I would because my injury still flares up. I've had to pick hiking over marathons. I've chosen running with my kids over playing in adult soccer leagues. I've found a way to have an active life, but not a pain-free one, and I never will.
I wish I didn't do college sports
As a mom, I don't know exactly what I would tell my daughters if either one of them said they wanted to play in college. I probably would tell them about my experiences and allow them to make an educated choice.
I know there is more than one way to keep playing, and it doesn't have to be at the collegiate level. Local adult leagues, even semi-pro could have been a better option for me, and someday may be a better option for my children.
Either way, playing in college is an experience, but mine cost more than it should.
Dropbox has about 2,600 employees and is 90% remote.
Drew Angerer/Getty
Dropbox's CEO said business executives are pushing too hard to get people to return to the office.
"They keep mashing the go back to 2019 button, and they see it's not working," Drew Houston told The Verge.
He said workers value remote work and not being tied to a tech hub more than lavish office perks.
Dropbox cofounder and CEO Drew Houston said he views his employees like customers, and that means giving them what they want — which isn't in-person work.
"We will support however they want to gather," Houston said in a new interview with The Verge. "But we're finding that these retreats and off-sites and things like that are often a lot more effective than asking people to commute."
Houston said other business leaders are making the wrong move by forcing employees back to the office. Many companies are pushing employees to return to office in a hybrid structure, including giants like Google, Apple, and Amazon.
"They keep mashing the go back to 2019 button, and they see it's not working," Houston said in the interview, speaking generally about return-to-office mandates. "Then they just push harder, and then you have this really toxic relationship."
He compared returning to the office to returning to movie theaters or malls. It may have been cool for a time and people might still occasionally want to watch a big movie like "Top Gun" at the cinema, he said, "but the world has moved on."
The CEO said the reason it used to be so easy to get people to the office was because they didn't have a choice. A lot of CEOs today don't understand that flexibility wasn't an option in the past, Houston said.
Dropbox implemented a "virtual first" model in April 2020 based on studying remote-first companies. Dropbox now has about 2,600 employees and is 90% remote, the CEO said. The remaining 10% in-person programming and providing space for people to self-organize in hubs.
A Dropbox spokesperson said if a team is looking for team-building, they can do an offsite gathering or retreat. Retreats usually last two and a half days and include workshops and strategy sessions with team-building activities.
A team recently did an offsite gathering in San Francisco, which included a walking tour of Chinatown, according to the spokesperson.
Dropbox Studios are designed to create human connection.
Aaron Wojack
In San Francisco, Dropbox converted its offices into studios, which are collaborative spaces designed for human connection. The CEO said utilization has been low for these spaces.
Transitioning to virtual first meant getting rid of the "super vibrant in-person culture" Dropbox had before, the CEO said. The company had a fancy office with Michelin-star chefs, a full coffee bar, a karaoke studio, and an Equinox-like gym.
In the midst of an AI-talent war, some have questioned Dropbox's decision to go 90% virtual, especially when competitors like Google still offer elaborate office perks to its employees. But Houston said people voted "voted with their feet that they value flexibility a lot more than snacks in the office."
"At home, you can set up your environment exactly how you want it and not just have snacks but your dog and something that's totally purpose-built for you," he added.
The move ended up being good for recruiting talent, the CEO said. Houston said 75% of employees used to be in the big tech hubs and now it's about 50%.
"That means we've gotten all these awesome people in these places who never would've joined Dropbox before at all levels," Houston said in the interview. "Places like Boston, LA, and Chicago went from zero people working there to now all those places have 100 or hundreds."
The 90% virtual model also avoids the "worst of both worlds," which according to Houston is the two or three-day hybrid compromise.
The CEO said one of the problems with hybrid work is it puts employees on a leash to tied to the nearby office space. That means you can't live outside commuting distance and you're still spending a lot of time in transit, which is "totally dead time," Houston said.
The CEO said the market will reveal whether going back to the office is the best way to get great talent — but he doesn't think it is.
An ex-TikTok worker claims the company hid the involvement of ByteDance, Fortune reported.
Evan Turner said he had check-ins with a ByteDance exec in Beijing and never met his American boss.
The claims come as TikTok fights legislation forcing a sale of the Chinese-owned app.
A former TikTok employee said the company tried to hide the involvement of Chinese owner ByteDance in his work by assigning him to a manager in Seattle, whom he never met.
Evan Turner, a former senior data scientist, told Fortune he was being managed by a Beijing-based ByteDance executive when he joined the company.
Turner worked at TikTok from April to September 2022, Fortune reported. He claimed he was placed under the management of an American manager in Seattle later in his employment. However, he said he was told in a video call that he would actually still work under the Beijing manager, the report said.
He added that he never met the American manager and claimed the opaque management structure differed from what executives at TikTok maintained about it operating independently from ByteDance.
Turner told Fortune that he met with the Beijing-based executive weekly, which consisted of meetings under seven minutes to report on his progress with tasks.
In a comment to Fortune, a TikTok spokesperson disputed the claims from Turner and the outlet's other sources in broad terms."These are completely unfounded assertions brought forth by disgruntled ex-employees," the person said. "It is incredible that Fortune would solely rely on individuals with clear motives and agendas to spread anonymous lies and distortions."
TikTok didn't immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider. Turner was unable to be reached for comment by BI.
The claims come as TikTok and ByteDance try to fend off legislation aimed at forcing a sale.
TikTok is facing a ban in app stores unless ByteDance sells it to non-Chinese owners. A new bill proposing the ban was passed last month by the House.
US lawmakers said in a statement announcing the bill that apps like TikTok are "controlled" by foreign players and "pose an unacceptable risk to US national security." But TikTok has insisted that it's run independently and has tried to distance itself from ByteDance.
Tesla layoffs reportedly impacted workers in China in addition to the US.
JOHN THYS / Getty
Elon Musk announced a 10% Tesla workforce reduction in an email to staff on Sunday night.
The carmaker denied reports they'd cut roughly 25% of their Berlin workers.
But some members of its China sales team have been made redundant, Reuters reported.
Tesla's layoffs will also reportedly impact its international workers.
On Sunday night, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said the company planned to cut "more than 10%" of its workforce, according to an internal memo viewed by Business Insider. Workers who'd been laid off in the US were notified that same night via their personal emails that they were terminated, effective immediately, and had been locked out of Tesla's internal systems, several laid-off workers told BI.
And the cuts reportedly don't just apply to US staff. Some members of China's sales team have also been laid off as part of the company's recent actions, two sources told Reuters. It's unclear how many people are affected.
But its German division has denied reports from local outlets that the layoffs impacted about a quarter of the company's 12,000 workers at its factory in Berlin, according to Reuters.
Tesla has major manufacturing footprints in both China and Germany. Ahead of the layoffs, the carmaker employed over 140,000 people globally, including about 20,000 in China. The Chinese EV market is the largest in the world and Musk has said in the past that Tesla faces competition from Chinese EV companies.
On Monday, some US Tesla employees were told during an all-hands meeting there would be further cuts outside North America, two sources told BI. Three other workers said they'd been told by managers that workers outside the region would be notified of layoffs in the days following the US notices of termination that were sent out on Sunday night.
A spokesperson for Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Musk said in the companywide email that there had been a "duplication of roles and job functions in certain areas" due to the company's rapid growth, according to a memo viewed by BI.
Over the weekend, US Tesla workers had speculated that layoffs were on the horizon, as rumors that some managers had been told to provide upper management with a list of names spread throughout the company.
Separately, Tesla started instructing managers in February to identify which roles at the company were business-critical and had temporarily delayed performance reviews.
Tesla's recent round of cuts is the company's first large-scale layoffs since it eliminated a few dozen workers at its plant in Buffalo, New York, in February 2023 and 10% of its salaried workforce in 2022.
Do you work for Tesla or have a tip? Reach out to the reporter via a non-work email at gkay@businessinsider.com
One user on X pointed that out, calling the review "almost unethical" for "potentially killing someone else's nascent project" in a post reposted over 2,000 times.
But it highlights the power of Brownlee's reviews. Earlier this year, a negative video of Fisker's Ocean SUV by Brownlee also made waves on social media.
Mario Tama/Getty Images; Chelsea Jia Feng/BI
Critical reviews in the age of innovation raise some interesting questions.
To be clear, there was nothing wrong with Brownlee's review. Humane's AI Pin costs $700. Watering down his review to ease the blow would be a disservice to the millions of fans relying on his perspective before making such a significant purchase.
Too often, companies view potential customers as an extension of their research and development. They are happy to sell a product that is still a work in progress on the promise they'll fix it on the fly. ("Updates are coming!")
But in a world of instant gratification, it can be hard to appreciate that innovation takes time.
Even Apple can run into this conundrum. Take the Apple Vision Pro. Reviewers are impressed with the technology behind the much-anticipated gadget — but are still struggling to figure out what they can do with it. Maybe, over time, that will get sorted out.
It's also worth remembering how cool tech can be, as Business Insider's Peter Kafka wrote following a bunch of trips in Waymo's software-powered taxis in San Francisco. Sure, robotaxis have their issues, Peter said, but they also elicit that "golly-gee-can-you-believe-it" sense.
As for Humane, America loves a comeback story. Just look at "Cyberpunk 2077." The highly anticipated video game had a disastrous launch in 2020, but redeemed itself three years later, ultimately winning a major award.
Still, Humane shouldn't get a pass for releasing a product that didn't seem ready for primetime, according to the reviews.
And its issue could be bigger than glitchy tech. Humane's broader thesis about reducing screen time might not be as applicable. As BI's Katie Notopolous put it: "I love staring at my iPhone."
3 things in markets
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1. Goldman finally strikes gold. After a rough stretch, the vaunted investment bank crushed earnings expectations, sending its stock soaring. A big tailwind, according to CEO David Solomon, is AI spawning "enormous opportunities" for the bank.
2. Buy the dip, Wedbush says. Last week's drop among tech stocks shouldn't scare away investors, according to Wedbush. A strong earnings report, buoyed by the ongoing AI craze, should keep them soaring, strategists said. But JPMorgan doesn't see it that way, saying prices are already stretched.
3. China's economy beat analysts' expectations. The country's GDP grew 5.3% in the first quarter of 2024, according to data published by the National Bureau of Statistics on Tuesday. It's a welcome return to form for the world's second-largest economy, although below-par new home and retail sales remain a cause for concern.
3 things in tech
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1. Amazon Prime Video viewers are giving up on its shows. Leaked documents show viewers are fed up with the streamer's error-ridden catalog system, which often has incomplete titles and missing episodes. In 2021, 60% of all content-related complaints were about Prime Video's catalog.
2. Eric Newcomer is bringing his Cerebral Valley AI Summit to New York. The conference, originally held in San Francisco, is famous for producing one of the largest generative AI acquisitions ever. Now, it's coming to New York in June.
3. OpenAI is plotting an expansion to NYC. Two people familiar with the plans told BI that the ChatGPT developer is looking to open a New York office next year. That would be the company's fifth office, alongside its current headquarters in San Francisco, a just-opened site in Tokyo, and spots in London and Dublin.
3 things in business
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1. America's young men are spending their money like never before. From sports betting to meme coins, young men are more willing than ever to blow money in the hopes of making a fortune.
2. Investors are getting into women's sports. With women like Caitlin Clark dominating March Madness headlines, investors see a big opportunity. BI compiled a list of 13 investors and fund managers pouring money into the next big thing in sports.
3. Bad news for Live Nation. The Wall Street Journal reports that the Justice Department could hit the concert giant with an antitrust lawsuit as soon as next month. Live Nation, which owns Ticketmaster, has long faced criticism over its high fees.