Russian leader Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that the naval upgrades would "drastically improve its combat potential."
Contributor via Getty Images
Russia's navy is set to receive more than 40 vessels this year, Vladimir Putin said on Thursday.
Putin says Russia's naval upgrades will "drastically improve its combat potential."
Russia's war against Ukraine has seen its navy weather significant losses.
Russia has been working hard to bolster its naval capabilities, the country's leader Vladimir Putin said on Thursday.
"A lot has been done in this area, as our navy is getting new ships," Putin said during a meeting on shipbuilding issues, according to Russian state media outlet TASS.
Russia's navy is set to receive more than 40 ships and boats this year, said Putin. This exceeds the 33 and 24 vessels it received in 2023 and 2022, respectively.
The boost in naval capacity, Putin said, is part of Russia's wider plans to "comprehensively upgrade the navy, including its ship, aircraft, and coastal components, as well as the infrastructure of bases."
He added that the upgrades to Russia's navy will "strengthen its positions in the strategically crucial areas of the world ocean" and "drastically improve its combat potential."
The move would certainly provide a boost to Russia's navy, which has weathered significant losses ever since the country invaded Ukraine in 2022.
In February, the head of the UK's armed forces, Adm. Sir Tony Radakin, said that 25% of Russia's vessels in the Black Sea had been "sunk or damaged" by Ukraine.
"Putin's continued illegal occupation of Ukraine is exacting a massive cost on Russia's Black Sea Fleet, which is now functionally inactive," UK defense secretary Grant Shapps said a month later.
Russia's defense ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment from BI sent outside regular business hours.
Kevin Mazur/TAS24/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management
Taylor Swift's Eras Tour boosted hotel prices in Portugal, Spain, and Sweden but not France.
France's larger population and hotel capacity diluted the economic impact of Swift's concerts, analysts said.
Upcoming shows in smaller European countries may see higher accommodation prices and inflation.
Taylor Swift's Eras Tour has made it to five European countries so far. The sold-out shows have boosted accommodation prices everywhere except one country: France.
Among the four countries Swift toured in May, three saw an increase in month-on-month hotel prices this year compared to the last three years, according to a Monday report from BMI, an analytics subsidiary of Fitch Solutions.
Portugal, Spain, and Sweden's hotel prices in May increased several times' their 2021-2023 average. But France saw a drop in accommodation inflation. The researchers did not analyze this month's shows in the UK.
Researchers at BMI attributed the difference to France's larger population and greater hotel capacity compared with the other tour stops, which may dilute the impact of the American pop star's concerts.
The 290,000 people who attended the six shows split between Paris and Lyon only make up 0.43% of the French population.
"France regularly hosts large events and has a very well-developed tourism industry and airports, suggesting strong capacity to host large numbers of domestic and international arrivals," the researchers wrote in the note. The country is weeks away from the summer Olympics kickoff.
But upcoming Swift shows in the Netherlands, Ireland, Austria, and Switzerland all have the potential to boost prices, given that those countries' populations are all under 20 million, the report noted. Swift's current tour takes her to 51 shows across 18 European cities.
The Eras tour has had a massive economic impact on other countries. The concerts rally tens of thousands of fans who spend big on restaurants, lodging, and visiting local attractions. Some Swifties will travel hours — and across countries — to attend a concert.
In the US, where the singer performed 53 shows, about 600 concertgoers surveyed by QuestionPro said they spent $1,300, on average. Swift has been mentioned on companies' earnings calls to explain demand upticks and by the Philadelphia Federal Reserve, which highlighted post-pandemic record hotel demand from her stop.
MBI analysts looking at US data found that concertgoers can spend four times the gross costs of tickets, affecting inflation in local economies. In Chicago, Eras tour dates led to 96.8% hotel room occupancy, an all-time high for the city, per the BMI report.
"Our analysis and data shows that hotel prices in Milan are on average 45% higher for the nights of Taylor Swift's shows in the city in July 2024, compared to the weeks before and after the show," Ben Julius, the founder of a tourism company called Tourist Italy, told Business Insider.
Earlier this year, Singapore's government incentives of nearly $3 million per show to get Swift to perform in the city-state sparked controversy and led to inter-regional political debate.
This photo of the ISS' exterior was taken in June 2023.
NASA Johnson
US astronauts took shelter on the ISS after a Russian satellite broke up nearby, NASA said.
The satellite, RESURS-P1, was decommissioned in 2021 and recently created over 100 pieces of debris.
Space agencies have been trying to reduce space junk like this from decommissioned assets.
US astronauts on the International Space Station were told to take shelter for about an hour after a Russian satellite broke up nearby, according to authorities.
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration said on Thursday evening that American crews took cover in their spacecraft at about 9 p.m. Eastern Time due to the satellite break-up.
That's about 1 a.m. for the astronauts, who follow UTC time on the ISS.
NASA said its instructions were a "precautionary measure" and that crews were told an hour later they could resume their normal activities.
Meanwhile, US Space Command said the destroyed satellite was the Russian-owned RESURS-P1 decommissioned in 2021.
The satellite's collapse on Wednesday at about 4 p.m. UTC created "over 100 pieces of trackable debris," Space Command added.
"USSPACECOM has observed no immediate threats and is continuing to conduct routine conjunction assessments to support the safety and sustainability of the space domain," its statement said.
LeoLabs, a company that tracks space movements, wrote on X that it was tracking over 180 fragments drifting in orbit after the break.
"We expect this number to increase in the coming days. We are actively analyzing the debris cloud to characterize it, identify a potential cause, and estimate the impact," the firm wrote.
By LeoLabs' estimation, the RESURS-P1 was about 13,200 pounds and held a "nearly circular orbit" when it split.
The Russian satellite was an observation tool capturing high-resolution images that allowed the viewer to distinguish objects on Earth about 1 meter apart.
Russia's space agency, Roscosmos, said in January 2022 that the satellite had been inactive since late 2021 due to the failure of its onboard equipment after operating 3.5 years longer than expected.
Satellite breakups in low Earth orbit can often pose hazards to other satellites, spacecraft, or space stations because of the debris they release.
Space agencies have been working to reduce space junk in low Earth orbit as more satellites are decommissioned, primarily because the resulting debris raises the risk of spacecraft crashes.
The preferred way of disposing of a retired satellite is typically to send it further away from Earth, reducing the risk of interrupting space activities near the planet. Another way is to allow the satellite to fall into the atmosphere, where it will be burned.
"The Daily Show" host went live following the debate, where he poked fun at Biden's performance against his rival, former President Donald Trump, 78.
At one point in the debate, Biden misspoke while defending his accomplishments in healthcare policy, saying that his administration had "finally beat Medicare."
Trump quickly jumped on Biden's misstep: "Well, he's right. He did beat Medicare. He beat it to death, and he's destroying Medicare."
"Okay, a high-pressure situation. A lot of times, you can confuse saving Medicare with beating it," Stewart joked.
"I'm sure it's not something that repeated throughout the debate, causing Democrats across the country to either jump out of windows or vomit silently into the nearest recycling bin," he continued.
But Biden, Stewart said, also seemed to run into trouble during the debate even when it wasn't his turn to speak. Biden was seen grimacing, looking stunned, and with his mouth hanging open while Trump spoke — and Stewart highlighted that in a supercut he played on the show.
"A lot of people have resting 25th Amendment face," Stewart said, referencing the section in the constitution that establishes processes in case of a president's death.
"I'm not a political expert, but while Biden was preparing at Camp David for a week, did anyone mention he would also be on camera on a split screen?" he continued.
When Stewart returned to "The Daily Show" in February, his first monologue touched on Biden's and Trump's fitness for the Oval Office.
"These two candidates. They are both similarly challenged," Stewart said. "And it is not crazy to think that the oldest people in the history of the country to ever run for president might have some of these challenges."
Last month, Stewart told audiences at the "Netflix is a Joke Fest" that Biden is so old that he "shouldn't be president."
"I know you know how fucking old he is, and I know you don't want to say it because Trump is so scary, but he's so fucking old," Stewart said. "I'm not saying that Biden can't contribute to society, he just shouldn't be president."
Representatives for Biden and Trump did not immediately respond to requests for comment from BI sent outside regular business hours.
The first presidential debate on Thursday was a disastrous night for President Joe Biden.
Donald Trump fired off a number of lies and misleading statements about his record.
But Biden frequently stumbled with his words, doing little to allay concerns about his age.
Former President Donald Trump, 78, may have lied throughout the first presidential debate of the 2024 election, but the evening still may have provided a lift for his campaign as President Joe Biden, 81, struggled to find his footing during the debate.
Trump and Biden had their first face-off on Thursday evening, breaking with election norms by holding a debate months before voters head to the polls in November.
"Debates can be lost at any moment, but they can only be won in the first 20 minutes," Evan Siegfried, a former GOP strategist and crisis communications specialist, told Business Insider. "Unfortunately, Joe Biden lost all chances of winning."
In true Trump form, it didn't take long before he started spewing misleading or false information about his and his opponent's presidential records.
On the US economy, Trump said it was incomparable to history throughout his term. In reality, the pandemic brought in a major recession, and employment plummeted. Economic growth, even without factoring the impacts of COVID-19, has actually been stronger under the Biden Administration, according to The Associated Press.
On the US-Mexico border: Trump claimed that Biden will open the floodgates for immigrants. In reality, Biden has enacted restrictions on asylum applications and is on track to match the number of deportations Trump executed during his administration.
On foreign relations, Trump also lied about the US's trade deficit with China. "We have the largest deficit with China," he claimed. But the deficit has been at the lowest level since 2009, The New York Times reported.
CNN's fact-checker, Daniel Dale, estimated that Trump said false or misleading statements 30 times during the debate. Biden made misleading or false statements nine times by comparison.
But lying on the record has become expected behavior for Trump, and on Thursday evening he forcefully delivered.
For Biden, the debate could have been an opportunity to flex some of the strides he made during his administration, and in a few moments, he did — but not while convincing viewers that he's still fit for the job.
A constant narrative that has been swirling around Biden is that the 81-year-old political veteran is too frail for a second term, despite the president's insistence and the assurances from his White House doctor.
A report from Special Counsel Robert Hur in February said that Biden's memory and advanced age were reasons not to charge the president for his handling of classified documents.
As a result, a major onus was on Biden to prove that he's still mentally and physically fit for the job.
Throughout the Thursday debate, Biden's voice sounded raspy as the president struggled at moments to hold in a cough. He stumbled through his answers and rebuttals. In a few cases, his statements were incomprehensible.
"We finally beat Medicare", Biden said at one point. Trump, accordingly, pounced.
"His voice sounds terrible; he looks terrible," Siegfried, the ex-GOP strategist, told BI.
Even prominent Democrats agreed that Thursday was not Biden's night.
"I think there was a sense of shock, actually, on how he came out at the beginning of this debate," former senior Obama White House advisor David Axelrod said on CNN. "How his voice sounded — he seemed a little disoriented at the beginning of the debate. He did get stronger as the debate went on, but by that time, I think the panic had set in."
Still, the true impacts of Thursday's debate will be hard to determine since the event was held so far out from the election, Siegfried said.
"That's a question we can't answer because we've never had a debate this early," Siegfried told BI. "Remember, Obama stumbled in the Denver debate against Mitt Romney in 2012, and people started saying it's over, but, a few weeks later, he got right back up on the horse and showed that it was just a onetime thing. We're not going to have this until the next debate in September."
"It's going to be months of this narrative," he added. "And it's been a narrative that's been out there for the length of his presidency."
US President Joe Biden greets Chinese President Xi Jinping before a meeting during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Leaders' week in Woodside, California on November 15, 2023.
BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP via Getty Images
Biden's debate performance on Thursday is earning him little praise in the US.
Both Trump and Biden are disliked in China, but people focused especially on the latter's demeanor.
On Weibo, he's being mocked for "looking like a robot" after people said he was barely blinking.
As the first presidential debate of 2024 wrapped up on Thursday evening, China started dunking President Joe Biden for his oratory style.
Neither presidential candidate is popular in China. Former President Donald Trump is often the subject of memes claiming he's secretly a Communist Party member trying to destroy the US from within.
But Biden has been taking the brunt of the jokes on Weibo, China's version of X. Minutes after the debate closed, a topic saying he was "looking like a robot and barely blinking" began picking up steam.
It didn't matter what either man said about the economy, veterans' affairs, or foreign policy — Chinese people just cared about how they looked and sounded.
"In today's first TV debate, Trump won," wrote the popular blogger Housha Moonlight. "It doesn't matter what the debate was about. The key is that with wit and flexibility, Trump successfully highlighted the old and dying appearance of the sleeping king."
"I'm worried that Deng Deng will die suddenly during this debate," another poster wrote, referring to a nickname for Biden.
To be sure, Weibo is a heavily moderated platform, but it can be useful for observing narratives and language that survive the scrutiny of censors.
A common criticism in China toward US democracy is how old its leaders are. Biden is 81 this year, while Trump is 78. Xi Jinping, the leader of China, is 71.
Indeed, the debate on Thursday prompted hundreds of posts and comments remarking on the ages of both candidates.
As the dust of the disastrous presidential debate settles, it might be one governor's time to shine.
Gov. Gavin Newsom's war room is probably considering how to make the best of it, a former GOP strategist says.
But Newsom reaffirmed his support for Biden, highlighting his commitment to the party.
If Gov. Gavin Newsom ever wanted to seriously consider a presidential bid, there might be no time like the present, one former GOP strategist says.
The high-stakes presidential debate between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump wrapped up on Thursday night, and it went horribly for Biden.
Evan Siegfried, a former GOP strategist and crisis communications specialist, told Business Insider shortly after the debate: "There will be others within the Democratic party who will quietly ask whether or not Biden should drop out."
And Siegfried thinks the people working for Gov. Gavin Newsom of California now be considering how to make the best of a bad situation.
He said that Newsom's people will be "smart enough, or at least cold-hearted enough to think, 'Okay, how can we get Newsom what he really wants — the presidency?"
Newsom might well be one of Biden's most viable replacements. At 56 years old, the governor of California — a state that, if it were its own nation, would be the fifth largest economy in the world — has positioned himself as a national voice on immigration and gun safety.
The governor has historically backed Biden and said he won't run in 2024.
In the summer of 2022, he told the White House that he was "all in" for Biden's reelection, per Politico.
He maintained this stance when he was asked the same question by the Associated Press in June 2023, saying that "not on God's green earth" would he dream of challenging Biden in the primaries.
Even during his well-publicized feud with Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, he appeared set on not running — even though he got plenty of airtime when they sparred on the Fox News debate stage while DeSantis was still angling for the GOP nomination.
However, when asked later in September whether he intends to run for the presidency, Newsom's answer wasn't an outright "no."
In an interview that aired on September 25, "60 Minutes" correspondent Cecilia Vega asked Newsom: "You may be termed out here, but does cleaning up the streets of California factor into a potential presidential run?"
He gave a non-committal answer and, when pressed again by Vega, said: "That was a — that was a never-ending response to your question."
Newsom holds the line
Post-presidential debate on Thursday, Newsom's maintained his staunch support for Biden.
When asked what he thought of the debate and whether he would reconsider a presidential bid, a representative of Newsom directed BI to his interview on MSNBC with host Alex Wagner.
When Wagner asked him whether Biden should step down, Newsom replied: "You don't turn your back because of one performance. What kind of party does that?"
Alex Wagner presses Gov. Gavin Newsom on questions about whether Biden should step down.
Newsom: “You don’t turn your back because of one performance. What kind of party does that?”
He added: "This president has delivered. We need to deliver for him at this moment."
Apart from Newsom, other candidates could replace Biden if he drops his reelection bid — including Vice President Kamala Harris, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, and more.
As for the current playing field, Trump emerged from Thursday night victorious and gloating.
"Tonight President Trump delivered the greatest debate performance and victory in history to the largest voter audience in history, making clear exactly how he will improve the lives of every American," his campaign spokespeople said in a statement to the press.
Representatives for Biden did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Business Insider sent outside regular business hours.
"It was a slow start, that's obvious to everyone," Kamala Harris said on CNN after the debate.
Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images
Joe Biden flailed in his first debate against Donald Trump.
It was so bad that even Vice President Kamala Harris acknowledged it.
"It was a slow start, that's obvious to everyone," she said on CNN.
Even Vice President Kamala Harris said Joe Biden's first debate against Donald Trump went poorly for him.
"Yes there was a slow start, but it was a strong finish," Harris said at the beginning of an interview with CNN anchor Anderson Cooper following the debate.
Pressed later on whether she was concerned, Harris reiterated the point: "It was a slow start, that's obvious to everyone. I'm not going to debate that point. I'm talking about the choice of November."
VP: It was a slow start, I’m not going to debate that.. I’m talking about the choice in November. I’m talking about one of the most elections in our lifetime… pic.twitter.com/KZ9K5E6fwC
On the whole, Harris sought to downplay the significance of the performance. She pivoted repeatedly toward emphasizing the Biden administration's record and talking up Trump's anti-democratic comments and opposition to abortion rights.
"I understand why everyone wants to talk about it," Harris said of Biden's performance. "But I think it's also important to recognize that the choice in November between these two people that were on the debate stage involves extraordinary stakes."
Tesla shareholders recently voted to ratify Elon Musk's multibillion-dollar pay package. But the fate of Musk's award still lies in the hands of a Delaware judge.
Apu Gomes via Getty Images
Lawyers who argued against Elon Musk's multibillion-dollar pay package asked for $6 billion in fees.
Tesla shareholders voted to re-approve Elon Musk's massive multibillion-dollar pay package.
A Delaware judge said she'll consider the attorney fees regardless of the shareholder vote.
A Delaware judge still wants to consider a $6-billion request in legal fees from lawyers who shot down Elon Musk's multibillion-dollar pay package at Tesla regardless of the recent shareholder vote, court documents show.
"The process leading to the approval of Musk's compensation plan was deeply flawed," McCormick wrote in her ruling, pointing to a conflict of interest at Tesla's board, which decides the pay plan and includes Musk's brother as a member.
With the outcome, lawyers representing Richard Tornetta, the Tesla shareholder who objected to the compensation plan, argued that they provided a valuable service in getting Musk's package rescinded. That value? About $6 billion worth of Tesla shares.
Accordingly, Tesla's defense team filed a motion on June 20 that argued the shareholder's ratification vote vindicates Musk's stock options award.
"Defendants contend that the consequences of the Ratification alter the course of this litigation and any relief that is potentially available (and relatedly, any attorneys' fees that may be awarded to Plaintiff's Counsel)," Tesla's attorneys wrote.
Chancellor McCormick will have to decide on the fate of the package and whether the plaintiff's attorneys do deserve about $6 billion in legal fees.
In response to Tesla's defense team's motion, McCormick wrote in a filing that she wants to hold a hearing on the legal fees without considering the shareholder vote since a separate meeting will be held to consider the impact of that vote.
"Given that we will hold a separate oral argument devoted solely to the questions raised by the stockholder vote, for the purposes of the July 8 hearing, the parties are instructed to argue the points at issue without regard to the stockholder vote," McCormick wrote. "All arguments concerning the stockholder vote will be deemed preserved."
James Park, a securities regulation expert at the University of California, Los Angeles, told Business Insider that the impact of the shareholder vote is crucial to consider the overall value of the litigation that struck down the pay in the first place.
"My only thought is that the defendant is correct that it would be difficult to evaluate the benefit of the litigation, which is necessary to evaluate the fee request, without considering the impact of the shareholder ratification vote," he wrote in an email.
Park said that McCormick's response likely indicates that she's "preserving her options."
Attorneys for Tesla and Tornetta, the plaintiff, did not respond to a request for comment.
President Joe Biden got his wish for an early debate. He may come to regret it.
Andrew Harnik/Getty Images
President Joe Biden struggled in the first debate of 2024.
Biden pushed for the earliest major debate in history.
After the president's performance, concerns about his age are going to come roaring back.
President Joe Biden wanted the earliest major presidential debate in history. He pushed for an empty room, muted mics, and Fox News on the sideline. He got everything he desired. Democrats are fuming after his disastrous performance.
At best, Biden fumbled a chance to jolt his campaign that is within shouting distance in some key battleground states but has little room for error. At worst, his raspy voice and rambling answers may be the final meaningful words of a president who warns that if he loses to former President Donald Trump that the American experiment as we know it will cease.
Major Democrats helped ensure that Biden avoided any serious primary challenge. No recent incumbent president has debate primary challengers. But no recent incumbent was also the oldest president in the nation's history. And in Biden's own view, no challenger posed such a fundamental risk to the nation as Trump.
One former White House aide told Politico that Biden's performance was "terrible."
Special counsel Robert Hur ripped the Band-Aid off when he said that he decided not to charge Biden because a jury would find the nation's leader to be a "well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory." Biden quieted some of those doubts with a rousing State of the Union that repeatedly tore into predecessor in everything but his name.
But as Thursday's debate unfolded, those doubts came roaring back.
"There's no way I'd send my boss out on national TV in that condition," Michael Hardaway, a former aide to House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries wrote on X. "There's 0 upside to Joe Biden doing any of these."
There’s no way I’d send my boss out on national TV in that condition. There’s 0 upside to Joe Biden doing any of these.
And trump hurls lie after lie unchecked by the mods.
Quentin James, a co-founder of the Collective PAC, an organization dedicated to Black voters, told The New York Times that he was surprised at how bad Biden's voice was.
"Compared to the State of the Union and on the campaign trail, I'm wondering if they did too much debate prep," James, who is supportive of Biden, told The Times. "There's very little range. Him being hoarse is hurting his performance."
Former Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang also weighed in on X near the end of the debate. "Guys, the Dems should nominate someone else – before it's too late. #swapJoeout," he wrote.
Multiple outlets reported that Biden had a cold, but as Politico Playbook author Eugene Daniels pointed out the president's illness wasn't mentioned before the debate.
Biden relishes in being counted out. He even spoke to Hur about President Obama didn't think he would be the best Democrat to run in 2016. Obama's former campaign manager David Plouffe reportedly cautioned Biden that he didn't want to end his decades-long career in public service with a distant finish in the first-in-the-nation Iowa caucuses.
Biden got the last laugh, incredibly overcoming a terrible finish in the Iowa caucuses to win not just the Democratic nomination but the presidency itself.
A different Obama aide, David Axelrod, reportedly got under Biden's skin this year after expressing concerns about the president's age. There will now likely Democrats that say he should have listened.
But it won't be a bad caucus result that does him in. It may just be a terrible debate in a mostly empty room on Georgia Tech's campus.
Biden was already saddled with a horrendous approval rating. Now, more stories about his biggest vulnerability, his age, are almost certainly coming.
The Biden team hates stories about Biden's age. They are about to get a lot more.