Author: News Room

When Gov. Wes Moore of Maryland signs his state’s budget into law as soon as Tuesday, it will signify the end of a difficult saga in which local leaders cut spending and raised some fees just to close a larger-than-expected $3 billion deficit.But Mr. Moore, a Democrat, is already bracing for the next fiscal fight. Maryland and its finances are highly influenced by the federal government, and the Trump administration is looking to cut vast swaths of the aid it sends to states.“We just made in Maryland the largest cuts to our budget in 16 years,” Mr. Moore said in…

The White House on Tuesday said that President Trump, while in Saudi Arabia, had secured $600 billion in deals with the Saudi government and firms. But the details the White House provided were vague and totaled less than half that number.And a closer look at the projects the administration provided shows several were already in the works before Mr. Trump took office.The announcement was made just before Mr. Trump spoke to a gathering of business leaders at the U.S.-Saudi Investment Forum in Riyadh, where he said the only country hotter than the United States was Saudi Arabia.“We are rocking,” he…

For 17 years, Airbnb has taken on the hotel industry, and now, two billion guests later, the company is upping the competition. In an announcement today, Brian Chesky, Airbnb’s chief executive, said the company will offer the kinds of services typically found at hotels, including room service, spa treatments and personal training, all bookable on Airbnb’s redesigned app. Other services could include meals prepared by professional chefs, and salon treatments like hair, nails and makeup.The company is also reimagining Airbnb Experiences, its service that offers tours and events hosted by experts, to emphasize authentic cultural, culinary, sports and wellness activities…

The temporary reduction in tariffs that the United States and China announced in Geneva on Monday will lift, at least for now, the de facto trade embargo that had been in place between the two countries for the past month. It will reduce the chances that American shoppers will face empty shelves during the holiday season and perhaps limit the price increases they will have to endure. It sent stock prices soaring around the world.But the deal does little to clear the cloud of uncertainty that has hung over the U.S. economy since President Trump took office in January.If anything,…

In March, after a steep decline in Tesla’s share price, Elon Musk told employees, “Hang on to your stock.”The chair of Tesla’s board, Robyn Denholm, has not heeded his advice. Ms. Denholm has made $198 million in the past six months selling Tesla stock that she earned for serving on the board, according to a New York Times analysis of securities filings.That brings her total profit on the sale of Tesla stock to more than $530 million since becoming the board’s leader in late 2018, far more than her peers have made at the most valuable U.S. companies during that…

Automakers are worried that President Trump’s tariffs on imported cars and auto parts will soon increase their costs and start eating into profits.But at least one business in the auto industry thinks the tariffs could give it a lift. That company is Carvana, an online retailer of used cars that has gained fame for storing vehicles in distinctive “vending machine” towers.The Trump tariffs, which include levies of 25 percent on vehicles made in Mexico, Canada, Germany and many other nations, are widely expected to raise the prices new cars and trucks, forcing more car shoppers to opt for a used…

U.S. inflation held steady in April in what economists warn could be a final lull before a likely surge in consumer prices because of President Trump’s trade war.The Consumer Price Index rose 2.3 percent from a year earlier, slightly below the previous month’s annual increase, data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed on Tuesday. Over the course of the month, prices rose 0.2 percent, an acceleration compared to March’s 0.1 percent decline.A closely watched measure of underlying inflation, which strips out volatile food and energy items, climbed 2.8 percent compared with the same time last year, in line…

Vindication? In the span of 24 hours, the “buy America” trade is back on and the odds of a U.S. recession have dipped. And pressure on the Fed to cut interest rates has abated despite the uncertainty surrounding Tuesday’s Consumer Price Index report.That has made Jay Powell one of the biggest beneficiaries from Monday’s U.S.-China tariff truce. The Fed chief may feel vindicated for holding steady on borrowing costs even as Wall Street second-guessed him and President Trump called him a “fool” for refusing to cut.The markets have come around to the Fed’s thinking. Futures traders now see roughly two…

President Trump’s decision to negotiate a break for China on tariffs is galling for Japan, which is reeling from auto sector levies that the White House has shown no sign of willingness to lift.Japan, a top U.S. ally in Asia, was eager to advance trade negotiations with Washington, even as Mr. Trump imposed tariffs on automobiles, and threatened an across-the-board 24 percent tariff on Japanese goods.While Beijing and others assembled plans for retaliatory tariffs, Japan rushed to Washington for trade negotiations, armed instead with commitments to buy more American goods and boost investments in the United States to $1 trillion.Now…

The U.S. welcome mat is rolling up — at least that’s how some international travelers see it, according to the World Travel & Tourism Council, a global organization representing the travel and tourism industry. And the cost for that hospitality lapse will be high.The United States is on track to lose $12.5 billion in international travel spending this year, falling to less than $169 billion from $181 billion in 2024, according to the latest Economic Impact Research, published by the W.T.T.C. on Tuesday.That’s a 22.5 percent decline from the U.S. international spending peak of $217.4 billion in 2019 — and…