Hong Kong’s privacy watchdog has condemned the owner of an education platform for paying a ransom to hackers who stole individuals’ personal data across 9,000 institutions worldwide, arguing that the money should have been spent on strengthening cybersecurity. Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data Ada Chung Lai-ling on Friday also questioned whether the hackers had truly returned the data stolen ...
Hong Kong’s privacy watchdog has condemned the owner of an education platform for paying a ransom to hackers who stole individuals’ personal data across 9,000 institutions worldwide, arguing that the money should have been spent on strengthening cybersecurity. Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data Ada Chung Lai-ling on Friday also questioned whether the hackers had truly returned the data stolen from Canvas and urged affected users to remain alert to suspicious calls or messages claiming to be...
(RTTNews) - The Australian stock market is slipping to slight losses in mid-market moves on Friday after opening in the green, reversing the slight gains in the previous session, despite the broadly positive cues from Wall Street overnight. The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 is falling be
(RTTNews) - The Australian stock market is slipping to slight losses in mid-market moves on Friday after opening in the green, reversing the slight gains in the previous session, despite the broadly positive cues from Wall Street overnight. The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 is falling be
Depopulation Won't Save Us Or The Planet Authored by Lipton Matthews via The Mises Institute, In recent years, a strand of environmental thinking has emerged that places population at the center of ecological crises. Some activists, including figures associated with the Extinction Rebellion and the Stop Having Kids Movements Movement in the United Kingdom and the United States have expressed anti-...
Depopulation Won't Save Us Or The Planet Authored by Lipton Matthews via The Mises Institute, In recent years, a strand of environmental thinking has emerged that places population at the center of ecological crises. Some activists, including figures associated with the Extinction Rebellion and the Stop Having Kids Movements Movement in the United Kingdom and the United States have expressed anti-natalist views, arguing that choosing not to have children is a meaningful response to climate change. The reasoning is lucid and, at first glance, convincing: fewer people should mean less consumption, lower emissions, and more space for the natural world to recover. Yet this argument becomes less compelling when examined more carefully. Depopulation, on its own, is neither a sufficient nor a reliable solution to environmental problems. Once questions of timing, infrastructure, and land use are considered, the connection between population decline and environmental improvement appears far more uncertain. The first issue is one of timing. Climate change is seen as an urgent problem that must be addressed within the next few decades. Population decline, however, unfolds over a much longer horizon. Even if fertility rates were to fall sharply today, the total number of people would remain high for decades because of population momentum. Large existing generations will continue to live, consume, and emit throughout the period in which climate action is most critical. For this reason, the impact of falling fertility on emissions is minimal within the relevant timeframe. Climate-economy modeling indicates that even substantial differences in long-term population size produce only very small differences in projected global temperatures. This conclusion is difficult to avoid. Demographic change happens too slowly to meaningfully influence climate outcomes in the near term. What ultimately matters is not population growth, but the speed at which economies innovate by developing tec...
Earnings Call Insights: Xos, Inc. (XOS) Q1 2026 Management View "Q1 2026 was, by many measures, the strongest opening to a year in Xos' history and a clear signal of what this business is becoming." (Co-Founder, CEO & Chairman Dakota Semler) "Xos today is broader than that. We build trucks, we manufacture and operate mobile energy infrastructure with the Xos Hub, and we power vehicles for other OE...
Earnings Call Insights: Xos, Inc. (XOS) Q1 2026 Management View "Q1 2026 was, by many measures, the strongest opening to a year in Xos' history and a clear signal of what this business is becoming." (Co-Founder, CEO & Chairman Dakota Semler) "Xos today is broader than that. We build trucks, we manufacture and operate mobile energy infrastructure with the Xos Hub, and we power vehicles for other OEMs through our Powered by Xos powertrain business." (CEO Semler) "We delivered 95 units in the quarter, including 63 powertrain systems for Blue Bird, 10 strip chassis supporting our partnership with UPS alongside record volumes of hub units shipped to customers across our commercial and municipal pipeline." (CEO Semler) "We've made the decision to invest more aggressively in hub production capacity and hub engineering" and "we're also preparing to begin shipping hubs to Europe later this year and are actively standing up the service partnerships needed to meet customer SLAs as we expand internationally." (CEO Semler) "The production team also successfully launched a new higher capacity hub configuration with our standard hub platform now increasing from 280-kilowatt hours to 420-kilowatt hours." (Co-Founder, COO & Director Giordano Sordoni) "For Q1 2026, our revenue was $11.2 million on 95 units" and "this quarter, we achieved our highest GAAP gross margin in the company's history, with a profit of $4.3 million or 38.6%." (Chief Financial Officer Liana Pogosyan) Outlook "We are reaffirming our full year 2026 guidance of revenue to fall within the range of $40 million to $50 million, unit deliveries to be within the range of 350 to 500 units, and non-GAAP operating loss to be in the range of $11.9 million to $13.3 million." (CFO Pogosyan) "We do not expect margins to hold at this level quarter after quarter. Mix will move around." (CEO Semler) "On a full year basis, we expect 2026 gross margins to be meaningfully better than 2025." (CEO Semler) Financial Results "For Q1 202...
US Treasuries slid with global peers as persistently higher oil prices threatened to worsen inflation and keep interest rates elevated for longer. The yield on two-year Treasuries climbed to 4.05%, while those on the 10-year rose near 4.52%, both reaching their highest levels in a year. Brent crude climbed above $107 a barrel as the prolonged closure of the Strait of Hormuz fueled supply concerns....
US Treasuries slid with global peers as persistently higher oil prices threatened to worsen inflation and keep interest rates elevated for longer. The yield on two-year Treasuries climbed to 4.05%, while those on the 10-year rose near 4.52%, both reaching their highest levels in a year. Brent crude climbed above $107 a barrel as the prolonged closure of the Strait of Hormuz fueled supply concerns. Weakness was also seen in other markets. Japan’s 10-year yields rose after a surprise increase in producer prices added pressure on the Bank of Japan to lift interest rates. Australian yields resumed their advance. Meanwhile, European bond futures fell as political uncertainty in the UK unnerved gilt investors. “The move higher in global bond yields is a little unsettling,” said Prashant Newnaha , senior Asia-Pacific rates strategist at TD Securities in Singapore. “An extended and persistently high oil price could be the nail in the coffin for bonds.” This global rout stems from the war-led surge in oil prices since March, which has stoked inflation and driven government borrowing costs higher around the world. The lift in Japanese producer prices followed data this week that suggested inflation in the US is becoming sticky, prompting traders to bet on tighter monetary policies from global central banks this year. “Concern about embedded inflation is spreading,” said Kenneth Crompton , head of rates strategy at National Australia Bank in Sydney. Japan and the UK have inflationary fiscal concerns behind them, but “they are a growing factor in the US too,” he said.
Tony Anderson/DigitalVision via Getty Images Summary Following my coverag e on The Middleby Corporation ( MIDD ) in Aug’25, in which I recommended a hold rating because the near-term outlook remained weak due to soft QSR demand and tariff headwinds, this post is to provide an update on my thoughts on the business and stock. Q1 2026 showed the first real evidence that the setup is improving. CF org...
Tony Anderson/DigitalVision via Getty Images Summary Following my coverag e on The Middleby Corporation ( MIDD ) in Aug’25, in which I recommended a hold rating because the near-term outlook remained weak due to soft QSR demand and tariff headwinds, this post is to provide an update on my thoughts on the business and stock. Q1 2026 showed the first real evidence that the setup is improving. CF organic growth turned positive, FP delivered strong growth, orders, and backlog ahead of the Midera spin, and valuation still does not look stretched. I am upgrading MIDD to Buy. Q1 2026 Earnings Review Things have gotten a lot better vs. my last update. Net sales from continuing operations were up 15% y/y in Q1 , with organic sales growth of ~12% y/y. This brought revenue up to $839.9 million, and it was driven by both segments. Commercial Foodservice [CF] revenue grew 9.4% y/y, with organic sales growth of 8.1%, benefiting from continued double-digit growth with dealer partners. Food Processing [FP] revenue was up even more, by ~34% y/y, to $224.4 million, with organic sales growth of 25%. The FP segment also delivered Q1 orders of $231 million, while backlog increased to $416 million. As a result, MIDD delivered solid profitability for the quarter. Adj. EBITDA came in at $180.6 million vs. $161.5 million in Q1 2025, with CF adj. EBITDA of $158.4 million and FP adj. EBITDA of $41.4 million. On a consolidated basis, total adj. EBITDA margin was 21.5%, and EBIT was $133 million. On a per-share basis, adj. EPS was $2.16 vs. $1.87 last year. CF Is Finally Showing the Inflection I Was Waiting For The biggest update, I believe, is in the CF segment. In my previous update, this was the main reason I gave a hold rating. The segment was weak, with organic sales down 5.5% in Q2 2025, and large QSR chain customers were pulling back. The replacement cycle was interesting, but the numbers did not show up in the P&L. Fast forward to today, things have changed for the better. CF organic sa...
《有毒的人》一书试图通过微表情和情绪泄露等科学手段帮助大众识别暗黑人格者。 心理学家利安娜·坦恩·布林克（Leanne ten Brinke）的《有毒的人：识别并应对你身边的暗黑人格者》，可能是最快从英文翻译成中文的科普著作之一：今年3月刚由西蒙和舒斯特尔出版社推出了精装原版，4月中译本就已全面上市。这神速，似乎很能说明其主题及其重点解析的对象——暗黑人格者——在如今这个动荡和充满不确定性的时代，...
《有毒的人》一书试图通过微表情和情绪泄露等科学手段帮助大众识别暗黑人格者。 心理学家利安娜·坦恩·布林克（Leanne ten Brinke）的《有毒的人：识别并应对你身边的暗黑人格者》，可能是最快从英文翻译成中文的科普著作之一：今年3月刚由西蒙和舒斯特尔出版社推出了精装原版，4月中译本就已全面上市。这神速，似乎很能说明其主题及其重点解析的对象——暗黑人格者——在如今这个动荡和充满不确定性的时代，堪称“普天之下”都备受关注。 识别术的科学基础：从“微表情”到“暗黑四联征” 布林克是加拿大英属哥伦比亚大学的心理学副教授，听上去算不上很“权威”，但她主持的“真相与信任实验室”（Truth and Trust Lab）在国际心理学界颇具声望，长期聚焦于一个核心问题：人类的欺骗行为在非语言层面留下了哪些可观察的痕迹？ 实验室最具代表性的早期研究，是对78名在电视上公开恳求失踪亲属归来的当事人影像进行逐帧编码——其中一半人实际上对失踪者的死亡负有责任。通过分析言语内容、肢体语言和情绪性面部表情，布林克试图建立一套区分“高风险真实欺骗”与真实悲痛的行为指标体系。 此后，在她与史蒂芬·波特（Stephen Porter）合作的一系列研究中，“情绪泄露”（emotional leakage）的概念得到了系统性检验。所谓情绪泄露，指的是当人们试图掩盖真实情绪时，真实的情感状态会以极短暂的面部肌肉运动——即所谓“微表情”（microexpressions，持续时间仅为1/25到1/5秒）——短暂地透过伪装表面浮现。布林克还利用“薄片”（thin-slice）分析方法，通过极短暂的行为片段来评估人格特质。她发现，朴素观察者在极短暂地接触某人的行为后，就能够相对准确地推断其精神病态特质水平——耐人寻味的是，这种准确性随接触时间的延长反而会下降，这暗示了高精神病态特质者具有在长期互动中构建欺骗性印象的能力。 布林克认为，人类的表情系统受两套神经路径控制：一套是有意识的“伪装”，另一套是无意识的“本能”。对于那些暗黑人格者，这两套系统时刻处于激烈的交火中。在其实验中，布林克重点标注了几个关键的识别维度。首先是“情感的时间差”。实验发现，真诚的情感往往是“全脸联动”且爆发式的，而暗黑人格者的表情则呈现出一种逻辑驱动的延迟。例如，在表达悲伤时，他们的嘴角可能已经下拉，但眼周的肌肉（眼轮匝肌）却在0...