>>Stocks Closing Lower
(New York, NY) -- Wall Street closed Thursday with stocks sharply lower. Walmart dropped shares after reported a week forecast for 2026 and i caused other retailers like Costco and Target to drop as well. It comes after two straight days of record closes for the S&P 500 on Tuesday and Wednesday. At the closing bell, the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 450 points to 44-176. The S&P 500 fell by 26 points to 61-17. The Nasdaq dropped by 93 points to 19-962.
>>Unemployment Claims Slightly Higher Than Expected
(Undated) -- Unemployment claims were up slightly last week. Initial filings for unemployment benefits totaled 219-thousand in the week ending February 15th. That's five-thousand more than the previous week. The Dow Jones initially estimated claims would only reach 215-thousand. Meanwhile, continuing claims also went up, reaching one-point-eight-seven-million with an increase of 24-thousand.
>>Musk Says America Will Go Bankrupt Unless Deficit Is Fixed
(Washington, DC) -- Elon Musk says America will go bankrupt unless the federal deficit is brought under control. Joined by President Trump in an interview with Sean Hannity, the head of DOGE said inflation will not be cut until they first tackle wasteful spending. Trump blamed the previous administration for the federal deficit, saying he inherited it from President Biden. He added that Musk has found only one-percent of the wasteful spending so far, and it could end up amounting to one-trillion dollars. The President vowed that Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare "won't be touched" when it comes to spending cuts.
>>Turkey Exporting Eggs To U.S.
(Istanbul) -- Turkey is exporting some 15-thousand tons of eggs to the U.S. as bird flu has sent egg prices skyrocketing here. Deliveries will start this month and continue through July, according to Turkish officials. U.S. Egg producers hope the imports will help ease some pressure on prices.
>>Amazon Beats Walmart In Quarterly Revenue For First Time
(Seattle, WA) -- Amazon has beaten out Walmart in quarterly revenue for the first time ever. The online retail giant reported nearly 188-billion-dollars in revenue during the fourth quarter. Walmart reported Thursday 180-point-five-billion dollars in revenue for the same period. Walmart is still leading Amazon when it comes to annual sales, although Amazon is gaining ground.
>>Meta Executives To See Big Bonuses
(Menlo Park, CA) -- Meta executives are set to get bigger bonuses this year. The company behind Facebook and Instagram said Thursday that some executives could see bonuses of up to 200 percent of their base salary, up from the previous cap of 75 percent. The announcement comes after the tech company started laying off five percent of its total workforce and cut annual stock option distributions by 10 percent for thousands of employees. Shares in the company are up 47 percent over the past year.
>>UnitedHealthCare Offers Employee Buyouts
(Minnetonka, MN) -- UnitedHealthCare is offering some employees buyouts. The offer comes amidst a turbulent year for the insurance company, which posted record revenue while dealing with a massive cyber attack and the murder of its CEO Brian Thompson in December. The buyouts are targeted at employees in the company's benefits operations unit. Those who decline the offer will either keep their jobs or get a comparable position.
>>ChatGPT Has 400 Million Weekly Users
(San Francisco, CA) -- ChatGPT now has more than 400 million active weekly users. OpenAI CEO Brad Lightcap posted the numbers to X Thursday noted that it's twice the number of users the artificial intelligence program boasted in August of last year. The company also announced that the number of paying users in the business sector has doubled to two million since September.
