For Thursday, May 14th, 2026
>>Wall Street Closes With Stocks Mixed
(New York, NY) -- Wall Street closed Wednesday with stocks mixed. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq both finished at record highs. It comes as traders are still digesting the producer price index released today by the Labor Department, which showed wholesale prices surged one-point-four percent in April. Elsewhere, shares of Nvidia and Micron Technology both rose. At the closing bell, the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 67 points to 49-693. The S&P 500 gained 43 points to 74-44. The Nasdaq rose 314 points to 26-402.
>>Wholesale Prices Up
(Washington, DC) -- Wholesale prices surged one-point-four percent in April, the biggest monthly increase since March 2022. The producer price index released yesterday by the Labor Department showed the cost of making goods went up well beyond the half-a-percent analysts were expecting. Year-over-year, the index is up six percent, the biggest annual jump since December 2022.
>>China Renews U.S. Beef Export Licenses
(Beijing) -- Major U.S. beef producers can start exporting beef to China again. On Thursday, China renewed export licenses for hundreds of U.S. beef processing plants. Reuters says over 400 U.S. beef plants lost export eligibility after Chinese permissions expired last March. The news comes as President Trump and a U.S. delegation is in China to discuss trade and other issues.
>>Senate Confirms Warsh As Next Fed Chair
(Washington, DC) -- The Senate is confirming Kevin Warsh as the next chair of the Federal Reserve. Wednesday's vote was 54-45, with every Republican voting in favor. Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania was the only Democrat to vote for Warsh. In terms of Senate history, it was the most partisan vote for a Fed chair nominee. Current Fed Chair Jerome Powell's term expires Friday. Powell's term was marked with constant battles with President Trump over cutting interest rates, and included a DOJ criminal investigation into Powell's renovations at the Reserve building that was later dropped. Warsh has expressed caution about cutting interest rates this year despite pressure from Trump to lower borrowing costs.
>>Americans Oppose Local AI Data Centers
(Undated) -- A majority of Americans say they oppose the construction of data centers in their local area. New polling from Gallup shows seven in ten Americans oppose the projects, and 48 percent of respondents said they are strongly opposed. These data centers house computing equipment that helps power AI technology used by businesses, universities and other institutions, but they have met fierce opposition from residents in many parts of the country. The centers require extensive amounts of electricity to operate and need substantial water to cool the equipment, which has raised concerns about the environmental impact and local electric bills.
>>Cisco To Cut 4K Jobs
(San Jose, CA) -- Cisco is cutting about four-thousand jobs. The software giant said Wednesday the cuts are part of a restructuring as the company shifts its focus toward artificial intelligence. Shares in Cisco rose more than 16-percent after the news. CEO Chuck Robbins said on the Cisco website that companies who "win in the AI era" will be those who "continuously shift ?investment toward the areas where demand and long-term value creation are strongest."
