Wealth Club

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Traveling as a family can be a great way to explore new cultures and become closer to one another. But how does a family stay on budget, not fall into debt or even make money while traveling?

We’ve rounded up expert advice from 10 family travel bloggers on optimizing family trips for finances and functionality. From traveling with infants to pre-teens, these tips can help families with kids of all ages make smart financial decisions on the fly. Or the drive. Or the hike.

1. 1. Open frequent flier accounts for your kids
      If you fly as a family, open up frequent flier accounts for your kids as soon as you are able, suggests La Jolla Mom. While many airlines do allow for this, Flying with a Baby warns that certain airlines may have restrictions or age minimums. For example, Emirates requires children to be two years old.
   2. Always spend in local currency
      When you’re about to pay with a credit card in a store or restaurant abroad, you might get asked if you want the charge to go through in U.S. dollars or in the local currency. Travel Babbo suggests to always choose the local currency because choosing U.S. dollars opens you up the exchange rate, over which you have no control.
   3. Splurge only if it’s important
      Alyson Long of World Travel Family and her family will splurge on certain experiences. They spent five expensive days in Dubai but said that experience was better than staying “a few extra weeks sitting, doing not-much” elsewhere.
   4. Make money to offset travel costs
      Let’s be real, traveling with kids is expensive. From additional tickets to more food being eaten, traveling with a family can add up. Suitcases and Sippy Cups reminds us that “saving money” is only one half of the financial equation. The other half is making money. Find an income stream that can be dedicated solely to travel funds.
   5. Choose the right travel credit card
      Travel Babbo reminds readers that the right travel card can make a major difference on costs. Find a card with no foreign transactions fees or one that earns you rewards. For some ideas, check out our best travel credit cards of 2018.
   6. Get outside to cut costs
      Consider doing something outside with your family to help keep everyone entertained and the costs down. No Man Before gives us serious hiking inspo, and is a great reminder that hiking with babies is doable. In fact, Madison of Our Vie Adventures even hiked and road-tripped throughout her pregnancy. If you’re near the ocean, visiting the beach is also a great option.
   7. Travel off season
      If you have little ones, this tip is easier before those children are in school. It’s a Lovely Life says that traveling off season not only means lower costs, but fewer lines and less waiting.
   8. Bring the grandparents
      Some families opt to bring the grandparents along as an extra set of eyes and hands. Travels with Baby mentions that this can be a great way to help with costs, but to be upfront about expectations. Make sure things like a date nights (for both couples!) are talked about in advance so everyone has a good time.

   Ultimately, traveling with family is about spending time together. These words by Space In Your Case are a great reminder: “Rather than trying to pack in lots of sights and destinations, take time to settle in one place and really explore all it has to offer…. Not feeling pressure to do everything can be incredibly relaxing and leave you more time to just be together.”

   How to maximize your rewards

   You want a travel credit card that prioritizes what’s important to you. Here are our picks for the best travel credit cards of 2018, including those best for:

   Planning a trip? Check out these articles for more inspiration and advice:
   5 family vacation planning tips I learned on the fly
   15 free activities for kids and families
   Our family vacation: 10 states, 12 nights and $3K in an RV

SpiceJet has joined the club of three listed airlines to receive a ratings downgrade this month as fuel price hike along with rupee depreciation continue to put pressure on profits as airlines are unable to increase fares amid stiff competition.

Crisil has downgraded its ratings on the bank facilities of SpiceJet to ‘Crisil BB-/Negative/Crisil A4’ from ‘Crisil BBB/Stable/Crisil A3+’, the ratings agency said.

The downgrade reflects Crisil’s belief that SpiceJet’s operating performance will remain under pressure in the near to medium term, driven by significant increase in the operating cost and limited ability to pass on the increased cost to customers due to intense competition. “Further, SpiceJet was expecting some cash infusion from the sale and lease back transactions that got delayed due to late delivery of the new aircraft. Hence, liquidity profile has weakened,” Crisil said in a report.

Aviation turbine fuel (ATF) prices increased by 10 per cent and the rupee depreciated 7.9 per cent over the last three months. ATF is a major cost and accounts for 35-40 per cent of total operating costs while 35-40 per cent of costs (lease and maintenance) are dollar denominated. Despite such a sharp increase, airlines could not increase prices due to intense competition, with the second quarter being inherently weak, Crisil said.

India’s largest airline Indigo also received a ratings downgrade last week from ICRA for similar reasons.

“ICRA Limited” has revised the Company’’s long term rating to [ICRA] A+ (negative) from [ICRA] AA (stable). ICRA has stated that this rating action takes into consideration the significant depreciation of the Indian Rupee coupled with a sharp rise in global crude oil prices. However, ICRA has also noted that the Company’’s competitive cost-structure coupled with its liquidity position places it in better position to overcome this phase as compared to other domestic airlines,” Indigo said in a statement to stock exchanges last week.

This puts all three listed airlines Jet Airways, IndiGo and SpiceJet on a negative rating from either stable or positive ratings. Indigo, the only profitable airline among the three depleted nearly all its gains in the first quarter, driven by high costs and nearly flat yields.

Jet Airways, on the other hand, is going through its toughest financial crisis wherein the airline booked more than ₹1,000 crore of losses in in two consecutive quarters and has been delaying salaries to pilots and senior executives. The airline was been last downgraded early this month.

Due to high competitive intensity, players have not been to increase their yields to mitigate cost pressures leading to decline in operating margins.

“The domestic airline industry is highly competitive, underpinned by frequent entry of new players and significant fleet addition by existing ones. During fiscal 2015, the industry saw the launch of services by Vistara and Air Asia India followed by addition of new players such as Air Carnival, Air Costa, Air Pegasus, TruJet, and Zoom Air over the 12 months through March 2018. Furthermore, factoring in current fleet addition plans, industry fleet size is estimated to grow to around 1,500 aircraft by fiscal 2025 from the current 500. These factors potentially expose the industry to intense price competition and adversely impact PLFs,” Crisil said.

President Donald Trump speaks to reporters at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, N.J., Thursday, Aug. 10, 2017.Evan Vucci/AP

• The president claimed on Dec. 19 that ISIS has been defeated as a justification to pull-out of Syria.
• The latest military airstrike data appears to contradict Trump's claims, which he later walked back, that ISIS is defeated.
• Between Dec. 16 and Dec. 29, the US military and its coalition partners conducted 469 strikes on ISIS targets, according to an Operation Inherent Resolve press release.
• Those strikes appear to be part of an uptick in strikes on extremists in Iraq and Syria.

As the president declared victory over the Islamic State last month, the US military and its coalition partners dropped hundreds of bombs on ISIS militants.

In justifying the rapid withdrawal of US troops from Syria, President Donald Trump tweeted a video message on Dec. 19, declaring, "We have won against ISIS. We've beaten them, and we've beaten them badly. We've taken back the land. And, now it's time for our troops to come back home."

Between Dec. 16 and Dec. 29, coalition forces conducted 469 strikes in Syria, engaging more than six hundred ISIS fighters and destroying and damaging dozens of facilities and fighting positions, Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve revealed Friday.

These strikes appear to be part of a larger uptick in strikes on ISIS in Syria that began last summer, as the number of bombs dropped on ISIS in Iraq and Syria rose from 241 in July to 876 in October, the US Air Forces Central Command Combined Air Operations Center introduced in its latest report.

Amid criticism from lawmakers and foreign policy experts from both sides of the aisle, Trump walked back his declaration of victory one day later, arguing that other countries should take up the fight against ISIS.

"Do we want to be there forever?" the president tweeted. "Time for others to finally fight."

ISIS is believed to still have tens of thousands of fighters in Iraq and Syria. The administration has argued that the campaign against ISIS will continue, just without US troops in Syria; confusion abounds about the scale and types of missions the US will continue against ISIS. 

Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, who initially called plans for a withdrawal an "Obama-like mistake," has since suggested that Trump understands that there is more to do before the US packs up and heads out. "He promised to destroy ISIS," the South Carolina lawmaker said Sunday, "He's going to keep that promise. We're not there yet, but as I said today, we're inside the 10-yard line and the president understands the need to finish the job."

Experts see the imminent US withdrawal as a strategic victory for US adversaries like Iran, Syria's Assad regime and Russia.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, refusing to give a timetable for withdrawal, said Wednesday that "our troops are coming out," but he insisted that the campaign to defeat ISIS would continue.

"The President also made very clear that we needed to continue the counter-ISIS campaign, and we needed to continue to ensure that we did the things to create stability throughout the Middle East. The counter-Iran campaign continues. We’ll do all of those things. We’ll continue to achieve those outcomes. We will simply do it at a time when the American forces have departed Syria," the secretary explained.

By Mark Schaefer

I recently attended a business analytics conference that featured some of the worst speakers I have ever seen. The first keynote speaker READ his speech … and it went downhill from there!

I am a professional speaker so I get to see a lot of great talent on the stage. But the experience at this conference made me realize there is a whole bunch of people in the world who have to give a speech for the first time without the benefit of much training or preparation.

I thought it would be fun to help. Here are my tips for giving your very first speech!

The content

Presumably you have been asked to talk about a certain topic based on your personal expertise. How do you organize your speech?

The biggest mistake I made when I started out was being Mr. Data Dump. I thought I needed to show people how smart I was by cramming every fact and figure I could into my talk. Nobody wants that. They just want to learn between 3-5 new things.

So, think about five key points you want to make in your talk. Start with an idea of what action you want them to take, or what you want to change after your talk, and then create 3-to-5 points to support your talk. Don’t try to do too much, If it goes beyond five points, people have a hard time following along.

Guess what? You just made an outline.

Decorating it

Now you have a goal and an outline. It’s time to make it fun and interesting. I call this “decorating” the speech.

For each of your main points in the outline, think of a personal story, or maybe some key insight or data point, you can use to fill in the talk and make it entertaining.

Using personal stories and anecdotes has an important secondary benefit — if you’re new to speaking, you’re going to be a lot less nervous about telling your own stories than something you have to develop from scratch.

Another benefit is that people tend to remember stories instead of facts and figures.

Finally, using personal stories guarantees that you’ll be giving a talk that nobody has ever heard before!

Here’s an excellent guide that will help you write your first speech.

Slides

If you’re doing your first speech, I highly recommend slides. If you’re new to speaking, slides can act as a prompt so you know where you are in the talk and what’s coming next. They can be a little security blanket for you and there’s nothing wrong with that, as long as you follow a few rules.

Plan on the lighting being lousy. Keep it very simple by creating slides with very light type on a very dark background.

Use large visual images instead of words whenever you can. If they are reading a slide, they’re not listening to you. Use slides to accentuate your talk, not tell your story.

Everybody hates bullet points.

If you have more than 10 words on a slide, that is probably too much. I’m not kidding.

A rule of thumb is that each slide in a deck averages about one minute of speaking time. Some are a little more, some a littl less, but it turns out to be a minute. So if you’re giving a 30 minute speech, you’ll need about 30 slides.

Here are some additional great ideas to punch up your presentation.

Rehearsal

I realize you may not have time for a lot of rehearsal, but it’s important for both the quality of your speech and your own confidence to practice as much as you can.

Before I give a new speech, I practice so much that I’m sick of it. That’s a good sign. At that point, I know it so well that I’m well-prepared for any situation (like a complete AV failure!)

If you don’t have time to rehearse, it is perfectly fine to have an outline or a few notecards for reference. Even author Malcolm Gladwell carries notes with him on the stage and he has given hundreds of speeches in his career.

An important benefit to rehearsing is timing. Nothing ruins a meeting more than a speaker running on for an hour when they had a 30-minute slot.

Details

Here is a checklist of other little things to consider when preparing for your first speech.

• Know the audience. Talk to the organizer and learn as much as you can about the audience ahead of time,
• Get clear on the AV situation. What size do your slides need to be? Will they have the right hook-ups for your computer? What kind of microphone?
• Will you be introduced, or do you need to introduce yourself?
• If it is an international audience, scour your talk and remove any words and phrases that might not be familiar to all.
• Will the talk be recorded? If yes, how will it be used (and can you get a copy)?
• Get precise times, places, and mobile phone numbers in case something goes wrong.
• Great advice on how to start a speech.

Nerves

Most people are terrified before a first talk. There are lots of tips and tricks available on the web to help you get through it, but here are a few things that helped me:

Begin your speech with something polite or funny that acknowledges your audience or the city where you’re speaking. This breaks the ice and also give you a chance to warm up. I’ve found that the first two minutes are the hardest. Memorize the first two minutes of your talk to build your momentum.

Have a drink of water on stage. If you feel your throat tightening from nerves, pause and take a sip of water.

Remember that the audience is pulling for you. You’re there for a reason and they want to learn from you and believe in you. You belong there. You deserve to be there.

Go for it

There have been entire books written about preparing and delivering a speech. But if this is your first try and you need to put together something quickly, I think the tips I’ve provided here are a good start.

I know giving your first speech might be nerve-wracking, but it can also be a lot of fun. I want to encourage you to dive in and give it a try.

Your first talk will probably be the most difficult one. Like anything in this world, you’ll get better over time. Keep going, keep practicing, and you’ll get more confident each time.

Illustration — That’s me at Social Media Marketing World

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Source: https://businessesgrow.com/2018/11/26/how-to-give-your-first-speech-and-knock-it-out-of-the-park/

These unmanned aerial vehicles can fly at high speeds, detect intruders, do aerobatic maneuvers like loops, rolls, spins, and hammerheads effortlessly and communicate with each other intelligently.

On a sunny Thursday morning, the display area at the Yelahanka Air Force station in Bengaluru, the venue of the biennial Aero India show saw the usual fighter jets and the aerobics planes taking a break to give way to hundreds of drones.

These unmanned aerial vehicles were participating at a unique Drone Olympics competition demonstrating their capabilities in various missions including surveillance, intrusion detection as well as providing relief items during rescue operations.

These UAVs could fly at high speeds, perform aerobatic maneuvers like loops, rolls, spins, and hammerheads effortlessly and communicate with each other intelligently.

This is for the first time that such a competition was conducted at Aero India.

According to the organisers, more than 120 applications were received out of which 57 suitable applicants were invited to participate in the competition.

The 17 shortlisted teams mainly comprising hi-tech start-ups, research institutes, students and individuals demonstrated their skills and innovation in the final event in five different categories.

Team ‘Dhaksha’ of Centre for Aerospace Research, MIT Campus, Anna University in Chennai dominated the competition and won the first place in the ‘surveillance hybrid design’ category.

In the real world, ‘Dhaksha’ has already performed several missions for surveillance using their indigenously designed and developed UAVs for disaster management during the 2015 Chennai floods.

Some other rescue operations in which it participated included Moulivakkam building collapse, Chennai oil spill, Kurangani hills forest fire, and crowd management activities in Marina Beach during new year.

“We want to make India self-reliant in UAV systems designs,” said R Vasantharaj, a research scientist representing Team Dhaksha.

Thanos Technologies, a Hyderabad-based drone tech start-up, won the first place in ‘supply drop challenge’, a category mainly for disaster management missions.

It included dropping relief material like medical aid with exact precision.

“We are already providing agricultural services and now we plan to into defence industry as well,” said Prathyush Akepati, co-founder and CTO at Thanos Technologies.

In the surveillance category for the drones above 4 kg, team Drovengers Quad won the first place, while for drones below 4 kg, a Mumbai-based start-up Sagar Defence Engineering bagged the first position.

“Our mission is to move the world to the unmanned systems,” said Saurabh Patil, R&D electronic engineer at Sagar Defence.

UAS-DTU, a team of undergraduate students of Delhi Technological University devoted to developing indigenous technological solutions for UAVs, bagged the first spot for ‘flying formation challenge’, the last category of the competition.

In this category, several drones took off in the air, communicated with each other intelligently and formed various shapes in the sky autonomously.

A total prize money of about Rs 36 lakh was distributed among the winners and runner-ups of the competition.

The Drone Olympics, organised by Ministry of Defence, aims to encourage the UAV industry to connect with potential buyers and business partners in the country and also provide an opportunity to the Armed Forces to assess the capabilities of UAVs.

With 22.5 per cent of the world’s UAV imports, India tops the list of drone-importing nations, according to the data provided by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).

Industry experts say drone-related firms like the ones which participated in the Aero India can reduce India’s dependence on foreign UAVs.

UAV demand is mainly derived from military-end user application, followed by law enforcement, precision agricultural, inspection and monitoring.

“We saw some tremendous applications. So you need to have hundreds of startups and industries which can come up for building these applications,” said G Satheesh Reddy, Secretary, Department of Defence R&D and chairman, Defence Research and Development Organisation.

US defence giant Lockheed Martin is already wooing Indian talent in the area of drones.

Three winners of the Aero India drone competition would receive development kit given to the teams in AlphaPilot - Lockheed Martin AI drone racing innovation challenge.

“It consists drone hardware, sensors, processing platform and supporting software,” said Vivek Lall, vice president of strategy and business development, Lockheed Martin.

AlphaPilot is an open innovation challenge, developing artificial intelligence for high-speed racing drones, conducted by Lockheed Martin along with the Drone Racing League (DRL).

“We invite the three teams to attend one of our events in the United States where our experts would help with set-up and activation,” added Lall.

According to 6Wresearch, India UAV market is projected to grow at a CAGR of 18 per cent during 2017-23. By 2021, the Indian UAV market is expected to reach $885.7 million, while the global market size will touch $21.47 billion, according to a study by BIS Research.

Photograph: PTI Photo

I’m not a millennial. In fact, I’m a Gen X-er. My twenties, and even my thirties, are long behind me.

At my age, I should have done the college thing and gotten my first low-paying job that would’ve eventually catapulted me into a successful working-class status. I never really aspired to be a part of the one percent. To quote The Notorious B.I.G., “mo’ money, mo’ problems.” But I did long to be a solid member of the middle class. I wanted to own my own home, have money in the bank, and go on vacation at least once a year, like so many Americans.

I have to say that, growing up, I had the fervent desire to surpass my mother in terms of success. She always encouraged me to do better, to be better. I went to school and got good grades. My endgame was to attain greatness. I wanted to reach the point where I was able to care for her and my family when the time came. Unfortunately, things did not work according to plan.

Nevertheless, my thirst for middle class was still strong, and I wanted to achieve that dream. So, I worked hard climbing the ladder of success. I followed the rules and worked in a corporate environment, making copies and pushing pencils, grasping for independence and career fulfillment. But in the end, I failed. Not because I wasn’t capable or determined — I was. However, I learned quickly that I did not want to play the games. I didn’t want to do the meetings and pointless projects, business lunches, team-building, back-biting and all those things that came with working for the man. I had to face facts; I was not a team player. (It started making sense that, in grade school, my report cards always said, “Plays well alone, but shows no interest in group activities.”)

As the years progressed, I became a willing victim of upward mobility. I was deep in debt, way behind on my student loans, and in the credit card crunch up to my eyeballs. In the past, if I wanted something, I saw no reason why I shouldn’t have it, whether I could afford it or not. And then I hit the wall.

By this time, I was well into my thirties and making just shy of $30K a year. I was increasingly unhappy and unable to focus. Depression became a regular guest in my home, which added to my downward spiral. After some much-needed therapy and mental help, my outlook changed. I no longer craved being middle class. Instead, I aspired to be healthy and whole, which came with its own requirements. From now on, I came first. I stopped chasing status.

I picked myself up and started anew. I found a job — not a career — where I could work from home. It’s part-time, which has a couple of benefits for my new lifestyle. I don’t have to deal with people. I enjoy what I do, and it has freed me up for those things that are truly important to me, like engaging with friends and writing. This year, I published my first novel.

As the saying goes, when life gives you lemons, make lemonade. And that is what making $20K forces you to do, especially when you’ve made the choice to live a simpler life. Luckily, I’m at an age where I want fewer material things. Also, because I work from home, my expenses are low. Things like transportation, eating out, and a clothing allowance are not a factor for me. Most times, I am dressed in my pajamas. Although my income is not substantial, I regularly contribute to my company’s 401K plan. It’s not much — just 10 percent — but it’s something. In two years, I will be going on a long-awaited trip to Italy funded completely with cash — no plastic — and that feels great.

Bottom line, I make just over $20,000 a year. I’m definitely not going to set the world on fire making that kind of money, but I’ve learned to adjust. I wouldn’t call it settling. I just think long and hard about the choices I make and the things I want. I’ve learned to budget and say no to myself about frivolous stuff.

My income dictates everything I do, how much I spend, the things that I buy, and even where I live. For example, I wanted to move to the Hyde Park neighborhood, close to shops, fine dining, and cafes where I often socialize with friends. But the rents in that area for a one-bedroom apartment started at $1200 a month. There was no way I could afford that. My solution was somewhat simple. I found a spacious studio in an adjacent neighborhood where the rent is much more affordable at $685. That’s just a 20-minute walk or a 7-minute bus ride away from all the action. Problem solved, and the studio suits me just fine.

Thankfully, the rest of my expenses are quite reasonable. Things like utilities, internet, cell phone and insurance (life and renter’s) average no more than $250 a month. I have a student loan payment of $140. Add in a tithing of 10 percent to my church, the cost of groceries, miscellaneous and household expenditures, and there you have it.

Of course, no life is fun if all you’re doing is paying bills. There have to be some concessions, even when you’re living from paycheck to paycheck. I’ve become a saver — and before you scratch your head, yes, it is possible to save money even on a $20K income (it’s hard, but not impossible). Saving money seemed so out of reach for me. However, once I began to budget, I was able to see places where I blew money needlessly. Now that extra money gets divided between an emergency fund — as suggested by all the financial gurus — and sinking funds that allow me to plan for vacations and satisfying all of my wants. I am not in a position to buy everything I want when I want it. My financial experience has taught me to be patient. Delayed gratification is something that must be learned, and when done right, can even be fun. I tend to appreciate the things that I have more than if I plopped down my credit card and made a quick purchase. I even save all of my change. My goal is to start investing a little at a time.

Now, you may ask, “Is living on $20K easy?” The answer is no. It requires constant planning, budgeting, and sacrifices. To be honest, I may not make a middle-class salary or even what constitutes as lower class, but despite that obstacle, I live what feels like a middle-class existence — meaning I don’t want for anything. My bills are being paid, and I make time for those special things in life. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not my desire to remain living at this economic level. But in the meantime, I make it work. Who knows — I may even dust off my dream of homeownership one day. Anything is possible.

TaKaylla L. Gordon is a freelance writer and author of The One Date Rule. A native of Chicago, TaKaylla is on a quest to live her best life no matter the income.

Image via Unsplash

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Source: https://thefinancialdiet.com/how-i-survive-on-20k-a-year/

Thought for the day: “Women want real men, men they can count on and yes, look up to. No amount of feminist theory will change that.”

Or here’s another one: “Intersectionality is a form of identity politics, in which the value of your opinion depends on how many victim groups you belong to.” And just for good measure: “The answer to toxic masculinity isn’t less masculinity. It’s better masculinity.”

These aren’t the views you’d expect to read on Music Ally. And as of Friday, they’re also not being heard by any of Spotify’s free listeners in the US.

These are examples of advertisements that were booked on Spotify by right-wing US organisation PragerU, in an effort to drive traffic to the videos on its website (examples: ‘What Does Diversity Have to Do with Science?’, ‘Where Are the Moderate Muslims?’, ‘Gender Identity: Why All the Confusion?’ and ‘Why You Should Be a Nationalist’ – you get the picture).

On Friday, according to PragerU, Spotify removed its ads and barred it from booking more. “Our policy team has re-reviewed the ads that you have submitted through Ad Studio and determined that the content of the ads do not comply with our editorial policies,” explained an email from Spotify released by PragerU.

“Our policy team has made the decision to stop all existing ads and not approve new ads coming through in the future. Please let us know if you have any questions or require further clarification.” Spotify has declined to comment. PragerU claims that its ads had reached more than 1m people on Spotify until they were pulled on 24 January.

The streaming service does publish its Advertising Editorial Policies: among those that PragerU may have been deemed to fail are “content that infringes upon or violates, or encourages the infringement or violation of, the rights of any third party” and “content that promotes stereotypes or inaccurately portrays or attacks an individual or group on the basis of age, national origin, race, religion, sex, sexual orientation or handicap”. There are also restrictions on ads for “religion or religious causes”.

Spotify isn’t the first online platform to tangle with PragerU: the organisation sued YouTube in 2017 claiming that its videos were being illegally censored by Google’s video service, as it marked them as ‘restricted’.

That lawsuit was dismissed in March 2018, when a judge ruled that “defendants are private entities who created their own video-sharing social media website and make decisions about whether and how to regulate content that has been uploaded on that website”.

There are important lines to be drawn between hate speech (including content designed to encourage hate more subtly) on one side and disagreeable-but-legal views on the other.

Spotify has long identified itself with progressive causes in the US, from supporting undocumented immigrants who came to America as children (‘DREAMers) to launching its ‘I’m With The Banned’ campaign in response to President Trump’s travel ban covering predominantly-Muslim countries.

It was also caught up in last year’s controversy around far-right celebrity Alex Jones’ InfoWars podcast – Spotify, like other tech platforms, eventually removed it – while on the advertising front, last November it pulled ads running in Massachusetts that supported a campaign to remove the right for trans people to use public toilets and changing rooms aligned with their gender identity.

Spotify is setting out its red lines for ads and content, and while the inevitable controversies will blow up and be capitalised on by organisations affected (“This bias against conservatives can’t continue. RT to stand up to Big Tech!” tweeted PragerU this weekend) it’s important that Spotify makes these decisions as part of a clear policy – particularly as it grows in prominence as an advertising platform.

Stuart Dredge

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The major indexes extended gains Tuesday afternoon in a broad advance, and the Nasdaq composite and S&P 500 today have a reason to feel better about their rebounds.

X

Indexes gapped up at the open and have trended higher all day, a good sign after the market on Monday gave back the bulk of its gains.

The Nasdaq led with a 2.3% vault, as the beaten-up technology sector spearheaded the market surge. Software and semiconductors ranked among Tuesday's best sectors. The iShares Nasdaq Biotech ETF (IBB) rallied 3.5%, giving the composite more fuel.

The S&P 500 rose 1.7%, benefiting from the tech rally and from strength in health care as well. Managed care, medical services, medical research and medical equipment industry groups were up more than 2.5%.

Both the Nasdaq and S&P 500 climbed back above their 200-day moving averages. While that doesn't automatically mean investors should increase exposure to stocks, it is a promising sign. At least, it indicates the indexes are on track with their rebounds.

The Dow Jones industrial average added 1.6%, with 10 of its 30 components up more than 2% each.

Volume was higher on the Nasdaq and nearly unchanged on the NYSE compared with the same time on Monday. Breadth was bullish: Advancers topped decliners by 11 to 2 on the NYSE and by 11 to 3 on the Nasdaq.

Despite the bullish market action, there was a curious lack of breakouts. Imperial Oil (IMO) cleared a cup base but the stock eased below the 34.39 buy point.

Some top-rated stocks are finding support at the 50-day moving average, or are climbing back above those lines.

Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) is rising from the 50-day line but volume is running below average. Unlike many other techs, Advanced Micro held at its 50-day average during the market sell-off. Tractor Supply (TSCO) is looking more firm above its 50-day line.

Boston Scientific (BSX) also is climbing from support. The company reports earnings on Oct. 24. Match Group (MTCH), which is new to IBD Leaderboard, is rising quickly above its 50-day average.

On the whole, leading stocks were behaving well. The Innovator IBD 50 ETF (FFTY) jumped more than 3%, its best performance since April 17.

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Source: https://www.investors.com/market-trend/stock-market-today/stocks-surge-nasdaq-sp-500-today-regain-critical-levels/