SLOW MOTION MASS MURDER IN THE PEWS

Trump wants to reopen the US economy on Easter because he'd like 'packed churches all over our country' despite massive public-health risk
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced that experts believe New York's coronavirus outbreak will reach an apex in 14 to 21 days. Easter is in 19 days.

DR TRUMP QUACK
'Trump kept saying it was basically pretty much a cure': Woman whose husband died after ingesting chloroquine tells the public not to 'believe anything that the president says'

THIS MAKES TRUMP NEGLIGENT AND COMPLICIT IN MANSLAUGHTER

Sonam Sheth Mar 23, 2020, 7:39 PM

The wife of an Arizona man who died after ingesting chloroquine phosphate to protect himself from the novel coronavirus spoke out Monday to urge the public not to "take anything" or "believe anything" without talking to a healthcare professional.

"We saw Trump on TV — every channel — and all of his buddies and that this was safe," the woman told NBC News' Vaughn Hillyard of President Donald Trump. "Trump kept saying it was basically pretty much a cure."

NBC News reported that the man, 68, and his wife, 61, took chloroquine to guard against the novel coronavirus, which causes a potentially fatal disease known as COVID-19. It's not clear how much chloroquine the man consumed, and Banner Health said he and his wife ingested a version of the chemical that's used to clean aquariums.

Both of them needed to seek medical care within half an hour; the woman is in critical condition, and the man died.

The pharmaceutical version of chloroquine — known as hydroxychloroquine — is used to treat malaria, but there is no conclusive evidence it is effective against the coronavirus, which the World Health Organization declared a pandemic earlier this month.

Trump has repeatedly touted the drug as a "very powerful" treatment for the disease and falsely claimed it had been approved by the Food and Drug Administration.

"It's shown very encouraging — very, very encouraging early results," Trump said last week. "And we're going to be able to make that drug available almost immediately. And that's where the FDA has been so great. They — they've gone through the approval process; it's been approved. And they did it, they took it down from many, many months to immediate. So we're going to be able to make that drug available by prescription or states."

The FDA came out with a statement after Trump's comments saying it had not approved chloroquine for the coronavirus and that much more research had to be done.

"Did you at any point hear that the FDA had not approved of it for coronavirus purposes?" Hillyard asked the woman.

"Yeah," she said. "But, you know, they kept saying that it was approved for other things."

Asked what her message to the American public was after what she and her husband went through, the woman told NBC News: "Oh my God, don't take anything. Don't believe anything that the president says and his people ... call your doctor."

"Please educate the people," she added, according to audio of the conversation that Hillyard posted to Twitter. "It feels like, like my heart is broken and it'll never mend. It's just broke, dead. Like my husband. My husband is 68. We're healthy. No underlying — no diabetes or lung issues. Nothing."

The single greatest threat to the global economy couldn't be clearer right now, and Congress is headed straight for it
Linette Lopez Mar 23, 2020

Senate Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY)

 Samuel Corum/Getty Images

The US share of global GDP is nearly 15%. If our economy can't stabilize and then recover from the coronavirus pandemic, it will be harder for the world to do so.

And so it's imperative that Congress write fair, generous legislation to get us through the economic shutdown required to fight the virus.

But that isn't what's happening. Republicans accuse Democrats of not moving fast enough. Democrats accuse Republicans of short-changing American workers and favoring big corporations.

That matters. Under-funding this stimulus will drag the global economy down. And any appearance that corporations are getting a more fair deal than individuals will make people not want to comply. A lack of compliance will drag on the crisis.

This is an opinion column. The thoughts expressed are those of the author.

The US economy contributes more than any other country to global GDP — about 15% of the total. When it falls into ruin, the entire global economy drags. We saw that happen during the financial crisis of 2008.

So it is imperative for the world that the US economy stay stable during the coronavirus pandemic, and that it can swing back to growth as soon as possible when it's over.

Right now there is one clear obstacle to that: the potential that Congress could under-fund the US coronavirus stimulus package. If they do, they put not only the economy but the effort to fight the virus at risk.

This is a case where the consequences (and possibility) of overspending are basically negligible, while the consequences of underspending could push the entire global economy into a longer, deeper recession.

And yet this weekend the Senate was unable to pass aid legislation. Senate Leader Mitch McConnell raged and blamed Democrats, while Democrats fumed over the legislation's $500 billion, opaque Treasury slush fund to be handed out to corporations at Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin's discretion. Treasury wouldn't have to report which corporations got that money for half a year, whereas during the financial crisis companies that received funds were made public within 60 days.


Democrats also rejected the bill over a lack of labor protections that would only mandate corporations keep employees "to the extent possible." They want more limits on executive compensation and share buybacks, and they want more money for healthcare workers. They accuse Republicans of being cheap, and writing a deal that favors corporations over average Americans.
You can't be cheap, and you can't be corrupt

St. Louis Federal Reserve President James Bullard on Sunday scared the pants off a lot of people by saying unemployment could hit 30% during the coronavirus. He also said the economy would take a $2.5 trillion hit. But he asked people to look at government efforts to get us through this not as an effort to stave off recession, but as an investment in public health. He's right.

"You want capital to just sit in place. Switch off the factory ... Then switch it back on," he said.

That means treating individuals and businesses with extreme generosity. To the Democrats, the Republican bill is far more generous to corporations than workers. Particularly by allowing them to fire people while still taking bailout money.

The only proposal that comes close to being generous enough for individuals comes from Democratic Rep. Rashida Tlaib. It would give a prepaid card with $2,000 to every American. That card would then be recharged with $1,000 monthly until one year after the end of the coronavirus crisis. This is the kind of plan that will make Americans believe the government has their back, not just the backs of big corporations.


Because you see, even a whiff of that kind of impropriety puts the entire global economy at risk. It is imperative that it be a fair deal.

The distrust that is bred by corruption will make it much harder to fight this virus, potentially dragging out the crisis. The vast majority of Americans already think that our lack of trust in each other and our government makes it hard to solve problems, according to Pew Research. If Americans feel like this whole aid package is a handout to big corporations — which they also distrust — they may stop listening to authorities.

After all, why should they respect a government that seems to have so little respect for them?

A lack of compliance would draw the crisis out only longer, bringing waves of the illness that will require mini-shutdowns to stabilize hospital capacity. Goldman Sachs estimates that the recession brought on by fighting off coronavirus will trough in April, knocking 10% off US GDP. Over time, bank analysts wrote last week, the economy should begin to grow again incrementally. How fast depends on how well Americans comply with government social-distancing mandates. Americans have to want to comply.

Goldman Sachs

I've said this before and I'll say it again: This all needs to move much faster. Small and midsize companies make up 83% of the US economy, and thousands of workers are already out of a job across the country. Means-testing initial payments to individuals — that is, restricting who gets the checks based on income — is a waste of time.

Let me put it this way: If you think that the 1% shouldn't get a check, then that means we wasted 1% of these aid funds. That's better than creating massive financial stress for millions of Americans and their families.

NOW WATCH: The founder of the World Economic Forum shares what he sees as the biggest threat to the global economy

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TRUMP ANNOUNCES END OF COVID-19  PANDEMIC 

IN AMERICA BY EASTER SUNDAY

MEANWHILE PM ABE OF JAPAN HAS CANCELED THE SUMMER OLYMPICS

WHICH WERE TO OCCUR AT THE END OF JULY

ONE OF THESE IS A QUACK SNAKE OIL SALESMAN

TV networks cut away from the White House coronavirus briefing as Trump contradicted his health experts
Kayla Epstein 3/24/2020

NOT SOCIAL DISTANCING

President Donald Trump with four members of his administration's coronavirus task force — Vice President Mike Pence, FDA Commissioner Dr. Stephen Hahn, Dr. Deborah Birx, and Surgeon General Jerome Adams — at a briefing on Thursday. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst


CNN, MSNBC, ABC News, NBC News, and CBS News cut away from President Trump's lengthy coronavirus briefing on Monday night.

During the briefing, Trump chafed at the idea of continuing the widespread order for people to stay home, saying it was harming the economy. His top infectious-diseases expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, had said social-distancing measures would need to be in place for "several weeks."

CBS told Insider that it "plans to continue covering briefings whenever possible" but may cut away for other programming. MSNBC told Insider that it "cut away because the information no longer appeared to be valuable to the important ongoing discussion around public health."

Critics of the president have called for networks to stop airing the briefings. "All of us should stop broadcasting it, honestly," MSNBC's Rachel Maddow said on Friday. "It's going to cost lives."

On Monday night, most of the major television networks, except for Fox News, cut away from President Donald Trump's daily coronavirus briefing.

Though the briefings often feature a rotating cast of Trump administration health experts, like Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and Surgeon General Jerome Adams, they have also allowed Trump to make inaccurate declarations about the administration's response and undercut the dire warnings of these professionals that Americans need to stay home to stop the virus from spreading.

As Trump has contradicted experts, provided inaccurate medical information, and engaged in lengthy diatribes against journalists, his critics have questioned how much networks should broadcast them — and whether relaying his words directly is a public benefit.
Several networks cut away from Trump's briefing on Monday night

Trump's coronavirus briefing with Vice President Mike Pence, Attorney General William Barr, and Dr. Deborah Birx of the White House's coronavirus task force was scheduled for 5:30 p.m. ET but didn't begin until after 6.

Trump quickly undermined his health experts' guidance that Americans need to stay home for several weeks, claiming that businesses would open "soon."

Trump implied that the limitations would continue for "a much shorter period of time than I've been hearing the news report," though Fauci had told the "Today" show on Friday that the measures would need to be in place for "several weeks."

At one point, Trump made Birx, the top health expert on the podium that day, part of a bit aimed at attacking journalists.

The major broadcast networks — ABC, CBS, and NBC — all cut away from Trump's briefing about 20 minutes in, The Associated Press reported. The cable news networks CNN and MSNBC followed suit after 7 p.m.

A spokesman for CBS News told Insider that the network "plans to continue covering briefings whenever possible, but may cut away for regularly scheduled news broadcasts, which many viewers depend on for delivering objective reporting and context on the developments of the day."

He said that CBS News' feed of the briefings was still available to affiliates and that it would incorporate major headlines from the events into the evening news.

MSNBC, on the other hand, "cut away because the information no longer appeared to be valuable to the important ongoing discussion around public health," a network representative told Insider.

On Twitter, Judd Deere, a White House spokesman, said the networks' decisions were "disgraceful" and thanked Fox News for airing the briefing.
—Judd Deere (@JuddPDeere45) March 23, 2020

"If the White House wants to ask for time on the network, they should make an official request. Otherwise we will make our own editorial decisions," a CNN representative said in a statement relayed by the network's media reporter Oliver Darcy.
Critics say it's time to stop broadcasting Trump's briefings

On Tuesday, the Washington Post media columnist Margaret Sullivan declared that "the media must stop live-broadcasting Trump's dangerous, destructive coronavirus briefings."

"These White House sessions — ostensibly meant to give the public critical and truthful information about this frightening crisis — are in fact working against that end," Sullivan wrote.

James Fallows, a longtime journalist for The Atlantic, also tweeted that "cable outlets should stop covering them live."
—James Fallows (@JamesFallows) March 19, 2020

"If it were up to me — and it's not — I would stop putting those briefings on live TV," the MSNBC host Rachel Maddow said on Friday. "Not out of spite, but because it's misinformation. If the president does end up saying anything true, you can run it as tape."

She added: "All of us should stop broadcasting it, honestly. It's going to cost lives."

Trump has repeatedly touted a drug called chloroquine as a possible treatment for COVID-19 over objections from his officials that it has not been approved for that use. A man in Arizona recently died and his wife was hospitalized after ingesting chloroquine phosphate, a version of the chemical that's used to clean aquariums.

"We saw Trump on TV — every channel — and all of his buddies and that this was safe," the woman told NBC News' Vaughn Hillyard on Monday. "Trump kept saying it was basically pretty much a cure."

Read more:
Trump claims if stopping coronavirus 'were up to the doctors' the world would be shut down 'for a couple of years'

Trump keeps touting a decades-old malaria pill as a coronavirus 'game changer', undercutting his top infectious-disease expert

FAUX NEWS AND DR. TRUMP
Trump just gave a disastrous coronavirus town hall full of misinformation that could kill thousands
Eliza Relman

President Trump during a Fox News virtual town hall on 

Tuesday. Screenshot/Fox News

President Trump insisted the country needs to "get back to work" as soon as April 12 during a "virtual town hall" on Fox News on Tuesday afternoon.

The president repeatedly claimed that the economic damage from the response would be worse than the loss of life the virus causes, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.
"More people are going to die if we allow this to continue — people have to go back to work," Trump said. "We can't lose the advantage that we have."

The president also made a reckless claim that Americans can practice adequate social distancing while at work if they stop shaking hands and wash their hands more frequently.
Scientists and public-health experts agree that millions of Americans should stay home as businesses and schools close to contain the spread of the highly infectious virus, which is estimated to be 10 times as deadly as the seasonal flu.

The World Health Organization said on Tuesday that the US could soon become the epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic.

President Donald Trump made a host of unsubstantiated claims about the threat posed by the coronavirus and announced his intent to scale back federal guidelines on social distancing by April 12 during a Tuesday "virtual town hall" on Fox News.

Trump repeatedly downplayed the public-health threat posed by the pandemic and insisted without evidence that more Americans would die if the country remains on lockdown than if the economy reopens and the virus spreads more widely.

"More people are going to die if we allow this to continue — people have to go back to work," Trump said. "We can't lose the advantage that we have."

At one point Trump claimed, without evidence, that more Americans would die by suicide if the country remained on lockdown than would be killed by "the flu."

"You're going to lose a number of people to the flu, but you're going to lose more people by putting a country in a massive recession or depression," he said. "You're going to have suicides by the thousands. You're going to have all sorts of things happen."

—Salvador Hernandez (@SalHernandez) March 24, 2020

The president also insisted that the economic damage from the response to the virus will be more damaging than the loss of life, an assertion even some of his most vocal supporters have condemned.

"We had the best economy in the history of our country, and then all of a sudden we're supposed to shut it down," Trump said, adding of the response to the pandemic: "It's been very painful for our country and very destabilizing for our country and we have to go back to work."

Scientists and public-health experts agree that millions of Americans should stay home as businesses and schools close to contain the spread of the highly infectious virus. On March 16, the federal government issued guidelines recommending that Americans avoid gatherings larger than 10 people, home-school their children, and avoid travel, among other social-distancing measures.

Trump argued on Tuesday that he agreed to these measures — recommended by the nations infectious disease experts — only to avoid criticism and political fallout.

"If I would have not done it, we would've been unbelievably criticized for not doing it," he said. "Somehow the word got out that this is the thing we're supposed to be doing."


The president also claimed that Americans could practice adequate social distancing while at work if they stop shaking hands and wash their hands more frequently.

"We have to open this country up," Trump said. "We can socially distance ourselves and go to work, and you'll have to work a little bit harder and you can clean your hands five times more than you're used to. You don't have to shake hands anymore with people."

And he inaccurately compared the threat presented by the coronavirus to the flu and automobile accidents. The country's top infectious-disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, has repeatedly asserted that the coronavirus is 10 times as lethal as the flu.

"We lose thousands and thousands of people a year to the flu — we never turn the country off," Trump insisted. "We lose much more than that to automobile accidents. We don't call up automobile companies and say 'stop making cars.'"
—Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) March 24, 2020

The World Health Organization warned on Tuesday that the US could soon become the epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic. WHO spokeswoman Margaret Harris told a press conference in Geneva on Tuesday there had been a "very large acceleration" in US cases in recent days, according to Reuters.


Harris said that in the past 24 hours, 85% of all new reported coronavirus cases had been in the US and Europe, with 40% of those in the US.

Trump also condemned New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo for asking the federal government for help in amassing thousands of ventilators necessary for what is expected to be by far the largest surge in critically ill coronavirus patients in the US.

Cuomo asked Trump on Tuesday to release the national stockpile of 20,000 ventilators to New York state, which is facing a major shortage in the critical machinery as cases surge. The governor said experts predicted the state would see the apex of its cases in about 14 to 21 days, and urgently called on the president to instate the Defense Production Act to compel private companies to begin producing critical medical equipment.

The president instead faulted Cuomo for not purchasing 16,000 ventilators in 2015 in preparation for a pandemic — a deal the governor was reportedly offered several years ago.

"He had a chance to buy in 2015 16,000 ventilators at a very low price and he turned it down," Trump said. "I'm not blaming him or anything else, but he shouldn't be talking about us. He's supposed to be buying his own ventilators."


Earlier on Tuesday, Vice President Mike Pence insisted that the federal government was "in the process of literally sending the entire national stockpile of ventilators out." But Cuomo said hours earlier than the Federal Emergency Management Agency had made only 400 of its machines available to the state.

"You want a pat on the back for sending 400 ventilators? What are we going to do with 400 ventilators when we need 30,000 ventilators?" Cuomo said. "You're missing the magnitude of the problem."
—Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) March 24, 2020

Adam Bienkov contributed reporting.

Trump says he wants the US open for business by Easter, but he can't actually force governors to reopen their states

• President Trump is taking a new tack toward the coronavirus outbreak by calling for an imminent rollback of social distancing. But the president could face major hurdles in trying to enact his plan to "restart" the economy.
• During Monday evening's marathon press conference, political observers began pointing out the lack of a feasible plan from the president on how to get people back to work.
• Because of the 10th Amendment, Trump can only do so much to reverse the stay-at-home and essential work orders imposed by several states.

BOMBARDIER 

The history of the US Air Force private jet that crashed in Afghanistan and has been called 'as essential to mission success as bullets'

Business Insider•January 28, 202
Air Force E-11A Crash Afganistan

Anna-Marie Wyant/DVIDS/US Air Force


A US Air Force military aircraft crashed in Afghanistan, killing all on board.


The aircraft was an E-11A communications aircraft, the military version of a popular private jet aircraft made by Canada's Bombardier.


Though the US denied it was shot down, the aircraft had a no-fatality safety record in civilian and military use.


Following the crash, members of the US Navy's SEAL Team Six recovered two bodies and the aircraft's flight recorder, Reuters reported.


Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

The US Air Force confirmed on Monday that one of its aircraft had crashed in Afghanistan, killing all on board.

The aircraft was a Bombardier E-11A, the military version of the popular Bombardier Global Express aircraft family used by the world's elite for long-range travel.

Though the Taliban has taken credit, Air Force officials have denied that it was shot down.

The Air Force frequently uses modified versions of civilian aircraft for its transport and combat missions,including those used by the 89th Airlift Wing which flies the president of the US.

While CEOs and the upper echelon of society use the civilian version of the E-11A to jet-set around the world in style and comfort, the Air Force has a different mission for it, facilitating communication between military forces in the field.

Here's what we know about the aircraft.

The Bombardier E-11A is the military version of the Bombardier Global Express family.

Bombardier Global 6000 VistaJet David Slotnick/Business Insider
Source: US Air Force

The Global Express is one of the largest wide cabin VIP aircraft produced by Bombardier of Canada's private jet division.

Bombardier Global 6000 VistaJet David Slotnick/Business Insider

The Canadian aircraft manufacturer's Global Express product line is a director competitor to Gulfstream, whose planes are also used by the Air Force.

A US Air Force Gulfstream C-20 Kevin Wallace/DVIDS/US Air Force

For the Air Force, however, it has a much different mission.

Air Force E-11A Crash Afghanistan Anna-Marie Wyant/DVIDS/US Air Force

The aircraft is used to facilitate communications, acting as a 

central hub for communications between forces both on the ground and in the air.

Air Force E-11A Crash Afghanistan
Anna-Marie Wyant/DVIDS/US Air Force
Source: US Air Force

A flying repeater, the aircraft allows forces to communicate with each other even when separated via mountains or obstacles or when using different communications systems.

Air Force E-11A Crash Afghanistan
Anna-Marie Wyant/DVIDS/US Air Force
Source: Air Force Mag

The Air Force had only four of the aircraft in its fleet.

Air Force E-11A Crash Afghanistan
Anna-Marie Wyant/DVIDS/US Air Force
Source: Military Times

The aircraft is rare and only operates in Afghanistan, so new pilots usually have their first time at the controls when flying over combat areas.

Air Force E-11A Crash Afghanistan
Anna-Marie Wyant/DVIDS/US Air Force
Source: Air Force Mag

Its sole base of operations is in Kandahar, Afghanistan, where the US military has been embroiled in war since 2001.

U.S. airmen prepare a U.S. Air Force MQ-9 Reaper drone as it leaves on a mission at Kandahar Air Field, Afghanistan March 9, 2016. Picture taken March 9, 2016. REUTERS/Josh Smith Thomson Reuters Source: US Air Force

The name for the program is Battlefield Operational Communication Node, or BACN for short, like the breakfast food.

Air Force E-11A Crash Afghanistan 

94th Airlift Wing/DVIDS/US Air Force
Source: US Air Force

Though the range of the Air Force's variant is unknown, the civilian version of the aircraft has a range upwards of 6,000 nautical miles, according to Bombardier, making it ideal for long endurance flights over battlefields.

Bombardier Global Express
MyLoupe/Universal Images Group/Getty Images Source: Bombardier

Though not as fast as other Air Force planes, Bombardier reports the civilian version of the Global Express XRS aircraft have a maximum speed of around Mach .88, greater than 600 miles per hour.

Air Force E-11A Crash Afghanistan
Anna-Marie Wyant/DVIDS/US Air Force Source: Bombardier

Its creation for born out of necessity when the military wanted to shore up communications following the rescue of Navy SEAL Marcus Luttrell, a mission which was later turned into the movie "Lone Survivor."

Lone Survivor Exercise
Justyn Freeman/DVIDS/US Air Force Source: US Air Force

Now, the Air Force refers to the aircraft as "as essential to mission success as bullets."

Air Force E-11A Crash Afghanistan
Capt. Keenan Kunst Source: US Air Force

The aircraft has a strong safety record, with no recorded fatalities in the aircraft family's 27-year history before the recent incident.

Bombardier Global Express
Patrick McMullan/Getty Images Source: Aviation Safety Network

This would be the first time that a Global Express aircraft crashed without outside interference.
 

Afghanistan plane crash us air force Reuters Source: Aviation Safety Network

Following the crash, news sources reported that members of the US Navy's SEAL Team Six recovered two bodies and the aircraft's flight recorder, which can better tell what brought the aircraft down.

The wreckage of an airplane is seen after a crash in Deh Yak district of Ghazni province, Afghanistan January 27, 2020.

Reuters

Read the original article on Business Insider

Bombardier CEO Bellemare to step down
HE WAS FIRED

By Rama Venkat  Reuters March 11, 2020


Bellemare, President and CEO of Bombardier Inc., speaks during a news conference on the acceleration of Global 7000 business jet aircraft interior completion operations and the inauguration of the new Bombardier Centre of Excellence in Pointe-ClaireMore

(Reuters) - Canada's Bombardier Inc said late Wednesday Chief Executive Officer Alain Bellemare would step down and be replaced by former company executive and Hydro-Quebec CEO Eric Martel.

Bellemare, who took over the top job at Bombardier in 2015, has steered the company through some of its biggest challenges, including a brush with bankruptcy due to its costly C Series jet program.

Under his watch, the company has narrowed its focus on making business jets, after offloading its stake in the A220 passenger jet program - formerly known as the C Series - to Airbus SE and selling the rail division to France's Alstom SA earlier this year.

"With the five-year turnaround plan nearing completion, the board, including Mr. Bellemare, unanimously concluded that it was the appropriate time for a new leader to take the helm of the corporation," Bombardier said in a statement.

Martel had worked with Bombardier for 13 years and was the president of its business aircraft unit before joining the hydropower producer as CEO in 2015.

Bombardier removes CEO after trains, planes divisions sold off

AFP•March 12, 2020



Alain Bellemare has been replaced as CEO of Canadian firm Bombardier after a painful restructuring (AFP Photo/Eric PIERMONT)More


Montreal (AFP) - Bombardier has removed its chief executive Alain Bellemare, who oversaw the Canadian manufacturing behemoth's sell-off of its trains and commercial aviation divisions in a painful restructuring.

In his place, the Montreal-based company has hired back the former head of its business jet division Eric Martel.

The announcement comes less than a month after Bombardier sold its trains division to France's Alstom and a remaining stake in its C Series medium-range passenger jetliner program to Airbus, which rebranded it the A220.

Martel will start his new job on April 6. Prior to joining Hydro-Quebec, serving as its president and chief executive since 2015, he held several leadership positions at Bombardier.
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"He is an engaging builder with a deep understanding of our organization and product portfolio as well as of the global business aircraft industry," chairman Pierre Beaudoin said in a statement late Wednesday.

With Bombardier's five-year turnaround almost complete, Beaudoin said the board decided it was time for a change in leadership.

Under Bellemare's stewardship, the company effectively exited commercial aviation with the sale of its A220 stake, discontinued its money-losing Learjet 85 program, and sold its water bomber, Q400 turboprop, CRJ regional jet and flight training divisions.

Hoping to build on the success of its regional aircraft program in the 1990s it had poured billions of dollars into the development of the A220, which became the first new design in the 100- to 150-seat category of single-aisle aircraft in more than 25 years, to go head-to-head against giants Airbus and Boeing.

But it also racked up more than US$9 billion in debts.

The fire sale ended last month with Alstom's acquisition of Bombardier Transport, a leading maker of subway trains and trams.

The company that started out 80 years ago making snowmobiles was left with only one division focused on the market for business jet.

Alstom, Bombardier shares fall after $6.7 billion rail deal

By Sudip Kar-Gupta and Allison Lampert Reuters February 18, 2020

FILE PHOTO: A logo of Alstom is seen at the Alstom's plant in Semeac near TarbesMore

By Sudip Kar-Gupta and Allison Lampert

PARIS/MONTREAL (Reuters) - Shares of Alstom SA and Montreal-based Bombardier Inc fell on Tuesday after the French firm agreed to buy its Canadian rival's rail division for up to 6.2 billion euros ($6.7 billion), a deal likely to draw scrutiny from competition regulators and unions concerned about job cuts.

The cash and shares deal, announced Monday, will make the combined entity the world's second-biggest train maker after China's state-owned CRRC Corp. It is the latest attempt by Western rail firms to try to build scale to lower costs.

JP Morgan analysts said there was uncertainty ahead "during a lengthy anti-trust process."

Bombardier shares were down 7.88% at C$1.52 near midday on Tuesday. Alstom shares closed 3.2% lower at 48.70 euros in Paris.

Bombardier would use sale proceeds to cut its debt, which has been a concern for investors and rating agencies. Its net debt would drop to $2.5 billion once the deal closes in the first half of 2021.

But it also leaves Bombardier as the only large pure business jet maker, compared with rivals which also generate revenue from military sales.

"If there were a serious market downturn, they would be at a major disadvantage, since there would be no defense revenue to compensate," said U.S. aerospace analyst Richard Aboulafia, vice president of analysis at Teal Group.

Bombardier Chief Executive Alain Bellemare said the company is focused on the "most resilient market segments," of business aviation, including large cabin corporate aircraft and an aftermarket business that is "less susceptible to economic cycles."

"We are more than viable as a pure play," he told Reuters by email.

Alstom executives have sought to quell concerns about any hurdles they might face over competition issues, after EU regulators blocked its attempt to merge rail assets with Germany's Siemens AG last year.

U.S. regulators will also examine the deal, a Bombardier spokesman said.

The Bombardier acquisition has a lower market share in signaling than the Siemens option, which had been one of the main sticking points with regulators, Alstom Chief Executive Henri Poupart-Lafarge said on Monday.

The transaction was complementary, with Bombardier more present in Northern Europe and Alstom in the south, Poupart-Lafarge said, adding it would not affect jobs.

The combined groups would have some 10,000 staff, including temporary workers, in Germany, where Bombardier Transportation has its headquarters and seven factories.

France would be the second-biggest market in Europe, with some 6,730 total employees.

French trade unions were initially sanguine about the transaction, saying they were reassured by the fact Alstom was still in hiring mode at the moment and that order books were full.

Regarding job cuts, "the project, such as it has been presented to us, does not seem to be leading down that road, but we remain very vigilant," Patrick de Cara, a representative for the CFDT union at Alstom, said.


(Reporting by Sudip Kar-Gupta in Paris, Allision Lampert in Montreal and Maya Nikolaeva in Paris; Editing by Edmund Blair, Matthew Lewis and Tom Brown)

Airbus, Quebec to buy out Bombardier's A220 stakeBy Sudip Kar-Gupta Reuters February 12, 2020


FILE PHOTO: The logo of Airbus is pictured at the aircraft builder's headquarters of Airbus in Colomiers near ToulouseMore


By Sudip Kar-Gupta

PARIS (Reuters) - Airbus has teamed up with the Quebec government to buy Bombardier's 33.5% stake in the A220 passenger jet programme, completing the Canadian firm's exit from civil aviation and boosting Airbus's position in a new battleground with Boeing.

Under the terms of Thursday's deal, Airbus's stake in the A220 programme - known as Airbus Canada - increases to 75% from 50.1%, while Quebec's holding rises to 25%.

In taking the larger holdings, the European aerospace group and Canadian province will be assuming Bombardier’s share of A220 ramp-up costs, while Bombardier will receive $591 million net of adjustments. The deal will secure more than 3,300 Airbus jobs in Quebec, the companies added.

The A220, previously known as the CSeries, is a 110-130 seater aircraft, targetted at regional aviation markets and a little smaller than Airbus's mainstay A320 jet.

The European group's move into that smaller market has been mirrored by U.S. rival Boeing's planned tie-up with Brazilian regional jet manufacturer Embraer and opens a new front in the battle between the two planemaking giants.

Bombardier said the sale would help the company - which faced a cash crunch in 2015 - to improve its financial position. Bombardier on Thursday reported a quarterly loss.

"This transaction supports our efforts to address our capital structure and completes our strategic exit from commercial aerospace," President and Chief Executive Alain Bellemare said.

The deal also postpones until 2026 the agreed date when Airbus can buy out Quebec's stake in the A220 programme, three years later than originally planned. The province increased its stake for "no cash consideration", the companies said, in return for its bigger share of the funding burden.

Sources have told Reuters that Bombardier's rail unit may also be sold to French group Alstom, although any deal has yet to be finalised.

Montreal-based Bombardier ceded control of the A220 programme to Airbus in 2018 for a token C$1 as part of broader efforts to improve its finances.

Airbus announced the increase in its stake in the programme alongside a hefty 2019 net loss due to one-off costs.

(Reporting by Sudip Kar-Gupta and Laurence Frost; Editing by Clarence Fernandez and Mark Potter)

Bombardier exits commercial aviation as it reports $1.6 billion loss

Alicja SiekierskaYahoo Finance Canada February 13, 2020


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Bombardier has completed its exit from commercial aviation, selling its remaining stake of its joint venture with Airbus as the beleaguered company looks to save cash and improve operations.

And there may be more sell-offs to come, as the Quebec-based company continues to look at “strategic alternatives” that will help it accelerate the payment of its significant debt load, which has ballooned to more than US$9 billion.

Bombardier said Thursday that it will transfer its shares in the Airbus partnership, which produces the A220 aircraft formerly known as the CSeries, to Airbus and the Government of Quebec. The move provides Bombardier with approximately US$600 million in cash from Airbus and gets the company off the hook from investing a further US$700 million into the program.

The deal boosts Airbus’ stake in the program from just over 50 per cent to 75 per cent, while Quebec’s share jumps from 16 per cent to 25 per cent.

Bombardier sunk more than US$6 billion into the development of the aircraft, which chief executive Alain Bellemare said on a conference call with analysts Thursday “was the biggest challenge in 2015 when we joined the company.”

“We were losing a lot of money. It was a cash drain,” Bellemare said.

“The strategy was always to exit commercial aircraft, and we’ve done that very successfully, while protecting jobs... We’re going to continue looking at our options and see if there are ways we can accelerate the deleveraging phase of the turnaround plan.”

The company said Thursday that its commercial aviation business, which had included the Airbus A220, the Q400 and the CRJ programs, was burning approximately US$1 billion in cash and lost the company US$400 million as of 2016.

“Addressing the challenging portfolio was a fundamental step in the company’s turnaround plan,” Bombardier said in a statement.

The divestitures are expected to continue. Analysts have said Bombardier may have to consider selling one – or potentially all – of its existing assets, which now only includes its rail division and private business jet program.

Multiple reports have suggested that France’s Alston is in talks to purchase Bombardier’s rail division for just under US$7 billion. Earlier this month, a Wall Street Journal report also said the company was in talks to sell its private jet business to U.S.-based Textron Inc.

When asked about potential asset sales on a conference call with analysts, Bellemare would not confirm the reports, but said the sale of the A220 stake “gives us plenty of liquidity to do the right things.”

“We are looking at our strategic options. As you understand, this is very sensitive,” he said. “We believe we have very strong assets, we have a strong cash position, and we’re going to do it the right way.”

Bombardier executives were challenged by some analysts on the conference call Thursday, with Goldman Sachs analyst Noah Poponak questioning what the company’s strategy is going forward.

“It’s starting to look more like an asset liquidation than a turnaround,” Poponak said.

Bellemare reiterated that the fundamental reason the company is looking at strategic options “is to accelerate the deleveraging of the business.”

“We have been doing a lot of cleanup over the last five years, addressing some of the underperforming businesses,” he said.

“We are now ending up with two very strong franchises – the train side, and the business aircraft side. We have a strong cash position and we have options.”

Bombardier, which reports its financial results in U.S. dollars, saw revenue fall three per cent in 2019 when compared to last year, down to $15.8 billion. The company’s net income fell from a $318 million profit last year to a loss in 2019 of $1.6 billion.

Bombardier exits commercial aviation, ending bold bet on promising jet

By Allison Lampert and David Ljunggren Reuters February 13, 2020
A worker walks in front of a Bombardier advertising board

 at the SBB CFF Swiss railway train station in Bern

MONTREAL/OTTAWA (Reuters) - Bombardier exited commercial aviation on Thursday, selling a loss-making plane program that ended its high-stakes gamble on a new jet that once drove it to the brink of bankruptcy.

The Canadian plane and train maker sold its minority stake in the A220 jet, formerly known as the CSeries, to Airbus SE for $600 million, and said it would take a $1.6 billion charge on the program.

Bombardier once threatened to reshape global aviation with the first all-new narrow-body jet in 30 years, triggering a race by major rivals to develop their own new planes.

But the $6 billion program was beset with delays and cost overruns. Bombardier, which required government bailouts in recent years as it struggled to fund the program, finally sold a majority stake to Airbus in 2017 for one Canadian dollar, partly to avert a potentially devastating trade challenge from U.S. planemaker Boeing Co .

The latest deal gives Airbus a 75% stake in the A220 program and the Canadian province of Quebec will own 25%. It also allows Bombardier to avoid future capital investments of about $700 million.

Quebec, which agreed to invest $1 billion in the program in 2015, said it would not spend further on the venture.

Airbus will buy back Quebec's entire stake on Jan. 1, 2026, said provincial Economy Minister Pierre Fitzgibbon.

"Yes, the aerospace sector has experienced some turbulence these past few years but I think this will soon be behind us," Fitzgibbon told reporters in Quebec City. "I think this step was essential for the firm to continue its activities."

The Canadian government, meanwhile, was confident that a C$372 million ($280.59 million) loan it gave Bombardier in 2017 will be repaid and Ottawa will not write it off, a government source said.

The source added it wasn’t yet clear whether Bombardier or Airbus would be responsible for paying the rest of the loan.

Bombardier has been shedding businesses to turn itself around. Chief Executive Alain Bellemare told analysts on Thursday that the "clean up over the past five years" would continue.

"We have options and we are going to continue looking at our options to see if there (are) ways that we can accelerate the deleveraging phase of the turnaround plan," he said on a conference call.

The company forecast a near-positive cash flow, a closely-watched metric, for 2020. Its cash flow was a negative $1.20 billion in 2019.

The company is weighing a possible sale of its remaining business jet or rail divisions.

Bombardier's shares were down 1% in afternoon trading after earlier dropping 9% on disappointment the company did not announce a deal to sell its rail unit to France's Alstom .

Bombardier has faced higher rail costs due to a few challenging contracts and has $9.7 billion in outstanding bonds according to Refinitiv data.

The company sees 35-40 deliveries of its flagship Global 7500 business jet in 2020, which list for $73 million each.

(Reporting by Allison Lampert in Montreal and David Ljunggren in Ottawa. Additional reporting by Ankit Ajmera and Rachit Vats in Bengaluru; Editing by Bernadette Baum)