Banks saddled with US$30B in unwanted debt in risk exodus

Jill R. Shah and Claire Ruckin, Bloomberg News

The world's biggest banks have already had to use about US$30 billion of their own cash this year to fund loans for acquisitions and buyouts that they weren't able to offload to investors.

The lenders have been forced to fund at least 15 deals in the U.S. and Europe as inflation and risk of a recession evaporates investor appetite for risky corporate debt. The total tally, based on calculations using data sourced by Bloomberg, could nearly double over the coming months as more deals are scheduled to close.

While it's not uncommon for banks to self-fund deals when market sentiment sours, the sheer amount of hung debt -- including US$3.9 billion for Apollo Global Management Inc.'s purchase of Brightspeed and more than US$8 billion for a buyout of Nielsen Holdings Plc -- is deterring banks from making new financing commitments.

A US$28.7 Billion Pile of Hung Debt | Nielsen buyout among most notable deals stuck on banks' books in 2022

“Risk departments are going to be loathe to allow banks to make additional commitments and balance-sheet risks going forward,” said Steven Oh, global head of leveraged finance at Pinebridge Investments LLC. “There still are going to be some LBO transactions, but it's going to be hard because it's going to be more costly -- and the banks themselves are less likely to provide guaranteed underwriting.”

That's a problem as private-equity sponsors sit on a mountain of deployable capital and fear of a recession ripens public markets for takeovers. Private-equity funds had about US$1.2 trillion on hand as of mid-2022, according to data from Pitchbook.

Moreover, banks have about US$43 billion of U.S. high-yield bonds and leveraged loans in the pipeline, with about US$30 billion expected to launch by the end of the year, according to an Oct. 17 report by Deutsche Bank AG.

That includes the US$12.5 billion original financing package for Elon Musk's buyout of Twitter Inc., which banks led by Morgan Stanley are on the hook to fund, as well as US$5 billion of debt for Apollo's buyout of Tenneco Inc.

In Europe, underwriters are sitting on €1.5 billion (US$1.5 billion) of term loans to fund the buyout of Unilever's tea business Ekaterra, which has yet to launch. Earlier this month, banks led by ING Bank NV pulled a €274.3 million loan supporting Dutch-based artificial grass maker TenCate Grass Holding BV's takeover of Hellas Construction Inc.

Even as Asia's fledgling leveraged loan business booms, a takeover of Toshiba Corp. -- which could be the region's biggest buyout this year -- is at risk of slipping behind schedule. Bidding groups are struggling to secure financing commitments from banks, Bloomberg reported earlier this week.

 

LOOKING ELSEWHERE

With the amount of hung debt already in the tens of billions, some are looking to private credit markets to fill any gaps -- though there's also been some pullback there as well.

Still, the year is providing a once-in-a-generation opportunity for private credit to increase market share, said Todd Koretzky, a partner in the leveraged finance group at Allen & Overy.

“It's a perfect storm of opportunity and readiness,” he said. “The moment that the broadly-syndicated market was dislocated, the private credit funds were ready with large amounts of capital and the ability to write checks.”

Sponsors have also embraced other maneuvers. Private-equity firms have announced new acquisitions in recent weeks without debt financing in place, effectively backstopping the entire purchase price with cash from their own funds.

Elsewhere in credit markets:

EMEA

• There are five deals in Europe's primary market on Thursday, which will take the weekly sales tally beyond 27 billion euros.
• Among the day's issuers is Latvia with a euro note maturing in 2027 and a senior note from Cooperatieve Rabobank UA
• Bankers are starting to analyze all the ways in which climate change will affect the value of their trading operations, according to a joint study by the International Swaps and Derivatives Association and Ernst & Young
• UniCredit SpA has put a package of about €1.5 billion in unlikely-to-pay and non-performing loans up for sale, MF reports without citing anyone

Asia

• China's high-yield dollar bonds declined Thursday amid gains in sovereign-debt yields across Asia and falling equity prices as inflation worries persist.
• The cost of insuring bonds against default rose for a second day in Asia as debt yields climbed on concern that strong inflation and aggressive rate hikes will weigh on global economic growth
• Asia issuers still have strong interest in selling ESG notes despite the global bond rout that's curtailed supply this year, said Madhur Agarwal, JPMorgan's head of DCM origination for Asia ex-Japan. The bank said at a Wednesday press briefing it expects ESG notes to make up 35-40 per cent of the region's sovereign, corporate and bank issuance in 2023

Americas

• Three borrowers combined to price US$6.5 billion Wednesday, navigating a weaker broader backdrop compared with trading days earlier this week. 
• Weekly volume in the US high-grade market has topped US$15 billion and the most in four weeks, as a rare thawing in the volatility-lashed debt market prompted well-known companies to rush to get deals done before things get even worse
• In the high-yield market, cruise line operator Carnival Corp. raised more money than first anticipated and at a lower cost. It pulled in nearly US$5 billion of orders for a US$2 billion note, with the deal pricing at the lower end of revised price talk

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Tick, Tock, We Live By The Clock

No longer tied to offices, workers are still bound by the clock

Jo Constantz, Bloomberg News

Even as more companies accept remote-work arrangements, the norm of being available from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. shows little sign of fading.

That's even though 94 per cent of desk workers want flexibility in when they work, according to a new survey by Slack Technologies Inc.'s Future Forum, compared with 80 per cent who say they want location flexibility. Slack polled more than 10,000 desk workers in the US, Australia, France, Germany, Japan and the UK.

Asynchronous arrangements — meaning that employees get work done on their own schedules and aren't required to be online at the same time as their coworkers — remain rare outside some startups and tech companies.

While remote work provides more schedule flexibility than the office — allowing time to do laundry or take the dog for a walk, for instance — many people still feel pressure to have a “green dot” on their workplace software that shows they're online and working. 

A lot of this pressure comes from leaders and managers who are holding onto outdated norms of professionalism, said Future Forum's co-founder, Sheela Subramanian. “We need to have a broader conversation about professional norms and what it means to be a good employee,” she said. “We're at the beginning of this experiment, of re-evaluating the role of work in our lives. We have a long way to go.” 

Subramanian said that when she talks to executives about schedule flexibility, they often get alarmed (“But we have so many meetings!”). Yet having scheduling flexibility doesn't mean working at all hours or that employees will never get together in person, she said. On the contrary, many people want clearer boundaries around when they're expected to respond to messages. “Organizations can create flexibility within a framework,” she said. “They can set expectations and be intentional.”

Future Forum suggests adopting “core working hours,” where coworkers are all online for a set, limited block of time, team-level agreements so everyone's on the same page in terms of how the work will get done, and digital tools that help keep track of progress in a transparent way.

Crunchbase Inc., a software firm that specializes in private company data, established a core working-hours policy when it went remote last year. Since the company was hiring employees across time zones, it set aside 1 p.m. to 6 p.m. New York time for meetings and synchronous work.

For people used to traditional schedules, it can take some time to adjust to the fact that they may not get immediate responses outside of core working hours, said Kelly Scheib, Crunchbase's chief people officer. 

According to Future Forum, workers who have full schedule flexibility are almost 30 per cent more productive than those with no ability to shift their schedule. Location flexibility, by comparison, is associated with a four per cent bump in productivity. Employees with schedule flexibility say they can focus better and have improved work-life balance. Workers with no schedule flexibility are also more than twice as likely to look for a new job in the coming year compared with those who have moderate schedule flexibility.

The 9-to-5 shift was formalized on the factory floor by Henry Ford in 1926, and while its origins hold little in common with today's digitized workplaces, it's so culturally ingrained in our economy and social lives that it may not make sense to abandon altogether, said Alexia Cambon, a human-resources research director at Gartner Inc. Instead, she advocates for getting away from the norm of back-to-back meetings.

It all comes down to workers' need for autonomy and trusting they can get the job done.

“The person who is best placed to decide how they should work is the individuals themselves, because they know what makes them productive,” Cambon said.  

 

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Tick, Tock, We Live By The Clock

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Tick, Tock, We Live By The Clock: Consider this an appendix to my post Tempus Fug'It. Also see my pal Werner at Shagya Blog's post on clocks and time. 

Wall Street credit traders on track for worst year since 2012

William Shaw and Ronan Martin, Bloomberg News

The world's biggest banks are heading for their worst year of credit trading in a decade as soaring interest rates and global economic uncertainty bite into their profits.

The 200 biggest investment banks are set to collectively make US$8.3 billion this financial year, a 36 per cent yearly drop and the lowest since at least 2012, according to forecasts from Coalition Greenwich. Company bond yields are at the highest levels since the financial crisis in 2009. 

“This year feels especially challenging in light of the excellent revenue environment we saw in 2020 and 2021,” Mollie Devine, research director at Coalition Greenwich, said in an interview. “When revenue pools contract we tend to see banks think more critically about personnel needs. On the margins, desks start to become more cautious on new hires and to look at existing traders more carefully.”

Credit trading refers to buying and selling instruments such as government and corporate bonds across global debt markets -- one of the key arenas for firms to raise financing. If a borrower opts to raise debt on the public markets, it will typically hire a syndicate of banks to work together and find investors to buy those bonds in what is historically a big source of revenue for global lenders.

Last year's top three arrangers of global corporate bond deals, JPMorgan Chase & Co., Bank of America Securities and Citigroup Inc., have maintained their positions so far this year but seen volume roughly halve. JPMorgan has arranged US$78 billion of offerings year-to-date compared with US$144 billion at the same point in 2021, while Bank of America is credited with US$67 billion versus US$126 billion last year. Citi's US$64 billion share is down from US$118 billion.

Representatives for the banks declined to comment.

“Flows which drive revenues have been very low as the huge volatility and corresponding low liquidity in turn lowers volumes,” said Max Castle, a fixed income portfolio manager at Mediolanum. “Many investors are more likely to sit on existing cash bond positions rather than make big changes due to the liquidity challenges and instead use derivatives to alter the risk profile of portfolios.”

JPMorgan has helped bring bond deals to market for the likes of Amazon Inc. and also worked on a US$30 billion, 11-part transaction for AT&T Inc. and Discovery Inc. in March, Bloomberg's league table data show. Bank of America and Citi have helped arrange deals for firms including Meta Platforms Inc. and Caterpillar Inc. respectively.

Yet overall volumes have slumped as firms take a cautious approach to raising debt. Global non-financial corporate bond issuance has dropped nearly 35 per cent on last year to US$1.5 trillion and the lowest level since 2012, according to Bloomberg league table data.

Borrowers have had to contend with ever-narrower windows in which to get deals done, opting to avoid days with important data releases, central bank meetings or national holidays in other countries to maximize the available investors.

The subsequent lack of new issuance has hurt lenders' revenues, and investors are sitting on the sidelines given macro-economic uncertainty, Coalition's Devine said. 

Firms' clients have been more reluctant to trade, with many waiting until rates have settled at a higher point. “However by the end of last year spreads had gotten very tight, and this year there was almost nowhere to go but up,” she said.

Elsewhere in credit markets:

EMEA

• There were 11 issuers raising at least €6.56 billion-equivalent in Europe's primary market on Tuesday. Morgan Stanley is jumping into the European bond market, seeking at least €1 billion across a two-part deal on Tuesday in six-year and 11-year fixed-to-floating rate notes, according to a person familiar with the matter.
• Italian football club AS Roma SpA is repaying its bond investors early and in full as it seeks to lock in new debt
• German power company EnBW Energie Baden-Wuerttemberg AG is looking to sidestep the volatility of public debt markets to raise the equivalent of US$1 billion privately, according to people familiar with the matter
• The screws are turning on companies that need to make refinancing decisions for more than US$50 billion of junior bonds, with some taking unusual steps as the cost of issuing new debt soars
• The stress weighing on credit markets is proving a boon for Ture Invest AB, a Swedish private lender that is increasingly filling the void left by derisking banks and bond markets
• The recent tumult in the UK government bond market is likely to be repeated where leveraged strategies are in place, said BlackRock Financial Management Inc.'s Bob Miller
• The Bank of England denied a Financial Times report saying the central bank is delaying the start of its program of gilt sales

Asia

• Chinese junk dollar bonds dropped to a record low on Tuesday, as a property debt crisis sparked by a crackdown on excessive borrowing and a slide in home sales showed few signs of turning around.
• Dollar bonds from some Indonesian property developers are also heading for their biggest declines in roughly seven weeks as concerns about refinancing spreads across the sector
• Elsewhere, Australia's policy rate trajectory has been steeper than most other countries despite the central bank's unexpectedly smaller quarter-point hike this month, said Reserve Bank No. 2 Michele Bullock

Americas

• T-Mobile US Inc. has boosted the size of its revolving credit facility to US$7.5 billion and removed certain collateral pledges, as the borrower looks to take advantage of its recently achieved investment-grade rating.
• Bank of Nova Scotia, the Canadian bank with the largest exposure to Latin America, sold US$750 million of loss-absorbing hybrid securities amid mounting concerns about the spillover effects of U.S. Federal Reserve rate hikes on emerging-market economies
• Mark Mobius warned that interest rates will soar to a three-decade high of 9 per cent if inflation persists

Nokia announces $340M expansion to its Ottawa facility

Daniel Johnson , BNN Bloomberg

Nokia Canada has announced a $340-million expansion to its Ottawa facility.

In a news release issued on Monday, the Prime Minister’s Office says Nokia will also improve its laboratories "with the goal to further advance wireless technology research and development in Canada."

The project is expected to create more than 340 jobs in Ontario, the release states. Nokia Canada said that with the added positions, it would have around 2,160 employees in Ottawa. 

“The project we’re announcing will help connect Canadians to the jobs of today and tomorrow. It will bring economic benefits to the National Capital Region and stimulate Canada’s tech ecosystem. This is about building a strong economy and a better future for everyone,” Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in the release. 

In a press release Monday, Nokia Canada said construction is scheduled to begin in 2023 and the new facility is expected to open in 2026. Nokia Canada said the expansion will improve its capabilities in 5G technology, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence and machine learning, as well as facilitate growth in cloud software.

"Today's announcement reinforces Nokia's commitment to the Canadian market, where we have invested $1.4 billion in R&D over the past five years. Nokia's R&D hub will generate net-new Canadian IP and bring innovative advanced telecommunications and cyber security technologies to market, helping us achieve our goal of improving people's lives in Canada and across the world,” Jeffrey Maddox, the president of Nokia Canada, said in the release. 

The Government of Canada is planning to provide up to $40 million to the project through its Strategic Innovation Fund, according to the press release. The Government of Ontario will provide $30 million in funding through Invest Ontario. Through Hydro Ottawa, the City of Ottawa will contribute $2 million to upgrade control systems. 

The new facility will help Nokia work towards its sustainability goals of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 50 per cent by 2030, the release said.

According to the release, the facility will feature sustainable technologies, including water-side heat recovery, air-side heat and energy recovery, water-side free cooling as well as rainwater harvesting. 

Hayabusa 2 has brought back gases from an asteroid for the first time


View of the asteroid Ryugu from the Hayabusa 2 spacecraft JAXA, University of Tokyo & collaborators© Provided by New Scientist

For the first time, researchers are working on analysing pristine gases from an asteroid. These gases were brought back in rock samples collected by Japan’s Hayabusa 2 spacecraft, which visited the asteroid Ryugu from 2018 through 2019, and they are giving us hints about how and where the asteroid – and other objects in the solar system – formed.

Ryugu was most likely formed toward the edges of our solar system before the migration of the giant planets flung it towards Earth. A new analysis of the iron in the samples shows that it may have come from even further out than researchers realised, near Uranus and Neptune, so these samples may help illuminate the history of the outer solar system.

“Essentially all of our knowledge of how we think the solar system formed and what this outer solar system material looks like is based on meteorites, but those have the disadvantage that they fell to Earth and were contaminated by air and weather and people,” says Henner Busemann at ETH Zürich in Switzerland, part of the research team that analysed the Hayabusa 2 samples. “In this case we know exactly where the sample came from, and it never touched the ground or saw rain.”

That means that we can use these samples to understand the asteroid and outer solar system in more detail. One of the ways researchers did that was by examining the gases that shook loose from the rock samples, but remained in the airtight sample containers, as they jostled their way back to Earth and determining how those gases got to Ryugu.

Because some of these gases got there directly from space radiation, this allowed the researchers to measure the age of the asteroid’s surface. “If you would walk on the asteroid, you would be exposed to all of these cosmic rays and the solar wind, and you would die of cancer very soon,” says Busemann. “The rocks, of course, do not die, but they undergo nuclear reactions that can tell us how long the rock has been exposed.”

While Ryugu itself – or at least the parent body that it broke off of long ago – is expected to be about 4.5 billion years old, the rocks in the sample were only at the surface for about 5 million years. That age is consistent with the amount of surface turnover seen in asteroids near Earth, not in the outer solar system, so Ryugu must have migrated inward from its birthplace at least millions of years ago.

Journal references:Science Advances, DOI:10.1126/sciadv.add8141,

DOI:10.1126/sciadv.abo7239; Science, DOI:doi/10.1126/science.abo0431

HRW reports Taliban torture and ill-treatment of three Afghan women detained for protesting


The NGO Human Right Watch (HRW) has denounced Thursday the torture and ill-treatment allegedly suffered by three Afghan women detained for protesting against Taliban abuses.


Archive - Two women in burqa in Afghanistan - 

USAID / ZUMA PRESS / CONTACTOPHOTO

According to the women's testimony to the organization, they have experienced threats, beatings, dangerous conditions of detention as well as denial of due process.

In addition, authorities reportedly assaulted and tasered the women's male relatives, shedding light on the Taliban's treatment of women protesters in custody and the Taliban's efforts to silence the protest movement.

"It is hard to overstate the incredible bravery of these and other Afghan women protesting Taliban abuses," said HRW's deputy women's rights director Heather Barr.

"The stories of these women show how deeply threatened the Taliban feel by their activities, and the lengths to which the Taliban will go to try to silence them," she added.

The Taliban, according to the NGO, arbitrarily arrested the three women during a single raid on a safe house in Kabul in February 2022. Authorities held them and their family members for several weeks at the Ministry of Interior in apparent retaliation for their involvement in planning and participating in women's rights protests. After their release, they were able to flee the country.

Tamana Paryani, one of the first protesters to be arbitrarily detained under the Taliban government, videotaped herself when the Taliban raided her house at night looking for her, and then promptly posted the video on social media.

"I didn't know them well, but I was scared then," Paryani has maintained. "I woke up in the night and my whole body was shaking. We were very scared. We knew we would be arrested," he has detailed.

The three women described being initially held in a cramped and suffocating single room with a total of 21 women and seven children for five days, with virtually no food, water or access to a bathroom.

The Taliban held them for several weeks and interrogated them abusively, without allowing them access to a lawyer or other due process rights, forcing them to forcibly confess and severely torturing them.

The Afghan authorities also forced the families of the three women to hand over the original titles to their property as the price of release, threatening that the Taliban would confiscate the property if the women got into trouble again.

The organization has therefore called on the Taliban to "immediately" release all those detained for exercising their right to freedom of expression and peaceful protest.

"They must respect the rights of all to peaceful assembly and freedom of expression, including journalists covering protests. They must end all arbitrary detentions, ensure due process, including immediate arraignment of suspects in custody before an independent judge, and provide immediate access to a lawyer," HRW said in a statement.

They have also called on the Taliban authorities to hold individuals in accordance with the UN Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, noting that anyone responsible for torture or other ill-treatment "must be impartially investigated and duly prosecuted".

"Afghan women and girls have faced some of the harshest consequences of Taliban rule and have led the difficult struggle to protect rights in Afghanistan," Barr said.

"Unfortunately, their pleas to the international community to support them have gone unanswered," she has warned.

COLOMBIA

Petro will comply with the indigenous agreement of the previous government and asks not to call them «terrorists» for violence

IT'S NOT VIOLENCE ITS SELF DEFENSE

The president of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, has reaffirmed this Thursday that they will comply with the agreements reached between the previous government and the indigenous communities, whom he has asked not to be called "terrorists" for the violent altercations that took place in Bogota a day before, which he already condemned.


The President of Colombia, Gustavo Petro -

 PRESIDENCIA DE COLOMBIA

Petro has met this Thursday with representatives of the Emberá community after the altercations a day earlier in the Colombian capital, which resulted in some thirty people injured, among them fourteen policemen, as well as two arrested for the violent rampages that took place.

"A month ago they had no drinking water, they lived overcrowded with more than 1,200 people where only 400 fit. They have seen 21 of their members die, most of them children in Bogota," he wrote on Twitter about this indigenous community. They feel their dignity has been cheated. Every time they are beaten they come more to Bogota," he said.


About 200 people demonstrated this Wednesday in downtown Bogota to protest the breach earlier this year of the agreement that these communities reached with the previous government of Ivan Duque. In response, Petro has stated that these agreements will be implemented by his government.

Leaving aside the violence experienced, Petro has pointed out that these families are claiming their rights and has asked not to be called "terrorists" and not to commit "one of the greatest social injustices" which is to blame the victims. "Indigenous fathers and mothers who have seen their own children die of hunger, HIV, epidemics, lack of care," said the Colombian president.

Prior to these statements, President Petro took to social networks to condemn the acts of violence that took place in downtown Bogota, emphasizing that "aggression against a police officer will never be a protest" and the need to establish dialogue to solve conflicts.

The Colombian authorities have made public the photos of about twenty people suspected of assaulting police officers and of the acts of that mobilization, offering a reward of up to 50 million pesos (about 57,500 euros) for information that may lead to their arrests.

Former Marine Whose Leg Was Amputated Poses as 1940s-Style Pin-Up for Calendar to Benefit Veterans

Jason Duaine Hahn - Yesterday 3:31 p.m.

Former military members have transformed into glamorous models once again for the 17th annual Pin-Ups for Vets calendar, which raises funds for fellow veterans across the U.S.


Shane Karns© Provided by People

Among the 13 women posing as 1940s-style pin-up models in the 2023 annual calendar is Annika Hutsler, a 26-year-old Marine veteran who elected to have her right leg amputated below the knee in 2019 after the discovery of an intramuscular arteriovenous vascular tumor in her foot.

"I was in awe," Hutsler told Fox News of seeing her photo for the Miss November page of the calendar. "I model, so I've seen what I look like on-camera. But with the hair, makeup and dresses, I looked like someone from that era."

"I just remembered walking in [on set] and seeing all the dresses ready. The music from that era was playing," she added of the photo shoot. "It was just a really fun experience to get dolled up in that way."

RELATED: Female Veterans Pose for 1940s-Style Pin-Up Calendar for a Good Cause — and the Pictures Are Stunning!

Hutsler told the outlet that her grandfather, who served in both the Vietnam and Korean Wars, had an emotional reaction to seeing his granddaughter dressed in attire women worn when he was young.

"He saw the photos and awestruck would be the best word to describe his reaction," she said. "It just reminded him of back when he was overseas."

Hutsler said she was proud to be able to contribute to the 2023 edition of the Pin-Ups for Vets calendar, a project that has helped purchase $100,000 worth of rehabilitation equipment for veteran and military hospitals.

"If you look back at the history of what pinups were, it's women feeling like they were part of the war effort," she explained to Fox News. "It's coming back around now because everybody on the calendar is a veteran. And this is our way to pay tribute to those women who participated in the war effort before us. Not only are these calendars good for morale, but [founder Gina Elise] is demonstrating the importance of giving back to those who are trying to find their way in the civilian world now."

It's certainly not the first time Hutsler has been an inspiration in the veteran community.

In an interview with Semper Fi & America's Fund, she opened up about the decision to have her foot amputated after experiencing multiple infections and other painful setbacks in the months that followed her tumor diagnosis. Though she saw many doctors hoping to save her foot, she ultimately decided to go through with an amputation below the knee to preserve her quality of life.

RELATED: A British Army Veteran Finds Peace in Peru's Rainforest in Prime Video Documentary 'Wildcat'

Since then, Hutsler has competed in the Warriors Games, the 2019 Marine Corps Trials, and the 2020 Marine Corps Trials. She also has her sights on participating in the 2026 Paralympics as a snowboarder, she told the organization, whose mission is to care for critically wounded, ill and injured service members, veterans and military families.

Hutsler has shared many moments from her journey on social media.

"I have progressed so much from the girl that had goals just to learn to run and snowboard again," she wrote in a recent post.

"Life is hard," she added. "But that just makes you tough. And you've always come out on top of all the things you never thought you could."

Read the original article on People

 PUTIN'S ANTI GAY LAW IN U$A

Republicans aim to pass national ‘don’t say gay’ law

Sam Levine in New York - 

Congressional Republicans introduced a measure Tuesday that would prohibit federal money from being used to teach children under 10 about LGBTQ issues.

Photograph: Octavio Jones/Reuters© Provided by The Guardian

The bill would prohibit the use of federal funds to teach children about “sexually-oriented material”as well as “any topic involving gender identity, gender dysphoria, transgenderism, sexual orientation, or related subjects.” The effects of such a law, if enacted, would be far-reaching since a range of institutions – schools, libraries, among them – receive public money.

The bill also gives parents the ability to sue in federal court if their child is exposed to the barred material that is funded “in whole or in part” by federal funds.

The bill was introduced by Mike Johnson, a Louisiana Republican, and 32 other GOP members of Congress.

“The Democrat party and their cultural allies are on a misguided crusade to immerse young children in sexual imagery and radical gender ideology,” he said in a statement. “This commonsense bill is straightforward. No federal tax dollars should go to any federal, state, or local government agencies, or private organizations that intentionally expose children under 10 years of age to sexually explicit material.”

The bill is unlikely to become law while Democrats control the US senate and White House, but it underscores how Republicans have zeroed in on anti-LGBTQ issues as a way of rallying their base.

Earlier this year, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed a law that barred schools from teaching about sexual orientation or gender identity until third grade, “or in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards.”

More than a dozen states introduced so-called “don’t say gay” bills this year.

Republicans have also targeted drag shows as part of this anti-LGBTQ effort. Idaho lawmakers will reportedly consider a measure to ban drag shows in public.

'Momentous': Asian Americans laud Anna May Wong's US quarter


More than 60 years after Anna May Wong became the first Asian American woman to receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, the pioneering actor has coined another first, quite literally.



With quarters bearing her face and manicured hand set to start shipping Monday, per the U.S. Mint, Wong will be the first Asian American to grace U.S. currency. Few could have been more stunned at the honor than her niece and namesake, Anna Wong, who learned about the American Women Quarters honor from the Mint's head legal consul.

“From there, it went into the designs and there were so many talented artists with many different renditions. I actually pulled out a quarter to look at the size to try and imagine how the images would transfer over to real life,” Anna Wong wrote in an email to The Associated Press.

The elder Wong, who fought against stereotypes foisted on her by a white Hollywood, is one of five women being honored this year as part of the program. She was chosen for being “a courageous advocate who championed for increased representation and more multi-dimensional roles for Asian American actors,” Mint Director Ventris Gibson said in a statement.

The other icons chosen include writer Maya Angelou; Dr. Sally Ride, an educator and the first American woman in space; Wilma Mankiller, the first female elected principal chief of the Cherokee Nation; and Nina Otero-Warren, a trailblazer for New Mexico’s suffrage movement.

Wong's achievement has excited Asian Americans inside and outside of the entertainment industry.

Her niece, whose father was Anna May Wong's brother, will participate in an event with the Mint on Nov. 4 at Paramount Studios in Los Angeles. One of Wong's movies, “Shanghai Express,” will be screened, followed by a panel discussion.

Arthur Dong, the author of “Hollywood Chinese," said the quarter feels like a validation of not just of Wong's contributions, but of all Asian Americans'. A star on the Walk of Fame is huge, but being on U.S. currency is a whole other stratosphere of renown.

“What it means is that people all across the nation — and my guess is around the world — will see her face and see her name,” Dong said. “If they don’t know anything about her, they will ... be curious and want to learn something about her.”

Born in Los Angeles in 1905, Wong started acting during the silent film era. While her career trajectory coincided with Hollywood's first Golden Age, things were not so golden for Wong.

She got her first big role in 1922 in “The Toll of the Seat,” according to Dong's book. Two years later, she played a Mongol slave in “The Thief of Bagdad.” For several years, she was stuck receiving offers only for femme fatale or Asian “dragon lady” roles.

She fled to European film sets and stages, but Wong was back in the U.S. by the early 1930s and again cast as characters reliant on tropes that would be hardly be tolerated today. These roles included the untrustworthy daughter of Fu Manchu in “Daughter of the Dragon” and a sex worker in “Shanghai Express.”

She famously lost out on the lead to white actor Luise Rainer in 1937's “The Good Earth," based on the novel about a Chinese farming family. But in 1938, she got to play a more humanized, sympathetic Chinese American doctor in “King of Chinatown.”

The juxtaposition of that film with her other roles is the focus of one day in a monthlong program, “Hollywood Chinese: The First 100 Years,” that Dong is curating at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles in November.

“('King of Chinatown') was part of this multi-picture deal at Paramount that gave her more control, more say in the types of films she was going to be participating in,” he said. “For a Chinese American woman to have that kind of multi-picture deal at Paramount, that was quite outstanding.”

By the 1950s, Wong had moved on to television appearances. She was supposed to return to the big screen in the movie adaptation of Rodgers and Hammerstein's “Flower Drum Song” but had to bow out because of illness. She died on Feb. 2, 1961, a year after receiving her star.

Bing Chen, co-founder of the nonprofit Gold House — focused on elevating representation and empowerment of Asian and Asian American content — called the new quarter “momentous.” He praised Wong as a star “for generations.”

But at the same time, he highlighted how anti-Asian hate incidents and the lack of representation in media still persist.

“In a slate of years when Asian women have faced extensive challenges — from being attacked to objectified on screen to being the least likely group to be promoted to corporate management — this currency reinforces what many of us have known all along: (they're) here and worthy,” Chen said in a statement. “It's impossible to forget, though, as a hyphenated community, that Asian Americans constantly struggle between being successful and being seen.”

Asian American advocacy groups outside of the entertainment world also praised the new quarters. Norman Chen, CEO of The Asian American Foundation, plans to seek the coins out to show to his parents.

“For them to see an Asian American woman on a coin, I think it’d be really powerful for them. It’s a dramatic symbol of how we are so integral to American society yet still seen in stereotypical ways,” he said. “But my parents will look at this they will be pleasantly surprised and proud.”

To sum it up, Chen said, it's a huge step: “Nothing is more American than our money.”

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Terry Tang is a member of The Associated Press’ Race and Ethnicity team. Follow her on Twitter at https://twitter.com/ttangAP

Terry Tang, The Associated Press