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On New Year's Day in 2017 the Kansas City Chiefs won their regular-season finale, with Charcandrick West's two touchdown catches from Alex Smith leading the way over the San Diego Chargers.

The Chiefs won the AFC West title that day, taking a tiebreaker with the Oakland Raiders. From that day until Sunday night, the Chiefs held at least a share of first place in the AFC West every single day, according to ESPN Stats and Info.

When the Baltimore Ravens fell on Clyde Edwards-Helaire's fumble Sunday night to seal a win over the Chiefs, Kansas City's streak ended. Not only are the Chiefs not in first place, they're looking up at two teams. The Las Vegas Raiders and Denver Broncos are both 2-0. The Los Angeles Chargers are 1-1.

The Chiefs winning the AFC West has become one of the biggest locks in the NFL. Part of that has been the Chiefs' dominance, but the other part is that the other three division teams have rarely been good enough to make things interesting. This season, they all are.

The Raiders have two quality wins over the Baltimore Ravens and Pittsburgh Steelers. The Broncos haven't played a tough schedule, but we can see that Teddy Bridgewater is having a positive impact on the offense. The Chargers lost a last-second game to the Dallas Cowboys, but they'll be a factor too. L.A. has a chance to make things very interesting when it travels to face the Chiefs this weekend.

Tyrann Mathieu and the Chiefs are in an unfamiliar position in the AFC West after a loss to the Ravens. (Photo by Rob Carr/Getty Images)

Of course, whether the Chiefs win the division yet again depends mostly on the Chiefs. At Kansas City's peak, it's probably the best team in football. But it has been surprisingly rare to see that Chiefs team since the middle of last season.

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Against-the-spread records don't matter in NFL standings, but they can be telling. The Chiefs are just 1-11-1 against the spread since last Nov. 1. They're mostly doing just enough to get by every week. That matters, but elite teams generally have a few blowouts over a 13-game stretch. The only game the Chiefs have won by more than six points since last Nov. 1 was the AFC championship game against the Buffalo Bills.

The Chiefs are still great, but it has been a long time since they were wrecking the rest of the NFL. In Week 1, they needed a furious comeback against the Cleveland Browns to win at home. In Week 2 they blew a double-digit lead and lost. If their inability to pull away from anyone lately is a sign, the AFC West race might actually be pretty good. The Chargers still have the highest ceiling, but we can't rule out the Raiders or Broncos. Both have looked good.

The Chiefs still should win the division. They're the best team. But it has been a long time since there was any real intrigue. We might get some this season.

Here are the power rankings following Week 2 of the NFL season:

32. Jacksonville Jaguars (0-2, Last week: 32)

Trevor Lawrence's line Sunday: 14-of-33 for 118 yards. He had a 37.2 passer rating. The Jaguars aren't very good but Lawrence has been part of the reason so far. He has to play better.

31. Houston Texans (1-1, LW: 31)

Tyrod Taylor hasn't been ruled out of Thursday's game yet, but it would be a tough turnaround. The Texans have been very competitive this season, but that job gets tougher if Davis Mills is at quarterback.

30. New York Jets (0-2, LW: 28)

The Jets need something to help Zach Wilson, whether it's an offensive line or a running game or some play-calling that's not putting him in position to force downfield interceptions. He has taken a league-leading 10 sacks. He has five interceptions. The Jets have 20 points through two games. It's not good.

29. Detroit Lions (0-2, LW: 30)

The Lions aren't good, but they have shown some decent signs, whether a comeback to almost tie the 49ers in Week 1 or leading at the half at Lambeau Field on Monday night. Dan Campbell seems like the type of coach who can keep his team engaged, even when the record will look ugly.

28. Atlanta Falcons (0-2, LW: 29)

The Falcons' point differential through two games is minus-49, easily the worst in the NFL. It's not like you can blame the schedule; the Eagles lost right after blowing out the Falcons. It's just a bad team that isn't getting much out of the few blue-chip players it actually has.

27. New York Giants (0-2, LW: 27)

Daniel Jones played well, and if not for an offsides penalty on a missed field goal, the Giants would have gotten a nice win at Washington. Not all is lost, though 0-2 isn't a great place to be.

26. Minnesota Vikings (0-2, LW: 25)

The NFL can be cruel. The Vikings gave up a fourth-and-inches completion to lose in overtime of Week 1. They had a 37-yard field goal to win in Week 2. If they're 1-0-1, they probably are feeling pretty good. Now, they might be wondering if Mike Zimmer is on the hot seat.

25. Cincinnati Bengals (1-1, LW: 24)

Joe Burrow had a rough day, but he doesn't seem like the type who will let that bother him. There are better days ahead for the Bengals, even if they're not there yet.

24. Philadelphia Eagles (1-1, LW: 23)

The Eagles had three plays of more than 10 yards, not including Jalen Hurts runs: Quez Watkins' 91-yard gain in which he didn't score, a 14-yard catch by Dallas Goedert and an 11-yard catch by DeVonta Smith. The Eagles' playmakers around Hurts are better than this, and they'll need to be going forward (as will Hurts).

23. Chicago Bears (1-1, LW: 26)

Justin Fields looked a beat late on most of his throws. But, he was a rookie coming off the bench cold. He should be a lot better in Week 3 with a full week of practice, if he gets the start.

22. Indianapolis Colts (0-2, LW: 21)

When you get zero points on your first two trips inside the 5-yard line then lose by a field goal, there will be regrets. The Colts play at the Titans this weekend, and if they're 0-3 coming out of that they'll be in a hole they might not dig out of.

21. Washington Football Team (1-1, LW: 20)

It was a heck of a win against the Giants, but we need to start wondering when the defense will show up. Daniel Jones had way too much time in the pocket. We'll see what it does Sunday at Buffalo. Washington isn't competing for an NFC East title unless the defense is really good, and it hasn't been yet.

20. Dallas Cowboys (1-1, LW: 19)

Tony Pollard had 109 yards on 13 carries while Ezekiel Elliott had 71 yards on 16 carries. This is why you don't pay running backs top dollar. Regardless, it seems clear the Cowboys have two backs they can trust and use.

19. Tennessee Titans (1-1, LW: 18)

Derrick Henry is from another era, and it's great. No other running back looks like him, plays like him or has anywhere near the workload he does. He had 41 touches and 237 total yards in a win the Titans needed. And if the Titans ask next week, he'll probably do the same thing again.

18. New Orleans Saints (1-1, LW: 7)

Hard to remember the last team that had such a big drop from one week to another. It's arguable the Saints were the NFL's best team in Week 1 and its worst in Week 2. Six first downs, 128 yards? How can you reconcile that with what we saw in the opener against the Packers?

17. Los Angeles Chargers (1-1, LW: 10)

Justin Herbert is still a young quarterback, something that gets forgotten because he has been so good. His two interceptions came in Cowboys territory, including one into the end zone. You're not going to make those mistakes and win in the NFL, and the picks cost the Chargers a shot at what would have been a nice win.

16. New England Patriots (1-1, LW: 15)

Josh Uche, a second-round draft pick last year, did little as a rookie. This season he's off to a fast start with three sacks, including two Sunday. He could be a big piece for the Patriots this season, and maybe for a while.

15. Miami Dolphins (1-1, LW: 13)

It's hard to know what to do with the Dolphins. Had they lost 35-0 with their starting quarterback that would have been a big blow, but Tua Tagovailoa exited with bruised ribs after four passes. We'll check back with the Dolphins when they have Tua healthy again. A Week 3 game against the Raiders is very interesting.

14. Carolina Panthers (2-0, LW: 22)

Sam Darnold will get a lot of attention, but it's the defense that needs more respect. This is a really exciting unit with what looks like a top-end pass rush. The Panthers made life miserable on the Saints' offense. Keep an eye on Carolina as this could be a playoff team.

13. Green Bay Packers (1-1, LW: 14)

Through six quarters, when the 0-1 Packers trailed the Lions at halftime of Week 2, it looked scary for Green Bay. The Packers still need to get better on defense, but it was a step forward. And at least a win. It would not have been a fun week in Green Bay at 0-2.

12. Cleveland Browns (1-1, LW: 11)

Odell Beckham Jr. is still out, having not fully recovered from his torn ACL. Jarvis Landry has a sprained MCL, and that's not an easy injury for a receiver. Until the Browns get their top two pass catchers back, the offense could be one dimensional.

11. Buffalo Bills (1-1, LW: 9)

Because the offense gets the attention, and the Bills have lost a game, their defense isn't getting enough credit. It has played very well two straight weeks. A lot of Sunday's shutout was the Dolphins losing starting quarterback Tua Tagovailoa to injury, but Miami still had an NFL offense. Once the Bills' offense really takes off, Buffalo still could reach the heights expected of it before the season thanks to a stifling defense.

10. Pittsburgh Steelers (1-1, LW: 8)

The offense seems stuck. You can't pin all of Sunday's loss, with just 17 points, on Ben Roethlisberger, but the passing game wasn't great. Pittsburgh, who drafted running back Najee Harris in the first round, never got a running game established. And when the defense gives up 382 yards passing, it's not going to turn out well.

9. Denver Broncos (2-0, LW: 16)

Courtland Sutton's huge day is a great sign for the Broncos. Eventually they'll get Jerry Jeudy back from a high ankle sprain, and they have a fun group of skill-position talent. The defense is good too. This is an interesting team, and since they play the Jets on Sunday, they're likely going to be 3-0.

8. Baltimore Ravens (1-1, LW: 12)

The Ravens were looking at starting 0-2 from a weird overtime game and a last-second loss to the Chiefs after a great comeback. A loss Sunday night would have been devastating but rookie Odafe Oweh knocked loose a fumble and recovered it. It's way too early to say that saved the Ravens' season, but it might turn out to be true.

7. Las Vegas Raiders (2-0, LW: 17)

When we hear so-and-so is the "most underrated player," they're usually not underrated at all, just under the radar for whatever reason. Derek Carr really is underrated. He keeps playing good, solid football, and he's off to a fantastic start this season. He's much lower on those quarterback ranking lists than deserved. It's time to give Carr some long-overdue credit.

6. Seattle Seahawks (1-1, LW: 5)

The Seahawks lose in overtime to fall to 1-1, and they're all alone in last place of the NFC West. They're No. 6 in these power rankings (not going to penalize them too much for an overtime loss) and yet the fourth NFC West team on this list. This is going to be a tough division.

5. Arizona Cardinals (2-0, LW: 6)

The good news is that playoff teams need to win when they don't play their best. This wasn't the Cardinals' best. Kyler Murray made some bad mistakes and the defense wasn't close to as good as it was in the opener. The Cardinals needed a missed 37-yard field goal to win. But they won. That'll matter in a few months when the playoff field is set.

4. Kansas City Chiefs (1-1, LW: 1)

It's not like a loss at Baltimore is bad. It stinks for Clyde Edwards-Helaire that it'll be on him for his late fumble, but he hasn't built up enough goodwill for everyone to forgive and forget. He has been nowhere near the playmaker the Chiefs thought they were getting in Round 1 of the 2020 draft.

3. Los Angeles Rams (2-0, LW: 4)

Cooper Kupp had a magnificent day and posted a dominant 9-163-2 line in the win. There will be weeks it's Robert Woods' turn or Tyler Higbee turns in a big game, but Kupp is going to put up a monster season.

2. San Francisco 49ers (2-0, LW: 3)

The offense carried a Week 1 win. In Week 2, it was a defensive gem. At some point both sides will both dominate for a stretch. About the only issue for the 49ers now is finding a healthy running back to face Green Bay in Week 3.

1. Tampa Bay Buccaneers (2-0, LW: 2)

Is Tom Brady really going to set a single-season touchdown record at age 44? It sure seems like the Buccaneers are making that a goal because Brady is throwing it early and often. What he's doing at this age is something we'll be talking about decades from now.

The rest is here:

NFL Power Rankings: Maybe this is the season someone challenges Chiefs in AFC West - Yahoo Sports

In her new drama The Starling, Melissa McCarthy plays a grocery store clerk engulfed in grief after the death of her young daughter a tragedy that's lingering traumatic effects have landed her art teacher husband (Chris O'Dowd) in a psychiatric hospital.

In Matt Harris's original script for the film, which was circulating around Hollywood for years after landing on the Black List for best unproduced screenplays in 2005, McCarthys main character was a man whose wife was institutionalized.

The Starling's gender-flipping calls to mind another project McCarthy was involved with in recent years 2016s Ghostbusters, which famously rebooted the beloved action-comedy series with four female leads, also including Kristen Wiig, Leslie Jones and Kate McKinnon. Though the Paul Feig-directed film was generally well-received by critics and still has a strong following, it notoriously became a flash point for toxic fandom, with angry and oftentimes blatantly sexist fans of the original films angrily railing against it and bullying its co-star Jones off of social media with racist attacks.

Five years later and in the lead-up to a new Ghostbusters release (November's sequel Ghostbusters: Afterlife, which reportedly ignores the events of the 2016 film) McCarthy reflected on the vitriol their film received in an interview with Yahoo Entertainment.

Kristen Wiig, Leslie Jones, Melissa McCarthy and Kate McKinnon in Ghostbusters (Sony)

"There's no end to stories we can tell, and there's so many reboots and relaunches and different interpretations, and to say any of them are wrong, I just dont get it," McCarthy told us (watch above).

I don't get the fight to see who can be the most negative and the most hate-filled. Everybody should be able to tell the story they want to tell. If you don't want to see it, you don't have to see it."

McCarthy is proud of the approach The Starling director Ted Melfi (Hidden Figures) took in recognizing how and why the film's parental roles could be reversed.

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"This one was a wonderful switch," she says. "This was Ted's idea. He said when he read it, he was raised by a single mother, he was like, 'I didn't buy the woman falling apart. In his life, it's always been the females that have kind of kept it together and kept trudging.

"I also think a man could be vulnerable and broken in a way that we've not traditionally seen."

The Starling premieres Sept. 24 on Netflix.

Watch the trailer:

-Video produced by Stacy Jackman and edited by Luis Saenz

See original here:

Melissa McCarthy reflects on 'Ghostbusters' backlash 5 years later: 'I don't get the fight to see who can be the most hate-filled' - Yahoo...

The vast majority of money managers remain cautious on cryptocurrency investing, despite some big name investors putting their money behind digital coins, according to one analyst.

Speaking at Yahoo Finances All Markets Summit Plus, Fairlead Strategies founder Katie Stockton said crypto adoption still remains in the "very early stages" with limited institutional money flowing into the space.

We're kind of at the very low end of that curve, right? That could accelerate to the upside, she said. That goes not just for individuals but institutions as well, especially pension funds is one source of major assets out there. Really which have not largely been deployed to cryptocurrencies now.

More than half of the worlds largest banks now have exposure to crypto, either through direct or indirect investments in projects related to digital currencies and blockchain, according to Blockdata. But more conservative wealth managers, including state and local pension funds, have largely remained on the sidelines, concerned about the price volatility and regulatory uncertainty clouding the industry.

Earlier this month, two Virginia public pension funds announced they were seeking approval for a $50 million investment in a fund that buys digital tokens and cryptocurrency derivatives, becoming one of a few pension funds to publicly announce they are jumping in.

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I think when we get there, we will see that greater liquidity and sort of tighter spreads, if you will, influence them in a positive way such that there will be less volatility, said Stockton. But we found that using the charts and the technical indicators at our disposal that the cryptocurrencies are really minding support resistance levels. So while there is expected volatility, we have ways to manage risk to navigate those short-term swings by identifying key levels, and combining them with indicators that measure things like momentum and overbought oversold readings.

Adoption among retail traders have accelerated at a faster rate, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. The price of bitcoin alone has increased nearly 500%, from March 2020. The ease with which investors can now buy digital coins, through platforms like Coinbase (COIN), Paypal (PYPL), and Robinhood (HOOD), have also led to increased exposure. A recent study by the University of Chicago found that 13% of Americans traded crypto over the last 12 months, compared to 24% who invested in stocks.

Regardless of adoption rates, Stockton sees a "long-term uptrend in crypto." Despite a recent sell-off triggered by Chinas central bank banning all crypto transactions, and fears around the Chinese property market, Stockton said crypto assets have held on to key resistance levels, signaling support in the market.

Bitcoin has tended to outperform when they're collectively going lower and [crypto assets] do tend to remain directionally in step, she said. So even though you can always find sources of outperformance and underperformance, you'll find that most [coins] are all up on the same day and all down on the same day and I think that that is something that we can depend upon.

Akiko Fujita is an anchor and reporter for Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter @AkikoFujita

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Crypto is in the early stages of a long-term upward trend: Analyst - Yahoo Finance

Amazon (AMZN) is giving away $40 million in credits for its Amazon Web Services (AWS) platform to help address health care inequities. The goal is to reach populations around the world with limited access to health services and to analyze data from underrepresented groups to better understand how inequality affects peoples health.

What weve seen over the past 18 months is customers, researchers, all working diligently to solve the COVID-19 pandemic, and now weve got the opportunity on the other side of this to address some of the other fundamental things, the inequities, that we discovered that the COVID-19 pandemic has laid bare, Max Peterson, VP of AWS worldwide public sector, told Yahoo Finance Live on Monday.

The tech industry has made health care one of its next big investment targets, with giants from Facebook and Apple to Microsoft and Google investing in the sector through either consumer products like the Apple Watch to the availability of commercial health services technology.

Amazons AWS is the global leader in cloud computing, accounting for 31% of total worldwide cloud spending in Q2 2021, according to Canalys.

Amazon is giving away $40 million in AWS credits to combat health inequity. (Photo by Jeff Halstead/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

The AWS credits will go to organizations that focus on three main areas including telehealth; understanding and addressing socioeconomic and environmental factors that impact peoples health, and ensuring data from underrepresented groups are included in medical studies.

The first will focus on getting health care to underserved areas. Amazon says that could include bringing telehealth to underserved regions and enabling remote patient monitoring.

Telehealth took off during the pandemic to help patients see their doctors in non-emergency medical situations without risking exposure to the coronavirus.

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Peterson says that an increase in telemedicine could address a lack of health resources in regions that dont have any available medical professionals, which is the case for roughly half the worlds population.

In addition to remote health care, Amazon will provide the AWS credits to organizations that look to address social determinants of health, or things ranging from the availability of healthy food to safe housing to clean air.

This will allow companies that leverage technology to harness AWS services to be able to look into the broader socioeconomic environmental factors that play a role in [health], Peterson said.

The pandemic made it clear that a number of factors ranging from economic stability and food insecurity can make for worse overall health outcomes. COVID-19 hit communities of color particularly hard, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The death rate from COVID-19 was twice as high for Black people than whites and 2.3 times as high for Hispanic patients.

The AWS effort will fund research into improving the diversity of available medical data, with the goal of improving outcomes for underserved people.

By using and analyzing things like global averages and health statistics, we think that our customers and our partners will be able to create new data sets that increase representation of underserved or underrepresented communities so that we have more accurate data sets for health about race, ethnicity, gender, and disability," Peterson said.

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Why Amazon is giving away AWS credits to promote health equity - Yahoo Finance

Public health officials agree that vaccination is key to ending the COVID-19 pandemic. However, despite the fact that 55 percent of the population of the United States is fully vaccinated with 64 percent having received at least one dose many remain hesitant, with some pointing to potentially dangerous side effects or adverse reactions. While medical professionals stress that both are extremely rare, some people will experience them and, understandably, many of these people are eager to share their stories.

Many experts, who acknowledge that vaccines can have any potential side effects, stress that these rare reactions must be weighed against the realities of COVID-19 and that stories about them should not scare people away from receiving what can be life-saving shots.

John Stokes, a 21-year-old senior and student athlete at Tennessee State University, is one such person who says that he had an adverse reaction to a COVID-19 vaccine.

In a since-removed TikTok posted earlier this month, he explained that he was hospitalized with myocarditis an inflammation of the heart and a previously known potential reaction to the vaccine shortly after receiving his second shot of the Pfizer vaccine. Stokes, who filmed the video from his hospital bed, was ultimately told that he was ineligible to continue to play at least the fall portion of his senior golf season, as he was warned against elevating his heart rate.

A student athlete developed myocarditis after receiving the COVID-19 vaccine. (Getty)

Before TikTok removed the video, it had received 4.5 million views, as well as hundreds of thousands of likes. Stokes, who denies the video violated any of TikToks community guidelines, filed an appeal to have the video reinstated, which the social media platform allegedly denied. Many commenters applauded Stokes for telling his truth, some of whom made it clear that they had no interest in ever receiving the vaccine.

Stokes tells Yahoo Life that he received his second COVID-19 vaccine shot on Aug. 31. Shortly after, he says, he developed common, temporary flu-like side effects, which included body aches. However, his chest pain, which he initially likened to a gas-like feeling, soon got worse.

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I told my parents something wasnt right, and we called the doctor, Stokes says. He told me to go to the ER. They diagnosed me with myocarditis, and they told me it was from the vaccine. I was hospitalized for several days after.

While in the hospital, Stokes says his heart initially hurt so much that he was unable to sleep. He was monitored by doctors and given Tylenol and a second anti-inflammatory agent whose name he was unable to recall. His doctors, he explains, did not want to give him additional medication and advised him to rest. Eventually, the extreme pain subsided, though he says he still has chest pain that is, however, more manageable.

It is easy to see why Stokess story would read as a warning against the vaccine. He is a young, seemingly healthy college athlete, whose time on the golf course was seemingly shortened after receiving the inoculation. (Stokes tells Yahoo Life that the concern about playing golf specifically focused on carrying heavy equipment long distances during tournaments, and he says that he was informed that even game-time nerves could negatively affect his heart.) Stokes says he is now an advocate against mandates from the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and says he is unhappy that TikTok has seemingly censored his story, despite it being the truth.

Yet many medical professionals are concerned about how quickly Stokess video circulated not because he was sharing misinformation but because stories like this, especially those that come with a call to action to reconsider the vaccine, can give people false sense of the real risks.

Dr. Eric Stecker, chair of the American College of Cardiology Science and Quality Council, tells Yahoo Life: It is very natural and appropriate to wonder whether the risk of myocarditis is worth taking, when the risk of critical illness or death is very low for people under age 30. The key is to recognize that the risk COVID-19 poses to adolescents and young adults is far from zero. In fact, because the Delta variant is so transmissible and vaccination rates in younger age groups are low, ICUs across the country are filling with younger patients than they did at any point in the pandemic.

Stokess experience may make people feel uncertain or even scared, but Stecker stresses that the data is still on the side of getting vaccinated.

The CDC has analyzed the risk-benefit trade-off and found that for every million doses administered of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines for people ages 12 to 29, approximately 6 deaths, 138 ICU admissions, 560 hospitalizations and 11,000 infections from COVID-19 will be avoided, he notes. This comes at the cost of 39 to 47 cases of myocarditis, almost all of which are mild and do not cause long-term heart problems. Strictly considering myocarditis risk and ignoring the other severe problems from COVID-19, people under 25 years old are 7 to 37 times more likely to get myocarditis from infection with COVID-19 than they are from the vaccine.

Dr. Nathan Anderson, a fellow of the American College of Cardiology, says that while the exact reason for myocarditis post-vaccination has not yet been confirmed, this kind of myocarditis may be easier to recover from than myocarditis caused for reasons other than an immune response.

We dont know for certain why the mRNA vaccines may cause myocarditis. However, inflammation, which is the root cause of myocarditis, is an immune system reaction, and since the vaccination is intended to train your immune system to recognize an invader by provoking an immune response, it makes sense that an overreaction within the immune system can result in other effects, he explains. In fact, the most common cause of myocarditis in America prior to the coronavirus pandemic was viruses that cause mild illness in the vast majority of people; but in a small number of people, for unclear reasons, they either infect the heart muscle or provoke a hyper-response in the immune system which results in myocarditis. In very severe myocarditis cases, the virus actually replicates within the heart muscle cells, damaging them directly. These cases are often much more difficult to treat than cases related to immune response.

Yet data points, no matter how thoroughly researched, do not have the appeal of a passionate video. That is part of the reason why TikToks Team Halo was created: The social media campaign, organized by the United Nations and the Vaccine Confidence Project, was established in order to build trust in COVID vaccines and cut through the noise surrounding them.

Team Halo member Dr. Siyab Panhwar, who made a video in response to Stokess initial post about myocarditis, stressed that the risks from the vaccine are extremely rare, while the potential risks from COVID itself are much, much worse.

The answer is overwhelmingly in favor of the vaccine, he explains. The mandates are more complicated they are more a political issue than a medical issue. I believe people should make their own decisions, but having properly assessed the data and their risk.

Team Halos Jess, a registered nurse who posts under the name @jesss2019 on TikTok, worries that fear will cloud facts.

Even though his story is sincere, the message and the way its put out can cause fear, she notes. What vaccine-hesitant viewers are not realizing is the perspective. Is this a risk with the mRNA vaccines? Yes. Is it a rare risk? Absolutely."

Ultimately, some people will be left in a far worse position than if they had chosen to be vaccinated, she warns.

"There are people who are COVID long-haulers, in their 30s, who are now on a ton of heart medication or had valve replacements," she says. "Were not seeing those kinds of heart issues with the vaccine but were seeing it with COVID-19.

See the original post:

A student athletes TikTok went viral after he developed myocarditis from the vaccine. Heres what experts want you to know. - Yahoo Life

This article originally appeared on Simply Wall St News.

The share price of Snap Inc. ( NYSE:SNAP ) rose to yet another new all time high of $83.54 on Friday. The stock price is now up more than 800% in just over 18 months, and 30% since the company released second quarter results two months ago. Some investors may be wondering if the stock price has now run too far, and whether its realistic to expect further upside.

The good news for shareholders is that Snap still appears to be trading at a modest discount to its intrinsic value which we calculate in detail below. This calculation is based on analyst forecasts which have been rising consistently since 2018.

See our latest analysis for Snap

To estimate Snaps fair value, we are using the forecast future cash flows of the company and discounting them back to today's value. We will use the Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) model on this occasion. There's really not all that much to it, even though it might appear quite complex.

We generally believe that a company's value is the present value of all of the cash it will generate in the future. However, a DCF is just one valuation metric among many, and it is not without flaws. For those who are keen learners of equity analysis, the Simply Wall St analysis model here may be something of interest to you.

See our latest analysis for Snap

We're using the 2-stage growth model, which simply means we take into account two stages of a company's growth. In the initial period the company may have a higher growth rate and the second stage is usually assumed to have a stable growth rate. To begin with, we have to get estimates of the next ten years of cash flows. Where possible we use analyst estimates, but when these aren't available we extrapolate the previous free cash flow (FCF) from the last estimate or reported value. We assume companies with shrinking free cash flow will slow their rate of shrinkage, and that companies with growing free cash flow will see their growth rate slow, over this period. We do this to reflect that growth tends to slow more in the early years than it does in later years.

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A DCF is all about the idea that a dollar in the future is less valuable than a dollar today, so we discount the value of these future cash flows to their estimated value in today's dollars:

2022

2023

2024

2025

2026

2027

2028

2029

2030

2031

Levered FCF ($, Millions)

US$902.1m

US$2.01b

US$3.84b

US$5.41b

US$6.98b

US$8.45b

US$9.74b

US$10.8b

US$11.8b

US$12.5b

Growth Rate Estimate Source

Analyst x8

Analyst x6

Analyst x1

Est @ 40.76%

Est @ 29.13%

Est @ 20.99%

Est @ 15.29%

Est @ 11.3%

Est @ 8.51%

Est @ 6.55%

Present Value ($, Millions) Discounted @ 7.1%

US$843

US$1.8k

US$3.1k

US$4.1k

US$5.0k

US$5.6k

US$6.0k

US$6.3k

US$6.4k

US$6.3k

("Est" = FCF growth rate estimated by Simply Wall St) Present Value of 10-year Cash Flow (PVCF) = US$45b

We now need to calculate the Terminal Value, which accounts for all the future cash flows after this ten year period.For a number of reasons a very conservative growth rate is used that cannot exceed that of a country's GDP growth. In this case we have used the 5-year average of the 10-year government bond yield (2.0%) to estimate future growth. In the same way as with the 10-year 'growth' period, we discount future cash flows to today's value, using a cost of equity of 7.1%.

Terminal Value (TV) = FCF 2031 (1 + g) (r - g) = US$13b (1 + 2.0%) (7.1%- 2.0%) = US$252b

Present Value of Terminal Value (PVTV) = TV / (1 + r) 10 = US$252b ( 1 + 7.1%) 10 = US$127b

The total value is the sum of cash flows for the next ten years plus the discounted terminal value, which results in the Total Equity Value,which in this case is US$172b.The last step is to then divide the equity value by the number of shares outstanding.Compared to the current share price of US$83.1, the company appearsa touch undervaluedat a 23% discount to where the stock price trades currently.Valuations are imprecise instruments though, rather like a telescope - move a few degrees and end up in a different galaxy. Do keep this in mind.

NYSE:SNAP Discounted Cash Flow September 27th 2021

The calculation above is very dependent on two assumptions. The first is the discount rate and the other is the cash flows. Valuation is only one side of the coin in terms of building your investment thesis, and it is only one of many factors that you need to assess for a company. It's not possible to obtain a foolproof valuation with a DCF model. Instead the best use for a DCF model is to test certain assumptions and theories to see if they would lead to the company being undervalued or overvalued.

Interestingly, the current share prices of other social media stocks like Facebook ( Nasdaq:FB ), Twitter ( NYSE:TWTR ), Pinterest ( NYSE:PINS ), Alphabet ( Nasdaq:GOOG ) are also trading at similar discounts when valued using analyst forecasts. Social media is one industry that analsysts are almost uniformally bullish on.

Snap will be releasing third quarter earnings in about a month's time. When a company is trading at a discount it should provide a margin of safety if earnings are lower than expected - although the company has beaten estimates in 11 of the last 12 quarters. Analysts typically update their earnings forecasts after each quarters results are released, which results in our fair value estimate updating too.

Other Solid Businesses : Low debt, high returns on equity and good past performance are fundamental to a strong business. Why not explore our interactive list of stocks with solid business fundamentals to see if there are other companies you may not have considered!

PS. The Simply Wall St app conducts a discounted cash flow valuation for every stock on the NYSE every day. If you want to find the calculation for other stocks just search here .

Simply Wall St analyst Richard Bowman and Simply Wall St have no position in any of the companies mentioned. This article is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material.

Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com

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Snap (NYSE:SNAP) Appears to Still be Reasonably Valued Despite Meteoric Price Performance - Yahoo Finance

If you're doing a story on the Utah Jazz, you might as well go to an expert. One reporter in Salt Lake City did just that ... only didn't realize it until it was too late.

KUTV reporter Hayley Crombleholme is "highly embarrassed" after not realizing she interviewed Jazz guard Jordan Clarkson about the team. Crombleholme admitted the mistake, and graciously shared two clips from the interview.

The first included Clarkson saying and spelling his name:

The second clip is among one of the funniest exchanges you'll see on a news program. It featured Crombleholme asking Clarkson if he attended any Jazz games last season.

Clarkson, completely deadpan, replied, "Yeah, a lot."

Clarkson wasn't offended about not being recognized. He responded to Crombleholme's tweet about the incident by laughing.

In Crombleholme's defense, Clarkson hasn't been with the team that long. After spending three and a half seasons with the Los Angeles Lakers, and then two and a half seasons with the Cleveland Cavaliers, Clarkson was dealt to the Jazz during the 2019-20 season.

He's been with the team since then, averaging 17.3 points and 4.0 assists over 110 games with Utah. Clarkson won the Sixth Man of the Year Award during the 2020-21 season.

Jordan Clarkson joined the Jazz during the 2019-20 NBA season. (Photo by Alex Goodlett/Getty Images)

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Utah reporter interviews Jordan Clarkson about Jazz and doesn't realize it - Yahoo Sports

Gary Cohn, a key architect of former President Trump's 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, has a new mission.

"We now need to get people back into the workforce and we need to force people in many respects to re-enter the workforce," Cohn told Yahoo Finance Live.

Cohn said he is worried the current shortage of labor threatens to undermine the ability of American businesses to compete at home and globally. The U.S. Department of Labor's latest JOLTS report showed there are almost 11 million job openings and roughly 8.4 million unemployed people in the United States.

"I think it's a huge issue right now, as you point out, labor demand is far outpacing labor supply," Stifel Chief Economist Lindsey Piegza said. But getting the unemployed back on the job, "it's not going to be a very fast or flip the switch scenario," Piegza added.

Cohn points to recent earnings reports from Darden Restaurants (DRI) and FedEx (FDX) which highlighted labor shortages as an issue impeding their growth. "They're not looking for that skilled of a labor force, they need a labor force that's willing to come to work," he said.

Federally funded pandemic related unemployment benefits expired at the beginning of September. But various states have extended eviction moratoriums and other measures, like prohibiting utilities from cutting off service for customers who fall behind on their bills. Democrats in Congress are also planning to introduce legislation to restore and extend COVID-19 unemployment benefits into next year.

"I think we have to stop many of these programs at a high level that are encouraging people to stay home and start encouraging to reenter the workforce," Cohn said.

White House chief economic adviser Gary Cohn speaks during a press briefing at the White House in Washington, U.S., September 28, 2017. REUTERS/Yuri Gripas

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Cohn supported the federal government's initial COVID-19 pandemic response, "giving money to people, allowing people to pay their bills, allowing people to buy food, allowing people to stay in their shelter, and live their lives. That was very important."

But he said the country is now at the other end of the spectrum and the federal government's new policy should be one that, "incentivizes work and doesn't incentivize allowing people or encouraging people to stay at home."

Private business is trying to entice people to work with hiring bonuses and higher wages. But that is contributing to inflation and undercutting the purchasing power of low income workers and those on the sidelines.

"If you're not entering the workforce, you're not participating in those increased wages. And in fact, you're losing purchasing power because your wages, your subsidies are not inflating with wages today," Cohn said.

Piegza said, "Many Americans have been able to accumulate at least somewhat of a wealth cushion that can carry them forward for some time now, even in the absence of some of these more generous benefits programs, meaning that businesses could still struggle for several months, maybe even to the first of the year before these individuals on the sideline decide to move back into the labor market."

Cohn says hiring bonuses won't solve the problem. "We've got to start talking about how we motivate people back into the labor force and how do we get them back working again?"

Adam Shapiro is co-anchor of Yahoo Finance Live 3pm to 5pm. Follow him on Twitter @Ajshaps

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Gary Cohn: 'We need to force people in many respects' back to work - Yahoo Finance

Talk about industrial and materials stocks being as cold as a slab of frozen beef.

The industrial and materials sectors of the S&P 500 have tanked 6.49% and 7.47%, respectively, since Aug. 16, according to research out of Sundial Capital Research. That makes each sector the worst performers from within the S&P 500 over this time span. The S&P 500 is roughly flat going back to Aug. 16.

Sundial says the selling pressure is "getting extreme," and the data bears that out.

The percentage of industrial stocks holding above their 50-day moving average has plunged below 20%, a level not seen since the height of COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020. Fewer than 60% of industrial stocks closed above their 200-day moving average earlier this week, indicating a severe loss in confidence in the sector among investors.

"As we've referenced in the past, healthy markets (and sectors) typically hold above that threshold. It might quickly drop below 60% during uptrends, but it's usually a spike pattern that quickly recovers. When it doesn't, beware," the team at Sundial explains of the dip below the 200-day moving average.

There are likely several reasons for the loss in confidence in the industrial patch.

For starters, economic growth globally has slowed down since the early part of the rebound from the pandemic this year. Industrial stocks tend to perform better at the start of an economic upswing as companies invest in the capital equipment they probably held off ordering when times were weak.

Meanwhile, industrials are continuing to battle a host of margin pressures ranging from labor shortages to raw material price inflation. The latest evidence on the financial impact of those dual struggles came via transport giant FedEx this week.

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FedEx said its quarterly results were drilled by $450 million due to labor shortages alone, notably at its ground segment. The company estimated a shocking 600,000 packages across the FedEx network are being rerouted because of the inability to find labor.

"The impact of constrained labor markets remains the biggest issue facing our business as with many other companies around the world and was the key driver of our lower than expected results in the first quarter," FedEx COO Raj Subramaniam told analysts on an earnings call.

Sundial goes on to add that the selling in industrials is approaching "panic" levels. This may prove to be a longer-term buying opportunity into the space, but Sundial cautions the choppiness is unlikely done in the near-term.

"This sector is nearing a critical inflection point, or maybe it's already there. Investors have puked about as much as they ever do during healthy market environments, at least when measured by internal breadth and momentum. Suppose we're in a similar environment to the past decade. In that case, we should see a relief rally in the coming weeks that alleviates the oversold conditions and allows longer-term indicators like the McClellan Summation Index to remain in (mostly) positive territory. A test of the low would typically be a higher probability for investors. Maybe it's too cute to expect markets to follow a precise playbook like that. Still, the overall suggestion is that buying conditions like this in Industrials might work longer-term as long as one is willing to suffer potentially high uncertainty in the weeks ahead," the researchers say.

Brian Sozzi is an editor-at-large and anchor at Yahoo Finance. Follow Sozzi on Twitter @BrianSozzi and on LinkedIn.

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Investors have lost total confidence in these stocks - Yahoo Finance

Each year, 8 million tons of plastic the equivalent of a garbage truck load every minute is dumped into the ocean, according to the World Economic Forum.

The Ocean Cleanup, a nonprofit engineering environmental organization based in the Netherlands, is attempting to remove as much of that plastic as is feasible.

Our strategy is really twofold, The Ocean Cleanup CEO and Founder Boyan Slat said on Yahoo Finance Live (video above). On one hand, stop the source, preventing more plastic from going into the oceans and rivers. But at the same time, there's already a lot of legacy plastic in the ocean, especially this Great Pacific Garbage Patch between Hawaii and California. It's massive and it doesn't go away by itself. So we have to clean that up.

The Ocean Cleanup has deployed three Interceptors in rivers in Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Dominican Republic to keep plastic from entering oceans. The solar-powered barrier and conveyor system uses river currents to funnel plastic into containers that can be brought back to land and sorted through.

The ultimate aim is to develop the first scalable technology to remove plastic from Earth's waters, Slat said.

Saarinah (45) carries recyclable plastic trash on January 30, 2021 in Kedonganan, Bali, Indonesia. (Photo by Agung Parameswara/Getty Images)

Ocean Cleanup is targeting garbage patches, which are areas where circulating ocean currents amass plastic in large concentrations.

Because most plastics don't break down for hundreds of years, the debris accumulates over time.

The most prominent garbage patch, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, is estimated to contain 79,000 tons of plastic across an area of over half a million square miles. The detritus is primarily made up of microplastics, which the National Ocean Service defines as "small plastic pieces less than five millimeters long which can be harmful to our ocean and aquatic life."

Ocean Cleanup's approach draws inspiration from the natural world and coastlines, in particular.

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If you look at coastlines, coastlines are actually very effective ways of catching plastic, Slat said. If you see it on the beach, it's out of the ocean, stays out of the ocean."

That gave Slat and his team members the idea of building coastlines in the middle of the ocean.

"Basically, we've developed very long, floating barriers that we drag through the patch," he said. "And it catches and then concentrates the plastic before we can take it out."

System 002 during a test run in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. (Photo: The Ocean Clean Up)

In 2019, Ocean Cleanup recalled its first system, nicknamed 'Wilson', to repair and iterate on its design. Since then, the nonprofit has continued to make adjustments and even launched its latest prototype, System 002 or 'Jenny', in July 2021.

If everything goes well, in a few weeks from now we hope to see a system completely filled with plastic, Slat said. And if that works, then we can with confidence say that the technology works and we can scale this up.

The nonprofit is also looking for ways to automate and clean up how its ocean vessels are powered. Slat noted the difficulty of cleaning up plastic in the oceans without using fossil fuels.

Batteries are just not good enough for that yet, he said. We do use fuels, but at the same time, we're experimenting with low carbon biofuels. And all the rest of the emissions will be offset, so the cleanup will be carbon neutral.

Plastic catch onboard a System 002 vessel. (Photo: The Ocean Clean Up)

Since it was founded in 2013, Ocean Cleanup boasts a number of notable backers, including Maersk (MAERSK) and a recent partnership with Coca-Cola (KO).

Regarding the partnership with Coca-Cola, which was rated the world's top plastic polluter in 2020, Slat said there's two ways to look at it.

One way, he said, is to look at it from a greenwashing lens, in which Coca-Cola appears to virtuously help with the plastic problem while continuing to pollute waters with plastic bottles and other packaging.

But the way I look at it is that it's a pragmatic way to scale this up, Slat continued. Companies like Coca-Cola, they don't want the ocean to be polluted with plastic. So by allowing them to solve this problem by cleaning out their own waste I think if anyone should be paying for this clean up, it's companies like Coca-Cola.

Grace is an assistant editor for Yahoo Finance and a UX writer for Yahoo products.

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Ocean Cleanup pilots the first scalable technology to remove plastic waste from Earth's waters - Yahoo Finance