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The first month of the new year has not even ended yet, and Wall Street firms are already building a case for stocks to rise even further this year.

With the composition of the government now confirmed and Democratic lawmakers in control of both the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate, strategists are preparing to see more fiscal stimulus boost consumer spending, the economy and corporate profits in the coming months. This is set to lay the groundwork for a strong recovery once the vaccine rollout reaches much of the population, many have said.

Still, these risk-on catalysts will likely come alongside some opposing forces, including rising interest rates and the specter of a less accommodative Federal Reserve and higher corporate taxes as the economy emerges from the pandemic.

But on net, with all these factors in mind, a number of strategists suggested stocks will rise even more strongly this year than they believed at the end of 2020.

Heres what some Wall Street strategists are now expecting for the U.S. stock market this year.

Goldman Sachs raised its S&P 500 earnings outlook this month, citing an unexpected bump higher in corporate earnings results as companies rebounded faster than expected from pandemic-related disruptions.

"Analysts expected 4Q S&P 500 EPS would fall by 11%, but results showed +2% year/year growth," the strategists led by David Kostin said in a note published Feb. 12. "We raise our S&P 500 2021 EPS estimate 2% to $181 (from $178), reflecting higher sales and profit margins that should overcome input cost pressure due to high operating leverage."

Despite the improved earnings outlook for this year, Goldman Sachs left its S&P 500 price target at 4,300, implying 9.3% upside from the index's record close on Feb. 12.

Fiscal stimulus will likely comprise the next catalyst for U.S. equities, Kostin added, as lawmakers in Washington work toward another robust round of virus relief measures that would stoke consumer spending and further boost corporate profits.

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"Many investors believe the spending boost will lead to higher inflation and interest rates, which would reduce the value of equity duration and increase the importance of near-term growth," Kostin said. "Fiscal stimulus should support consumer-facing cyclicals and our High Operating Leverage and Low Labor Cost baskets."

The firm highlighted a number of cyclical stocks that appeared appealing due to correlations with consumer spending and strong earnings growth over the past year, including Whirlpool, Charles Schwab, 3M and Facebook.

Updated EPS target as of Feb. 12, 2021, following a prior update on Jan. 8, 2021

RBC Capital Markets released its initial year-end outlook for U.S. equities on Jan. 20. In this, RBC said it expected the S&P 500 would ultimately end the year at 4,100, implying upside of 9% from closing prices on Jan. 19. One of the key drivers of the rise will come amid the expected economic reopening, with RBC estimating real gross domestic product will grow 5% in 2021.

Before ending the year higher, however, stocks are likely to endure a pullback as traders take a pause after 2020s 16% rally and extended gains so far this year.

While we expect 2021 will be a solid year, it comes with risk. We anticipate a period of consolidation, most lik

ely in the first half, the strategists led by Lori Calvasina said in a note.

The drop could come as a mid-single digit decline from the indexs recent record highs, taking the S&P 500 down to about 3,600, the firm said. But it could also be an as much as mid-teens correction that pulls the index back down to approximately 3,200, it added.

Our positioning/sentiment analysis suggests a pullback could start any time, but could also take a few more weeks/months to materialize, Calvasina said. Ultimately, 2021 price action will reflect 2022s fundamentals. Longer-term risks to the market and our bullish full-year view include higher corporate taxes, Tech/Internet regulation, a less accommodative Fed, and the virus/vaccine backdrop.

S&P 500 price target initiated Jan. 20, 2021

Credit Suisse raised both its S&P 500 price and earnings per share targets for 2021 this month, also in anticipation of additional fiscal stimulus. The firm raised its price target on the S&P 500 to 4,200, up from the 4,050 it saw at the end of last year, with the revised outlook representing about 10.6% upside from closing prices on Jan. 19. Credit Suisse now sees S&P 500 aggregate earnings per share growing by 25% over last year to $175 in 2021, up from the $168 seen previously.

Democrats picked up both Georgia Senate seats, paving the way for Biden to implement his agenda more broadly, Credit Suisse strategist Jonathan Golub said in a note. This should result in additional stimulus, including the expansion of payments to individuals.

While the timeline for vaccination rollouts has proven underwhelming, the likely avalanche of pent-up consumer demand cannot be ignored, he added. Any additional stimulus will further fan these flames.

Unlike some other strategists, however, Golub said he does not anticipate more progressive policies on taxes or regulatory issues that might disrupt technology, health care, financials, energy or the market more broadly despite the Democratic control of each of the White House, Senate and House of Representatives.

Given the assumptions for more stimulus, Credit Suisse upgraded pro-cyclicals including the consumer discretionary sector excluding internet retailers industrials, materials and energy to Overweight. The firm also downgraded the major sector outperformers of 2020 including information technology, communications and internet retail to Market Weight. Financials and health care companies remained the firms highest conviction Overweight calls.

Updated S&P 500 price target as of Jan. 7, 2021

Emily McCormick is a reporter for Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter: @emily_mcck

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Strategists see more stock market gains through the end of the year - Yahoo Finance

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Newspaper coverage of the incident is hard to find. New York HeraldOne cold April night in 1919, at around 2 a.m., a mob of 60 rowdy white students at the University of Maine surrounded the dorm room of Samuel and Roger Courtney in Hannibal Hamlin Hall. The mob planned to attack the two Black brothers from Boston in retaliation for what a newspaper article described at the time as their domineering manner and ill temper. The brothers were just two among what yearbooks show could not have been more than a dozen Black University of Maine students at the time. While no first-person accounts or university records of the incident are known to remain, newspaper clippings and photographs from a former students scrapbook help fill in the details. Although outnumbered, the Courtney brothers escaped. They knocked three freshmen attackers out cold in the process. Soon a mob of hundreds of students and community members formed to finish what the freshmen had started. The mob captured the brothers and led them about four miles back to campus with horse halters around their necks. Before a growing crowd at the livestock-viewing pavilion, members of the mob held down Samuel and Roger as their heads were shaved and their bodies stripped naked in the near-freezing weather. They were forced to slop each other with hot molasses. The mob then covered them with feathers from their dorm room pillows. The victims and bystanders cried out for the mob to stop but to no avail. Local police, alerted hours earlier, arrived only after the incident ended. No arrests were made. Incidents of tarring and feathering as a form of public torture can be found throughout American history, from colonial times onward. In nearby Ellsworth, Maine, a Know Nothing mob, seen by some as a forerunner to the KKK, tarred and feathered Jesuit priest Father John Bapst in 1851. Especially leading into World War I, this method of vigilantism continued to be used by the KKK and other groups against Black Americans, immigrants and labor organizers, especially in the South and West. As with the Courtney brothers incident, substitutions like molasses or milkweed were made based on what was readily available. Although rarely fatal, victims of tarring and feathering attacks were not only humiliated by being held down, shaved, stripped naked and covered in a boiled sticky substance and feathers, but their skin often became burned and blistered or peeled off when solvents were used to remove the remnants. Discovering the attack When I first discovered the Courtney brothers incident in the summer of 2020 as Black Lives Matter protests took place worldwide following the May death of George Floyd it felt monumental to me. Not only am I a historian at the university where this shameful event occurred, but Ive also devoted the past five years to tracking down information about the Red Summer of 1919, the name given to the nationwide wave of violence against Black Americans that year. University alumni records and yearbooks indicate the Courtney brothers never finished their studies. One article mentions possible legal action against the university, although I couldnt find evidence of it. The Courtney brothers, pictured tarred and feathered inside the livestock-viewing pavilion on the University of Maines campus. Seth Pinkham papers, Fogler Library, University of Maine Local media like The Bangor Daily News and the campus newspaper reported nothing on the event. A search of databases populated with millions of pages of historic newspapers yielded just six news accounts of the Courtney brothers incident. Most were published in the greater Boston area where the family was prominent, or in the Black press. While most of white America was unaware of the attack, many Black Americans likely read about it in The Chicago Defender, the most prominent and widely distributed Black paper in the nation at the time. Anyone with firsthand memory of the incident is long gone. Samuel passed away in 1929 with no descendants. Roger, who worked in real estate investment, died a year later, leaving a pregnant wife and toddler behind. Obituaries for both men are brief and provide no details about their deaths. My efforts to speak with Courtney family members are ongoing. Roger Courtneys infant son, Horace Sears Courtney, sits in a stroller. Yale Beinecke Library No condemnation The tarring and feathering is also missing from official University of Maine histories. A brief statement from the universitys then-president, Robert J. Aley, claimed the event was nothing more than childish hazing that was likely to happen any time, at any college, the gravity depending much upon the susceptibilities of the victim and the notoriety given it. Rather than condemn the mobs violence, his statement highlighted the fact that one of the brothers had previously violated unspecified campus rules, as if that justified the treatment the men received. A cross-country search When I began my research on the Red Summer in 2015, almost no documents about the events were digitized, and resources were spread out across the country at dozens of different institutions. I spent much of 2015 on a 7,500-mile cross-country journey, scouring material at over 20 archives, libraries and historical societies nationwide. On that trip, I collected digital copies of over 700 documents about this harrowing spike in anti-Black violence, including photographs of bodies on fire, reports of Black churches burned, court documents and coroners reports, telegrams documenting local government reactions and incendiary editorials that fueled the fire. I built a database of riot dates and locations, number of people killed, sizes of mobs, number of arrests, supposed instigating factors and related archival material to piece together how these events were all connected. This data allowed me to create maps, timelines and other methods of examining that moment in history. While each event was different, many trends emerged, such as the role of labor and housing tension spurred by the first wave of the Great Migration or the prevalence of attacks against Black soldiers that year. The end result, Visualizing the Red Summer, is now used in classrooms around the country. It has been featured or cited by Teaching Human Rights, the National Archives, History.com and the American Historical Association, among others. Yet most Americans have still never heard about the Black sharecroppers killed in the Elaine Massacre in Arkansas that year for organizing their labor or the fatal stoning of Black Chicago teenager Eugene Williams for floating into white waters in Lake Michigan. They werent taught about the Black World War I soldiers attacked in Charleston, South Carolina, and Bisbee, Arizona, during the Red Summer. There is still work to do, but the recent anniversaries of events like the Tulsa Massacre or the Red Summer, which coincided with modern-day Black Lives Matter protests and the killings of Americans like Breonna Taylor and George Floyd, have sparked a renewed interest in the past. This new discovery brings my research back home to campus. It has afforded me an opportunity to engage students with the events of the Red Summer in new ways. As the humanities specialist at the McGillicuddy Humanities Center, I worked with students in a public history class in the fall of 2020 to design a digital exhibit and walking tour of hidden histories at the University of Maine. This tour includes the attack on the Courtney brothers. Intentionally forgotten stories, or those buried out of shame or trauma, exist everywhere. By uncovering these local stories, it will become more clear how acts of violence against people of color are not limited to a particular time or place, but are rather part of collective American history. [Insight in your inbox each day. You can get it with The Conversations email newsletter.]This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It was written by: Karen Sieber, University of Maine. Read more:For universities, making the case for diversity is part of making amends for racist pastWhy I teach a course called White Racism Karen Sieber does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

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COVID vaccines and relative effectiveness: Yahoo News Explains - Yahoo News

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Traders this week are gearing up for another packed week of quarterly earnings results.

The vast majority of companies that have so far reported results have handily beaten expectations, even after a series of upward revisions over the past couple months.

As of Friday, 59% of the S&P 500 has so far reported fourth-quarter results, according to data from FactSet. Of these, 81% of companies beat earnings expectations, which would tie it for the second-highest percentage of earnings beats since FactSet began tracking the metric in 2008. And earnings are currently on track to rise by 1.7% for the fourth quarter, which would mark the first quarter that S&P 500 companies report aggregate earnings growth since the final quarter of 2019.

Two of this weeks closely watched earnings results will come from ride-hailing rivals Lyft (LYFT) and Uber (UBER), which are set to report quarterly results on Tuesday and Wednesday after market close, respectively.

The pandemic dealt a blow to both companies throughout much of 2020, as consumer sheltering in place eschewed shared rides. Revenue fell by 48% in the third quarter over last year at Lyft, and 20% at Uber.

While sales are likely to still be down sharply in the fourth quarter, many analysts noted that the worst is probably behind both of these companies as the economy starts to reopen later this year.

We see a confluence of positive factors giving Uber and Lyft tailwinds into 2021 with more investors coming back to the story with many of the dark clouds clearing (Prop 22, demand improving), and a greater focus on reopening plays, Wedbush analyst Dan Ives wrote in a note, referring to the California proposition that allowed both companies to continue classifying their drivers as contract rather than full-time workers.

Fourth-quarter guidance from both companies last quarter appeared to affirm their upward trajectory. Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said during the companys last earnings call in November that he expected adjusted EBITDA losses would improve on a year-over-year basis in the fourth quarter, after widening by about 7% to $625 million in the third quarter. The company also doubled down on its target of hitting its first quarter of adjusted EBITDA profitability by the end of 2021.

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Lyft CEO Logan Green also said last quarter that the company expected to report its first quarter of adjusted EBITDA profitability by the end of this year, even if rides remain depressed compared to when they first issued that guidance back in late 2019. At the time, Green also said operating expenses would retreat further this year, and that revenue per active rider would pick up, suggesting more frequent rides by Lyft users.

Over the course of the pandemic, Uber has had an edge on Lyft, however, in that its business included both mobility and food delivery segments. The latter picked up strongly during the pandemic as customers sheltering in place ordered more food online, helping offset declines in ride-hailing. Gross bookings at Ubers smaller UberEats business more than doubled in each of the second and third quarters of 2020, while mobility bookings more than halved over both periods. And while UberEats remains an unprofitable unit in the business, Khosrowshahi said in November he was confident the delivery business would post adjusted EBITDA profitability sometime next year.

Uber also recently made another acquisition to supplement its delivery business, announcing earlier this month that it would be picking up the alcohol-delivery company Drizly. The acquisition is expected to close in the first half of 2021 and will not be reflected in fourth-quarter results, but may factor into the companys guidance, if issued this week. Ubers earlier acquisition of peer food-delivery company Postmates closed in December, prior to the end of the fourth quarter.

Shares of Uber have risen 57% over the last year and 29% since market close of Nov. 6, after which Pfizer (PFE) and BioNTech (BNTX) first announced positive efficacy data on their COVID-19 vaccine and sparked a rally in reopening stocks. Lyft shares have risen 9.5% over the last year, but 40% since the close of Nov. 6.

Disney (DIS) is also poised to report fiscal first-quarter results this week, which will likely reflect ongoing growth in streaming platform Disney+ alongside some improvement across the companys more virus-exposed theme parks and experiences businesses.

Disney+ has been a key source of momentum for the entertainment giant while other areas of the business floundered during the pandemic. The streaming platform boasted 86.2 million subscribers as of Dec. 2, Disney reported at its investor day in December, reaching that level in just over a year of operation. Across all operations including Hulu and ESPN+, streaming subscribers totaled 137 million.

However, the companys subscriber numbers still pale compared to those at Netflix, which reported nearly 204 million global paid viewers as of the end of last year.

Still, the breakneck growth so far at Disney+ has already led the company to upwardly revise its longer-term projections. Disney said at its investor day that it now expects between 230 million-260 million global subscribers by the end of fiscal 2024, up significantly from the 60 million-90 million target the company posted in 2019. Disney+ is expected to become a profitable business segment by fiscal 2024 as well. And the company will also be increasing the price of Disney+ by $1 to $7.99 for U.S. users starting in March.

But while Disney+ soared, Disneys parks, cruises and other live entertainment operations languished throughout much of 2020. This area of the business had once comprised the profit engine of Disney prior to the virus, but swung to losses in each of the fiscal fourth and third quarters of last year as visitations dried up.

While most of Disneys global parks have reopened with limited capacity, Disneys flagship theme parks in Anaheim, California remain closed due to the pandemic. Disneyland and Disney California Adventure have both been closed since last March, and the aggregate impact of global park closures and weak visitor trends led Disney to slash tens of thousands of jobs throughout last year. Just last week, however, two California Assembly members introduced legislation that would allow theme park operators to reopen their locations sooner than previously proposed.

Shares of Disney have risen 28% over the last year, outperforming the S&P 500s 16.6% gain over that period.

Monday: Hasbro (HAS) before market open; Take-Two Interactive (TTWO), Chegg (CHGG) after market close

Tuesday: Centene (CNC), Coty Inc. (COTY), S&P Global (SPGI) before market open; Tenet Healthcare (TNT), Twitter (TWTR), Lyft (LYFT), Cisco Systems (CSCO) after market close

Wednesday: Coca-Cola (KO), Under Armour (UAA), CME Group (CME), General Motors (GM) before market open; Uber (UBER), MGM Resorts International (MGM), Zillow Group (ZG), iRobot (IRBT), Sonos (SONO), Spirit Airlines (SAVE), Zynga (ZNGA), OReilly Automotives (ORLY) after market close

Thursday: PepsiCo (PEP), Kraft Heinz (KHC), Yeti Holdings (YETI), Tyson Foods (TSN), Molson Coors (TAP), Duke Energy (DUK), Kellogg (K) before market open; GoDaddy (GDDY), Disney (DIS), DataDog (DDOG), Expedia (EXPE), HubSpot (HUBS), Affirm Holdings (AFFM) after market close

Friday: N/A

Monday: N/A

Tuesday: NFIB Small Business Optimism, January (97.0 expected, 95.9 in December); JOLTS Job Openings, December (6.450 million expected, 6.527 million in November)

Wednesday: MBA Mortgage Applications, week ended February 5 (8.1% during prior week); Consumer Price Index, month-over-month, January (0.3% expected, 0.4% in December); Consumer Price Index excluding food and energy, month-over-month, January (0.2% expected, 0.1% in December); Consumer Price Index year-over-year, January (1.5% expected, 1.4% in December); Consumer Price Index excluding food and energy year-over-year, January (1.5% expected, 1.6% in December); Real Average Hourly Earnings year-over-year, January (4.1% in December); Real Average weekly Earnings, year-over-year, January (5.3% in December); Wholesale inventories, month-over-month, December final (0.1% expected, 0.1% in prior print); Monthly Budget Statement, January (-$143.6 billion in December)

Thursday: Initial jobless claims, week ended February 6 (773,000 expected, 779,000 during prior week) Continuing claims, week ended Jan. 30 (4.592 million during prior week)

Friday: University of Michigan Sentiment Index, February preliminary (80.9 expected, 79.0 in January)

Emily McCormick is a reporter for Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter: @emily_mcck

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Uber, Lyft and Disney earnings: What to know in the week ahead - Yahoo Tech

(Bloomberg) -- Palantir Technologies Inc. and International Business Machines Corp. are uniting in a partnership that will dramatically expand the reach of Palantirs sales force while making IBMs own artificial-intelligence software easier for non-technical customers to use, the companies plan to announce Monday.

The global partnership is the largest of its kind for Palantir, the maker of data-analysis software whose shares have more than quadrupled since its September debut on the New York Stock Exchange. Palantir gains access to a sales team of more than 2,500 people, up from its current 30. Palantirs stock rose 10% as trading opened in New York Monday, boosting the shares to $37.53.

The relationship is the payday for the project Palantir started more than a year ago to break its data integration and analysis software into smaller, less pricey modules. The Denver-based company mainly sells to companies with revenue in excess of $500 million -- many of which already have relationships with IBM.

Reselling Palantirs software to augment the data and AI tools that IBM already offers and make them easier for more people to use was a natural fit, said Rob Thomas, IBMs senior vice president of software, cloud and data. Were going to sell it to 180 countries and thousands of customers.

Palantirs software requires little to no coding, enabling less technical employees to use it, Thomas said. To expand IBMs cloud and AI business, half the revenue will need to come through partnerships like the one struck with Palantir. Thats a pretty fundamental change for us, he said.

Expanded Access

Without providing a time frame, Thomas said he expects the partnership to help boost IBMs customers using AI to 80% from its current 20%.

Palantir Chief Operating Officer Shyam Sankar said the technical fit with IBM and its reach are part of his companys long-term effort to finally ramp sales. In addition to commercial customers, government contracts have surged both in number and size during the pandemic.

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This is the biggest [partnership[ weve announced -- expect more, Sankar said. He said he expects to triple Palantirs direct-sales team to about 100 this year, a significant hike for a company whose management once prided itself on not employing a single salesperson.

Started with funding from PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel in 2003, Palantir found early success with users at the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency and went on to sign the Defense Department and Internal Revenue Service, which, respectively, have used the software to locate roadside bombs and hunt tax cheats.

Government Contracts

More recently the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention use Palantirs software to help predict Covid-19 outbreaks, distribute protective gear and allocate vaccines.

While Palantirs government contracts have grown -- sometimes amid privacy and surveillance concerns -- the companys commercial business has been slower to evolve.

Palantir last reported 132 total government and commercial clients, a concentrated pool that includes BP Plc, Merck KGaA and Airbus SE. Early customers like American Express Co. and Coca-Cola Co. which experimented with low-cost Palantir software trials and later ditched them, arent necessarily top of Palantirs list now, Sankar said.

We hope to win all this business back in the fullness of time, Sankar said, adding there is no pride list of former customers it hopes to now re-engage.

Palantir reports financial results for 2020 on Feb. 16. A shareholder lockup expires three days later, unleashing the remaining 80% of all shares that have not been eligible to trade. Palantir shares rose $2 to $34.05 on Feb. 5, giving it a stock-market value of $59.3 billion.

(Updates with shares in the second paragraph.)

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Palantir Surges on Deal to Offer Software Through IBM - Yahoo Finance

Your next stimulus check is just weeks away will you get the full $1,400?

The planned third round of coronavirus stimulus checks is moving through Congress at light speed compared to the draaaaaaaaaaagged-out second batch.

Lawmakers played footsie over the last direct aid payments throughout the spring, summer and fall of 2020. And, when the money finally started arriving before New Year's, all you got was a stimulus check for a measly (to borrow former President Donald Trump's description) $600 half the $1,200 distributed the very first time.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (pictured) is optimistic about getting new, $1,400 stimulus checks out very soon. Here's an update on the timing, and on your likelihood of getting the full amount.

To speed along President Joe Biden's $1.9 trillion dollar pandemic relief package, including the next stimulus checks, the Democrats who control Congress are using a streamlined process that could allow passage with simple majorities meaning no Republican support.

Republicans say the president's bill is too expensive. In hopes of winning over some members of the opposing party, Democrats are considering targeting the new direct payments to people with the greatest need.

Last spring's first, $1,200 stimulus checks were largely spent on essential needs, including food and rent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics has said.

Some of the money also was used for investing, a bureau survey found, or was spent on other, unspecified things possibly including affordable life insurance polices. Demand for life insurance has surged due to COVID.

The third stimulus checks may be more restricted, to go only to lower-income Americans, according to multiple media reports. For example, payments could phase out for individuals with incomes over $50,000, down from $75,000 for the two earlier checks.

While some people might have a smaller chance of receiving another stimulus check, families may get more money this time. The last payments excluded college students and other dependents over age 16; Biden aims to fix that in the new go-round.

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More than two-thirds of Americans (68%) support Biden's pandemic package, according to a Quinnipiac University poll. Congressional leaders have grown more optimistic about delivering it quickly, after a budget bill to fast-track the process passed the House and Senate last week.

Speaker Pelosi released a statement on Friday saying the hope is to wrap up work on Biden's COVID plan "before the end of February" a timeline that could give you a fresh stimulus check in early March.

That's an improvement from an earlier remark from Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, indicating it could take Congress until mid-March to pass the next stimulus checks. Under that scenario, you'd get no money in your pocket until late March, and maybe not before April.

If COVID is battering your budget and you need additional cash right now, here are a few ways to tide yourself over financially until the next stimulus check comes.

Shrink the cost of your debt. If youve been using credit cards more than usual during the current crisis, you're probably piling up expensive interest. Tame your credit card debt and make it go away more swiftly by gathering up your balances into a single, lower-interest debt consolidation loan.

Shave down your insurance bills. Since many of us are driving less during the pandemic, car insurance companies have been giving price breaks. But if your auto insurer is stingy, shop around for a better policy. Plus, you might save hundreds on homeowners insurance by comparing rates to find a lower price on that coverage.

Refinance your mortgage and slash your payments. Mortgage rates have been lower than ever, so refinancing your existing home loan could provide big savings. Mortgage tech and data provider Black Knight says 19.4 million U.S. homeowners have the potential to cut their housing payments by an average $308 per month through a refi.

If you've been looking forward to a $1,400 payment but are at risk of receiving a reduced amount or no money at all under new income restrictions, here are a couple of things you can do:

Get your 2020 taxes in quickly. Log into a good tax software program and start working on your 2020 return, so you're ready to submit it when the IRS begins accepting returns on Feb. 12. Your eligibility for a stimulus check will be based on your most recent tax return, so if your income was pinched by the pandemic in 2020, you may have a better chance of getting a $1,400 payment.

Find savings to "make your own" stimulus check. Look for creative ways to save, to squeeze $1,400 out of your budget. For example, cancel streaming services and any other monthly subscriptions you're not using. Turn a hobby or your special skills and talents into a side hustle, to bring in extra income. And, download a free browser add-on that will automatically hunt for better prices and coupons whenever you shop online.

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Your next stimulus check is just weeks away will you get the full $1,400? - Yahoo Finance

When asked about the 20 policies that define President Bidens agenda, more Americans support than oppose all 20 of them, according to a new Yahoo News/YouGov poll.

The margins are decisive. The majority of Bidens proposals garner at least twice as much support as opposition. Nearly half are favored by more than 60 percent of Americans.

The survey of 1,516 U.S. adults, which was conducted from Jan. 20 to Jan. 21, comes at a time when partisan divisions in Washington are driving a fierce debate over the size and scope of Bidens COVID-19 rescue package. On Monday, the president is set to meet with a group of 10 Republican senators who want to slash his $1.9 trillion plan to secure their backing in Congress.

But despite the distance between politicians on Capitol Hill, the Yahoo News/YouGov poll shows that ordinary Americans overwhelmingly favor most of Bidens agenda particularly his plan to end a pandemic that has killed more than 440,000.

Of all 20 policies covered by the poll, the two most popular were the ones at the center of Bidens current COVID proposal: $2,000 relief checks (74 percent favor vs. 13 percent oppose) and increased federal funding for vaccination (69 percent favor vs. 17 percent oppose). A full 58 percent of Americans also support raising the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour, another key element of Bidens COVID-19 rescue package. Thats almost twice the share of Americans (31 percent) who oppose a wage hike. Nearly identical numbers favor (57 percent) and oppose (32 percent) a national mask mandate.

In contrast, the $600 billion Republican plan floated Monday would shrink relief checks by $400 and deliver them to fewer Americans. It would also keep the federal minimum wage at $7.25 an hour.

A full 59 percent of Americans agree with the president that the pandemic should be his top priority. The next closest issue was the economic recovery, at 24 percent.

After calling in his inaugural address for an end to Americas uncivil war, Biden also appears to be finding common ground with his constituents on the economy, health care, climate change, immigration and criminal justice. Two-thirds of Americans (65 percent) favor more federal funding for research and development to assist domestic manufacturing and investing in renewable energy infrastructure, the core planks of Bidens separate COVID-19 recovery package, which he hopes to advance later this year. Opposition is negligible, at 13 percent and 17 percent, respectively.

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More than 60 percent of Americans the equivalent of a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate also support stopping family separation at the U.S.-Mexico border (64 percent to 20 percent); creating a pathway to citizenship for young immigrants brought to the U.S. illegally as children (61 percent to 23 percent); and enacting comprehensive criminal-justice reform (63 percent to 12 percent).

And half or more Americans favor cutting carbon emissions to zero by the year 2050 (54 percent to. 23 percent); rejoining the World Health Organization (57 percent to 28 percent); giving all Americans the option of buying Medicare-like public health insurance (57 percent to 22 percent); and providing more federal funding for community policing measures (51 percent to 21 percent); and reversing the recent tax cuts for Americans making more than $400,000 (50 percent to 30 percent).

Meanwhile, opposition to most of the rest of Bidens agenda stalls out below 35 percent, including rejoining the Paris Climate Accords (48 percent to 30 percent); reversing the recent tax cut for corporations (45 percent to 32 percent); and eliminating tuition at public colleges and universities for families making up to $125,000 (47 percent to 33 percent).

The only Biden policies that received nearly as much opposition as support were halting construction on the border wall with Mexico (45 percent to 42 percent) and ending the ban on travelers from Muslim-majority countries (42 percent to 35 percent) perhaps because they were also the two policies most closely identified with former President Donald Trump, triggering the usual partisan resistance.

In that sense, Americas divisions have hardly healed. By a better than two-to-one margin, more Americans believe Joe Biden won the 2020 election fair and square (57 percent) than believe the election was rigged and stolen from Trump (27 percent), with 16 percent unsure. Yet 68 percent of Trump voters still believe in the false notion that the election was stolen.

Similarly, Americans are united in revulsion toward the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, with 81 percent saying it was not justified, versus just 8 percent who say it was. More than 9 in 10 Americans said the attack made them feel angry, ashamed or fearful. The attack came after Trump headlined a nearby rally urging supporters to fight in the name of his false election fraud claims. Five people were killed, including a Capitol Police officer.

But when asked about Trumps responsibility for the attack or his upcoming Senate impeachment trial over the incident, Americans split roughly 50-40, suggesting that views about the former president remain as polarized as ever. Specifically:

In each case, Republicans and Democrats responded along party lines in their support or opposition to Trump though larger majorities endorsed Twitters decision to ban Trump (54 percent to 37 percent) as well as Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnells remark that the mob was provoked by the president (53 percent to 35 percent).

One silver lining, however and perhaps another patch of common ground is a widening sense of patriotism among the public. In a July Yahoo News/YouGov survey, just 61 percent of Americans described themselves as patriotic; today that number is up to 69 percent. And while only slightly fewer Republicans feel patriotic now (84 percent) than in July (88 percent), patriotism among Democrats has risen 12 percentage points (from 56 percent to 68 percent) in the wake of Bidens inauguration.

__________________

The Yahoo News survey was conducted by YouGov using a nationally representative sample

of 1,516 U.S. adults interviewed online from Jan. 20 to 21, 2020. This sample was weighted according to gender, age, race and education based on the American Community Survey, conducted by the U.S. Bureau of the Census, as well as 2016 and 2020 Presidential votes (or non vote), registration status, geographic region and urbanicity. Respondents were selected from YouGovs opt-in panel to be representative of all U.S adults. The margin of error is approximately 2.7 percent.

____

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Yahoo News/YouGov poll: More than two-thirds of Americans side with Biden on COVID relief and most support the rest of his agenda - Yahoo...

You wouldnt think it would ever actually happen. But the moment it was announced that Kevin Feige the Marvel Studios chief whos engineered 23 movies, 13 years and three phases of straight hits with very few missteps was branching out from the Marvel Cinematic Universe and into Lucasfilms Star Wars universe, it was a thought that crossed all of our minds: Could Marvel and Star Wars someday cross streams in a movie? Its natural to wonder, given that with Marvel and Lucasfilm both under the Disney umbrella, the trucks, so to speak, are parked in the same garage.

If youd ask me if anything were talking about right now was in the realm of possibility 20 years ago, I wouldve said, I dont think so, Feige tells us during a recent interview promoting yet another one of his MCU coups, the Disney+ TV spinoff WandaVision.

But wait for the BUT.

But I really dont think so, he quickly adds. I dont think theres any reason for it.

Beyond Feige, we are already seeing some crossover behind the scenes. The super producer hired Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and Loki writer Michael Waldron to pen the mysterious Star Wars film hes currently developing (and will say absolutely nothing about).

A crossover wouldnt be entirely unprecedented, at least in the wider canon of comic books. Marvel was the first publisher to release Star Wars comics in the late-70s and early 80s, a license the publisher re-acquired in 2015. Feige also admits to enjoying the Star Trek and X-Men crossover Planet X, which Marvel released in 1996. On the page, anyway.

As for any team-ups on the screen, Feige invites you to revisit Patton Oswalts hilarious pre-Force Awakens filibuster from a Season 5 episode of Parks and Recreation in which he imagines Thanos, Tony Stark, Spider-Man, the X-Men and Fantastic Four crashing Episode VII and linking the universes.

That, Feige says, is probably as close as well ever get.

UPDATE: Oswalt jokingly replied to Feiges comments on Twitter Thursday.

Story continues

Watch Elizabeth Olsen, Paul Bettany and Kevin Feige talk about WandaVision:

Videos produced by Jon San and edited by Jason Fitzpatrick

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Kevin Feige assures us there will never be a Marvel-'Star Wars' crossover movie - Yahoo Entertainment

A look at the shareholders of Aldeyra Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:ALDX) can tell us which group is most powerful. Institutions often own shares in more established companies, while it's not unusual to see insiders own a fair bit of smaller companies. Companies that have been privatized tend to have low insider ownership.

With a market capitalization of US$588m, Aldeyra Therapeutics is a small cap stock, so it might not be well known by many institutional investors. Taking a look at our data on the ownership groups (below), it seems that institutions are noticeable on the share registry. We can zoom in on the different ownership groups, to learn more about Aldeyra Therapeutics.

View our latest analysis for Aldeyra Therapeutics

Institutional investors commonly compare their own returns to the returns of a commonly followed index. So they generally do consider buying larger companies that are included in the relevant benchmark index.

We can see that Aldeyra Therapeutics does have institutional investors; and they hold a good portion of the company's stock. This can indicate that the company has a certain degree of credibility in the investment community. However, it is best to be wary of relying on the supposed validation that comes with institutional investors. They too, get it wrong sometimes. If multiple institutions change their view on a stock at the same time, you could see the share price drop fast. It's therefore worth looking at Aldeyra Therapeutics' earnings history below. Of course, the future is what really matters.

It looks like hedge funds own 19% of Aldeyra Therapeutics shares. That worth noting, since hedge funds are often quite active investors, who may try to influence management. Many want to see value creation (and a higher share price) in the short term or medium term. The company's largest shareholder is Perceptive Advisors LLC, with ownership of 19%. In comparison, the second and third largest shareholders hold about 4.1% and 3.5% of the stock. Additionally, the company's CEO Todd Brady directly holds 0.8% of the total shares outstanding.

Story continues

A closer look at our ownership figures suggests that the top 16 shareholders have a combined ownership of 50% implying that no single shareholder has a majority.

While studying institutional ownership for a company can add value to your research, it is also a good practice to research analyst recommendations to get a deeper understand of a stock's expected performance. There are a reasonable number of analysts covering the stock, so it might be useful to find out their aggregate view on the future.

While the precise definition of an insider can be subjective, almost everyone considers board members to be insiders. Company management run the business, but the CEO will answer to the board, even if he or she is a member of it.

Insider ownership is positive when it signals leadership are thinking like the true owners of the company. However, high insider ownership can also give immense power to a small group within the company. This can be negative in some circumstances.

Shareholders would probably be interested to learn that insiders own shares in Aldeyra Therapeutics, Inc.. It has a market capitalization of just US$588m, and insiders have US$7.6m worth of shares, in their own names. Some would say this shows alignment of interests between shareholders and the board. But it might be worth checking if those insiders have been selling.

The general public holds a 38% stake in Aldeyra Therapeutics. While this size of ownership may not be enough to sway a policy decision in their favour, they can still make a collective impact on company policies.

It's always worth thinking about the different groups who own shares in a company. But to understand Aldeyra Therapeutics better, we need to consider many other factors. For example, we've discovered 2 warning signs for Aldeyra Therapeutics (1 is concerning!) that you should be aware of before investing here.

Ultimately the future is most important. You can access this free report on analyst forecasts for the company.

NB: Figures in this article are calculated using data from the last twelve months, which refer to the 12-month period ending on the last date of the month the financial statement is dated. This may not be consistent with full year annual report figures.

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. 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. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.

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

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Could The Aldeyra Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:ALDX) Ownership Structure Tell Us Something Useful? - Yahoo Finance

The Daily Beast

Tami Chappell via ReutersStartling documents released Monday point to heavy-handed interference by top Trump administration officials last summer to downplay the severity of the COVID-19 pandemic, through suppressed testing results and altered guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on reopening businesses and schools.The documents are the result of a House Oversight investigation launched in September into reports of efforts by Trump political appointees at the Department of Health and Human Services to interfere with guidance issued by CDC in order to keep businesses open, even though evidence proved it could cost American lives. The select subcommittee in charge of the investigation said Monday that it found that HHS officials sought to suppress accurate scientific information they felt could be use[d] against the president, according to the documents. They also found that Trump appointees with limited scientific experience attempted to alter or block at least 13 CDC reports related to the virus.Those altered reports are said to have produced a false sense of security pushed by the CDC that allowed businesses and some schools to open, made people feel secure in public places, and downplayed the importance of wearing a mask. According to one of the documents released, the Trump administration changed the guidance for the explicit purpose of reducing testing and allowing the virus to spread while quickly reopening the economy.On Sept. 11, 2020, for example, top Trump HHS adviser Paul Alexander emailed senior COVID Task Force adviser Scott Atlas about a forthcoming CDC report on deaths in young people, which Alexander claimed that, despite being true, was very duplicitous to damage the administration. He tried to engage Atlas to help craft an op-ed .. disputing the reporting for on face value, it is meant to mislead, according to the documents.In the email, which is part of the cache of documents released Monday, Alexander warned, The timing of this is meant to interfere with school re-opening and we need to get something out fast to preempt this in the next day or so and I can work with you on it. Alexander became the focus of public outrage in December when internal emails emerged showing he was pushing top Trump health officials to adopt a herd immunity strategy for the U.S. There is no other way, we need to establish herd, and it only comes about allowing the non-high risk groups expose themselves to the virus. PERIOD, his letter to Trump HHS public-affairs adviser Marc Caputo read. Infants, kids, teens, young people, young adults, middle aged with no conditions etc. have zero to little risk. so we use them to develop herd we want them infected. Alexander left HHS in mid-September after reports emerged about his attempts to alter the CDCs Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Reports.The new internal emails referred to Monday, according to Oversight Chairman James Clyburn (D-SC), show how the Trump administration took steps to end testing of asymptomatic infections in low-risk people because these tests were causing infected people to quarantine, which HHS Alexander complained was preventing the workforce from working and would not allow schools and colleges to optimally reopen.The documents show how Alexander pressured Food and Drug Administration officials to go so far as to quickly approve emergency use of convalescent plasma as treatment, even advising them to disregard concerns from National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director Francis Collins and Allergy and Infectious Diseases chief Anthony Fauci, instead accusing the NIH of stepping out of their lane.Another email from the Select Subcommittee last summer to Vice President Pence and Secretary Azar into Trumps instruction to slow the testing down went unanswered. A short time later, the CDC issued guidance in direct contradiction to scientific evidence advising against testing of asymptomatic people who had been exposed to COVID-19 positive people. At the time, the subcommittee says it raised serious concerns about the change noting that it was reportedly pursuant to instructions coming from the top down.Still, Assistant Secretary for Health at HHS Brett Giroir flatly denied any political involvement in the decision, and claimed that the new guidelines are a CDC action. Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

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New crypto VC fund attracts Wall Street billionaires and LL Cool J - Yahoo Money

Mohammed Siraj (pictured right) grabbed Kuldeep Yadav (pictured middle) by the neck in a strange interaction caught on camera. (Image: Twitter)

The cricket world has been left baffled after a bizarre interaction between Indian bowlers Mohammed Siraj and Kuldeep Yadav.

India were chasing the game after England captain Joe Root became the first batsman to smash a double-hundred in his 100th Test, crafting a massive 218 runs to put his team in charge of the opening match in Chennai.

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The 30-year-old registered his second double-century in three matches as England amassed 8-555 on a flat wicket at the MA Chidambaram Stadium on Saturday.

At the end of Day Two, Dom Bess was batting on 28 with Jack Leach on six at the other end.

But it was the unusual interaction, caught on broadcast, between reserve bowlers Siraj and Yadav that had many baffled.

During a break, cameras picked up Siraj grabbing Yadav by the next, which clearly startled Yadav.

Fans on social media questioned whether the interaction was just friendly banter or a serious action.

That Siraj and Yadav video doesn't look like it's for fun lol.

Zinara Rathnayake (@Zin10SantaFe) February 6, 2021

Friendly or serious? Mohammed Siraj grabs Kuldeep Yadav by his neck, WATCH - DNA India#farmers #farmersprotest

Shivinder Thakur (@ShivinderST) February 6, 2021

Many fans suggested the action was a joke between two friends.

Story continues

Either way, India will be looking for the whole team to unite after England stormed past 550 on Day 2.

Root was seen battling cramps in the final overs on Friday but returned to hound India's bowlers when England resumed on 3-263.

The right-hander looked typically solid against an Indian attack which could manage only a couple of half-hearted lbw appeals against him in the first two sessions.

Root was more than happy to let Ben Stokes dominate their 124-run collaboration for the fourth wicket as the boundaries flowed.

Playing his first test since August, Stokes smashed 10 boundaries and three sixes in a typically entertaining 82.

"I think we're in a very strong position as a team," Stokes, Test cricket's top-ranked all-rounder, told a video conference.

"No thoughts whatsoever of a declaration tonight because that would be stupid.

"If you won the toss and you're batting first, you just get as many runs as you can out here in India. If we can bat another hour tomorrow, we'd be very happy."

with AAP

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'What's going on': Indian teammates baffle fans with strange interaction - Yahoo Sport Australia