Week InReview
Friday | Jun 18, 2021
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The post-pandemic employee. |
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Illustration: Martin Tognola/WSJ |
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The employees who return to the office after a year of remote work aren’t the employees their bosses remember.
They have spent over a year adjusting to a radically different rhythm — both in terms of work and their personal lives. They have shifted their working hours, and learned to manage their own tasks without oversight. They may place more value on their family time or personal priorities, and perhaps been forever changed by a loss or health concerns. After a year of working in solitude, many have come to expect more control over how, when and where their work gets done, and to have greater autonomy relative to their managers and organizations.
They may not even feel like they need a whole lot of managing anymore.
— The Wall Street Journal
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Regulators are worried about hidden risks to investors and even the financial system stemming from a fast-growing corner of the crypto market meant to be immune from volatility. Their focus is on so-called stablecoins, a form of cryptocurrency that has a fixed price, typically one dollar, and is backed by real-money reserves. But in recent weeks, lawmakers and officials from the Federal Reserve and the administration have expressed alarm both in public and private that some consumers won’t actually be protected should one of the firms not have the backing they purport to have. (Bloomberg Cryptocurrencies | Jun 16)
The Wall Street boom is petering out at U.S. banks. For much of 2020 and through the first quarter of this year, the biggest U.S. banks posted blockbuster results from trading stocks and bonds and advising companies on deals. The Federal Reserve flooded the market with money, companies raced to sell new debt and go public, and traders on Reddit and from big institutions moved those securities quickly. Banks at the middle of all of those transactions reaped the rewards. Now, executives are warning that their market revenue is tumbling, at least compared with the past year. (The Wall Street Journal | Jun 16)
Federal Reserve officials sped up their expected pace of policy tightening amid optimism about the labor market and heightened concerns for inflation. Fed Chair Jerome Powell told a press conference Wednesday that officials would begin a discussion about scaling back bond purchases used to support financial markets and the economy during the pandemic. ( Bloomberg Economics | Jun 16) see also Fed urged to aid money market funds as negative rates loom (Financial Times | Jun 15)
A recent change to an SEC rule governing shareholder proposals “guts” the process in return for “minuscule and largely hypothetical cost savings,” a group of institutional investors said in a federal complaint filed Tuesday in Washington. The amendments to the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Rule 14a-8 “dramatically increase” how much stock shareholders must own to submit a proposal, and the agency’s “purported justifications for the amendments were flawed at every turn,” according to the complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. (Bloomberg Law | Jun 15)
Before the pandemic, U.S. companies were borrowing heavily at low interest rates. When Covid-19 lockdowns triggered a recession, they didn’t pull back. They borrowed even more and soon paid even less. After a brief spike, interest rates on corporate debt plummeted to their lowest level on record, bringing a surge in new bonds. (The Wall Street Journal | Jun 14)
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'Bug Bites': CISA releases second graphic novel
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency released the second graphic novel in their CISA Resilience Series. 'Bug Bites' communicates the dangers and risks associated with threat actors using social media and other communication platforms to spread mis-, dis-, and malinformation (MDM) for the sole purpose of planting doubt in the minds of targeted audiences to steer their opinion.
How to stop ransomware and other sorts of cyber-mischief
Ransomware attacks are evidence of an epoch of intensifying cyber-insecurity that will impinge on everyone, from tech firms to schools and armies. One threat is catastrophe: think of an air-traffic-control system or a nuclear-power plant failing. But another is harder to spot, as cybercrime impedes the digitization of many industries, hampering a revolution that promises to raise living standards around the world.
Most firms face second ransomware attack after paying off first
Some 80% of organizations that paid ransom demands experienced a second attack, of which 46% believed the subsequent ransomware to be caused by the same attackers. Among those that paid to regain access to their systems, 46% said at least some of their data was corrupted.
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Shakespeare quotes, rewritten for business class
"How poor are they that have not stock options! What wound did ever heal but by vesting?" Yesterday, Twitter learned that UNC Chapel Hill was hiring a lecturer to teach courses in both Shakespeare and business writing (at a rate of… $8,000 per course). Of course, if the university really wanted to streamline operations, the two could be seamlessly combined. (You’re welcome, UNC English department.)
Instead of firing employees for these personality traits, perhaps companies should give them bonuses
The corporate world has always been a stew of contradictions. Most leaders are preoccupied with fit, hiring folks whose personality and values click into their culture like Legos. But organizations that consistently display fearless creativity and set the pace in their industry typically have leaders who don’t play well with others. They’re obsessive, oppositional, audacious, and socially maladroit.
Flying taxis get a boost as airlines plow into startups
Flying taxis moved a step closer to becoming a fixture buzzing across urban skyscapes, as a closely watched effort was unveiled in Los Angeles and startups in the U.K. and Brazil made commercial breakthroughs.
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