Japanese technology and entertainment company Sony logged an 18% rise in profit for the fiscal year through March on healthy results at its music and video-game operations.Its chief executive, Hiroki Totoki, outlined the company’s strategy for growth Wednesday, stressing that collaboration among Sony Corp.’s various segments, like animation and music, were crucial to deliver the “kando,” or emotional engagement, that lies at the core of the company’s vision and strength.“Building on our momentum and results to date and working with a laser-like focus to realize our long-term Creative Entertainment Vision will be at the core of our corporate strategies moving forward,” he told reporters.Sony’s movies division has strong offerings in the pipeline, including Spider-Man films and biopics about The Beatles, while animation remains a driver of growth centered around the popular anime streaming service Crunchyroll, Totoki said.Tokyo-based Sony reported a record annual profit of 1.14 trillion yen ($7.8 billion), up from 970.6 billion yen in the previous fiscal year. Annual sales were virtually unchanged, inching down to 12.957 trillion yen ($88 billion) from 13.020 trillion yen.One area that lagged among Sony’s sprawling businesses was the financial segment, where revenue stalled. But its film division and its imaging and sensor solutions segment did well.Sony officials said they were studying how to respond to President Donald Trump’s tariffs, although that was a challenge because of uncertainties and constant changes. But they said the negative impact from U.S. trade policy will be kept to 10% of Sony’s operating profit in the coming fiscal year by adjusting the allocation of shipments, among other measures.Totoki stressed that Sony plans to leverage its content creating technology, like virtual reality and image sensors, to feed into its entertainment products, including working on immersive experiences. Sony also has powerful collaborative relations with various entertainment companies like Kadokawa, which includes publishing as well as films and animation, and Bandai Namco, a video game maker, he added.Sony will emphasize the “diversity” of its workers, helping bring out people’s creative potential, Totoki said.Among the Sony movies that fared well at the box office for the fiscal year through March were “Venom: The Last Dance,” featuring the Marvel Comics superhero, and “Bad Boys: Ride or Die,” an action comedy, where Will Smith and Martin Lawrence return in their popular cop roles in the fourth installment in the series.Sony, which makes the PlayStation console and game software played on that machine, also posted healthy results in the gaming business.Its music operations, which also held up, include recordings, streaming services and music for games. The top-selling recorded music projects for the latest fiscal year globally was SZA’s “SOS Deluxe: LANA,” followed by Beyonce, Future & Metro Boomin and Travis Scott.The top seller in its Japan music business was Kenshi Yonezu’s “Lost Corner” album, followed by offerings from Stray Kids and Six Tones.For the January-March quarter, Sony posted a 197.7 billion yen ($1.3 billion) profit, up 5% from 189 billion yen the same quarter in the previous fiscal year. Sales were 2.6 trillion yen ($17.7 billion), down 24% from 3.48 trillion yen.Sony is forecasting a nearly 13% drop in profit for the fiscal year through March 2026, to 930 billion yen ($6.3 billion), on 11.7 trillion yen ($80 billion) sales, down 2.9% on-year.Sony Group Corp. stocks, which fell in Tokyo morning trading, rebounded to finish 3.7% higher after its financial results were announced.
Yuri Kageyama is on Threads: https://www.threads.com/@yurikageyama
Yuri Kageyama, AP Business Writer
For 20-year-old Mayank Yadav, riding a crowded bus in the summer months in this western Indian city can be like sitting in an oven. That makes it a treat when he steps off and into a bus stop outfitted with sprinklers that bathe overheated commuters in a cooling mist.
Everyone is suffering from the heat, Yadav said. I hope they do more of this across the city.
Rising heat is a problem for millions of people in India. In Ahmedabad, temperatures this year have already reached 42 degrees Celsius (107 Fahrenheit), a level usually not seen for several more weeks, prompting city officials to advise people to stay indoors and stay hydrated.
And yet, coping with that heat is a familiar challenge in Ahmedabad. After a 2010 heat wave killed more than 1,300 people, city and health officials rushed to develop South Asia’s first heat action plan.
The plan, rolled out in 2013 and now replicated across India and South Asia, includes strategies for hospitals, government officials and citizens to react immediately when temperatures rise beyond human tolerance. Public health officials said it’s helped save hundreds of lives every summer.
City officials, with help from climate and health researchers, have implemented two simple yet effective solutions to help those affected most by heat: the poor and those who work outdoors. By painting tin-roofed households with reflective paint, they’ve reduced indoor temperatures, which otherwise might be up to 5 degrees Celsius (9 degrees Fahrenheit) hotter than outside. More recently, the city hung curtains woven of straw and water sprinklers at one bus stop so commuters can get relief from the sun and heat. Officials said they plan to expand the idea to other bus stops in the city.
Residents said both measures have been a relief even as they brace for at least three more months of sweltering summer.
A simple coat of paint makes all the difference
Throughout the city’s low-income neighborhoods, hundreds of tin-roofed homes have been painted with reflective paint that helps keep the indoors cooler. Residents said their houses were so hot before the roofs were painted that they would spend most of their time outdoors under any shade they could find.
Earlier, it was really difficult to sleep inside the house,” said Akashbhai Thakor, who works as a delivery van driver and lives with his wife and three-month-old child in Ahmedabad. Thakor’s roof was painted as part of a research project that is trying to measure the impact of the so-called cool roofs.
Early results have been promising. After the roof was painted, the house is much cooler, especially at night, said Thakor.
People like Thakor are much more vulnerable to extreme heat because their houses aren’t insulated and, since most of them depend on a daily wage, they must work regardless of the weather, said Priya Bhavsar of the Indian Institute of Public Health Gandhinagar, who is working on the project. Bhavsar said low-cost solutions could be the only respite for thousands of people in the city who can’t afford to buy an air conditioner.
Veer Vanzara, who lives in the same area as Thakor and works in a nearby garment factory, said the heat makes his job much worse, especially since his factory has no ventilation. So his family is grateful for the cool roofs. The evenings and night are much cooler than before inside our house, he said.
A bus stop that’s become an oasis from the heat
In Ahmedabad’s city center, a 25-meter stretch of a bus stop has been draped with mats made of straw which, when sprinkled with water, immediately cool the hot wind. Sprinklers installed on the bus stop roof lightly spray cool water on the commuters below, providing instant relief from the blazing heat just a step away.
When nothing like this was here, it was really hot. What they’ve done is really good. Senior citizens like me can get some cooling from the heat, said 77-year-old Ratilal Bhoire, who was waiting under the sprinklers with his daughter. Bhoire said when he was younger, Ahmedabad was hot, but it was still possible to walk many kilometers without feeling dizzy, even at the height of summer. Nowadays you can’t do that, he said.
Heat is the city’s biggest problem and heat wavescontinuous days of extreme heatare increasing, said Dr. Tejas Shah of Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation, who oversees the city’s heat action plan. We are in the period of climate change, and it has already shown its effect, said Shah.
Shah and other city officials said the onset of summer has become a testing time and efforts such as cool roofs and cool bus stops are reducing heat-related illness and deaths. As climate projections predict only hotter and longer summers for his city, Shah said being prepared is the only thing to do.
It (the heat) needs to be addressed in the proper way,” he said.
The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.
Sibi Arasu, Associated Press
The cost of flying is becoming increasingly out of reach for the average American in 2025. The President of the United States, however, is gearing up to accept a $400 million super jet, complete with nine bathrooms and a master bedroom, as a gift from the Qatari government.
News of the proposed gift broke this week, when ABC News reported that the royal family of Qatar plans to present President Trump with a luxury Boeing 747-8 jumbo jet next week during his trip to the region. ABC News also reported that Trump is preparing to accept the gift and retrofit it to use as Air Force One until shortly before he leaves office. At that point, ownership of the plane will be turned over to the Trump presidential library foundation. Overhauling the jet would be at taxpayer expense. This follows a stalled deal with Boeing to update two 747-8 jets for use as Air Force One planes in 2018.
Trumps potential acceptance of the opulent gift comes as, for the average American, the price of a standard airline ticket has shot up by 25% in the past year. The news also comes mere weeks after Trump chastised critics for concerns over how his global trade war might impact prices of everyday goods, encouraging Americans to embrace a more frugal lifestyle by cutting down on purchases like dolls for their children.
Aside from the dystopian optics of the situation, experts have warned that Trump accepting the colloquially named palace in the sky, which is believed to be worth $400 million, could present very real security consequencesand sparks concerns around foreign bribery. Heres what we know about the design of the super luxury plane so far.
A photo provided by Boeing with the caption “Boeing Delivers First 747-8 Intercontinental VIP Airplane . . . taking off for its delivery flight from Paine Field on Feb. 28th [2012]” [Photo: Boeing]
What kind of plane is it?
The plane in question is a Boeing 747-8 Intercontinental jumbo jet. According to a design overview published by Boeing, the 747-8 Intercontinental (747-8I) has a wingspan of about 225 feet, which is double that of Boeings fastest-selling commercial plane, the Next-Generation 737. Boeing also claims that the 747-8 is the worlds fastest commercial jet, capable of traveling at 0.86 Mach or roughly 660 miles per hour.
The double-decker plane is designed with luxury in mind, including a flowing grand staircase to connect the first and second floors, sculpted ceilings, and dynamic LED lighting throughout the cabin.
What amenities does it have?
Details about the specific plane that Trump is set to receive have not been officially revealed. However, based on images of the aircraft published by MSNBC, it appears likely that the $400 million jets interiors have been customized beyond Boeings specifications to suit the needs of a wealthy client.
A page from an Amac Aerospace brochure. [Image: Amac Aerospace/Internet Archive]
An aircraft specification summary of the Boeing 747-8I model published by the Swiss aviation company Amac Aerospace provides more insight into the amenities available on board this type of aircraft. According to the summary, the jumbo jet, which is the same model as the Qatari plane, is more like an airborne mansion. It comes with five galley kitchens, nine bathrooms (including several showers), and a master bedroom suite.
Pages from an Amac Aerospace brochure. [Images: Amac Aerospace/Internet Archive]
A few business class seating sections are sprinkled throughout the plane, but, for the most part, it’s divided into a series of swanky lounges and one private office. For entertainment, the plane is equipped with live TV and radio, 13 Blu-ray players, speakers, and subwoofers. When the aircraft specification summary was published back in 2020, the plane was decked out in a color scheme of red, tan, and gold.
What are the security concerns?
To meet security standards for carrying the President, the current Air Force One planes are equipped with radiation shielding, antimissile technology, and multiple communication systems that allow the President to communicate with the military from anywhere in the world.
According to information provided to The Wall Street Journal, the defense contractor L3 Harris has already been contacted to retrofit the Qatari plane to serve as a presidential aircraft. L3 Harris declined to comment for this story.
Further, a Trump administration official told the AP that it would be possible to quickly add some countermeasures and communications systems to the Qatari plane, but that it would be less capable that the existing Air Force One aircraft or the Boeing replacements. Now, many experts are raising the alarm that this gift could present major security risks and ethical concerns.
One anonymous former government official told The Washington Post that Air Force One is a flying nuclear-hardened command post, and that the Qatari plane would need to be literally ripped open to bring it up to an acceptable security standard. Former Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall added that bugs on the plane would be a top concern, concluding that the only way Trump will be flying on the plane while hes in office is if he waives a lot of the security requirements needed to deem it safe.
Meanwhile, several politicians have condemned the idea of accepting the plane. Even Trump allies have cast doubt on the idea, with Republican Senator Lindsey Graham telling reporters Monday that he wanted to make sure the gift was kosher, while the far-right conservative activist Lara Loomer said the plane would be a stain on Trumps legacy.
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer condemned the concept in no uncertain terms in a string of tweets posted to his X account, calling the Qatari plane shameless self-enrichment and a national security betrayal. Nothing says America First like Air Force One, brought to you by Qatar, Schumer wrote. Its not just bribery, its premium foreign influence with extra legroom.
Uber is on Wednesday launching its own version of a bus system along busy routes, calling it its most affordable ride option yet.
The rideshare company has introduced Route Share, a new service offering pickups every 20 minutes along busy corridors during weekday commute hours. Available from 6 a.m. to 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. local time, the service will launch in New York City, San Francisco, Chicago, Philadelphia, Dallas, Boston, and Baltimore
Riders can select the Route Share option to see nearby routes and book a seat anywhere from seven days to 10 minutes before their intended pickup. They’ll then be prompted to walk to the set pickup area where the driver will wait for a maximum of two minutes. Customers will share those rides with up to two other passengers.
Rides will be up to 50% less than an UberX, the company said.
The new service was announced as part of Ubers annual GO-GET product event, where the company spotlighted more affordable options for cost-conscious consumers navigating todays economic pressures.
Heres what else Uber unveiled at GO-GET 2025:
[Image: Courtesy of Uber]
RIDE PASSES
Similar to how airlines have monetized the ability to lock-in prices while airfare is low, Uber is introducing a feature that allows riders to secure a fixed price for a one-hour window each day on select routes. For instance, someone commuting daily to the gym can lock in a fare to avoid price surges from weather or traffic. The pass costs $2.99 and will last for 30 days or until they hit $50 of savings, whichever comes first, the company said.
Uber is also launching an option for users to prepay for 5, 10, 15, or 20 rides on regular routes in exchange for discounted fares.
[Image: Courtesy of Uber]
SHARED AUTONOMOUS RIDES
In a major step toward autonomous mobility, Uber and Volkswagen announced in April a partnership to deploy thousands of all-electric, fully autonomous vehicles across the U.S. over the next decade. Uber said Wednesday that a shared autonomous ride option is expected to launch in Los Angeles early next year.
[Image: Courtesy of Uber]
OPENTABLE PARTNERSHIP
Additionally, Uber is rolling out a new Dine Out feature, which lets users access in-person dining deals directly through the Uber Eats app. Its also partnering with OpenTable in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, the U.K., Ireland, and Australia to enable restaurant reservations within the app.
[Image: Courtesy of Uber]
UBER ONE MEMBER DAYS
Uber is introducing a promotional savings event akin to Amazons Prime Week. The Uber One Member Days will run from May 16 to May 23, featuring tens of thousands of deals across the platform and its partners for subscribers paying the $10 monthly fee. Think 50% off shared rides, 20% off Uber Black, and 40% off Comfort Electric, with new deals each day of the week, Uber said in a press release.
California’s top insurance regulator said Tuesday that State Farm can soon start raising premiums by 17% for all of its home insurance customers in the state to help the insurer rebuild its capital following the Los Angeles wildfires.State Farm has argued the emergency rate hikes are necessary to help the company avoid a “dire” financial crisis that could force them to drop more California policies. The state’s largest home insurer said it was already struggling financially before this year but the LA fires, which destroyed more than 16,000 buildings in January, have made things worse.The increase will apply to all of the roughly one million homeowners State Farm insures in the state.The decision comes as California is undergoing a yearslong effort to entice insurers to continue doing business in the state as wildfires increasingly destroy entire neighborhoods. In 2023, several major companies, including State Farm, stopped issuing residential policies because of high fire risk. Last year, Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara unveiled a slate of regulations aimed at giving insurers more latitude to raise premiums in exchange for more policies in high-risk areas. Those rules kick in this year.State Farm initially asked for a 22% rate increase for homeowners but revised it to 17% during a recent hearing before an administrative judge. The request also includes a 38% hike for rental owners and 15% for tenants. The new rates will take effect in June. In exchange, State Farm will get a $400 million cash infusion from its parent company and agree to halt some nonrenewals through the end of this year.On Tuesday, administrative Judge Karl Frederic Seligman ordered a ruling supporting State Farm’s request, calling it “a rescue mission to stabilize State Farm’s financial condition while safeguarding policyholders.”Lara adopted the recommendation the same day. The new rates are temporary until the state has a chance to consider State Farm’s request from last year for a 30% rate increase for homeowners. The hearings for that request are set for October.“I expect State Farm provide the highest level of service to its California customers and to fulfill its promises. State Farm must now justify its financial condition and detail its recovery plan in a full rate hearing before a neutral judge and my Department’s experts,” Lara said in a statement.State Farm said in a statement that the approval “is a critical first step for State Farm General’s (SFG) ability to continue serving our California customers.” The company received a financial rating downgrade last year and has seen a decline of $5 billion in its surplus account over the last decade.The company said it has paid more than $3.51 billion and is handling more than 12,600 claims as of this week.“Today’s decision that would make consumers pay now but allow State Farm to wait months before having to show its math is a great disappointment for consumers,” Carmen Balber, executive director of Consumer Watchdog, said of the ruling. The group opposes State Farm’s request for higher premiums.State Farm said it plans to refund the emergency rates if California later approves lower rates. The insurer last received state approval for a 20% rate increase in December 2023.
Trān Nguyn, Associated Press
Apple just announced new accessibility features coming to its operating systems. Theres a redesigned braille input experience, and a new reader that allows you to customize your text so its more legible. But theres one that will be great for anyone attending any lecture or presentation: Magnifier for Mac.The iPhone and iPad got their Magnifier apps back in 2016. It worked pretty much like the iOS camera: You point your device anywhere you want and zoom in to the desired level. It also allows you to apply real-time filters to enhance readability depending on your visions condition, like turning a books black text over white page into white text over blue, as well as changing the images contrast and brightness. It also can detect objects around you.The new Mac version takes all that up to an 11 with its new features. To get the view of the world the new Magnifier needs, you will need to use a USB camera or an iPhone. The latter automatically connects to your computer using MacOSs Continuity Camera feature, allowing you to use your phone as the eyes for your Apple desktop or laptop. Zoom in to focus on something far away, apply the same filters, and adjust the image, just like in iOS and iPadOS.[Image: Apple]A matter of perspectiveWhat makes the update brilliant is the new perspective adjustment. Since you cant move your Mac around like with Apples handheld devices, you need a way to frame the text you want to read correctly.Like Apples introductory video shows, you can point your Mac with the attached camera to a whiteboard. Since you are probably not going to be looking at it from a fully perpendicular perspective, the app allows you to draw a polygon by clicking on each corner of the whiteboard in your screen. Then, applying some image deformation magical maths, Magnifier will automatically correct the perspective, turning the skewed whiteboard with deformed text into a perfect flat image that gives you the best view in the class, auditorium, or conference room.From there, you can do whatever you want with that text, including transforming handwriting into a typeface for easier reading. Magnifier uses Apples new Accessibility Reader, too, which allows you to customize how a page looks with the colors, fonts, and sizes you preferas well as copying and pasting from the whatever text the camera is looking at, regardless of it being handwritten or not. Its similar to what you can do now with other Apple apps, like Preview, but in one continuous, seamless experience.Bonus points: Magnifier also supports reading any paper-based media using Desk View, the feature that uses your iPhones wide-angle lens to capture whats flat on the table in front of your screen. Just put that novel on the table and transform its small type into something you can read easily (or have your Macs text-to-speech abilities to read it for you). Its easy to imagine every single student, office person, and TED Talk drone using the new Magnifier to get a better experience possible at a presentationsleeping pills notwithstandingonce it comes out later this year (according to Apple). This new little jewel will make your Macbook the best seat in the house no matter where you are sitting.
Elon Musks Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has spent its first 100 days slashing government programs and firing employees. Yet Musk views DOGE not just as a downsizing force, but also as a team of technologically elite shock troops tasked with rapidly modernizing outdated government systems.
One of DOGEs primary targets on that front is the Office of Personnel Management’s antiquated retirement application system, which still relies on paper forms and manual processing. The system handles retirement applications and manages benefits for former federal employees and their families, coordinating closely with agency HR teams and payroll centers. DOGE and its allies inside the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) say theyve now built and tested a fully digital, AI-enhanced replacement system, which they plan to launch across federal agencies on June 2.
But the plans rely heavily on a product built during the Biden administration called the Online Retirement Application (ORA) system, say two former OPM employees who recently left the agency.
A leaked planning document shared with Fast Company shows the ORA pilot launched in 2023 with a handful of agency HR and payroll offices, serving a few hundred retirees. The plan under Biden was to roll out the ORA system government-wide in 2025.
The first source, who worked on retirement systems at OPM and spoke to Fast Company on the condition of anonymity, says that ORA is still just a prototype, and not built to support tens of thousands of real retirees. Yet one of the first actions OPM took when Trump came into office was to interrupt the development of ORA.
They reduced support contracts and added a team of DOGE developers, adds the second source, who until recently worked at OPM and also spoke on the condition of anonymity. There is now a war room to accelerate the work.
DOGE has kept its version of the ORA system largely under wraps. It remains unclear whether the team changed the original systems architecture or user experience, or how the systems AI components were developed, trained, or integrated. A White House official told Fox News that the AI met Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP) requirements for securing and monitoring cloud-based services used by government agencies. (Neither DOGE nor OPM responded to Fast Companys requests for comment.)
The first ex-OPM source fears that DOGE, without fully understanding the federal retirement workflow, will simply roll out the ORA system as is. I think instead of testing it with some Department of Interior retirees, they’re just slapping the system into being a requirement, the source says. This would put the onus entirely on all retiring federal employees to correctly input their data and documents into the system without help from their agency HR department, according to the source.
Few dispute the need for modernization. The current system processes around 100,000 retirement applications annuallyin a literal underground mine in Boyers, Pennsylvania. The paper-based workflow is infamously slow and prone to error, often causing months-long delays that can be devastating for retirees who depend on timely benefits. While DOGE cites a Trump executive order from February 11 as the mandate behind its work, the OPMs original ORA and digital records systems were responses to a 2021 Biden executive order aimed at modernizing federal technology.
To spearhead the retirement-focused effort, Musk reportedly tapped Airbnb cofounder Joe Gebbia, a close friend and fellow Trump supporter. Gebbia joined DOGE in late February, vowing to apply his designer brain and startup spirit to build a paperless solution.
Since then, a team of DOGE agents has been working out of a command center at OPM, collaborating with Retirement Services personnel and select staff. OPM acting director Charles Ezell said in a May 7 memo that the new system had already processed 25 retirement claims without generating papera claim that Gebbia then echoed on X. Notably, Ezell referred to the system in the memo as the ORA, the system built under Biden.
Some experts suspect DOGEs version is little more than a minimum viable product (MVP)a rough prototype meant to demonstrate potential. Former U.S. Digital Service engineer Kate Green notes that MVPs often depend on manual work-arounds and arent ready for large-scale use. These MVPs often have manual steps or work-arounds for difficult parts of the app, and future development eliminates these steps to create something fully automated, she tells Fast Company.
The second ex-OPM source says DOGE may be emphasizing flashy featureslike ditching paperwhile ignoring the real pain points, such as retirement applications with missing documents, missing signatures, or errors. Personally, the source says, I think they are focusing just on paper because it seems like an easy win.
Republicans in Congress are moving with rapid speed to advance President Donald Trump’s big bill of tax breaks, spending cuts and beefed-up border security funding as leaders work to enact many of his campaign promises.House committees have been laboring for months to draft the legislation, which Republicans have labeled “THE ONE, BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL,” a nod to Trump himself. Speaker Mike Johnson is pushing to approve the package and send it to the Senate by Memorial Day.Democrats say they will fight what House party leader Hakeem Jeffries calls “this extreme and toxic bill.”Here’s a look at what’s in and out of the legislative package so far:
Tax cuts for individuals and businesses
The tax portion of the GOP legislation contains more than $5 trillion in tax cuts, according to an estimate from the Joint Committee on Taxationcosts that are partially offset by spending cuts elsewhere and other changes in the tax code.Republicans look to make permanent the individual income tax cuts passed in President Donald Trump’s first term, plus enact some of the promises he made on the campaign trail to not tax tips, overtime and interest on auto loans. Republicans partially offset the tax breaks by rolling back the clean energy tax credits passed during Joe Biden’s presidency, such as a $7,500 tax credit for electric vehicles, bringing the overall cost of the tax cuts down to about $3.7 trillion.The bill is expected to undergo further changes in the coming weeks. Lawmakers from New York are leading an effort to boost the state and local tax deduction, which the bill would already increase from $10,000 to $30,000 for families making less than $400,000 per year.The legislation provides a deduction for those workers in service industry and other jobs that have traditionally relied on tips.The package provides tax relief for automobile shoppers with a temporary deduction of up to $10,000 on car loan interest, applying the benefit only for those vehicles where the final assembly occurred in the United States. The tax break would expire at the end of Trump’s term.For seniors, there would be a bolstered $4,000 deduction on Social Security wages for those with adjusted incomes no higher than $75,000 for individuals and $150,000 for couples.
States to pick up more of the tab for food assistance
House Republicans are looking to shift some of the cost of the Supplemental Nutrition and Assistance Program, known as SNAP, to the states. States would shoulder 5% of benefit costs under the bill beginning in fiscal year 2028. The share could also go higher for those states with high rates of overpayments and underpayments. The bill would also require states to pick up 75% of the administrative costs.Currently, states shoulder none of the benefit costs and half of the administration costs.Republicans argue that states have minimal incentive to control costs as a result of the current cost-sharing arrangement. But the changes would give them the incentive to enhance efficiencies and improve outcomes for recipients.Republicans also are expanding work requirements for food aid recipients, which under current law applies to individuals without dependents aged 18-54. The bill expands the work requirement through age 64 and exempts only those caring for a dependent child under the age of 7.At the same time, the legislation would invest $60 billion in new money for agriculture programs, sending aid to farmers.
New work requirements for Medicaid
A centerpiece of the package is more than $900 billion in reduced spending, most of that coming through the Medicaid program.Republicans insist they are simply rooting out “waste, fraud and abuse” to generate savings with new work and eligibility requirements. But Democrats warn that millions of Americans will lose coverage. In the 15 years since Obamacare became law, Medicaid has only expanded as most states have tapped into federal funds.An estimate from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said the proposals would reduce the number of people with health care by at least 7.6 million from the Medicaid changes, and possibly more with other changes to the Affordable Care Act.To be eligible for Medicaid, there would be new “community engagement requirements” of at least 80 hours per month of work, education or service for able-bodied adults without dependents. The new requirement would not kick in until Jan. 1, 2029. People would also have to verify their eligibility to be in the program twice a year, rather than just once.Applicants could not qualify for Medicaid if they have a home that is valued at more than $1 million.
Funding for 1 million migrant deportations, 20,000 new officers and the border wall
The legislation would provide $46.5 billion to revive construction of Trump’s wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, and more money for the deportation agenda.There’s $4 billion to hire an additional 3,000 new Border Patrol agents as well as 5,000 new customs officers, and $2.1 billion for signing and retention bonuses, for a total of $69 billion in new spending.It includes major changes to immigration policy, imposing a $1,000 fee on migrants seeking asylumsomething the nation has never done, putting it on par with few others, including Australia and Iran.Overall, the plan is to remove 1 million immigrants annually and house 100,000 people in detention centers. It calls for 10,000 more Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers and investigators.
More money for the Pentagon and Trump’s ‘Golden Dome’
The House Armed Services Committee was tasked with drafting legislation with $100 billion in new spending. But they did that and more, passing a bill with $150 billion for the Defense Department and national security.Among the highlights, it would provide $25 billion for Trump’s “Golden Dome for America,” a long-envisioned missile defense shield, $21 billion to restock the nation’s ammunition arsenal, $34 billion to expand the naval fleet with more shipbuilding and some $5 billion for border security.It also includes $9 billion for servicemember quality of life-related issues, including housing, health care and special pay.
Tax on university endowments and overhaul of student loans
A wholesale revamping of the student loan program is key to the legislation, providing $330 billion in budget cuts and savings.The proposal would replace all existing student loan repayment plans with just two: a standard option with monthly payments spread out over 10 to 25 years and a “repayment assistance” plan that is generally less generous than those it would replace.Among other changes, the bill would repeal Biden-era regulations that made it easier for borrowers to get loans canceled if their colleges defrauded them or closed suddenly.There would be a tax increase,up to 21%, on some university endowments.
Federal employee pension cuts
The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform targeted federal workers’ pensions for a projected $50.9 billion in deficit savings over 10 years.Most of the savings would come from requiring federal workers hired before 2014 to pay more into the retirement system. They would have to match the 4.4% salary rate paid by federal workers hired since 2014.
More drilling, mining on public lands
One section of the bill would allow increased leasing of public lands for drilling, mining and logging while clearing the path for more development by speeding up government approvals. Royalty rates paid by companies to extract oil, gas and coal would be cut, reversing former President Joe Biden’s attempts to curb fossil fuels to help address climate change.Oil and gas royalty rates would drop from 16.7% on public lands and 18.75% offshore to a uniform 12.5%. Royalties for coal would drop from 12.5% to 7%.The measure calls for four oil and gas lease sales in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge over the next decade. It also seeks to boost the ailing coal industry with a mandate to make available for leasing 6,250 square miles of public landsan area greater in size than Connecticut.Republican supporters say the lost revenue would be offset by increased development. It’s uncertain if companies would have an appetite for leases given the industry’s precipitous decline in recent years as utilities switched to cleaner burning fuels and renewable energy.In a last-minute add, Republicans also included a provision authorizing sales of hundreds of thousands of acres of public lands in Nevada and Utah, prompting outrage from Democrats and environmentalists.
Associated Press writers Collin Binkley in Washington and Matthew Brown in Billings, Montana, contributed to this report.
Kevin Freking and Lisa Mascaro, Associated Press
Ever wonder why the sound of rain makes you instantly drowsy, but a ticking clock drives you up the wall? Thats because not all noise soothes the brain in the same way. Sleep sounds might seem like just background buzz, but they’re carefully engineered to allow your brain to let go. Behind every babbling brook or rainforest storm track is an intricate design meant to quiet the mind, block out distractions, and nudge you toward sleep.
As more people rely on sleep sounds to wind down, the industry behind them has surged, which is evidence of just how common this nightly ritual has become. Mediation and mindfulness app Headspace, says 51% of listeners use its sleep content (the app has been downloaded more than 70 million times).
Ozlo, a company that created bluetooth earbuds that mask noise with sleep sounds, launched its flagship product in October 2024 after a successful Kickstarter. Since then, the company has sold nearly 100,000 units worldwide. Meanwhile, platforms like YouTube and Spotify are packed with deep sleep playlists, sound baths, and endless loops of ambient noise.
Color noisewhite, brown, or pink, which emit sound energy at different frequenciescan be surprisingly effective at helping you fall and stay asleep. But we often oversimplify how they work, says Ethan Cohen, a music and sound composer at Ozlo Sleepbuds, and these sounds alone arent a cure-all.
There’s often this tendency to say, this sound does X, Y, or Z. But you don’t just press a button and conk out, he says. Theyre facilitating the conditions for healthy sleep or relaxation. Theyre giving you your best chance at sleeping well.
A lot of what makes a sound effective is personal. People tend to like certain frequency ranges based on nature, says Scott Sorenson, audio engineer for Headspace. White noise is what rain sounds likeits really high pitched. Brown noise is a much lower frequency rangeit sounds like youre underwater or even in the womb. We all have that maternal connection.
Memory plays a huge role, too. If you grew up next to a highway, the rumble of trucks might feel oddly soothing. If your childhood nights were filled with crickets and light wind, even the low hum of traffic might keep you awake. There’s a lot of preference involved based on what is happening in the person’s life and in their environment, Cohen says.
Thats why both Ozlo and Headspace have built full libraries of sleep soundsto meet people where they are. Sound composers like Cohen and Sorenson go way beyond simple static. They build immersive sound environments: layers of familiar, soothing textures help create a feeling of safety and ease, quietly occupying the mind just enough to help you drift off.
Inside the craft of sleep sound design
Building the perfect sleep sound is part science, part art. And most sounds are designed to serve two main purposes: mask disturbances (like traffic or snoring), and calm the mind.
Ozlos most popular request is for sleep maskssounds built specifically to block out noisy environments. To design one, Cohen studies how these external sleep disturbances sound at a frequency level. I look at what the noise sounds like on its own. Then what it sounds like once our headphones are sitting in your ears, he says. From there, he builds layers to cover the gaps, often at a similar frequency as the offending sound.
The goal is that any time an external sound is also heard, it just blends into that bed of sound, he says. Were gently raising the threshold of what sounds a person is hearing so that if something does bubble up in their external environment, nothing pokes through the quiet and causes a disturbance.
Calming tracks that quiet racing thoughts take a slightly different approach. Instead of just covering up noise, they aim to transport you somewhere elsesomewhere your brain instinctively feels safe. It should evoke positive or calming memories, says Cohen.
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Sorenson describes this process as constructing an audio diorama: layering field recordings, ambient noise, and subtle musical motifs to build a miniature world for a listeners mind to explore. I want to create things that are hidden inside of the sound. That if you listen, you can peel back the layers and go deeper and deeper, he says. That kind of mindset allows the mind to drift into that other space when we sleep.
Right now, Cohen is working on re-creating the experience of being on a train. He started with a field recording he made on a recent ridethat becomes the foundation. Then, he gets deeper to fill in the gaps that the audio didnt pick up: What materials is the train made out of? Does it feel like a safe, well-running train? Does it feel crowded? he asks. Every detail matters, even if listeners dont consciously recognize it.
Once he sets the scene, Cohen begins layering in other sounds: rain tapping against the window (either digitally created or carefully edited from a sample), the soft chatter of other passengers, intermittent gusts of wind, the distant call of a train horn. Those will all be separate elements that I’m mixing together to create a sense of realism, he says.
Keeping the brain engagedbut not awake
Even though personal preference shapes what we find soothing, good sleep sounds share a few key traits.
First: predictability. A well-studied aspect of what makes something relaxing is that there’s formal predictability, says Cohen. There won’t be anything that is surprising or shocking or jolting in the experience. Think about how a sudden car alarm or barking dog snaps you wide awake.
But too much predictability backfires. If it’s too simple, too monotonous, it becomes annoying, says Sorenson. Think of the maddening tick of a clock or rhythmic drip of a faucet. The best sounds strike a balance: steady enough to be calming, but varied enough to keep your brain gently engaged. Rain is a classic example. If you listen to the rain, there’s an immense amount of randomness and variation within a larger predictable phenomenon, says Cohen.
[Images: Courtesy of Headspace]
Another detail most listeners wont consciously notice: the key of the music itself. Sorenson has found that sleep sounds built around major keysrather than minor onestend to feel lighter and more relaxing.
The best sleep sounds don’t just drown out the worldthey create a new one that’s easy to get lost in. And right now, theyre one of the gentlest tools we have to improve sleep. In a world obsessed with quick fixes, Sorensen says, theres something powerful about finding rest through creativity, memory, and sound.
Art is important. Sound and music have a healing effect on people, says Sorenson. Potentially at some point, there could be a pill for everything. But right now, this is what we have.
Digital banking fintech firm Chime disclosed a rise in 2024 revenue in its IPO filing on Tuesday for a long-awaited U.S. stock market launch.
Financial technology companies have increasingly entered the U.S. lending space, aiming to wrest market share from major players such as JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America and Citigroup.
Chime’s revenue rose to $1.67 billion in the fiscal year ended 2024, up from $1.28 billion, a year earlier.
The IPO window has reopened as markets recover sharply amid progress in trade talks, offering companies an opportunity to list their shares after months of turbulence driven by tariffs.
A strong debut by Chime could pave the way for other IPO candidates, particularly in the technology sector, to move forward with their listings.
“We led the 2017 Series B when few Silicon Valley investors believed, driven by our conviction that Chime could become a category-defining company,” said Simon Wu from Cathay Innovation.
“Today’s IPO filing marks an exciting new chapternot just for Chime, but for the future of inclusive, technology-driven consumer finance.”
San Francisco-based Chime, cofounded by Chris Britt and Ryan King in 2012, provides financial services via a mobile app.
The company has raised $2.65 billion from private investors since its inception, according to data from PitchBook. Its last fundraise round attracted high-profile investors including SoftBank Investment Advisers, General Atlantic and Tiger Global Management.
In August 2021, Chime achieved a valuation of $25 billion during a fundraise. However, the company did not disclose the number of shares it intends to sell or the estimated price band for its listing.
The startup will trade on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol “CHYM”.
Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs and J.P.Morgan are heading a syndicate of Wall Street investment banks chosen to underwrite the offering.
Jaiveer Shekhawat and Manya Saini, Reuters
