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1. China Further Eases COVID-19 Rules
China eased its strict COVID-19 restrictions Wednesday in reaction to protests circulating major cities in the country, the Associated Press reports. Changes include the ability to isolate at home instead of a quarantine center after testing positive for the virus and public facilities no longer requiring visitors to enter a health code that tracks their virus tests.
“Local officials must ‘take strict and detailed measures to protect people’s life, safety and health’ but at the same time ‘minimize the impact of the epidemic on economic and social development,’” the AP reports.
2. Trump Organization Guilty of Fraud
The Trump Organization, former President Donald Trump’s company, was convicted of tax fraud Tuesday. The company was found guilty on all 17 counts and faces a fine of up to $1.6 million, the Associated Press reports.
“This case is unprecedented and involved no monetary gain to these two corporations,” Trump said in a statement, adding: “New York City is a hard place to be ‘Trump.’”
While the million-dollar fine is essentially a slap on the wrist of a billion-dollar company, the Trump Organization’s ability to obtain loans and make deals could be compromised by the ruling, the AP reports.
3. Holiday Hotel Demand Follows Normal Patterns
Hotel demand is expected to follow usual seasonal patterns this holiday season, when demand typically dips due to business travel shutting down and families staying with other family, HNN’s Bryan Wroten reports.
Isaac Collazo, vice president of analytics at STR, said he expects occupancy in the U.S. to drop a point from Dec. 18 through Dec. 31 while average daily rate will grow 2%, which will keep revenue per available room flat.
Hotel demand could see a slight additional boost this holiday season due to both Christmas Day and New Year’s Day being on Sunday, as most people will have Monday off, Wroten reports.
4. Europe Stocks Rise, US Dips
With inflation starting to ease in the eurozone and prudent planning to avoid an energy crisis this winter, the European market is starting to look more optimistic, the Wall Street Journal reports. The Euro Stoxx 50 index gained 19% this quarter as of Tuesday, on pace to be the best quarterly performance since 2009.
“We’re in a recovery trade. There’s still going to be a recession. But what we’re seeing is signs that the recession won’t be as bad and that inflation might calm down more quickly than people thought,” said Jordan Rochester, a currency strategist at Nomura.
However, U.S. stock futures dipped even further Wednesday, with the Dow Jones Industrial down 0.4% and S&P 500 dropping 0.7%, the Associated Press reports. The Federal Reserve is expected to raise interest rates an additional half-percentage point by the end of the week.
5. New York Hotel Union Holds Political Power
The Hotel and Gaming Trades Council, a New York and New Jersey union that represents about 35,000 hotel and casino workers, wields a significant amount of political power in the New York City area and has irritated some hotel operators, the New York Times reports.
The union, which donated to the campaigns of the eventual governor of New York and mayor of New York City, blocked the conversion of the Paramount Hotel in Times Square into affordable housing. While the property was shut down during the beginning of the pandemic, the union claimed the conversion “threatened the jobs of the workers waiting to return to the 597-room hotel.”
Though the union has fought for its workers, some hotel operators aren’t fond of the union’s decision-making, which includes accelerating the expansion of casinos and pushing a hotel regulation that could cost New York billions in tax revenue, the newspaper reports.