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- Is a free iPhone 15 from the phone company a good deal? Not necessarily. The Washington Post
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India’s Modi lashes opposition as Adani allegations persist – Reuters India
- India’s Modi lashes opposition as Adani allegations persist Reuters India
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- Trust of 140 crore Indians my safety shield which your lies and accusations can’t destroy: PM Modi to Cong in Lok Sabha The Tribune India
- Sanjay Jha writes on Rahul Gandhi’s speech in Parliament: Questions the Congress leader has raised need answers, not political rhetoric and whataboutery The Indian Express
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CVS, Walmart and Walgreens to reduce pharmacy hours as staffing challenges persist
CVS and Walmart are reducing their pharmacy operating hours across the U.S. to improve employees’ work-life balance as the chains continue to struggle with staffing shortages in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.
CVS said it will be “adjusting hours in select stores” come spring, as part of a periodic review of “operating hours to make sure we’re open during peak customer demand.” The move will affect around two-thirds of the company’s approximately 9,000 retail pharmacies beginning in March, a company spokesperson said in a statement to CBS MoneyWatch.
CVS, which is the largest pharmacy chain in the U.S. by revenue, said it’s making the schedule changes in order to “ensure our pharmacy teams are available to serve patients when they’re most needed,” a CVS spokesperson said. “If a pharmacy is closed, a patient can visit any open CVS Pharmacy location for assistance with their immediate prescription needs,” the spokesperson added.
Walmart reduces hours, raises pay
Walmart also said it’s cutting hours at its pharmacy locations nationwide to improve “work-life balance” for its associates.
Walmart pharmacies will be open from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Friday. Previously they were open until 9 p.m. on weekdays.
“Walmart is committed to helping our associates live better. Walmart has a strong and incredible pharmacy team, and we are making this change to not only enhance their work-life balance but also to maintain the best level of service for our customers,” Walmart said in a statement to CBS MoneyWatch.
Walmart said it’s making the schedule change based on feedback from pharmacy staff and customers.
“By positioning our teams in the hours where our customers say they want to visit our pharmacy, we are better able to deliver excellent customer service and support our associates as they continue to serve their communities every day,” Walmart said.
In mid-June, Walmart announced higher wages for more than 36,000 pharmacy technicians, raising their average hourly pay to more than $20.
Prior to the pandemic, pharmacists and pharmacy technicians outnumbered opportunities for employment, according to Michael Hogue, dean of the Loma Linda University School of Pharmacy.
As the COVID-19 vaccines first began to be rolled out in 2021, regional and national pharmacy chains were clamoring for qualified workers to support the massive public health campaign. Job opportunities for pharmacy students soared.
Walgreens hires more pharmacists, raises pay
A spokesperson for the Walgreens pharmacy chain, the second largest in the U.S., also said it has had to adjust pharmacy hours over the past 12-plus months due to staffing challenges.
Walgreens added that it has hired thousands of pharmacists as well as increased pharmacy workers’ pay to address ongoing staffing issues. It said the efforts are working and the issues are subsiding.
“We have seen positive staffing trends for the past several months as we work to return more stores to normal operating hours,” Walgreens said.
Pharmacies aggressively hired pharmacists and pharmacy technicians starting in February 2021, when COVID-19 vaccines were first made available to the general public, to accelerate efforts to inoculate as many people as possible. Pharmacist job postings surged and drugstore chains offered hefty signing bonuses of up to $20,000.
Wall St rises after CPI data but Fed concerns persist
NEW YORK, Dec 13 (Reuters) – U.S. stocks rose on Tuesday after a unexpectedly small consumer price increase buoyed optimism that the Federal Reserve could soon dial back its inflation-taming interest rate hikes, but concerns remained the central back could stay aggressive.
The benchmark S&P 500 (.SPX) jumped as much as 2.76% to a three-month high early in the trading session on news that November U.S. consumer prices barely rose as gasoline and used cars cost less, leading to the smallest annual inflation increase in nearly a year at 7.1%.
Rising expectations for smaller and slower Fed rate hikes sent U.S. Treasury yields sharply lower and helped lift rate-sensitive gauges like the S&P 500 growth index (.IGX), up 1.18%, and the S&P 500 real estate index (.SPLRCR) up 2.04% to their highest intraday levels in nearly three months. The real estate sector notched its biggest daily percentage gain in two weeks as the best performing of the 11 major sectors.
Fed funds futures prices implied a better-than-even chance that the Fed will follow an expected half-point rate hike this week, with smaller 25-basis point hikes at its first two meetings of 2023, and stopping shy of 5% by March.
Morgan Stanley’s chief U.S. economist Ellen Zentner now sees even smaller Fed rate hikes, of 25 basis points at the central bank’s February meeting, and no further increases in March, leaving the peak fed funds rate at 4.625%.
Still, equities pared gains ahead of the Fed’s policy statement on Wednesday, in which the central bank is widely expected to announce a 50 basis point rate hike.
“There was some excitement early on that the CPI number was once again below expectations – it shows some sequential cooling – but once we saw that initial pop, stock investors kind of reassessed,” said Jason Ware, chief investment officer at Albion Financial Group in Salt Lake City, Utah.
“That probably took some of the steam out of the markets once investors realized tomorrow very well may be (Fed Chair) Jerome Powell throwing cold water on the rally today.”
The Dow Jones Industrial Average (.DJI) rose 103.6 points, or 0.3%, to 34,108.64, the S&P 500 (.SPX) gained 29.09 points, or 0.73%, to 4,019.65 and the Nasdaq Composite (.IXIC) added 113.08 points, or 1.01%, to 11,256.81.
[1/3] Screens display the trading information for ExxonMobil on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York City, U.S., December 9, 2022. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid
Energy (.SPNY), up 1.77%, was among the best performing S&P sectors on the day as the softer-than-anticipated inflation data sent the dollar lower and boosted crude oil prices.
The consumer inflation numbers follow November’s producer prices report last week, which was slightly higher than expected but pointed to a moderation in the trend.
Still, some questioned whether the trend in prices could continue.
“Today’s CPI print is incrementally good, but it needs to be sustained,” said Venu Krishna, head of U.S. equity strategy at Barclays in New York.
“There is a big question mark whether we can really come to the 2% inflation (Fed target). Perhaps we live in a world in which it will be higher and that means rates will be higher and then multiples will certainly be lower.”
Moderna Inc (MRNA.O) surged 19.63% after the biotechnology firm’s experimental vaccine in combination with Merck & Co Inc’s (MRK.N) blockbuster drug Keytruda showed promising results in a skin cancer study. Merck shares advanced 1.78%.
Pinterest Inc (PINS.N) jumped 11.90% after Piper Sandler upgraded the social media platform’s stock to “overweight” from “neutral.”
Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by a 2.83-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 1.49-to-1 ratio favored advancers.
The S&P 500 posted 18 new 52-week highs and 1 new lows; the Nasdaq Composite recorded 92 new highs and 212 new lows.
Reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak, additional reporting by Carolina Mandl; Editing by Richard Chang
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
Dollar gains as inflation pressures persist; eyes on c.bank meetings
SINGAPORE, Dec 12 (Reuters) – The dollar climbed on Monday after data on Friday showed U.S. producer prices had risen more than expected last month, pointing to persistent inflationary pressures and a chance the Federal Reserve would keep interest rates higher for longer.
The dollar rose 0.35% against the Japanese yen to 137.05. Against a basket of currencies, the U.S. dollar index eked out a 0.12% gain at 105.18.
The euro was last 0.2% lower at $1.0509.
Sterling fell 0.31% to $1.2229 in Asia trade on Monday, while the Aussie edged 0.34% lower to $0.6773.
The kiwi similarly slipped 0.34% to $0.6393.
The U.S. producer price index for final demand in November was up 0.3% from the previous month and 7.4% from a year earlier, data released on Friday showed, a slight upside surprise from forecasts of a 0.2% and 7.2% increase, respectively.
“There were a little bit of concerns about how inflation would be persistently high and would encourage the Fed to keep policy at a restrictive level for even longer than previously expected,” said Carol Kong, a currency strategist at Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA).
Traders were also kept on edge in the run up to key risk events this week, including U.S. inflation data and a slew of major central bank meetings.
The Federal Reserve once again takes centre stage, and is widely expected to raise interest rates by 50 basis points, though focus will be on the central bank’s updated economic projections and Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s press conference.
“If he does talk more about the risks to the economy … I think that will probably be considered dovish by markets and, of course, markets love dovish comments and how the FOMC will pay more attention to downside risks to the economy,” said CBA’s Kong.
The Bank of England and the European Central Bank (ECB) will also meet this week, and each is likewise expected to deliver a 50 bp rate hike.
“ECB officials have been telling us that they care more about the underlying inflation, which has remained elevated,” said Kong of the upcoming ECB meeting.
“If they do hike by 50 bps … they might follow up with some pretty hawkish comments in Lagarde’s post meeting conference.”
Ahead of the FOMC meeting, November’s U.S. inflation figures are due on Tuesday, with economists expecting core annual inflation of 6.1%.
“The market reaction to U.S. inflation surprises has been asymmetric so far in 2022, with downside surprises having a larger effect than upside ones,” said analysts at Barclays.
“The inflation print will likely be the bigger driver of the two, (given) the Fed’s guidance toward smaller hikes,” they added, referring to influences on the U.S. dollar.
The offshore yuan eased slightly to 6.9798 per dollar, further pressured by worries over a potential spike in COVID cases as China eases its stringent COVID-19 restrictions.
Reporting by Rae Wee; Editing by Lincoln Feast and Bradley Perrett
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
Rural Arizona county delays certifying midterm results as election disputes persist
CNN
—
Officials in a rural Arizona county Monday delayed the certification of November’s midterm elections, missing the legal deadline and leading the Arizona secretary of state’s office to sue over the county’s failure to sign off on the results.
By a 2-1 vote Monday morning, the Republican majority on the Cochise County Board of Supervisors pushed back certification until Friday, citing concerns about voting machines. Because Monday was the deadline for all 15 Arizona counties to certify their results, Cochise’s action could put at risk the votes of some 47,000 county residents and could inject chaos into the election if those votes go uncounted.
In the lawsuit filed by the office of Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs – a Democrat who will be the state’s next governor – officials said failing to certify the election results violates state law and could “potentially disenfranchise” the county’s voters.
CNN has reached out to the supervisors for comment.
Arizona official rebuts Kari Lake’s claim about vote counting
The standoff between officials in Cochise County and the Arizona secretary of state’s office illustrates how election misinformation is continuing to stoke controversy about the 2022 results in some corners of the country even though many of the candidates who echoed former President Donald Trump’s lies about the 2020 election were defeated in November.
A crowd of grassroots activists turned up at a special meeting of the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors to loudly protest that county’s election administration procedures during a public comment portion of the meeting after problems with printers at voting locations on Election Day led to long lines at about a third of the county’s voting locations. In a new letter to the state attorney general’s office – which had demanded an explanation of the problems – the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office said that “no voter was disenfranchised because of the difficulty the county experienced with some of its printers.”
Disputes over the results have erupted elsewhere.
In Pennsylvania, where counties also faced a Monday deadline to certify their general election balloting, local officials have faced an onslaught of petitions demanding recounts. And officials in Luzerne County, in northeastern Pennsylvania, deadlocked Monday on whether to certify the results, according to multiple media reports. Election officials there did not respond to inquiries from CNN on Monday afternoon.
In a statement to CNN, officials with the Pennsylvania Department of State said they have reached out to Luzerne officials “to inquire about the board’s decision and their intended next steps.”
On Election Day, a paper shortage in Luzerne County prompted a court-ordered extension of in-person voting.
Arizona, another key battleground state, has long been a cauldron of election conspiracies. GOP gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake and GOP secretary of state candidate Mark Finchem, both of whom pushed Trump’s lies about 2020, have refused to concede their races, as they continue to sow doubts about this year’s election results.
Kari Lake won’t commit to accepting 2022 election results
Lake’s campaign filed a lawsuit last week demanding more information from Maricopa County’s elections department about the number of voters who checked in to polling places compared to the ballots cast. And Arizona’s GOP attorney general candidate Abe Hamadeh – who, like Lake and Finchem, was backed by Trump – filed a lawsuit in the state superior court in Maricopa County last week challenging the election results based on what the suit describes as errors in the management of the election.
Hamadeh is trailing his opponent Democrat Kris Mayes by 510 votes as their race heads toward a recount. But the lawsuit asks the court to issue an injunction prohibiting the Arizona secretary of state from certifying Mayes as the winner and asks the court to declare Hamadeh as the winner. A recount cannot begin until the state’s votes are certified.
Alex Gulotta, Arizona state director of All Voting is Local, said the drama over certification of the votes and the refusal by losing candidates to back down is part of an “infrastructure of election denial” that has been building since the 2020 election in Arizona.
“Those folks are going to continue to try and find fertile ground for their efforts to undermine our elections. They are not going to give up,” Gulotta said. “We had a whole slate of election deniers, many of whom were not elected.”
But their refusal to concede “was inevitable in Arizona, at least in this cycle, given the candidates. These aren’t good losers,” he added. “They said from the beginning that they would be bad losers.”
In Cochise County, the Republican officials on the county Board of Supervisors advocated for the delay, citing concerns about voting machines.
Ann English, the Democratic chairwoman, argued that there was “no reason for us to delay.”
But Republican commissioners Tom Crosby and Peggy Judd, who have cited claims that the machines were not properly certified, voted to delay signing off on the results. Monday’s action marked the second time the Republican-controlled board has delayed certification. And it marked the latest effort by Republicans on the board to register their disapproval of vote-tallying machines. Earlier this month, they attempted to mount an expansive hand count audit of the midterm results, pitting them against Cochise’s election director and the county attorney, who warned that the gambit might break the law.
State election officials said the concerns cited by the Republican majority about the vote-tallying machines are rooted in debunked conspiracy theories.
The state’s election director Kori Lorick has confirmed in writing that the voting machines had been tested and certified – a point Hobbs reiterated in Monday’s lawsuit. She is asking the court to force the board to certify the results by Thursday.
An initial deadline of December 5 had been set for statewide certification. In the lawsuit, Hobbs’ lawyers said state law does allow for a slight delay if her office has not received a county’s results, but not past December 8 – or 30 days after the election.
“Absent this Court’s intervention, the Secretary will have no choice but to complete statewide canvass by December 8 without Cochise County’s votes included,” her lawyers added.
If votes from this Republican stronghold somehow went uncounted, it could flip two races to Democrats: the contest for state superintendent and a congressional race in which Republican Juan Ciscomani already has been projected as the winner by CNN and other outlets.
In a recent opinion piece published in The Arizona Republic, two former election officials in Maricopa County – said the courts were likely to step in and force Cochise to certify the results.
But Republican Helen Purcell, a former Maricopa County recorder, and Tammy Patrick, a Democrat and the county’s former federal compliance officer, warned that “a Republican-controlled board of supervisors could end up disenfranchising their own voters and hand Democrats even more victories in the midterms.”
This story has been updated with additional developments.
Iran prison fire kills four, injures 61 as protests persist
DUBAI, Oct 16 (Reuters) – A fire at Iran’s Evin prison late on Saturday killed four detainees and injured 61, state media reported, as anti-government protests sparked by a woman’s death in police custody continued on Sunday, including at several universities.
Iranian authorities said on Saturday that a prison workshop had been set on fire “after a fight among a number of prisoners convicted of financial crimes and theft”. Evin holds many detainees facing security charges, including Iranians with dual nationality.
Iran’s judiciary said four of those injured in Saturday’s fire were in critical condition and that those killed had died of smoke inhalation, Iranian state media reported.
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Protests sparked by 22-year-old Mahsa Amini’s death on Sept. 16 have turned into one of the boldest challenges to Iran’s clerical rulers since the 1979 revolution, with protesters calling for the downfall of the Islamic Republic, even if the unrest does not seem close to toppling the system.
Demonstrations continued at several universities on Sunday, including in the cities of Tabriz and Rasht, to a heavy deployment of riot police. Videos posted on social media showed students at a Tehran university chanting: “Iran has turned into a big prison. Evin prison has become a slaughterhouse.”
Reuters could not independently verify the footage.
Families of some political detainees took to social media to call on the authorities to ensure their safety at Evin prison, which in 2018 was blacklisted by the U.S. government for “serious human rights abuses”.
Footage of the prison aired on state television hours after the fire apparently showed that calm had returned to the facility with inmates asleep in their wards. It also showed firefighters inspecting a workshop with fire damage to the roof.
Atena Daemi, a human rights activist, said that relatives of prisoners in the women’s section had gone to Evin for visiting hours, but authorities denied them access, resulting in a standoff. Prisoners were “fine, but the phones are broken”, they were told, according to Daemi. She later tweeted that some women prisoners had called their families.
The husband of Iranian journalist Niloofar Hamedi, who broke the news of Amini’s hospitalisation and was arrested last month, also wrote on Twitter that she had telephoned him on Sunday.
A lawyer representing an American Iranian held at Evin, Siamak Namazi, imprisoned for nearly seven years on espionage-related charges rejected by Washington as baseless, said on Sunday that Namazi had contacted his relatives.
A view of smoke rising from Evin Prison in Tehran, Iran, October 15, 2022 in this still image take from a video obtained by Reuters.
“SiamakNamazi has now spoken to his family. He is safe and has been moved to a secure area of Evin Prison. We have no further details,” lawyer Jared Genser said in a tweet.
Several other dual national Iranians and foreign citizens are held in Evin prison mostly for security-related charges. Some Twitter posts by their friends and relatives said they had contacted their families on Sunday.
VIOLENT CRACKDOWN
Asked about the prison fire, U.S. President Joe Biden told reporters during a campaign trip on Saturday to Portland, Oregon that the Iranian government was “so oppressive” and that he was surprised by the courage of the Iranian protesters.
Iran’s foreign ministry said Biden had interfered in Tehran’s state matters by showing support for the anti-government protests. read more
France said on Sunday it was following with the utmost attention the situation at Evin prison, “where several French nationals are being arbitrarily detained”.
“France once again reminds the Iranian authorities that they are responsible for the safety and health of our compatriots detained in Iran,” a French foreign ministry spokesperson said in a statement, repeating a call for their immediate release.
Protests have been met with a brutal state crackdown. Rights groups said at least 240 protesters had been killed in the anti-government protests, including 32 minors. Over 8,000 people had been arrested in 111 cities and towns, Iranian activist news agency HRANA said on Saturday. The authorities have not published a death toll.
Among the casualties have been teenage girls whose deaths have become a rallying cry for more demonstrations across the country.
Iran, which has blamed the violence on enemies at home and abroad, denies security forces have killed protesters. State media said on Saturday at least 26 members of the security forces had been killed by “rioters”.
The clampdown on protests has attracted international condemnation, with the United States, Canada and some European countries imposing sanctions on Iranian officials and organisations they accuse of being involved.
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Additional reporting by Mathieu Rosemain in Paris
Writing by Parisa Hafezi
Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky, Alexandra Hudson
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
Credit Suisse to buy back $3 billion in debt, sell hotel as credit fears persist
Signage hangs over the entrance of a Credit Suisse Group AG branch in Zurich, Switzerland, on Sunday, Sept. 25, 2022. Inflation in Switzerland has more than doubled since the start of the year and the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs expects it to come in at a three-decade-high of 3% for 2022. Photographer: Pascal Mora/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Troubled bank Credit Suisse offered to buy back up to 3 billion Swiss francs ($3.03 billion) of debt securities Friday, as it navigates a plunging share price and a rise in bets against its debt.
The Swiss lender also confirmed that it is selling its famous Savoy Hotel in Zurich’s financial district, prompting some speculation that it is scrambling for liquidity.
In a statement Friday regarding the offer to repurchase debt securities, Credit Suisse said: “The transactions are consistent with our proactive approach to managing our overall liability composition and optimizing interest expense and allow us to take advantage of market conditions to repurchase debt at attractive prices.”
It comes after Credit Suisse’s shares briefly hit an all-time low earlier this week, and credit default swaps hit a record high, amid market’s skittishness over its future.
The embattled lender is embarking on a massive strategic review under a new CEO after a string of scandals and risk management failures, and will give a progress update alongside its quarterly earnings on Oct. 27.
The most costly of the scandals was the bank’s $5 billion exposure to hedge fund Archegos, which collapsed in March 2021. Credit Suisse has since overhauled its management team, suspended share buybacks and cut its dividend as it looks to shore up its future.
Shares closed at 4.22 Swiss francs on Thursday. They are down over 50% year to date.
On Friday, the bank announced a cash tender offer relating to eight euro or sterling-denominated senior debt securities, worth up to 1 billion euros ($980 million), along with 12 U.S. dollar-denominated securities worth up to $2 billion. The offers on the debt securities will expire by Nov. 3 and Nov. 10, respectively.
As Iran protests persist, Khamenei blames foreigners for unrest
In recent days, a new front of the protests emerged on university campuses across the country, including at an elite university in the capital that was besieged by security forces, according to activists and student groups. A national student group said that as of Saturday, students at more than 100 Iranian universities had joined a call to boycott classes in solidarity with the protests.
Videos posted on social media Monday also appeared to show young girls demonstrating at their schools, and repeating some of the protest movement’s familiar slogans.
Khamenei — a frequent target of derision in the protesters’ chants — said Amini’s death “broke our hearts” but called the reaction “unnatural,” according to the semiofficial Tasnim news agency. “How is it that some people do not see the foreign hand?” he was quoted as saying.
The protests, many led by women, are fueled by a litany of grievances: fury over Amini’s death, at the morality police who detained her and the mandatory strictures, like wearing the headscarf, that they enforce, as well as broader anger at the security services, the government and Iran’s clerical establishment. Gatherings to show solidarity with Iran’s protesters have attracted thousands of people in cities around the world.
The government crackdown on the demonstrations has killed at least 52 people, according to Amnesty International, and has included the use of live fire by the security services and the throttling of internet service to prevent demonstrators from organizing.
Last week, Iran carried out deadly cross-border attacks in northern Iraq, targeting the headquarters of three Iranian Kurdish opposition parties that support the demonstrations, in a sign of the government’s growing unease.
The protests began in Iran’s predominantly Kurdish west, where Amini was from, and which shares a border with Iraq’s semiautonomous Kurdish region.
Khamenei’s comments Monday echoed those of other Iranian officials, including President Ebrahim Raisi, who have blamed foreign enemies for the protests. Iranian authorities said Friday that they had arrested nine European nationals for their alleged role in the protests, in a move likely to increase tensions with the West.
“This week, the United States will be imposing further costs on perpetrators of violence against peaceful protestors,” President Biden said in a statement Monday. “We will continue holding Iranian officials accountable and supporting the rights of Iranians to protest freely.”
Despite the growing death toll, protests continued over the weekend and on Monday, including on university campuses in nearly half a dozen cities, according to videos posted by 1500 Tasvir, an anti-government group that monitors the demonstrations.
Videos posted online showed students chanting for the release of students detained in earlier crackdowns, voicing support for women and calling for the death of the supreme leader. Security forces could be seen firing tear gas at students at Isfahan University in another video. The Washington Post could not independently verify the authenticity of the videos.
The protest sites included Tehran’s elite Sharif University of Technology, a highly selective academic institution often compared to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Security forces raided the university on Sunday, beating and arresting students, according to videos shared on social media, as well as Twitter messages posted by a student association.
One video posted Sunday showed a stream of people fleeing what appeared to be a small battalion of officers on motorcycles outside the university. People can be heard screaming as loud booms — probably gunshots or tear gas canisters being fired — ring out in steady succession. Another video showed a line of people, apparently under arrest, being led into a large white van. The student group, the Islamic Association of Sharif, said in a Twitter post that up to 40 students had been arrested.
“The Islamic Association of the Students of Sharif University finds it necessary at this sensitive time to invite everyone to unite,” the group said in a statement posted Monday on Twitter. “And we want all the students and teachers of universities across the country to shut down classes as a sign of solidarity.”
Fourth of July travel: Flight cancellations, delays persist ahead of holiday weekend
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Tuesday marked another day of widespread flight disruptions for summer travelers.
More than 1,400 flights in, out of and across the United States were already delayed as of noon ET Tuesday, according to flight tracking website FlightAware. Meanwhile, more than 500 flights were canceled.
It’s already been a bleak travel season for the airline industry, which has had to drop 15% of the flights they originally planned for June through August to make the remaining flights more reliable, according to Airlines for America President Nicholas Calio.
FOURTH OF JULY TRAVEL: FLIGHT CANCELLATIONS CONTINUE AS HOLIDAY NEARS
Travellers check departure screens for their flight status at O’Hare International Airport in Chicago, Thursday, Dec. 30, 2021. (AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh / AP Newsroom)
Still, according to figures tracked by FlightAware, a number of trips are still getting delayed and canceled.
NO MORE CHEAP FLIGHTS: DOMESTIC TRAVEL PRICES UP OVER 20% FROM PRE-PANDEMIC LEVELS, REPORT SAYS
Over the past weekend, over 18,000 flights were delayed from Friday through Sunday, according to FlightAware data. Each day, 23% of all flights were delayed and about 3% were canceled, according to the data.
Travelers pass through Salt Lake City International Airport, Thursday, June 2, 2022, in Salt Lake City. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer / AP Newsroom)
However, FlightAware spokesperson Kathleen Bangs told FOX Business the website saw a “streak of delays and even higher cancellations” over Father’s Day and the Juneteenth holiday weekend. On Thursday and Friday of that weekend, cancellations reached 6% and 5%, respectively, she said.
Airlines already struggled with bad weather and shortages of workers, especially pilots, leading to widespread cancellations over the Memorial Day holiday weekend, which typically kicks off the summer travel season.
Cancelations reached 4.7% on the Friday of that holiday weekend, according to FlightAware.
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Airlines have been trying to ramp up hiring efforts and are also training more pilots to try and get back on track as passengers flood back to airports.
The Fourth of July holiday weekend is just days away and about 3.55 million people are expected to fly.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.