Business
Coronavirus: Trump orders General Motors to produce ventilators as U.S. cases climb – Global News
President Donald Trump issued an order Friday that seeks to force General Motors to produce ventilators for coronavirus patients under the Defense Production Act.
Trump said negotiations with General Motors had been productive, “but our fight against the virus is too urgent to allow the give-and-take of the contracting process to continue to run its normal course.”
Trump said “GM was wasting time” and that his actions will help ensure the quick production of ventilators that will save American lives.
Previously Trump has been reluctant to use the act to force businesses to contribute to the coronavirus fight, and wasn’t clear what triggered his order against GM.
The Detroit automaker is among the farthest along among U.S. companies trying to repurpose factories to build ventilators. It’s working with Ventec Life Systems, a small Seattle-area ventilator maker to increase the company’s production and will use a GM auto electronics plant in Kokomo, Indiana, to make the machines.
The company said Friday it could build 10,000 ventilators per month starting in April with potential to make even more.
Trump said the United States would produce 100,000 ventilators in 100 days and said he had named White House aide Peter Navarro as the coordinator of the Defense Production Act.
“We’re going to make a lot of ventilators,” Trump said, pledging to take care of U.S. needs while also helping other countries.
After Trump invoked the act, GM said in a statement that it has been working around the clock for more than a week with Ventec and parts suppliers to build more ventilators. The company said its commitment to build Ventec’s ventilators “has never wavered.”
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Trump said from the Oval Office that the government thought it had a deal for 40,000 ventilators but GM cut the number to 6,000 and talked about a higher price than previously discussed.
“I didn’t like it,” he said. “So we did activate it with respect to General Motors. And hopefully, maybe we won’t even need the full activation. We’ll find out, but we need the ventilators.”
GM said it is offering resources to Ventec “at cost.” And Ventec, not GM, is talking with the government. The only changes Ventec has made have been at the government’s request, said Chris Brooks, the company’s chief strategy officer. GM would merely be a contract manufacturer for Ventec, he said.
Ventec ventilators, which are portable and can handle intensive care patients, cost about $18,000 each, Brooks said. That’s much cheaper than the more sophisticated ventilators used by hospitals that can cost up to $50,000, he said.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency has made multiple requests since Sunday for estimates of how many ventilators it can build at what price, and has not settled on any numbers, according to Brooks. That could slow Ventec’s efforts to ramp up production because it doesn’t know how many breathing machines it must build, he said.
Trump’s action came just after a series of tweets attacking GM and CEO Mary Barra. The president also cajoled Ford to build ventilators fast. Ford responded that it’s “pulling out all the stops.”
It was a dramatic shift in tone from the night before, when the president told Fox News that pleas by hospitals for more ventilators are exaggerated.
Trump questioned whether the number of ventilators requested by hospitals was exaggerated: “I have a feeling that a lot of the numbers that are being said in some areas are just bigger than they’re going to be,” he said.
“I don’t believe you need 40,000 or 30,000 ventilators,” he continued. “You know, you’re going to major hospitals sometimes, they’ll have two ventilators. And now, all of a sudden, they’re saying, ‘can we order 30,000 ventilators?’”
Experts say that no matter how many ventilators that companies can crank out, it may not be enough to cover the entire need, and it may not come in time to help areas now being hit hard with critical virus cases.
At present, U.S. hospitals have roughly 65,000 ventilators that are fully capable of treating severe coronavirus patients. They could cobble together about 170,000, including some simpler versions that won’t work in all cases, said Dr. Lewis Rubinson, chief medical officer at Morristown Medical Center in New Jersey and lead author of a 2010 medical journal article on the matter.
In February, Dr. James Lawler, an associate professor and infectious disease specialist at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, estimated that 960,000 people in the U.S. will need to be on ventilators.
Rubinson said it’s unlikely the U.S. would need that many ventilators at the same time, estimating it will need more like 300,000 fairly quickly. If social distancing works, people will get sick at different times, allowing hospitals to use ventilators on multiple patients.
In the most severe cases, the coronavirus damages healthy tissue in the lungs, making it hard for them to deliver oxygen to the blood. Pneumonia can develop, along with a more severe and potentially deadly condition called acute respiratory distress syndrome, which can damage other organs.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has been pleading for 30,000 more ventilators to handle an expected surge in critical virus patients during the next three weeks.
U.S. Rep. Debbie Dingell, a Michigan Democrat, said her state is facing a critical need for ventilators. Michigan has gone from three coronavirus deaths a week ago to a total of 92 on Friday.
“I think we need to let the scientists and the doctors tell us what we need and not people without medical degrees or the background,” she said.
Kevin Freking in Washington and David Koenig in Dallas contributed to this story.
With files from Reuters
© 2020 The Canadian Press
Business
Calgary breaks all-time record in housing starts but increasing demand keeps inventory low – CBC.ca
Soaring housing demands in Calgary led to an all-time record for new residential builds last year, but inventory levels of completed and unsold units remained low due to demand outpacing supply.
According to the latest report from Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC), total housing starts increased by 13 per cent in Calgary, reaching a total of 19,579 units with growth across all dwelling types in the city.
That compares to a decline of 0.5 per cent overall for housing starts in the six major Canadian cities surveyed by CMHC.
Calgary also had the highest housing starts by population.
“Part of the reason why we think that might have happened is that developers are responding to low vacancies in the rental market,” said Adebola Omosola, a housing economics specialist with CMHC.
“The population of Calgary is still growing, a record number of people moved here last year, and we still expect that to remain at least in the short term.”
Earlier this year, the Calgary Real Estate Board also predicted that demand, especially for rental apartments, wouldn’t let up any time soon.
Industry can cope with demand, expert says
According to numbers from the report, average construction times were higher in 2023 for all dwelling types except for apartments.
The agency’s report suggests the increase in the number of under-construction residential projects might mean builders are operating at or near full capacity.
However, there’s optimism the construction industry can match the increasing need.
Brian Hahn, CEO of BILD Calgary Region, said despite concerns around about construction costs, project timelines and labour shortages, the industry has kept up with the demand for new builds.
“I’ve heard that kind of conversation at the end of 2022 and I heard it in 2023,” Hahn said.
“Yet here we are early in 2024, and January and February were record numbers again.”
Hahn added he believes the current pace of construction will continue for at least the next six months and that the industry is looking at initiatives to attract more people to the trades.
Increase in row house and apartment construction
Construction growth was largely driven by new apartment projects, making up almost half of the housing starts in Calgary in 2023.
The federal housing agency says 9,034 apartment units were started that year, an increase of 17 per cent from the previous year. Of those, about 54 per cent were purpose-built rentals.
Apartments made up around two-thirds of all units under construction, CMHC said, with the total number of units under construction reaching 23,473.
Growth, however, was seen across all dwelling types. Row homes increased by 34 per cent from the previous year while groundbreaking on single-detached homes grew by two per cent.
“Notwithstanding challenges, our members and the industry counterparts that support them managed to produce a record amount of starts and completions,” Hahn said.
“I have little doubt that the industry will do their very best to keep pace at those levels.”
Business
Ottawa real estate: House starts down, apartments up in 2023 – CTV News Ottawa
Rental housing dominated construction in Ottawa last year, according to a new report from the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC).
Residential construction declined significantly in 2023, with housing starts dropping to 9,245 units, a 19.5 per cent decline from the record high observed in 2022. But while single-detached and row housing starts fell compared to 2022, new construction for rental units and condominiums rose.
“There’s been a shift toward rental construction over the past two years. Rental housing starts made up nearly one third of total starts in 2023, close to double the average of the previous five years,” the report stated.
Apartment starts reached their highest level since the 1970s.
“The trend toward rental and condominium apartment construction follows increased demand in these market segments due to population growth, households looking for affordable options, and some seniors downsizing to smaller units,” the CMHC said.
Demand from international migration and students, the high cost of home ownership, and people moving to Ottawa from other parts of Ontario were the main drivers for rental housing starts in 2023. The CMHC says rental and condominium apartment starts made up 63 per cent of total starts in 2023, compared to the average of 37 per cent for the period 2018-2022.
There was a modest increase in rental housing starts in 2023 over the record-high seen the year prior and a jump in new condominiums. The report shows 5,846 new apartments were built in Ottawa last year, up 2.1 per cent compared to 2022.
Big demand for condos
The CMHC said condo starts reached a new high in 2023, increasing 3 per cent from 2022 numbers.
“As of the end of 2023, there were only 13 completed and unsold condominium units, highlighting continued demand for new units,” the CMHC said.
Condominum starts increased in areas such as Chinatown, Hintonburg, Vanier and Alta Vista, as well as some suburban areas like Kanata, Stittsville, and western Orléans. Condo apartment construction declined in denser parts of the city like downtown, Lowertown and Centretown, the report says.
Taller buildings are also becoming more common, as the cranes dotting the skyline can attest. The CMHC notes that buildings with more than 20 storeys accounted for nearly 10 per cent of apartment structure starts in 2022 and 2023, compared to an average of 2 per cent over the 2017-2021 period. The number of units per building also rose 7 per cent compared to 2022.
Single-detached home construction down significantly
The number of new single-detached homes built in Ottawa last year was the lowest level seen in the city since the mid 1990s, CMHC said.
“The Ottawa area experienced a slowdown in residential construction in 2023, driven by a significant decline in single-detached and row housing starts,” the CMHC said.
Single-detached housing starts were down 45 per cent compared to 2022. Row house starts dropped by 38 per cent compared to 2022, marking a third year of declines in a row.
“Demand for single-detached and row houses also declined in 2023. Higher mortgage rates and home prices have led to a shift in demand toward more affordable rental and condominium units,” the report said.
There were 1,535 single-detached housing starts in Ottawa last year, 208 new semi-detached homes and 1,678 new row houses.
The majority of single-detached and row housing starts were built in suburban communities such as Barrhaven, Stittsville, Kanata, Orléans and rural parts of the city.
“Increased construction costs resulting from higher financing rates and inflation that occurred in 2022 and 2023 contributed to the decline in construction in the region,” the CMHC said.
Business
Trump’s media company ticker leads to fleeting windfall for some investors
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Possible confusion over the new stock symbol for former President Donald Trump’s Truth Social (DJT-Q) saw some investor brokerage balances briefly jump by hundreds of thousands of dollars on Tuesday, the first day Trump’s “DJT” ticker traded.
Several people complained on social media about briefly seeing the value of their DJT stock holdings on Charles Schwab platforms inflated to figures more in line with what they would be worth if the shares traded at the level of the Dow Jones Transportation Average.
Some users said they faced a similar issue in pre-market hours on Morgan Stanley’s E*Trade trading platform.
Shares of Trump Media & Technology Group opened Tuesday at $70.90, while the Dow Jones Transportation Average started the session at 15,937.73 points.
For one trader, the Schwab brokerage balance jumped by more than $1 million due to the error, according to a screen grab shared on social media platform X. Reuters was unable to contact the trader or independently verify the brokerage balance.
“It sure was nice seeing millions in the account, even if it wasn’t real,” another person, going by the username @DanielBenjamin8, who faced the issue in his E*Trade account, posted on X.
Two X users and one on Reddit surmised that the inflated balances were due to the ticker symbol for the company being nearly identical to the index.
A spokeswoman for Charles Schwab said that certain users on some of Schwab’s trading platforms saw their brokerage balances briefly inflated due to a technical issue.
The issue has been resolved and investors are able to trade equities and options on Schwab platforms, she said. Schwab declined to describe the exact cause of the issue.
E*Trade did not immediately respond to a request for comment outside of regular business hours.
Trump Media & Technology Group and S&P Dow Jones Indices, which maintains the Dow Jones Transportation Average Index, did not immediately comment on the issue.
While social media users said the issue appeared to have been resolved, many rued not being able to cash out their supposed gains from the error.
“I better go tell my boss that I’m actually not retiring,” the trader whose account balance had briefly jump by more than $1 million, wrote on X.
Trump Media & Technology Group shares surged more than 36% on Tuesday in their debut on the Nasdaq that comes more than two years since its merger with a blank-check firm was announced.
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