Raphael Stevens

America’s temporary pause in the use of Johnson & Johnson’s single-dose Covid-19 vaccine will not interfere with President Joe Biden’s goal of getting the nation to some semblance of normalcy by Independence Day, the dean of Brown University’s School of Public Health said Tuesday.”I think this is going to be a blip on the calendar in terms of getting Americans vaccinated,” said Dr. Ashish Jha. “I don’t think it’s going to affect the timeline at all.” Federal health agencies advised Tuesday that the U.S. should temporarily pause the use of J&J’s single-dose vaccine after six women out of the roughly 6.9 million people who received the shot reported getting severe blood clots. The blood clots occurred in women between the ages of 18 and 48. One woman died and another is in critical condition. They all developed symptoms 6 to 13 days after getting the shot, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Food and Drug Administration.  Jha told CNBC’s “The News with Shepard Smith” that the cautionary measures were proof that “the system is working,” and that the government’s swift action may counter vaccine hesitancy. “My hope is that it will actually build confidence in people that we don’t take adverse events lightly, and that we investigate them, and that we really are making sure these vaccines are very, very safe.”Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, reaffirmed that the pause comes “out of an abundance of caution” and that it will give health officials time to investigate. “You want to make sure that safety is the important issue here,” Fauci said during a White House press briefing Tuesday. “We are totally aware that this is a very rare event. We want to get this worked out as quickly as we possibly can.”Jha told host Shepard Smith that he “expects the pause to last days, not much longer,” and echoed Fauci’s assertion on the rarity of the blood clots. “The key point here is that this is an incredibly rare, adverse event,” Jha said. “It’s not going to affect very many people at all, and I just think, out of an abundance of caution, we’re just taking a pause to  see what else we can find out about it.” More

In this articleDISDisney is revamping its inclusivity initiatives for cast members and guests, allowing employees to more freely express themselves through gender-inclusive costuming and hair styles.DisneyA new initiative within Disney’s parks division means cast members won’t have to cover their tattoos and can style themselves in costumes that are gender inclusive.On Tuesday, Josh D’Amaro, chairman of Disney parks, experiences and products, revealed the update to the company’s dress and style code, as part of a wider effort to make its employees and guests feel even more welcome at its theme parks.”Moving forward, we believe our cast, who are at the center of the magic that lives in all our experiences, can provide the best of Disney’s legendary guest service when they have more options for personal expression – creating richer, more personal and more engaging experiences with our guests.” D’Amaro wrote in a blog post on Disney’s website Tuesday.One of the first things that every Disney cast member learns when joining the parks team is the “four keys” — safety, courtesy, show and efficiency. These “keys” are guidelines for employee etiquette and are aimed at providing a seamless guest experience. For example, if a young guest drops a bucket of popcorn on the sidewalk of Main Street, a cast member will quickly work to provide that guest with a new bucket, while another cast member cleans up the spill.Last fall, after 65 years, Disney added a fifth key — inclusion.”We want our guests to see their own backgrounds and traditions reflected in the stories, experiences and products they encounter in their interactions with Disney,” D’Amaro said. “And we want our cast members – and future cast members – to feel a sense of belonging at work.”This means offering more inclusive products like costumes for people in wheelchairs and LGBTQ Mickey ears, as well as revamping attractions in the parks to feature more diversity.Disney’s parks, experiences and consumer products division is expanding its merchandise collections to include more inclusive items like costumes for wheelchairs.DisneyDisney has already begun to reimagine several attractions, including its Jungle Cruise ride, and is transitioning Splash Mountain into a new adventure ride featuring Princess Tiana and other characters from “The Princess and the Frog.”Another key piece of that strategy is allowing cast members to better express their personality while working in the parks.Disney has always had a strict policy for how its parks employees must dress and present themselves while in public. This included gender-specific rules for how men and women can wear their hair and style facial hair as well as restricting what types of jewelry could be worn and requiring that tattoos remain covered at all times.Now, there will no longer be segmented rules for male and female workers. D’Amaro explained that all cast members will follow the same guidelines, which feature gender-inclusive hairstyles, jewelry and nail styles. Cast members will still need to abide by some of the previous rules, like keeping hair natural colors and making sure their name tag is never covered.”The world is changing, and we will change with it,” he said.Costuming, too, will be more gender inclusive. Cast members will no longer have to choose between a male and female look based on what part of the park they work in. They will now have a wider range of costume options. It will be more in line with how cast members in the Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge land are able to mix and match different clothing pieces to create their own personal look.”Changes like these are strategic: we see in study after study that the next generation of Disney fans and guests rejects gender stereotypes and craves values alignment with brands,” said Erin Uritus, CEO of Out & Equal, an organization that works toward LGBTQ workplace equality, in a statement. “Simply put, they want the companies they patronize to be as inclusive and forward-looking as they are. This is a great moment for people everywhere to see Disney – an iconic company – signal that everyone is welcome there.””With these changes, cast members can bring their full, authentic selves to their work,” she said. “More Disney guests will be able to see themselves reflected in the diversity of people across all levels of the company.”Disneyland is slated to reopen on April 30 at limited capacity for California residents. Disney’s Orlando-based parks and parks in Hong Kong and Shanghai have reopened to the public, while Disneyland Paris has remained closed due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. More

In this articleCOINCNBC’s Jim Cramer endorsed buying Coinbase in its public debut Wednesday, saying he’s impressed by the popular cryptocurrency exchange’s business model and leadership team.Should the stock rally hard out the gate, however, investors must be disciplined not to chase because it will likely trade volatile after listing directly on the Nasdaq, he said.”If you, like me, [are] a big believer in cryptocurrency … you’ll want to own Coinbase for the long-haul,” the “Mad Money” host said.”What matters to me is that there’s a tremendous appetite for this new asset class and it’s not going away. You don’t have to be a believer in crypto the concept to believe in crypto the investment,” he said.Coinbase, the hottest stock to come to market so far this year, could be a victim of bad timing in the near term, Cramer said. The market’s appetite for the new entrant may lead to pressure in other tech stocks as some investors trim holdings in growth names to raise cash for Coinbase.”I think Coinbase is the real deal — the numbers are incredible — but I hate the timing,” he said. “One of my biggest fears right now is that we have a growth stock glut, just too many of these things, especially in tech.”One appeal of Coinbase is that the exchange is connected to the strong-performing Bitcoin, Cramer said. Bitcoin, which is the poster child of crypto assets, hit new highs above $63,000 on Tuesday. Coinbase, which was founded in 2012, supports trading in a wide range of cryptocurrencies, including Ethereum and Litecoin, while making money on commissions.One cause for concern is that too much initial demand may carry shares of Coinbase to extreme levels, Cramer said. In that scenario, a great buying opportunity could open up if early investors move to dump shares and take profit, inducing a big sell-off, he said.”I say buy some tomorrow, ideally at less than $475, but I accept that some has to be bought,” Cramer advised. “Then wait to buy more on weakness and get ready for the bumpiest ride of your financial life, a ride I expect to be lucrative over the long haul.”DisclaimerQuestions for Cramer? Call Cramer: 1-800-743-CNBCWant to take a deep dive into Cramer’s world? Hit him up! Mad Money Twitter – Jim Cramer Twitter – Facebook – InstagramQuestions, comments, suggestions for the “Mad Money” website? [email protected] More

Bottles for the Pfizer BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine are ready to be prepared before the opening of a mass vaccination site in the Queens borough of New York, February 24, 2021.Seth Wenig | Pool | ReutersPfizer CEO Albert Bourla said Tuesday that his company has ramped up production of its two-shot coronavirus vaccine and will be able to deliver a total of 300 million doses to the U.S. ahead of schedule.Bourla said on Twitter that Pfizer can deliver 10% more doses to the U.S. by the end of May than it had previously agreed to produce — up to 220 million from 200 million.The company will be able to supply the full 300 million, which it had agreed to deliver to the U.S. by the end of July, two weeks early, Bourla said.”In the fight against COVID-19, we’re in this together,” he tweeted.The announcement came as dozens of states temporarily stopped administering Johnson & Johnson’s single-dose Covid vaccine. The Food and Drug Administration advised them Tuesday to do so after six women in the U.S. developed a rare blood-clotting disorder that left one woman dead and another in critical condition.Some states, such as New York, said they will use Pfizer’s vaccine in place of the J&J shot for appointments that had already been scheduled.President Joe Biden last month set a goal of getting enough Americans vaccinated in time for them to safely gather in small groups for the Fourth of July. He also vowed that every adult in the U.S. will have access to the vaccine by the end of May.The Biden administration in February said that it had purchased enough vaccine doses from Pfizer and Moderna for each company to deliver 300 million shots by the end of July. The government’s total purchase from Pfizer came to approximately $6 billion.While the U.S. is vaccinating more people than ever, it is also reporting roughly as many new Covid cases per day as it did during last summer’s surge. The nation counted an average 68,758 new infections over the past seven days, and cases are trending higher in numerous states, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.Just over 20% of the U.S. population is fully vaccinated, according to Johns Hopkins. That’s well below the 70%-85% threshold that Biden’s top medical advisor, Dr. Anthony Fauci, says is required for the country to reach herd immunity and suppress the pandemic. More

A healthcare worker holds a vial of the Moderna COVID-19 Vaccine at a pop-up vaccination site operated by SOMOS Community Care during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic in New York, January 29, 2021.Mike Segar | ReutersModerna’s Covid-19 vaccine was more than 90% effective at protecting against Covid and more than 95% effective against severe disease up to six months after the second dose, the company said Tuesday, citing updated data from its phase three clinical trial.The update brings Moderna a step closer to filing its request for full U.S. approval for its vaccine. Full approval requires a more rigorous review process to show the shot is safe and effective for its intended use. Once it gets full approval, Moderna can begin marketing the shots directly to consumers and selling them to individuals and private companies in the U.S.The new data included Covid-19 cases through April 9 and evaluated over 900 cases, including more than 100 severe cases, it said. The vaccine is currently authorized for emergency use by the Food and Drug Administration for people who are age 18 and older, and the agency can revoke the emergency use authorization, or EUA, at any time. Moderna submitted only two months of follow-up safety data for the EUA. The FDA usually requires six months for full approval.The company said its results are preliminary. Moderna said throughout the year it will share updated data on efficacy against asymptomatic infection as well as the persistence of antibodies.The new data comes after a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine showed antibodies induced by the Moderna vaccine were still present six months after the second dose. It also comes after Pfizer said earlier this month its vaccine, which uses technology similar to Moderna’s, was also shown to be highly effective six months after the second dose.Dr. Isaac Bogoch, an infectious disease specialist who has sat on several drug data and safety monitoring boards, called Moderna’s update “amazing news” and said he’s glad to hear that both mRNA vaccines are highly effective at six months.”I think it is fair to estimate that they will both have decent efficacy for many months beyond this,” he said.Moderna is still evaluating its vaccine in people ages 17 and younger.The company said Tuesday its trial testing the vaccine in adolescents ages 12 to 17 is now fully enrolled, with about 3,000 participants in the U.S.It said its trial testing the vaccine in children 6 months to 11 years old is currently enrolling participants. It expects to enroll 6,750 healthy pediatric participants in the U.S. and Canada. As in Pfizer’s study, kids will begin by receiving a low dose of the vaccine before progressively moving to higher doses. More

Longtime crypto bull Meltem Demirors said Tuesday that bitcoin’s ascent has built wealth for a different kind of investor.The comments on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” came one day before a major milestone for the crypto world is scheduled to take place: Coinbase’s Nasdaq debut.”Here’s what’s great about it for me: Bitcoin has created a lot of wealth for people who weren’t part of the traditional financial system, weren’t money managers,” said Demirors, the chief strategy officer at CoinShares, a digital asset investment firm.She said she got into bitcoin when it was around $150 per coin. On Tuesday, it hit yet another record high, trading above $63,000 as investors awaited Coinbase’s direct listing.The digital currency exchange’s public debut Wednesday “is going to mint hundreds, if not thousands, of multimillionaires and billionaires who all love crypto and are probably going to take some of their listing proceeds and continue to invest in the crypto ecosystem,” Demirors said.”There’s really this nice recursive effect where this industry isn’t just about the assets. It’s now really about the companies, which we’ve been investing in for almost a decade now,” she added.Indeed, Soona Amhaz, a general partner of crypto venture firm Volt Capital, said Coinbase’s direct listing is far from the only exciting development for digital assets.”The crypto story doesn’t end with Coinbase going public,” she said on CNBC’s “Closing Bell.” “This is very much a stake in the ground for crypto companies being built now.”Some believe Coinbase may fetch a valuation as high as $100 billion. While such a market cap would be monumental for the crypto industry, Amhaz said what’s more important is continuing to expand the number of people who own digital assets around the globe.”We’re going to see more crypto companies that are building to help on-ramp the next 100 million users into crypto and be exposed to this new financial paradigm,” she said.Created in 2009, bitcoin is the world’s largest cryptocurrency by market value. Its price has soared particularly high in recent months. As recently as October, bitcoin traded below $11,000 per coin.One key factor fueling the rise has been further institutional adoption. Some companies, such as Tesla, have bought bitcoin using cash on its balance sheet.Last month, Morgan Stanley was the first major U.S. bank to announce it would provide access to bitcoin funds for its wealth management clients. Another Wall Street titan, Goldman Sachs, is also expected to take similar steps for clients of its private wealth management group. More