Good morning, Quartz readers! What to watch for today The White House unveils new school safety proposals. They come following a roundtable between lawmakers in the wake of the Florida school shooting. An administration official told CNN that the NRA wants the White House to pursue school safety programs, rather than raise the age limit for buying certain firearms. M.K. Sharma goes to court. The Punjab National Bank auditor at the center of an alleged $2 billion fraud scandal is accused of helping to secure unauthorized loans using fraudulent letters for billionaire jeweler Nirav Modi and his uncle Mehul Choksi. The Atlas 5 rocket launches. The 60-meter rocket holding a new-generation NOAA weather satellite will lift off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 2:00 GMT. While you were sleeping Spotify filed for a $1 billion IPO. The Swedish music-streaming giant will be listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol "SPOT." In an unusual move, the company decided to go public without any bank underwriters, which lets the market set the opening share price. The US economy grew 2.5% in its fourth quarter. The GDP was solid, but expanded slightly more slowly than the 2.6% expected in the final three months of 2017. Economists forecast that it will hit the Trump administration's 3% annual growth target this year, especially after Fed chair Jerome Powell's upbeat speech before lawmakers this week. A major US gun retailer will stop selling assault-style weapons. In the wake of the shooting at a Florida high school—which reopened on Wednesday (paywall)—Dick's Sporting Goods announced that it would immediately end sales of all assault-style rifles, and would no longer sell high-capacity magazines or guns to anyone under 21 years of age, regardless of local laws (paywall). Bank of America's sexual misconduct probe expanded. Two more employees were fired in the bank's hedge-fund-focused prime-brokerage unit after it was determined they interfered with an investigation (paywall) into alleged inappropriate behavior by Omeed Malik, a former executive in the unit. A Slovakian journalist's murder was linked to his reporting. Aktuality.sk reporter Jan Kuciak and his girlfriend were shot dead in Slovakia last week. The country's police chief now believes the murder was a move to silence Kuciak's investigation into the activities of the Italian mafia in his country and its connections to prime minister Robert Fico. Quartz obsession interlude Lynsey Chutel on one of the world's most elitist sports in one of the poorest places on earth: "The [equestrian] club's willingness to encourage new riders, albeit still wealthy ones, demonstrates a self-awareness of its place in this society. Still, should Lubumbashi's wealthy feel any moral obligation to the city's poor, any more so than the wealthy of any other city?" Read more here. Matters of debate Warren Buffett doesn't beat the market anymore. It doesn't mean he's lost his touch—declining Berkshire returns may just be an indicator of success. Kids who play more will get better jobs. Play is crucial for establishing foundations of social, emotional, and academic learning. Automated vehicles don't solve problems for cities. We should focus instead on moving greater numbers of people (paywall) by optimizing city grids for mass transit. Surprising discoveries Ben Carson's office furniture cost more than a low-income family earns in a year. The US Department of Housing and Urban Development head won't return the $31,000 dining set. Sex sells, even for monkeys. Rhesus macaques prefer evocative imagery in advertising, preferably featuring female macaque backsides or dominant males. A French company wants to bottle your unique scent. The mother-son team's secretive process involves extracting molecules from clothing. New Orleans has been a secret pilot for predictive policing. Peter Thiel-owned Palantir has had a deal with the city's police department since 2012 that even the city council didn't know about. Mongolians are protesting a manga that "insults" Genghis Khan. The Japanese publisher apologized for a picture of a character scribbling a penis on a portrait of the famed leader. Our best wishes for a productive day. Please send any news, comments, human-scented perfume, and expensive tables to hi@qz.com. You can follow us on Twitter for updates throughout the day or download our apps for iPhone and Android. Today's Daily Brief was written and edited by Sangeeta Singh-Kurtz and Susan Howson. |
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