Travelodge boss resigns amid criticism over handling of assaults; oil price tops $93 a barrel – business live
Posted on Thursday August 20, 2026

Joanna Boydell has quit as budget hotel chain scrambles to improve safety

Meanwhile, the UK’s sports fashion retailer JD Sports has slashed its profit forecasts as cost-of-living pressures, fuelled by the US war on Iran, weighed on sales of trainers.

JD Sports, which sells a range of sports brands including Nike and Adidas, said widespread inflation had hit shoppers’ wallets, resulting in falling sales across important markets such as the US, where it struggled to quickly shift trainers and other footwear.

Buying back more long-dated debt should ease pressure on longer-term yields, helping households through lower mortgage rates and corporations through lower borrowing costs. That’s positive.

For the dollar, lower long-term yields are initially negative, as they reduce the attractiveness of US assets to international investors. That’s partly why the dollar sold off so aggressively yesterday.

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Sales of trainers dive as cost of living pressures hit JD Sports performance
Posted on Thursday August 20, 2026

Inflation deterring shoppers from spending, especially in the US, says sportswear fashion chain

Sports fashion retailer JD has slashed its profit forecasts as cost-of-living pressures, fuelled by the US war on Iran, weighed on sales of trainers.

JD Sports, which sells a range of sports brands including Nike and Adidas, said widespread inflation had hit shoppers’ wallets, resulting in falling sales across important markets such as the US, where it struggled to quickly shift trainers and other footwear.

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Oxfam ‘can’t guarantee future’ of charity shops as it also reviews warehouse business
Posted on Thursday August 20, 2026

Dwindling donations and stiff competition from secondhand sellers online prompt review but ‘no plans for closures yet’

Oxfam is reviewing the operations of its three warehouses in Batley, Bicester and Milton Keynes and says it “cannot give guarantees” on the future of its high street shops in a “difficult economic climate”.

The charity said it had no plans to close warehouses or shops but insiders fear that Batley, which houses Oxfam’s main textile recycling centre, will shut as part of a cost-cutting drive because the West Yorkshire site’s lease is up for renewal.

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US gross national debt tops $40tn for first time
Posted on Wednesday August 19, 2026

Milestone marks years of government spending that grew under both Donald Trump and Joe Biden

US debt reached $40tn for the first time on Wednesday, the US treasury department said, after the government deficit doubled over the last decade.

The treasury’s latest debt balance showed $40.047tn on Tuesday afternoon, the highest in US history.

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Zuckerberg lied about concern for child safety, Meta whistleblower testifies at landmark trial
Posted on Wednesday August 19, 2026

Arturo Béjar, former Meta safety engineer, tells jury tech company was aware of products’ potential harm to children

Meta has taken a “don’t ask, don’t tell” strategy when it comes to the safety of children on its social media platforms, according to a whistleblower who testified during a landmark trial against the company on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Arturo Béjar, a former Meta safety engineer, told the jury that the company was aware of the harm its products caused children, which included its recommendations pushing content from sexual predators and violent and graphic images. He said he repeatedly raised the issue to various Facebook and Instagram executives but that they did little to resolve it.

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Roblox commits to privacy overhaul after eSafety discovers adults can contact children via gaming platform
Posted on Wednesday August 19, 2026

Regulator says verifiable safety measures are ‘critical’ to the online service’s viability

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Roblox has committed to making changes to its online gaming platform after Australia’s eSafety commissioner discovered adults were still able to see child accounts and send connection requests without parental consent.

The company has provided a legal agreement to the online safety regulator after testing earlier this year also revealed children and adults could view and respond to one another’s posts on forums outside game environments without parental consent.

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England v Pakistan: first Test, day two – live
Posted on Thursday August 20, 2026

Updates from Headingley; play starts 11am BST
Day one report | Sign up for the Spin | Mail Jim

“Morning James! Hope you’re enjoying the Test. I’m most certainly not…” writes Zain Malik.

“I sent this in yesterday and think it would better reflect circumstances and mood this morning:

The visiting cricketer must first contend with the peculiarities of the local climate. The sky hangs low over Headingley, a vast sheet of grey through which the sun, presumably, exists somewhere. Moisture clings to the grass and gathers on the seats. The pitch is a threatening shade of green. Beyond the boundary, spectators disappear beneath coats and umbrellas while the floodlights will soon glow in what the calendar, rather optimistically, describes as summer. This is most certainly not what a “heatwave” looks like.

Then comes the waiting.

The covers advance and retreat. Groundstaff emerge, confer and disappear. Water droplets gather on television cameras. Broadcasters in raincoats staring towards the square, caricatures of English cricketing misery, wearing the anxious resignation of patients at the dentist’s reception waiting for a name neither particularly wants to hear.

For Pakistanis, though, this is all strangely familiar. Test cricket has long played in the background of Pakistani life: on televisions in offices and bank branches, in shops and drawing rooms, followed intermittently between meetings, customers and cups of tea. And no fixture has tested that national appetite quite like a Test series in the English summer. The hours are convenient, the opposition familiar and the audience enormous; only the weather refuses to cooperate. England asks the Pakistani cricket follower to master one of the game’s more peculiar disciplines: spending an entire day watching almost no cricket at all.”

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Surrey v Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire v Durham and more: county cricket – live
Posted on Thursday August 20, 2026

Updates as County Championship returns
Sign up for the Spin | Mail Tanya

No play at three grounds for now: Old Trafford, Edgbaston, and here at Derby where thunder has just rolled alluringly.

Arrive at Derby in teeming rain. Apparently Ben Stokes had a net at 8.30am but it all looks very soggy now.

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