The financial news that actually matters
Every Smokey Bones restaurant in Georgia has gone dark, and the barbecue-and-grill chain is pulling back in other states too, just months after its parent company promised that filing for bankruptcy would not mean closing its doors. WSB-TV in Atlanta reported that Smokey Bones confirmed the statewide Georgia shutdowns directly to the station. (The link…
Federal agents knocked on doors across Minnesota in late April 2026, executing search warrants at five locations linked to providers accused of billing Medicaid millions for children’s therapy and disability services that were never properly delivered. For families who rely on those programs, the raids were the first visible sign that a sprawling fraud investigation…
The national average price for a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline climbed to $4.20 for the week ending April 28, 2026, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s weekly retail price tracker. That is the highest pump price American drivers have faced since the week ending June 13, 2022, when post-pandemic demand and the fallout…
Massachusetts securities regulators fined Fidelity Investments $1.25 million in May 2026, alleging the firm was too slow to warn customers about data breaches and failed to properly oversee the outside technology vendors handling their personal information, according to a consent order issued by the state’s Securities Division. The penalty targets one of the largest asset…
The last time this many Americans said their personal finances were heading in the wrong direction, the country was sliding into a recession and still absorbing the shock of the September 11 attacks. A Gallup poll conducted April 1 through 15, 2026, found that 55% of respondents said their financial situation was getting worse. That…
When indie developer Marco Arment tweeted in early May 2026 that a mysterious new subscription tier had appeared in his App Store Connect dashboard, he was not the only one refreshing the page. Within days, developers across forums and social channels confirmed the same thing: Apple had quietly added a third subscription option that lets…
United Parcel Service is entering what executives describe as the final stages of a sweeping operational overhaul, yet the company’s first-quarter 2026 results show that soft package volumes and rising fuel expenses are still squeezing the payoff. On the April 28 earnings call, CEO Carol Tome told analysts the restructuring is “closer to the finish…
Every spring, tax preparers across the country field the same panicked call: a retiree who pulled a lump sum from a traditional IRA or 401(k) expecting a refund, only to discover the IRS wants thousands of dollars instead. The surprise is not a glitch. It is baked into the way retirement-account withdrawals are taxed and…
In April 2026, a tube of American Silver Eagles listed at $41.50 per coin on the price-comparison tracker at FindBullionPrices.com while one-ounce bars from Sunshine Minting and Valcambi clustered between $34 and $37 at dealers such as SD Bullion and Monument Metals. That $5-to-$8 gap per ounce sounds modest in isolation. Multiply it across 100…
The United Arab Emirates appears to be moving toward a departure from OPEC that could come within the spring of 2026, a shift that would free one of the world’s most aggressive oil investors to pump far more crude and potentially drag global prices lower at a moment when American drivers are bracing for the…