Please ensure Javascript is enabled for purposes of website accessibility

Average US rate on a 30-year mortgage falls to 6.62%, easing for the third week in a row

The average rate on a 30-year in the U.S. declined for the third week in a row, another positive move for prospective homebuyers during what’s traditionally the housing market’s busy season.

The rate fell to 6.62% from 6.64% last week, mortgage buyer said Thursday. A year ago, the rate averaged 6.88%.

The average rate has mostly trended lower since reaching just over 7% in mid-January. When mortgage rates decline, they boost homebuyers’ purchasing power.

Borrowing costs on 15-year fixed-rate mortgages, popular with homeowners refinancing their home loans, were unchanged from last week. The average rate remained at 5.82%, but is down 6.16% a year ago, Freddie Mac said.

Mortgage rates are influenced by several factors, including global demand for U.S. Treasurys, the ‘s interest rate policy decisions and bond market investors’ expectations for future inflation.

The average rate on a 30-year mortgage loosely follows moves in the 10-year Treasury yield, which lenders use as a guide to pricing home loans.

The yield, which has mostly fallen this year after climbing to around 4.8% in mid-January, has been volatile of late as bond investors reacted to the Trump administration’s decision to escalate U.S. on goods imported from nations around the world.

After sliding to just 4.01% at the end of last week, the 10-year Treasury yield climbed to nearly 4.5% Wednesday morning. It was at 4.36% in afternoon trading Thursday following the White House’s decision to temporarily pause the new tariffs on most nations, even while increasing import taxes on .

The latest drop in mortgage rates partially reflects the bond market’s uncertainty over the Trump administration’s on-again, off-again tariff policy, which is likely to keep mortgage rates volatile, said Lisa Sturtevant, chief economist at Bright MLS.

“All of the uncertainty in the economy and in the mortgage market is making it difficult for prospective homebuyers to know what to do,” she said. “Should they buy now or wait until later this year and hope that rates will come down further?”

Recent forecasts by housing economists generally called for the average rate on a 30-year mortgage to remain around 6.5% this year.

The U.S. housing market has been in a sales slump since 2022, when mortgage rates began to climb from pandemic-era lows. Sales of previously occupied U.S. homes fell last year to their lowest level in nearly 30 years.

Easing mortgage rates and more homes on the market nationally helped drive sales higher in February from the previous month helped drive sales higher in February from the previous month though they were down year-over-year.

Still, home shoppers who can afford to buy at current mortgage rates may benefit from more buyer-friendly trends this spring homebuying season, including a sharp increase in home listings and lower asking prices in some metro areas.

U.S. Cellular to lay off 95 Va. employees due to T-Mobile merger

U.S. Cellular will lay off 95 workers in Virginia in June, according to a post on the Virginia Department of Workforce Development’s website Friday.

The Chicago-based ‘s wireless operations will be sold to for $4.4 billion, the companies announced in May 2024, and U.S. Cellular plans to lay off 4,100 employees nationally, according to a letter from an HR director at the company.

There may be a light at the end of the tunnel for those workers, however. In the March 26-dated letter, Izik Youker writes that U.S. Cellular “has made arrangements with T-Mobile to offer employment to a majority of these employees at a salary or wage rate with benefits that when taken as a whole are no less favorable.”

The employees will be let go on June 2 or within the two following weeks, the letter specifies.

Employees at retail stores in , Farmville, Galax, Lynchburg, , , Rocky Mount, Salem and will be impacted along with some remote employees, according to the letter.

The acquisition will allow T-Mobile to expand services to underserved rural areas, the company said last year.

Arlington entrepreneur prepares for Blue Origin space flight

Arlington entrepreneur and former NASA engineer will be a member of the first all-woman crew set to fly to the edge of space next week as passengers on a commercial rocket.

Along with singer Katy Perry and CBS Mornings co-host Gayle King, Bowe is scheduled to take an 11-minute flight April 14 on the self-flying New Shepard rocket from Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos’ company. The rest of the group includes Lauren Sánchez, an Emmy-winning journalist, helicopter pilot and Bezos’ fiancée; documentary producer Kerianne Flynn; and Amanda Nguyễn, a bioastronautics research scientist and advocate for sexual violence survivors.

Bowe is CEO of STEMBoard, which she founded in 2013 in County and offers advisory services to . The company landed on the Inc. 5000 list of the fastest-growing privately owned U.S. companies in 2020, and in 2022, Bowe launched Lingo, a self-paced coding kit that includes tutorials and online resources and is used by children around the world to learn how to code. Lingo recently secured $2.3 million in venture capital.

In February, Bowe was announced as one of the crew members on Blue Origin’s 11th human space flight and New Shepard’s 31st overall mission. She’ll be the first Bahamian American to fly into space, and only five Black women have ever gone to space as NASA astronauts.

Speaking to Elle magazine, which featured the six women on its cover in April, Bowe said: “I read a stat that there’s a huge majority of middle school girls who decide not to pursue STEM fields, although they otherwise would have been interested, because they see them as male-dominated fields. So this representation really matters. It’s people seeing themselves and being able to show up authentically in their careers in the future.”

Bowe, a University of Michigan graduate who was an aerospace engineer at NASA before starting , told Elle that she “wanted to go to space, but I didn’t think it was possible. I was afraid to even dream about it.”

The flight has gotten some criticism along with accolades, as The New York Times columnist Jessica Grose pointed out an “embarrassing exchange” between Sánchez and Perry in the Elle story about getting “glam” for the flight and not drawing attention to serious issues, such as the fact that the Trump administration has laid off 23 people from NASA, including its chief scientist, Katherine Calvin.

On Friday, The Washington Post reported that an early White House budget plan calls for “massive” cuts to NASA’s science budget. Blue Origin secured a $2.38 billion U.S. Space Force contract in April for seven missions, Reuters reported last week.

Meanwhile, Bowe has completed training for the flight, and in an interview with King earlier this week on CBS, she said, “I’ve been preparing for this moment all my life.”

New Shepard, named for late NASA astronaut Alan Shepard, is scheduled to lift off Monday, April 14, at 9:30 a.m. from Blue Origin’s facility in West Texas. It will fly to the edge of space and back, and the flight will be livestreamed on Space.com and Blue Origin’s website. Weather or equipment delays could push liftoff up to an hour later, according to Space.com.

Freak sell-off of ‘safe haven’ US bonds has Wall Street rattled

NEW YORK (AP) — The upheaval in has been grabbing all the headlines, but there is a bigger problem looming in another corner of the financial markets that rarely gets headlines: Investors are dumping U.S. government bonds.

Normally, investors rush into Treasurys at a whiff of economic chaos but now they are selling them as not even the lure of higher interest payments on the bonds is getting them to buy. The freak development has experts worried that big banks, funds and traders are losing faith in America as a good place to store their money.

“The fear is the U.S. is losing its standing as the safe haven,” said George Cipolloni, a fund manager at Penn Mutual Asset Management. “Our bond market is the biggest and most stable in the world, but when you add instability, bad things can happen.”

That could be bad news for consumers in need of a loan — and for , who had hoped his tariff pause earlier this week would restore confidence in the markets.

What’s happening?

A week ago, the yield on the 10-year Treasury was 4.01%. On Friday, the yield shot as high as 4.58% before sliding back to around 4.50%. That’s a major swing for the bond market, which measures moves by the hundredths of a percentage point.

Among the possible knockoff effects is a big hit to ordinary Americans in the form of higher interest rates on mortgages and car financing and other loans.

“As yields move higher, you’ll see your borrowing rates move higher, too,” said Brian Rehling, head of fixed income strategy at Wells Fargo Investment Institute. “And every corporation uses these funding markets. If they get more expensive, they’re going to have to pass along those costs customers or cut costs by cutting jobs.”

To be sure, no one can say exactly what mix of factors is behind the developing bond bust or how long it will last, but it’s rattling nonetheless.

Bonds are supposed to move in the opposite direction as stocks, rising when stocks are falling. In this way, they act like shock absorbers to 401(k)s and other portfolios in stock market meltdowns, compensating somewhat for the losses.

“This is Econ 101,” said Jack McIntyre, portfolio manager for Brandywine Global, adding about the bond sell-off now, “It’s left people scratching their heads.”

The latest trigger for bond yields to go up was Friday’s worse-than-expected reading on sentiment among U.S. consumers, including expectations for much higher inflation ahead. But the unusual bond yield spike this week also reflects deeper worries as Trump’s threats have made America seem hostile and unstable even to longtime allies.

The influence of the bond market

Trump acknowledged that the bond market played a role in his decision Wednesday to put a 90-day pause on many tariffs, saying investors “were getting a little queasy.”

If indeed it was the bond market, and not stocks, that made him change course, it wouldn’t come as a surprise.

The bond market’s reaction to her tax and budget policy was behind the ouster of United Kingdom’s Liz Truss in 2022, whose 49 days made her Britain’s shortest-serving prime minister. James Carville, adviser to former U.S. President Bill Clinton, also famously said he’d like to be reincarnated as the bond market because of how much power it wields.

The instinctual rush into U.S. debt is so ingrained in investors it even happens when you’d least expect.

People poured money into U.S. Treasury bonds during 2009 Financial Crisis, for instance, even though U.S. was the source of the problem, specifically its housing market.

But to Wall Street pros it made sense: U.S. Treasurys are liquid, stable in price and you can buy and sell them with ease even during a panic, so of course businesses and traders would rush into them to wait out the storm.

Yields on U.S bonds quickly fell during that crisis, which had a benefit beyond cushioning personal financial portfolios. It also lowered borrowing costs, which helped businesses and consumers recover.

This time that natural corrective isn’t kicking in.

What’s causing the sell-off?

Aside from sudden jitters about the U.S., several other things could be triggering the bond sell-off.

Some experts speculate that , a vast holder of U.S. government bonds, is dumping them in retaliation. But that seems unlikely since that would hurt the country, too. Selling Treasurys, or essentially exchanging U.S. dollars for Chinese yuan, would make China’s currency strengthen and its exports more expensive.

Another explanation is that a favored strategy of some hedge funds involving U.S. debt and lots of borrowing — called the basis — is going against them. That means their lenders are asking to get repaid and they need to raise cash.

“They are selling Treasurys and that is pushing up yields — that’s part of it,” said Mike Arone, chief investment strategist at State Street Global Advisors. “But the other part is that U.S. has become a less reliable global partner.”

Wells Fargo’s Rehling said he’s worried about a hit to confidence in the U.S., too, but that it’s way too early to be sure and that the sell-off may stop soon, anyway.

“If Treasurys are no longer the place to park your cash, where do you go?,” he said. “Is there another bond out there that is more liquid? I don’t’ think so.”

Xpect Solutions names new CFO

Fairfax County-based — an IT, and infrastructure solutions provider to — announced Tuesday that it has appointed Jeff Dohmann as .

Dohmann has experience from financial roles across private equity-backed firms in the federal sector. He was most recently interim at Reston-based Raft and previously served as CFO of McLean-based Groundswell, where he led the integration of three legacy firms, standardized financial operations and improved gross margins through data-driven insights and operational improvements, according to an Xpect Solutions news release.

“I’m excited to join Xpect Solutions at such a pivotal point in its growth trajectory,” Dohmann said in a statement. “The team has built a business with an exceptional reputation and an ambitious vision. I look forward to helping Xpect continue its upward momentum — ensuring we make smart investments, execute our M&A strategy effectively and maintain financial rigor as we scale.”

Dohmann held senior finance roles at McLean-based Sierra7 and County-based Accenture Federal Services earlier in his career. He holds a Master of Business Administration from Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business and a bachelor’s degree in finance from Virginia Tech. He was named to DCA Live’s CFO Stars list for excellence in financial leadership in 2023.

“With the pace of our growth and the opportunities ahead, bringing in a CFO of Jeff’s caliber is a critical step in Xpect’s journey,” Yusuf Abdul-Salaam, of Xpect Solutions, said in a statement. “Jeff’s track record leading finance in high-growth, private equity-backed government contracting firms — combined with his expertise in integration, forecasting and operational discipline — makes him the ideal partner to help us grow responsibly, invest strategically and deliver even more value to our federal law enforcement agency customers.”

Xpect Solutions focuses on supporting federal government agencies and specializes in cybersecurity, cloud services, network infrastructure and data center management. It is a NewSpring Holdings company.

US stocks climb in shaky trading but the US dollar and government bonds sink as trade-war fears rise

NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. are climbing in shaky trading Friday as ‘s  war with  escalates further and U.S. households get more worried about it. Gold’s price is rising, the U.S. dollar’s value is falling and other financial markets are also swinging in indications of fear about where the U.S. economy will ultimately fit in the world’s.

The S&P 500 was up 1.4% in afternoon trading, but only after veering repeatedly between earlier gains and losses. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 456 points, or 1.2%, as of 12:57 p.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 1.6% higher. Both also swung earlier, with the Dow going from a loss of nearly 340 points to a gain of nearly 500 points.

The shaky trading came after China announced Friday that it was boosting its on U.S. products to 125% in the latest tit-for-tat increase following Trump’s escalations on imports from China.

The repeated U.S. tariff increases “on China has become a numbers game, which has no practical economic significance, and will become a joke in the history of the world economy,” a Finance Ministry spokesman said in a statement announcing the new tariffs. “However, if the US insists on continuing to substantially infringe on China’s interests, China will resolutely counter and fight to the end.”

Rising tensions between the world’s two largest economies could cause widespread damage and a possible global recession, even after Trump recently announced a 90-day pause on some of his tariffs for other countries, except for China.

All the uncertainty caused by the trade war is eroding confidence among U.S. shoppers, which could affect their spending and translate into real damage for the economy, which came into this year running at a solid rate.

A preliminary survey by the University of Michigan suggested sentiment among U.S. consumers is falling even more sharply than economists expected. “This decline was, like the last month’s, pervasive and unanimous across age, income, education, geographic region, and political affiliation,” according to the survey’s director, Joanne Hsu.

“We remain in the early innings of this global trade regime change, and while the 90-day pause on reciprocal tariffs temporarily reversed the market selloff, it does prolong uncertainty,” according to Darrell Cronk, president of Wells Fargo Investment Institute.

The price of gold rose more than 2% following China’s latest escalation. It’s one of the areas of the market that investors have instinctually herded to when fear is high.

Other areas historically seen as safe havens aren’t seeing the same wave, though. The value of the U.S. dollar fell again against everything from the euro to the Japanese yen to the Canadian dollar.

Prices for longer-term Treasury bonds, which are essentially IOUs from the U.S. government, also fell. That’s counter to their history. Treasurys have long been seen as one of the safest possible investments in the world.

The drop in prices for Treasurys in turn sent their yields higher, because investors are essentially demanding to get paid more for the risk of holding them. The yield on the 10-year Treasury jumped as high as 4.58% earlier in the day, but has moderated to 4.47%. It stood at 4.40% late Thursday and just 4.01% at the end of last week. That’s a major move for the bond market.

Several reasons could be behind this week’s jump in U.S. Treasury yields. Investors outside the United States could be selling their U.S. bonds because of the trade war, and hedge funds could be selling whatever’s available in order to raise cash to cover other losses.

More worryingly, doubts may be rising about the United States’ reputation as the world’s safest place to keep cash. The jump in yields could also be an indication of stress in the financial system’s plumbing.

Regardless of the reasons for their rise, higher yields crank up pressure on the stock market and raise rates for mortgages and other loans going to U.S. households and businesses, which slows the economy.

The market’s swings came after a set of stronger-than-expected profit reports Friday from some of the biggest U.S. banks, which traditionally help kick off each earnings reporting season.

, Morgan Stanley and Wells Fargo all reported stronger profit for the first three months of the year than analysts expected. JPMorgan Chase rose 3.2%, Morgan Stanley rose 0.2% and Wells Fargo lost 2.1%.

Another report on inflation also came in better than expected. That could give the more leeway to cut interest rates if it feels the need to support the economy. Lower rates would help make mortgages and other loans cheaper to get.

But Friday’s report on inflation at the wholesale level was backward looking, measuring March’s price levels. The worry is that inflation will rise in coming months as Trump’s tariffs make their way through the economy. And that could tie the Fed’s hands.

The University of Michigan’s survey suggested U.S. consumers are bracing for inflation of 6.7% in the year ahead, up from last month’s forecast of 5.0%. That’s the highest since 1981, and such expectations can create a feedback loop that only pushes inflation higher.

In stock markets abroad, indexes were scattershot around the world. Germany’s DAX lost 0.9%, but the FTSE 100 in London added 0.6% as the government reported the economy, the world’s sixth largest, enjoyed a growth spurt in February. Japan’s Nikkei 225 dropped 3%, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng climbed 1.1%.

___

AP writers Jiang Junzhe and Elaine Kurtenbach contributed.

Virginia’s Gateway Region adds three localities to footprint

Virginia’s Gateway Region Organization announced Thursday that its board of directors voted three additional Virginia localities — the city of , along with and counties — into its geographic footprint.

Based in , the VGR is a private nonprofit economic development organization that works closely with the Virginia Economic Development Partnership to market the localities it represents and advocate for business growth.

According to the nonprofit, the three new localities will be represented by VGR for all economic development and related activities, starting July 1.

“We’re thrilled to welcome Emporia, Greensville and Brunswick into our regional marketing footprint,” Rex Davis, board chairman for VGR, said in a statement. “Their addition strengthens our collective voice, expands our reach and enhances our ability to attract investment and opportunity to the region. This is a powerful step forward in building a more vibrant, connected and competitive regional economy.”

VGR currently represents the independent localities within the tri-cities of Petersburg, Hopewell and Colonial Heights, in addition to the surrounding counties of Dinwiddie, Prince George and Sussex, as well as the incorporated towns within them.

Surry County recently transitioned out of the VGR marketing footprint, said the organization. The VGR’s goal is to unite the region for economic prosperity, and it heavily focuses on new and existing business investment and job creation. Since 2020, the organization and its partner localities have announced more than 1,700 jobs and $780 million in capital investment for the region.

“The addition of these three new communities along the vital I-85 and I-95 corridors significantly enhances our position as a premier location where we make things and move things,” VGR President and Keith Boswell said in a statement. “Their geographic location, workforce assets and commitment to growth align perfectly with our region’s vision for advanced manufacturing and logistics excellence. This expansion enhances our ability to compete globally and deliver more opportunities to the communities we serve.”

Averett president steps down after 3 months, citing wife’s illness

David Joyce stepped down Friday as the 15th president of due to a family medical matter, according to the private school.

A man wearing a blue tie and glasses.
David Joyce. Photo courtesy Averett University

“It is with a heavy heart I share that my wife, Lynne, has experienced a serious medical diagnosis that will require our fulltime attention,” Joyce said in a statement. “Lynne and I regret we will be unable to walk alongside Averett students as they succeed inside and outside of the classroom and will greatly miss the many dear colleagues, community members and friends we’ve made here, but will continue to support and cheer for this great institution as it moves forward.”

Venita Mitchell, currently Averett’s vice president for student engagement, will serve as acting president as the university’s board “continues an expedited search for the university’s next president,” according to a news statement.

The announcement came a day after news broke that Averett filed a federal lawsuit March 26 alleging its former chief finance officer worked with an investment firm to conceal illicit draws from its endowment that were used to cover budget deficits.

In a complaint, Averett states that Donald Aungst, who was hired by the university in 2020, colluded with Arizona-based Global Strategic Investment Services to “surreptitiously” drain close to $20 million from the university’s endowment. GSIS rebukes the allegations.

“Averett University repeatedly accessed its own endowment fund to meet payroll, invest in technology, pay down debt and cover other operational expenses due to liquidity challenges at the university,” the company said in a statement. “It is truly unfortunate that Averett — through this spurious federal lawsuit — is now seeking to scapegoat our firm … for the decisions, actions and inactions of its own officers and directors during this unfortunate period.”

In July 2024, Averett revealed publicly that it was responding to a temporary funding shortage due to mismanagement of the school’s finances, instituting salary reductions for top leaders and furlough days for staffers.

The cost cutting has been extensive with the university going on to cut positions and eliminating several majors. In March, the school listed its equestrian center for sale for $1.6 million.

Averett announced in December 2024 that Tiffany Franks, who served nearly 17 years as president of the university, would retire Jan. 5.

Selected by the board with assistance from Academic Search, a Washington, D.C. higher-education executive search firm, Joyce has nearly 30 years of experience as a college president. For eight years he led Union College in Kentucky. He spent another 10 years as president of Ripon College in Wisconsin and most recently worked for nine years as president of Brevard College in North Carolina.

Mitchell joined Averett in July 2021 with more than three decades of experience in higher education administration. Previously, she served as vice president and dean of student life for 18 years at William Woods University in Fulton, Missouri. She has a doctorate in educational and policy analysis from the University of Missouri.

A woman wearing gold hoop earrings.
Venita Mitchell will be acting president at Averett University. Photo courtesy Averett

“We are grateful for Dr. Mitchell’s willingness to briefly serve in this acting capacity at such a busy time of the academic year,” Rev. Daniel Carlton, chair of the Averett Board of Trustees, said in a statement. “A natural leader and collaborative problem-solver, Dr. Mitchell has been a true asset to Averett for nearly four years, making great impacts on Averett students, faculty and staff.”

Averett’s board has again hired Academic Search to secure a permanent leader and the board is currently interviewing candidates, according to the announcement.

Also Friday, Averett University announced Deborah Hall is the school’s interim . Hall, who was brought to Averett by Joyce, according to the statement, has 30 years of leadership experience in financial and operational management in higher education. She was previously vice president for finance and operations at LaGrange College in Georgia.

A spokesperson for Averett said Hall began work at the university Jan. 17, replacing Donald Merricks, a retired bank president, former state delegate and two-time alumnus, who was named Averett’s interim in September 2024.

“Deb is an incredible financial leader, and we are most appreciative she will remain in her interim post during this time of transition,” Carlton said in a statement.

U.Va. med school faculty, clinical leaders defend those who backed CEO’s resignation

More than a month after Dr. K. Craig Kent resigned as ‘s following an independent investigation and an emergency meeting of the Board of Visitors, drama is still roiling at the university.

A group of 21 doctors — U.Va. School of Medicine faculty senators and senators-elect, as well as the president and vice president of the U.Va. Medical Center’s clinical staff — released a letter this week titled, “Statement in Defense of U.Va. School of Medicine Faculty & Colleagues.”

The letter alleges that other public letters by three former U.Va. rectors, a current member of the health system’s board and another member who resigned recently, as well as a prominent U.Va. neurosurgeon, “advanced a false narrative” that 128 physicians who called for Kent’s last year were “motivated by greed.”

“We write to set the record straight and lay that narrative to rest,” the faculty letter says. “It would be a disservice to the community not to defend our faculty against a campaign of falsehoods accusing physicians of placing personal profit above the interests of patients.”

War of words

The issue goes back to September 2024, when 128 faculty members employed by the U.Va. Physicians Group signed a letter of “no confidence” that alleged Kent and Dr. Melina Kibbe, dean of the U.Va. School of Medicine, had created a “culture of fear and retaliation” that “compromised patient safety.” The letter, whose signatures were not made public and were revealed only to a few board of visitors members, also alleged that the UVA Health leaders had spent too much on C-suite executives and failed to “be forthcoming on significant financial matters.”

Although U.Va. President Jim Ryan wrote in a September 2024 email to 1,400 medical personnel that “there are many accusations [but] few details” in the letter of no confidence, and U.Va. Health System Board member Bill Crutchfield defended Kent and Kibbe publicly at the time, the board of visitors hired a law firm, Williams & Connolly, to conduct a third-party investigation into the physicians’ allegations. At the end of the probe, on Feb. 26, Kent resigned. Kibbe is still employed as the medical school’s dean.

In the weeks after Kent’s resignation, former U.Va. neurosurgery co-chair Dr. Neal Kassell, who now chairs the Focused Ultrasound Foundation, wrote a letter published in The Daily Progress saying that Kent and Kibbe were “the most visionary and transformative leaders” the health system had “since I joined the university in 1984.”

Kassell added that “a segment of U.Va.’s medical faculty has long resisted reform and accountability, entrenched in a culture that privileges over innovation. Such cultural habits and lingering bitterness from individuals overlooked for roles have fueled dissent. The resulting campaign of anonymous accusations, media leaks and smears threatens to destabilize the health system and tarnish the university’s reputation.”

Tom Scully, a nonvoting member of the UVA Health System board and a prominent attorney, resigned from the board a week after Kent’s resignation and wrote a letter accusing the 128 physicians who signed the letter of no confidence as “a bunch of angry docs who wanted no change or reform.” He added that he thought an unnamed BOV member who sought to become the next rector “wanted to ‘make a new mark on U.Va.,’ and that included cleaning up UVA Health and getting rid of Dr. Kent.”

Scully alleged that the Williams & Connolly investigation was “guided, coached and directed to a preconceived result.” Reached this week by phone, Scully said he didn’t have much to add to his letter but said Kent “is a very decent guy who got treated very shabbily.”

On March 7, three former U.Va. rectors — Frank M. Conner III, James B. Murray Jr., and Whittington W. Clement — sent a letter to attorney Gladstone Jones, who represents a group of UVA Health physicians, and Paul Manning, chair of the UVA Health board and a board of visitors member.

This letter asserts that Kent was not the only UVA Health leader who experienced pushback for financial reforms in the health system. Dr. Rick Shannon, Kent’s predecessor, “learned that a separate, self-governing physician’s cooperative, the University Physicians Group, employed every doctor, an arrangement that since 1979 had masked the physicians’ salaries from public accountability” and “metastasized into a large enterprise that managed hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue, with millions more held in capital reserves.”

Shannon worked to change the status quo after joining the health system in 2013, including instituting safety protocols and calling for greater accountability regarding spending and billing. However, according to the former rectors, a “letter-writing campaign” organized by “a small group of vocal and politically well-connected physicians” aimed to have Shannon removed by then-new President Ryan, and Shannon soon left to work at Duke University.

In 2020, Kent was hired, just before the pandemic started, and after the early months of financial decline had ended, Kent started a strategic planning process and resumed Shannon’s reforms, according to the rectors’ letter. Once again, the “unwieldy, duplicative and expensive employment structure” for physicians caused a problem, the former rectors wrote. “After four years, Dr. Kent finally prevailed against stubborn resistance … and finally put the health system back in charge of managing the cash and paying its own physicians.”

“The blowback from all these changes was predictable,” the letter adds. “Letters of protest were sent to Dr. Kent’s superior, President Jim Ryan,” and in September 2024, the letter signed by 128 physicians was released.

The April 7 letter from the U.Va. School of Medicine faculty senators says that the letters from Conner, Murray, Clement, Scully, Crutchfield and Kassell “collectively take untenable positions against a broad swath of U.Va. clinicians; the Faculty Senate; the chair of the [BOV] Audit, Compliance and Risk Committee; the president of the university; the current Board of Visitors; and two nationally respected law firms.”

The letter adds, “After four years of dismissive responses and even retaliation, concerns were escalated to the Board of Visitors, who retained a law firm to investigate the allegations. The investigation led to Craig Kent’s immediate resignation, demonstrating that these longstanding concerns were indeed significant and actionable. Further, President Ryan subsequently offered a public apology for his initial response.”

According to a Daily Progress report, Ryan wrote a letter March 1 that although he “disagreed with the approach” taken by the group of 128 letter signers, his September 2024 response was “intemperate and disrespectful.”

Conner, Crutchfield and Kassell did not immediately respond to messages requesting comment on the April 7 letter.

Murray, one of the former U.Va. rectors, said in an interview Thursday that “speaking for myself, I think we stand by the original letter.” He added that his primary issue with the 21 faculty members’ April letter defending their colleagues is that they are “publicizing … what is essentially a personnel .”

Clement added in an interview Friday that the rectors’ letter “was not about the motivations that inspired the doctors to oppose Craig Kent. The letter was not about defending his aggressive management style,” but rather, “we were concerned that the publicity had tarnished the institutions.”

Asked whether the public battle could impact the university’s search for a new permanent leader of UVA Health, Clement said, “I don’t know. It’s not helpful.”

JPMorgan logs Q1 profit of $14.6 billion as CEO warns of uncertainty over global trade, other events

NEW YORK (AP) — JPMorgan’s net income rose 9% to $14.6 billion in the first quarter and the New York bank beat ‘s profit and revenue targets, but it’s chief executive warned of global economic uncertainties ahead due to ‘s ongoing war and other geopolitical tensions.

Jamie Dimon said a strong performance by the bank’s markets division helped lift it to another strong quarter, but added trade tensions to his list of potential negatives facing the bank and broader economy.

JPMorgan’s earnings per share rose to $5.07 per share from $4.44 a year ago. The result beat Wall Street profit projections of $4.63 a share, according to the data firm FactSet. Total managed revenue hit $46 billion, up from the $41.9 billion a year ago. Wall Street was expecting revenue of $44 billion.

Trump’s herky-jerky tariff increases — currently bumped up by 10% for most U.S. trading partners and 145% for — have sent financial markets into dizzying fluctuations for weeks and created an enormous amount of uncertainty about where the global economy is headed. That’s bad for banks, which thrive on stability and healthy consumers and businesses borrowing money.

JPMorgan’s trading desk thrived in the first three months of 2025, helped by the market’s volatility, even before Trump rolled out his massive “Liberation Day” on April 2.

The bank’s markets revenue rose 21% in the period, with equities revenue up 48% from a year ago.

With regard to China, which further escalated its tariffs on imports from the U.S. to 125%, JPMorgan executives said it was too early to make any long-term projections or statements about the impact of the ongoing trade war on its business there.

“We really have to see how things play out,” said Jeremy Barnum. ”In the near term, that business is performing fine and we are not seeing any effect.”

JPMorgan set aside $3.3 billion to cover bad loans, up from $1.9 billion a year ago, while repurchasing $7 billion of common stock and boosting its dividend 12%.

JPMorgan shares rose 2.4% in premarket trading.

Investment bank Morgan Stanley also beat Wall Street’s first-quarter projections. The New York bank also cited a strong performance from its equities trading division, helping boost its net income to $4.3 billion and revenue to a record $17.7 billion. Its shares were up a little more than 1% before the bell.

Wells Fargo also reported early Friday, with the San Francisco bank posting first-quarter net income of $4.89 billion, or $1.39 per share. That topped analysts’ forecast for earnings of $1.23 per share.

In a statement, CEO Charles Scharf said: ”We support the administration’s willingness to look at barriers to fair trade for the United States, though there are certainly risks associated with such significant actions,” adding that the bank is “prepared for a slower economic environment in 2025.”

Wells shares rose 1.7% in premarket trading.