WASHINGTON (AP) — Record-low mortgages below 3% are long gone. Credit card rates will likely rise. So will the cost of an auto loan. Savers may finally receive a yield high enough to top inflation. The half-point hike in its benchmark short-term rate that the Federal Reserve announced Wednesday won’t, by itself, have much immediate effect on most Americans. But additional large hikes are expected to be announced in June and July, and economists foresee the fastest pace of rate increases since 1989.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Federal Reserve intensified its drive to curb the worst inflation in 40 years by raising its benchmark short-term interest rate by an sizable half-percentage point. The half-point hike in the Fed’s key rate — its largest since 2000 — raised it to a range of 0.75% to 1%, the highest point since the pandemic struck two years ago.

NEW YORK (AP) — New York's attorney general is announcing that the company behind the TurboTax tax-filing program will pay $141 million to customers across the United States who were deceived by misleading promises of free tax-filing services. Under the terms of a settlement signed by the attorneys general of all 50 states, Intuit Inc. will suspend TurboTax’s “free, free, free” ad campaign and pay restitution to nearly 4.4 million taxpayers.

ATLANTA – Electric vehicle startup Rivian and state and local officials signed off Monday on a deal announced last December to build a $5 billion manufacturing plant east of Atlanta that will create 7,500 jobs.

An inflation gauge closely tracked by the Federal Reserve jumped 6.6% in March compared with a year ago, the highest reading in four decades, further evidence that surging prices are pressuring household budgets and the health of the economy. Yet there were signs in Friday’s report from the Commerce Department that inflation might be slowing from its galloping pace and could be nearing a peak, at least for now.     

The death toll from two coal mine accidents last week in southern Poland has risen to 13 after another injured miner died. The man died Tuesday at a hospital where 20 other coal mining workers are still being treated for burns from methane gas blasts, a doctor said. His death means that seven miners and rescuers were killed by repeated blasts Wednesday and Thursday at the Pniowek mine. Search for seven others who are missing was suspended after Thursday's blasts hurt 10 rescuers. In the nearby Borynia-Zofiowka mine 13 teams of rescuers are searching for four miners gone missing after a tremor and methane gas discharge Saturday. Six miners died in that accident.

Hunger is soaring across conflict-ridden Burkina Faso, a result of increasing violence by jihadi rebels linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State group, which has killed thousands and displaced millions, preventing people from farming. According to the latest food security report by the government and U.N. agencies, some 3.5 million people in Burkina Faso are food insecure, with nearly 630,000 expected to be on the brink of starvation. This is an 82% increase from last year of people facing emergency hunger. Jihadi rebels are also expanding and pushing south and west into Burkina Faso’s breadbasket, stealing crops and livestock and chasing people from their rural farms and into cities.   

Elon Musk reached an agreement to buy Twitter for roughly $44 billion on Monday, promising a more lenient touch to policing content on the social media platform where he — the world's richest person — promotes his interests, attacks critics and opines on a wide range of issues to more than 83 million followers.

NEW YORK (AP) — CNN is shutting down its CNN+ streaming service less than a month after its launch, a spectacular flameout for a venture that had attracted stars like Chris Wallace and Alison Roman and was seen as a way to attract a new generation of news consumers.

Applications for unemployment benefits inched down last week as the total number of Americans collecting aid fell to its lowest level in more than 50 years. Jobless claims fell by 2,000 to 184,000 last week, the Labor Department said Thursday. The four-week average of claims, which levels out week-to-week volatility, rose by 4,500 to 177,250. About 1.42 million Americans were collecting traditional unemployment benefits in the week of April 9, the fewest since February 21, 1970. Two years after the coronavirus pandemic plunged the economy into a brief but devastating recession, American workers are enjoying extraordinary job security. 

The first and most popular cryptocurrency, bitcoin, launched more than a decade ago. Yet for all the relentless buzz around cryptocurrencies, relatively few are well versed in them. A 2021 poll by Pew Research Center found that just 16% of Americans said they have ever invested in cryptocurrencies. Those not in that group may wonder if it's worth understanding the lingo or the technology. As cryptocurrencies and related technologies reach into politics, intertwine with the larger economy and impact the environment, everyone could use a sense of what they are, how they work and their pitfalls and potential.

Moderna hopes to offer updated COVID-19 boosters in the fall that combine its original vaccine with protection against the omicron variant. On Tuesday, it reported a preliminary hint that such an approach might work.

Millions of Americans wait until the last minute to file their taxes, and this year is no exception. Monday is Tax Day — the federal deadline for individual tax filing and payments. The IRS will receive tens of millions of last-minute filings electronically and through paper forms. Nina Tross at the National Society of Tax Professionals says if people haven’t filed their taxes by now, “they’re better off filing an extension.” But she says many people don’t realize that filing an extension “has zero effect,” so long as people are paid up on their income taxes by Tax Day. She adds that people are “better off extending than amending.”

Delta Air Lines lost $940 million in the first quarter, hurt by a rise in fuel prices, but bookings surged in recent weeks, setting up a breakout summer as Americans try to put the pandemic behind them.

When the Kmart in Avenel, New Jersey, closes its doors on April 16, it will leave only three remaining U.S. locations for the former retail powerhouse. It's a far cry from the chain's heyday in the 1980s and ‘90s when it had more than 2,000 stores and sold product lines endorsed by Martha Stewart and former “Charlies Angel” Jaclyn Smith. Kmart’s demise is attributed to the rise of Walmart and Target and online behemoth Amazon. But retail expert Mark Cohen says the company also was dogged by poor management decisions and could have stayed viable.

CAMARILLO, Calif. (AP) — The average U.S. price of a gallon of regular-grade gasoline dropped 10 cents over the past two weeks to $4.27 per gallon as oil prices continue to “yo-yo," industry analyst Trilby Lundberg said Sunday.

The United Nations says prices for world food commodities like grains and vegetable oils have reached their highest levels ever because of Russia's war in Ukraine. The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization said Friday that its Food Price Index, which tracks monthly changes in international prices for a basket of commodities, averaged 159.3 points last month, up 12.6% from February. As it is, the February index was the highest level since its 1990 inception. FAO says the war in Ukraine was largely responsible for the 17.1% rise in prices for grains, including wheat. Russia and Ukraine together account for around 30% and 20% of global wheat and corn exports, respectively.

LIMA, Peru (AP) — Peru's capital and its main port were under a tight curfew Tuesday decreed by President Pedro Castillo in response to violent protests over rising fuel and food prices, with armed soldiers and police deployed to enforce the measure.

DETROIT (AP) — BMW has halted production at two German factories. Mercedes is slowing work at its assembly plants. Volkswagen, warning of production stoppages, is looking for alternative sources for parts.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Bird flu has infected two more farms in Iowa, forcing the killing of 5.3 million hens and 88,000 turkeys, officials said Friday.

ATLANTA – The General Assembly has decided it needs more time to prepare for the coming wave of electric vehicles.

For decades, the free flow of trade across much of the world allowed the richest nations to enjoy easy access to low-priced goods and supplies. It meant solid economies and stable markets.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Several hundred workers at a Kellogg's plant that makes Cheez-Its won a new contract that delivers more than 15% wage increases over three years after 1,400 workers at the company's cereal plants went on strike for nearly three months last fall.

Russia's war in Ukraine will disrupt commerce and clog up supply chains, slashing economic growth and pushing prices sharply higher around the globe, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and …

Two months after the Berlin Wall fell, another powerful symbol opened its doors in the middle of Moscow: a gleaming new McDonald’s.