philucky casino Quest Partners LLC acquired a new stake in TriCo Bancshares ( NASDAQ:TCBK – Free Report ) during the third quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The firm acquired 13,793 shares of the financial services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $588,000. Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in TCBK. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP raised its position in shares of TriCo Bancshares by 3.5% in the second quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 1,502,992 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $59,471,000 after purchasing an additional 50,358 shares during the period. American Century Companies Inc. raised its holdings in TriCo Bancshares by 27.3% in the 2nd quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 403,712 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $15,975,000 after acquiring an additional 86,689 shares during the period. Curi RMB Capital LLC lifted its position in TriCo Bancshares by 1.6% during the 3rd quarter. Curi RMB Capital LLC now owns 346,833 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $14,792,000 after acquiring an additional 5,314 shares during the last quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC boosted its holdings in TriCo Bancshares by 8.9% during the second quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC now owns 235,867 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $9,333,000 after acquiring an additional 19,224 shares during the period. Finally, Bank of New York Mellon Corp grew its position in shares of TriCo Bancshares by 5.6% in the second quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 184,610 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $7,305,000 after purchasing an additional 9,723 shares during the last quarter. 59.11% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds. Insider Buying and Selling at TriCo Bancshares In other TriCo Bancshares news, Director Michael W. Koehnen sold 1,400 shares of TriCo Bancshares stock in a transaction on Wednesday, August 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $45.20, for a total value of $63,280.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now owns 3,000 shares in the company, valued at approximately $135,600. The trade was a 31.82 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink . Company insiders own 4.64% of the company’s stock. TriCo Bancshares Stock Up 3.2 % TriCo Bancshares ( NASDAQ:TCBK – Get Free Report ) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, October 24th. The financial services provider reported $0.88 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.82 by $0.06. The firm had revenue of $133.84 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $98.65 million. TriCo Bancshares had a net margin of 21.12% and a return on equity of 9.45%. On average, analysts anticipate that TriCo Bancshares will post 3.38 EPS for the current year. Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth Several equities analysts recently weighed in on the company. Piper Sandler cut their price objective on TriCo Bancshares from $53.00 to $50.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, October 28th. Stephens reduced their price objective on TriCo Bancshares from $52.00 to $50.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Janney Montgomery Scott reaffirmed a “neutral” rating on shares of TriCo Bancshares in a research report on Friday, July 26th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods reissued a “market perform” rating and issued a $48.00 price target (up from $42.00) on shares of TriCo Bancshares in a report on Monday, July 29th. Finally, DA Davidson downgraded shares of TriCo Bancshares from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and boosted their price objective for the stock from $50.00 to $53.00 in a report on Tuesday, November 12th. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have given a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $48.20. View Our Latest Stock Report on TriCo Bancshares TriCo Bancshares Profile ( Free Report ) TriCo Bancshares operates as a bank holding company for Tri Counties Bank that provides commercial banking services to individual and corporate customers. The company accepts demand, savings, and time deposits. It also provides small business loans; real estate mortgage loans, such as residential and commercial loans; consumer loans; mortgage, auto, other vehicle, and personal loans; commercial loans, including agricultural loans; and real estate construction loans. Further Reading Want to see what other hedge funds are holding TCBK? Visit HoldingsChannel.com to get the latest 13F filings and insider trades for TriCo Bancshares ( NASDAQ:TCBK – Free Report ). Receive News & Ratings for TriCo Bancshares Daily - Enter your email address below to receive a concise daily summary of the latest news and analysts' ratings for TriCo Bancshares and related companies with MarketBeat.com's FREE daily email newsletter .Tens of thousands of people have expressed support on social media for the killing of UnitedHealthcare’s CEO, or sympathized with it, in what at least one researcher is calling a worrying sign of radicalization among segments of the U.S. population. “And people wonder why we want these executives dead,” wrote Taylor Lorenz, a former New York Times and Washington Post journalist, in a post on BlueSky a few hours after the CEO, 50-year-old Brian Thompson, was gunned down in Manhattan by a man with a silenced pistol. After a backlash, Lorenz later posted , “no, that doesn’t mean people should murder them.” The Network Contagion Research Institute at Rutgers University identified thousands of similar posts on X within hours of the killing. The posts, which could have been viewed by more than 8.3 million accounts, garnered 180,000 likes and 24,400 retweets, according to the institute . “The surge of social media posts praising and glorifying the killing of UnitedHealth CEO Brian Thompson is deeply concerning,” said Alex Goldenberg, a senior adviser for the institute and a fellow at Rutgers. “We’ve identified highly engaged posts circulating the names of other healthcare CEOs and others celebrating the shooter," he said. "The framing of this incident as some opening blow in a class war and not a brutal murder is especially alarming.” Law enforcement officials have been warning for years of a heightened risk of political violence from a small minority of Americans, mainly on the right, radicalized on social media and marinating in conspiracy theories. (Police have not revealed information about the killer’s motive.) These posts appeared to come mostly from accounts that have expressed far-left views, but some came from far-right accounts as well, noted Tobita Chow, a climate activist whose post summing up the sentiment reached millions of accounts. “My notifications are mostly a cascade of populist rage,” he posted . “Checking people’s profiles, it’s coming from across the political spectrum: leftists, normie Dems, MAGA, a libertarian or two, and many people whose presence on here is otherwise entirely apolitical.” The main theme animating many of the posts about the Thompson killing was that UnitedHealthcare and other insurance companies harm and kill Americans by denying coverage in the name of profit. Many posts raised an announcement last month by Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield — which covers consumers in Connecticut, New York and Missouri — that it would no longer pay for anesthesia care if a surgery or procedure goes beyond an arbitrary time limit, regardless of how long the procedure takes. (Anthem BCBS reversed course on the policy Thursday.) “Then people wonder why a health insurance CEO was gunned down ... because insurance companies pull this garbage,” one X user wrote . On the official Facebook post about Thompson’s death from UnitedHealth Group, the parent company of UnitedHealthcare, most people reacted with the “laughter” emoji. Out of approximately 40,000 reactions on the post, 35,000 used the “Haha” emote and 2,200 used the “Sad” emote. Some of the top sitewide posts on Reddit after the shooting were celebratory, ranging from memes that congratulated the shooter to top replies in subreddits like “r/nursing” that created a mock coverage review and claim denial for Thompson’s care. “This fatal shooting has been reviewed by a peer and is considered a non-covered experimental procedure,” read a reply with over 2,400 upvotes. Thompson was the father of two teenagers. Law enforcement officials told NBC News they found the words “deny,” “defend” and “depose,” written on the shell casings found at the shooting scene. Those words seem to echo the title of a 2010 book, “Delay Deny Defend,” whose subtitle is, “Why insurance companies don’t pay claims and what you can do about it.” The author declined to comment. Lorenz, who was a technology reporter for The New York Times from 2019 to 2022 and a columnist for the Washington Post from 2022 to earlier this year, also posted the photo of another insurance company CEO with a birthdate and a blank date of death. (That post has since been removed.) And she reposted a post that said: “hypothetically, would it be considered an actionable threat to start emailing other insurance CEOs a simple, ‘you’re next’?” Lorenz, who now hosts a popular podcast for Vox Media and has a Substack newsletter, said in an email to NBC News that she was not seeking to justify violence. She noted that she later posted : “I hope people learn the names of all of these insurance company CEOs and engage in very peaceful letter writing campaigns so that they stop ruthlessly murdering thousands of innocent Americans by denying coverage.” In the email to NBC News, she said she didn’t intend to suggest that she personally wanted health care executives dead. “My post that you cited below uses the royal ‘we’ and is explaining the public sentiment surrounding the event. People absolutely want healthcare executives dead because these executives are responsible for unfathomable levels of death and suffering. ... People have a very justified hatred toward insurance company CEOs because of the death and suffering they facilitate. It’s interesting how you don’t consider that violence.” She added, “Me surfacing commentary that OTHER people post like Jenny, is not me endorsing those people and their posts. I can’t believe I have to explain to a reporter in 2024 that retweets are not endorsements.” One of the most read X posts on the subject came from Chow, the climate activist. In an interview, he said he was not condoning the killing, but calling attention to populist anger about the private health insurance system. “Saw mainstream news coverage about the killing of the CEO of United Healthcare on TikTok and I think political and industry leaders might want to read the comments and think hard about them,” he wrote in a post that got 137,000 likes. “Compassion withheld until documentation can be produced that determines the bullet holes were not a preexisting condition,” one user responded. “My take is that there is a great deal of populist anger about the way corporations in private health insurance are able to just abuse people and ruin people’s lives and in the case of health insurance even potentially leave them to die with impunity and for profit,” Chow said. “Obviously I don’t think the solution to that is vigilante assassinations, but I think business and political leaders need to take seriously where this sentiment is coming from.” He said the killing produced an outpouring of complaints about UnitedHealthcare specifically. Many social media users shared a chart from the finance website ValuePenguin that showed UnitedHealthcare had the highest claims denial rate among major insurance companies. While the gunman’s motive is not yet known, health care industry professionals have experienced escalating threats , said Drew Neckar, a principal consultant at Cosecure, a security and risk management company. “The health care sector specifically has seen a pretty significant increase in violence, whether that be physical violence, threats, et cetera. It’s been a problem for decades, but it has significantly increased since the pandemic,” he said. Neckar noted that the threats are usually aimed at front-line providers such as doctors and nurses, though he said he has also noticed an increase in threats against health care executives. “There isn’t a healthcare organization I’ve worked with in the past several years that hasn’t experienced at least a 25 to 50% increase in actual violence against staff and threats of violence against staff,” he said. Shannon Watts, founder of the gun violence prevention group Moms Demand Action, vividly recalls the endless, losing battles loved ones waged against UnitedHealthcare for coverage sought by her late stepfather, who was dying from glioblastoma in the early 2000s. Despite her bitterness over UnitedHealthcare’s treatment of her stepfather, Watts was horrified to read the vitriol aimed at the slain executive. “You know it was really across all platforms. It was shocking to me to see prominent people, not just bots, defending, condoning, mocking, celebrating gun violence,” she said. “Two things can be true: The health insurance system is broken and must be fixed, and also gun violence and murder is wrong.”

Minister asks regional administrations to deal with illegal disposal sitesRutgers women’s basketball star displays next-level toughness in loss to Ohio StateNEW YORK (AP) — Bitcoin topped $100,000 for the first time this week as a massive rally in the world's most popular cryptocurrency, largely accelerated by the election of Donald Trump, rolls on. The cryptocurrency officially to rose six figures Wednesday night, just hours after the president-elect said he intends to nominate cryptocurrency advocate Paul Atkins to be the next chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission. Bitcoin has soared since Trump won the U.S. presidential election on Nov. 5. The asset climbed from $69,374 on Election Day, hitting as high as $103,713 Wednesday, according to CoinDesk. And the latest all-time high arrives just two years after bitcoin dropped below $17,000 following the collapse of crypto exchange FTX . Bitcoin fell back below the $100,000 by Thursday afternoon, sitting above $99,000 by 4 p.m. ET. Even amid a massive rally that has more than doubled the value of bitcoin this year, some experts continue to warn of investment risks around the asset, which has quite a volatile history. Here’s what you need to know. Cryptocurrency has been around for a while now. But chances are you’ve heard about it more and more over the last few years. In basic terms, cryptocurrency is digital money. This kind of currency is designed to work through an online network without a central authority — meaning it’s typically not backed by any government or banking institution — and transactions get recorded with technology called a blockchain. Bitcoin is the largest and oldest cryptocurrency, although other assets like ethereum, XRP, tether and dogecoin have also gained popularity over the years. Some investors see cryptocurrency as a “digital alternative” to traditional money, but most daily financial transactions are still conducted using fiat currencies such as the dollar. Also, bitcoin can be very volatile, with its price reliant on larger market conditions. A lot of the recent action has to do with the outcome of the U.S. presidential election. Trump, who was once a crypto skeptic, has pledged to make the U.S. “the crypto capital of the planet” and create a “strategic reserve” of bitcoin. His campaign accepted donations in cryptocurrency and he courted fans at a bitcoin conference in July. He also launched World Liberty Financial, a new venture with family members to trade cryptocurrencies. On Thursday morning, hours after bitcoin surpassed the $100,000 mark, Trump congratulated “BITCOINERS” on his social media platform Truth Social. He also appeared to take credit for the recent rally, writing, “YOU’RE WELCOME!!!” Top crypto players welcomed Trump’s election victory last month, in hopes that he would be able to push through legislative and regulatory changes that they’ve long lobbied for — which, generally speaking, aim for an increased sense of legitimacy without too much red tape. And the industry has made sizeable investments along the way. Back in August, Public Citizen, a left-leaning consumer rights advocacy nonprofit, reported finding that crypto-sector corporations spent more than $119 million in 2024 to back pro-crypto candidates across federal elections. Trump made his latest pro-crypto move when he announced his plans Wednesday to nominate Atkins to chair the SEC. Atkins was an SEC commissioner during the presidency of George W. Bush. In the years since leaving the agency, Atkins has made the case against too much market regulation. He joined the Token Alliance, a cryptocurrency advocacy organization, in 2017. Under current chair Gary Gensler, who will step down when Trump takes office, the SEC has cracked down on the crypto industry — penalizing a number of companies for violating securities laws. Gensler has also faced ample criticism from industry players in the process. One crypto-friendly move the SEC did make under Gensler was the approval in January of spot bitcoin ETFs, or exchange trade funds, which allow investors to have a stake in bitcoin without directly buying it. The spot ETFs were the dominant driver of bitcoin's price before Trump's win — but, like much of the crypto’s recent momentum, saw record inflows postelection. Story continues below video Bitcoin surpassing the coveted $100,000 mark has left much of the crypto world buzzing. “What we’re seeing isn’t just a rally — it’s a fundamental transformation of bitcoin’s place in the financial system,” Nathan McCauley, CEO and co-founder of crypto custodian Anchorage Digital, said in a statement — while pointing to the growth of who's entering the market, particularly with rising institutional adoption. Still, others note that the new heights of bitcoin's price don't necessarily mean the asset is going mainstream. The $100,000 level is “merely a psychological factor and ultimately just a number,” Dan Coatsworth, investment analyst at British investment company AJ Bell, wrote in a Thursday commentary . That being said, bitcoin could keep climbing to more and more all-time highs, particularly if Trump makes good on his promises for more crypto-friendly regulation once in office. If Trump actually makes a bitcoin reserve, for example, supply changes could also propel the price forward. “It is hard to overstate the magnitude of the change in Washington’s attitude towards crypto post-election,” Matt Hougan, chief investment officer at Bitwise Asset Management, said via email Thursday, reiterating that prices could keep rising if trends persist. “There is a lot more demand than there is supply, and that’s usually a pretty good recipe for success.” Still, as with everything in the volatile cryptoverse, the future is never promised. Worldwide regulatory uncertainties and environmental concerns around bitcoin “mining" — the creation of new bitcoin, which consumes a lot of energy — are among factors that analysts like Coatsworth note could hamper future growth. And, as still a relatively young asset with a history of volatility, longer-term adoption has yet to be seen through. Today’s excitement around bitcoin may make many who aren’t already in the space want to get in on the action. For those in a position to invest, Hougan says it's not too late — noting that bitcoin is still early in its development and most institutional investors “still have zero exposure.” At the same time, Hougan and others maintain that it's important to tread cautiously and not bite off more than you can chew. Experts continue to stress caution around getting carried away with crypto “FOMO,” or the fear of missing out, especially for small-pocketed investors. “A lot of people have got rich from the cryptocurrency soaring in value this year, but this high-risk asset isn’t suitable for everyone,” Coatsworth noted Thursday. “It’s volatile, unpredictable and is driven by speculation, none of which makes for a sleep-at-night investment.” In short, history shows you can lose money in crypto as quickly as you’ve made it. Long-term price behavior relies on larger market conditions. Trading continues at all hours, every day. Coatsworth points to recent research from the Bank for International Settlements, a Switzerland-based global organization of central banks, which found that about three-quarters of retail buyers on crypto exchange apps likely lost money on their bitcoin investments between 2015 and 2022. At the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, bitcoin stood at just over $5,000. Its price climbed to nearly $69,000 by November 2021, during high demand for technology assets, but later crashed during an aggressive series of rate hikes by the Federal Reserve. And the late-2022 collapse of FTX significantly undermined confidence in crypto overall, with bitcoin falling below $17,000. Investors began returning in large numbers as inflation started to cool — and gains skyrocketed on the anticipation and then early success of spot ETFs, and again, now the post-election frenzy. But lighter regulation from the coming Trump administration could also mean less guardrails. This story has been corrected to refer to Anchorage Digital as a crypto custodian, not a crypto asset manager.

Pile burns planned at the start of the new yearNone

A hunter took trophy photos with a mountain lion he shot in Missouri, but was then cited for killing the protected cat, officials said. While hunting in Iron County on Nov. 16, the man saw a mountain lion pass under a tree stand he was on, according to court documents. “He got excited at what it was, stood up, and then decided to shoot (the mountain lion” as it was walking off,” Missouri Department of Conservation officials said in a probable cause statement filed on Dec. 19. The mountain lion ran about 50 yards after it was shot, then it died, according to court documents. In Missouri, it is illegal to kill a mountain lion unless it is posing a threat to humans or attacking domesticated animals or livestock, conservation officials said. The man was cited for killing a protected species illegally, a misdemeanor, according to court documents. If convicted, he could face up to a year in prison and a $2,000 fine, officials said. The tag on the mountain lion’s ear indicated it had been marked by the Nebraska Games and Parks Commission, according to court documents. That means the mountain lion would have traveled more than 400 miles to Iron County, Missouri. The man is scheduled to appear in court on Feb. 20. Mountain lions are a threatened species, according to the National Wildlife Federation. Iron County is about a 95-mile drive southwest from St. Louis.CYCLONE POWER

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Haiti’s online media association said two reporters were killed and several others were wounded in a gang attack on Tuesday on the reopening of Port-au-Prince’s biggest public hospital. Street gangs have taken over an estimated 85% of Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince, and they forced the closure of the General Hospital early this year. Authorities had pledged to reopen the facility Tuesday but as journalists gathered to cover the event, suspected gang members opened fire in a vicious Christmas Eve attack. Robest Dimanche, a spokesman for the Online Media Collective, identified the dead journalists as Markenzy Nathoux and Jimmy Jean. Dimanche said an unspecified number of reporters had also been wounded in the attack, which he blamed on the Viv Ansanm coalition of gangs. Haiti’s interim president, Leslie Voltaire, said in an address to the nation that journalists and police were among the victims of the attack. He did not specify how many casualties there were, or give a breakdown for the dead or wounded. “I send my sympathies to the people who were victims, the national police and the journalists,” Voltaire said, pledging “this crime is not going to go unpunished.” A video posted online by the reporters trapped inside the hospital showed what appeared to be two lifeless bodies of men on stretchers, their clothes bloodied. One of the men had a lanyard with a press credential around his neck. Radio Télé Métronome initially reported that seven journalists and two police officers were wounded. Police and officials did not immediately respond to calls for information on the attack. Street gangs have taken over an estimated 85% of Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince. They forced the closure of the General Hospital early this year during violence that also targeted the main international airport and Haiti’s two largest prisons. Authorities had pledged to reopen the facility Tuesday but as journalists gathered to cover the event, suspected gang members opened fire. Video posted online earlier showed reporters inside the building and at least three lying on the floor, apparently wounded. That video could also not be immediately verified. Johnson “Izo” André, considered Haiti’s most powerful gang leader and part of a gang known as Viv Ansanm, which that has taken control of much of Port-au-Prince , posted a video on social media claiming responsibility for the attack. The video said the gang coalition had not authorized the hospital’s reopening. Haiti has seen journalists targeted before. In 2023, two local journalists were killed in the space of a couple of weeks — radio reporter Dumesky Kersaint was fatally shot in mid-April that year, while journalist Ricot Jean was found dead later that month. In July, former Prime Minister Garry Conille visited the Hospital of the State University of Haiti, more widely known as the General Hospital, after authorities regained control of it from gangs. The hospital had been left ravaged and strewn with debris. Walls and nearby buildings were riddled with bullet holes, signaling fights between police and gangs. The hospital is across the street from the national palace, the scene of several battles in recent months. Gang attacks have pushed Haiti’s health system to the brink of collapse with looting, setting fires, and destroying medical institutions and pharmacies in the capital. The violence has created a surge in patients and a shortage of resources to treat them. Haiti’s health care system faces additional challenges during the rainy season, which is likely to increase the risk of water-borne diseases. Poor conditions in camps and makeshift settlements have heightened the risk of diseases like cholera, with over 84,000 suspected cases in the country, according to UNICEF. ___ Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america Evens Sanon, The Associated PressIssues, Challenges that Shaped Telecoms Sector in 2024