First Female Athlete Diagnosed With CTE After Repeated Head Impacts
Australian researchers say Heather Anderson, who died last year, had multiple lesions across her cortex
A former Australian athlete was diagnosed with chronic traumatic encephalopathy, marking the first time a female professional athlete has been found to have the degenerative brain disease stemming from repetitive head trauma.
Researchers at the Australian Sports Brain Bank determined Heather Anderson, a professional Australian Rules footballer who died last year, had multiple lesions related to the disease, known as CTE, across her cortex, according to a statement from the Concussion Legacy Foundation. Anderson died in November at age 28.
Australian Rules football is a fast-paced tackling and kicking game. It’s one of the country’s most popular sports. The professional women’s Australian Football League launched in 2017.
Foundation officials said the findings should serve as a warning for the women’s sports world as more female athletes participate in contact sports.
“This case should be seen as a canary in a coal mine that she’s certainly not the only young AFL player with CTE,” said Chris Nowinski, co-founder of the Concussion Legacy Foundation. “It should make us stop and ask: ‘Does this matter to us?,’ which it should, and therefore how do we prevent it? That conversation just has not been prioritized.”
Symptoms of CTE include memory loss, impulse control problems, depression and progressive dementia, according to the Boston University CTE Center. Scientists can only diagnose the progressive degenerative disease after death through brain-tissue analysis. There is no known cure.
The disease is still being studied. Researchers have found CTE in athletes playing contact sports including boxing, American football and hockey, and in military veterans.
A study published in 2017 found 87% of donated brains from former high-school, college, semiprofessional and professional football players showed signs of the disease. Among former National Football League players in the study, 110 of 111 brains showed signs of CTE. Researchers noted that those sampled for the study were people expected to have experienced head trauma, and had on average played for much longer than most recreational players.
Research into the connection between contact sports and CTE has sparked concern in the U.S. in recent years, particularly within American football. The National Football League has changed some rules to limit potential injuries. Some high school football programs are using technology like helmet sensors to help track the hits young players take.
A small number of women have been diagnosed with CTE, but Anderson’s diagnosis is the first among female professional athletes, researchers said in a paper about the diagnosis. Anderson played contact sports for 18 years, beginning at 5 years old. She played both Australian Rules football and rugby, eventually playing professionally in her early 20s. Anderson played for the Adelaide Crows, which won the league’s first Grand Final in 2017. She was known for wearing a soft-shelled pink helmet while she played.
Over the course of her career, she suffered one concussion and four possible concussions that weren’t officially diagnosed, researchers said. Anderson also served in the military for nine years. Researchers said she suffered no known concussions related to her service.
Athletes who begin playing contact sports in their youth and into adulthood face the greatest risk of developing CTE, researchers said. The growth of professional women’s leagues in recent years means more women are playing at a higher level.
The Concussion Legacy Foundation and Boston University in June published guidelines to help sports organizations lower the risk of athletes developing CTE. They include limiting hits to the head during practice and increasing the minimum age to participate in parts of the sports that could lead to repeated head injuries.
“I hope this begins a dialogue with sports-covering bodies on this issue,” Nowinski said. “We can predict here in 2023 that this is going to be the first of many, many cases of high-profile female athletes developing CTE.”
Switzerland/Paramount: block loopholes which swerve oil sanctions
Authorities scrutinising Geneva-based crude trader about use of overseas subsidiary
Switzerland has a history of tiptoeing advantageously between warring nations. It joined with the US, the EU and the UK in condemning Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Its version of sanctions meanwhile appears to create useful leeway for international commodity traders such as Paramount Energy & Commodities.
Since early December, several countries including Switzerland have banned local companies from trading and shipping Russian oil at prices above $60 per barrel.
At least one Geneva-based crude trader, Paramount, continued to do so by indirect means, the FT reported in March. It created an offshore subsidiary in the United Arab Emirates for the purpose.
Paramount shifted its Russian oil trading to this subsidiary, whose location exempted it from the sanction. One important eastern Russian grade of crude, known as ESPO, has consistently traded above the $60 per barrel threshold.
Paramount says the UAE business is a totally separate entity that exploits no loophole.
It has emerged that the Swiss authorities are scrutinising the exemption for foreign subsidiaries even so. But the paucity of action to make sanctions effective suggest such probes are the exception rather than the rule.
US enforcers should examine current practices as closely as Swiss counterparts. During the seventies some Swiss-based commodity traders, famously shipped Iranian crude to apartheid South Africa in defiance of sanctions.
The quid pro quo for Ukraine as the ultimate beneficiary of western sanctions should be equally glaring scrutiny when the war ends
Ukraine is one of the world’s most corrupt European countries. It ranked 116th of 180 countries in Transparency International’s survey of perceptions in 2022.
Reconstruction could cost over $400bn, according to the World Bank. This must not become a payday for Ukrainian oligarchs, politicians and officials. Tough enforcement will be needed to deter misappropriation. Otherwise, big western investment institutions may withhold co-investments.
Brussels to stick with plan for post-Brexit tariffs on UK EV imports from 2024
London and carmakers seek delay but commission official says levies will provide incentive for EU battery production
The European Commission has insisted it will stick by plans to impose tariffs on electric vehicles shipped between the UK and EU from next year after warning that the bloc was losing out in the global battle for battery investments.
The British government, backed by carmakers from across Europe, is seeking a deferral of a post-Brexit trade rule it argues will heap excessive costs on to the industry from 2024 to 2027.
The requirement under “rules of origin” requires EVs traded across the Channel to have 60 per cent of their battery and 45 per cent of their parts by value overall sourced from the EU or UK or face 10 per cent tariffs.
But this week a senior commission official, Richard Szostak, told British and EU parliamentarians that battery investment in the bloc had “fallen off a cliff” and the tariffs would incentivise domestic production.
The EU’s share of global investment in battery production dropped from 41 per cent in 2021 to just 2 per cent in 2022, after the US offered large subsidies under its Inflation Reduction Act, he noted.
“In addition to the pull factor [from the US’s IRA] . . . we would be adding a push factor encouraging batteries to be bought in China or the US [by not introducing cross-Channel tariffs]. That is the other side of the discussion,” Szostak said. “The EU when judging its interest has to look at both sides of this question,” he added.
The slow pace of openings of battery factories across the continent and the UK, along with Chinese dominance in key parts of the process, mean most cars made in Europe will not meet the new rules of origin. EU car lobby group ACEA calculated that its members would face a €4.3bn bill from the levy between 2024 and 2026.
The issue is most acute for continental European carmakers that sell large numbers of vehicles in the UK, including VW, Mercedes and Ford because of a new EV quota being introduced by the British government next year.
Carmakers must have 22 per cent of their UK sales made up of zero-emission vehicles in 2024. Meeting that target will require the importing of EVs built on the continent.
Most Japanese and South Korean EVs can be imported into the UK tariff-free under the terms of their post-Brexit trade deals. This would mean EU carmakers losing market share in the UK if their EVs are hit with 10 per cent levies.
Chinese-made vehicles already pay the tariffs but can compete with EU-made EVs because of their much lower starting price.
The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders, which represents the UK auto industry, has also warned that the introduction of tariffs on EU imports would slow the sale of EVs in the UK, as the extra cost would mean higher prices for consumers.
EU-based carmakers are hoping their national governments will pressure the commission to change its approach but admit that has not happened yet.
“No one really wants the political signal you get when customs duties on electric vehicles suddenly go up by 10 per cent,” said one industry official. “There is definitely a willingness to talk about this. But it’s still too early to say that the penny has finally dropped and that this will now be changed. We have a long way to go.”
In response to Szostak, UK trade minister Lord Dominic Johnson told the meeting of parliamentarians that the two sides should not “try to beggar each other” by building separate supply chains. He wanted “proper cross-border access to each others’ supply chains which makes them more efficient”.
“It’s a clear realisation among us all . . . that there is nothing to be gained by having unnecessary friction that reduces trade and welfare and wealth,” he added.
Research Calls
- Upgrades:
- Advanced Micro (AMD) upgraded to Outperform from Market Perform at Northland Capital; tgt raised to $150
- BioMarin Pharmaceutical (BMRN) upgraded to Outperform from Market Perform at BMO Capital Markets; tgt $102
- Coherent (COHR) upgraded to Equal Weight from Underweight at Barclays; tgt raised to $45
- Netflix (NFLX) upgraded to Neutral from Sell at Goldman; tgt raised to $400
- Nucor (NUE) upgraded to Outperform from Neutral at Exane BNP Paribas; tgt $191
- Pearson Plc (PSO) upgraded to Buy from Neutral at UBS
- Pegasystems (PEGA) upgraded to Outperform from Neutral at Exane BNP Paribas; tgt raised to $65
- Downgrades:
- aTyr Pharma (LIFE) downgraded to Perform from Outperform at Oppenheimer
- Braskem SA (BAK) downgraded to Neutral from Overweight at JP Morgan; tgt lowered to $11
- Coinbase Global (COIN) downgraded to Neutral from Overweight at Piper Sandler; tgt lowered to $60
- Conagra (CAG) downgraded to Hold from Buy at Jefferies; tgt lowered to $38
- Ecolab (ECL) downgraded to Neutral from Buy at Northcoast
- Gaming and Leisure Properties (GLPI) downgraded to Hold from Buy at Deutsche Bank; tgt lowered to $52
- Lumentum (LITE) downgraded to Underweight from Equal Weight at Barclays; tgt raised to $42
- Ryerson (RYI) downgraded to Market Perform from Outperform at BMO Capital Markets; tgt $45
- SPX Corp (SPXC) downgraded to Neutral from Buy at UBS; tgt raised to $90
- Steel Dynamics (STLD) downgraded to Neutral from Outperform at Exane BNP Paribas; tgt $102
- U.S. Steel (X) downgraded to Neutral from Outperform at Exane BNP Paribas; tgt $26
- VICI Properties (VICI) downgraded to Hold from Buy at Deutsche Bank; tgt lowered to $34
- Wabash Natl (WNC) downgraded to Mkt Perform from Strong Buy at Raymond James
- Others:
- 4D Molecular Therapeutics (FDMT) initiated with a Buy at Chardan Capital Markets; tgt $30
- 10x Genomics (TXG) assumed with an Overweight at JP Morgan; tgt $65
- Adaptive Biotechnologies (ADPT) assumed with an Overweight at JP Morgan; tgt $15
- Akoya Biosciences (AKYA) assumed with an Overweight at JP Morgan; tgt $18
- Alarm.com (ALRM) assumed with a Neutral at JP Morgan; tgt $55
- Axon (AXON) assumed with an Overweight at JP Morgan; tgt $236
- Ballard Power (BLDP) initiated with a Neutral at Citigroup
- Catalent (CTLT) assumed with a Neutral at JP Morgan; tgt $45
- Clear Secure (YOU) assumed with a Neutral at JP Morgan; tgt $30
- Flex (FLEX) assumed with an Overweight at JP Morgan; tgt $30
- Full Truck Alliance Co. Ltd. (YMM) initiated with an Overweight at Morgan Stanley; tgt $9
- Garmin (GRMN) assumed with an Overweight at JP Morgan; tgt $115
- Gladstone (GLAD) initiated with a Buy at Jefferies; tgt $11
- Hertz Global (HTZ) initiated with a Buy at Jefferies; tgt $24
- Jabil (JBL) assumed with an Overweight at JP Morgan; tgt $110
- Illumina (ILMN) assumed with a Neutral at JP Morgan; tgt $235
- Invitae (NVTA) assumed with an Underweight at JP Morgan
- Logitech Int'l SA (LOGI) assumed with an Overweight at JP Morgan; tgt $70
- Materion (MTRN) initiated with a Buy at Seaport Research Partners; tgt $135
- Motorola Solutions (MSI) assumed with an Overweight at JP Morgan; tgt $320
- Myriad Genetics (MYGN) assumed with an Underweight at JP Morgan; tgt $18
- NanoString Technologies (NSTG) assumed with an Overweight at JP Morgan; tgt $18
- NET Power (NPWR) initiated with a Neutral at Citigroup; tgt $15
- Noble Corporation (NE) initiated with a Buy at Citigroup; tgt $64
- Pacific Biosciences (PACB) assumed with an Overweight at JP Morgan; tgt $13
- Plug Power (PLUG) initiated with a Buy at Citigroup; tgt $13
- Repligen (RGEN) assumed with an Overweight at JP Morgan; tgt $220
- Resideo (REZI) assumed with an Overweight at JP Morgan; tgt $22
- Rollins (ROL) initiated with a Buy at BofA Securities; tgt $49
- Seadrill Ltd (SDRL) initiated with a Neutral at Citigroup; tgt $48.10
- Seer (SEER) assumed with a Neutral at JP Morgan; tgt $10
- Snap One (SNPO) assumed with an Overweight at JP Morgan; tgt $13
- SOPHiA GENETICS SA (SOPH) assumed with an Overweight at JP Morgan; tgt $10
- Trinity Capital (TRIN) initiated with a Buy at Jefferies; tgt $15
- Valaris (VAL) initiated with a Buy at Citigroup; tgt $85
Gapping down
Select Index ETFs showing early weakness:
- QQQ -0.5%, IWM -0.5%, SPY -0.4%, DIA -0.4%, .
Other news:
- NKLA -4.4% (Nikola Corporation subsidiary Romeo Power transferred ownership of all of Romeo's right, title and interest in and to all of its tangible and intangible assets to SG Service Co)
- UPS -2.3% (Teamsters union tweets "Around 4AM, UPS walked away from the bargaining table after presenting an unacceptable offer to the Teamsters that did not address members' needs. The UPS Teamsters Nat'l Negotiating Committee unanimously rejected the package" )
- LNW -1.1% (CFO to step down; Oliver Chow to serve as Interim CFO; reaffirms outlook)