In Friday’s edition, our host David Kennedy started the programme with our main stories which covered: layoffs at the tech giants and a 4-month extension of the grain deal.

10,000 at Amazon, 11,000 at Meta, 700 at Lyft, 3,700 at Twitter. These are the large numbers of jobs being lost at the largest tech firms, and the list is a lot longer.

In some cases, these numbers represent only a few percent of the total workforces, but do these retrenchments signal that the rise of the big boys is coming to an end?

Meanwhile, recent U.N. statistics warns some 10 percent of the world’s population is facing famine this year, with some reportedly eating ash to warm their empty bellies, according to the Action Against Hunger.

Therefore, the deal struck by the U.N. for Russia and Ukraine to continue grain exports is hopefully a sign that the dire situation will not get worse.

What’s more…

-Several U.S. manufacturers are setting minimum prices on goods to limit discounts this holiday season.

-A U.S. watchdog regulator agency, in a report published Thursday, demanded the federal regulator of offshore oil and gas infrastructure to develop a cybersecurity strategy for more than 1,600 facilities under its oversight.

-Ticketmaster canceled a planned general public ticket sale on Friday for Taylor Swift’s 2023 U.S. tour as 3.5 billion ticket requests from fans, bots and scalpers overwhelmed the site with record demand.