The companies in the S&P 500 paid out a record $140.6 billion in dividends in the most recent quarter. That’s up from $137.6 billion in the first three months of the year and $123.4 billion in the same quarter last year.

Fed fund futures show that traders assign a roughly 96% probability that the Federal Reserve will deliver a 0.75-percentage-point rate hike at its meeting later this month, according to CME Group. That is up from 84% a day ago, after minutes from the central bank’s recent meeting showed that taming inflation was the main goal.

The U.S. has recorded more than 11 million unfilled job openings in six of the past seven months, four million more monthly openings than was typical before Covid-19 hit the economy in early 2020.

The S&P 500 fell 21% through Thursday, suffering its worst first half of a year since 1970. Investment-grade bonds lost 11%, posting their worst start to a year in history.

New sales of convertible bonds have all but dried up with the Convertible Index sliding about 20% this year, roughly matching the S&P 500.

The S&P 500 has fallen 23% in 2022, marking its worst start to a year since 1932. 

Inflation and high fuel prices are also taking a toll on consumer confidence with an index of consumer sentiment dropping again in June to its lowest point since the inception of the survey in the late 1940s.

A group led by billionaire Walmart heir Rob Walton has agreed to purchase the Denver Broncos for $4.65 billion in a record-breaking transaction. The sale, which is still pending league approval, is far and away the richest ever for a North American sports team and doubles the high price for sales of NFL teams, which was previously about $2.3 billion.

Individual income tax collections are poised to reach $2.6 trillion, or 10.6% of the economy in the fiscal year that ends Sept. 30. That is up from 9.1% in 2021 and would mark a record in the 109-year history of the tax, topping the war-tax receipts of 1944 and the dot-com boom of 2000.

U.S. households boosted spending for a fourth straight month in April, but the rate at which they were setting aside savings fell to its lowest point in 14 years.