Smith pushed him away and then slapped him lightly across the cheek with the back of his left hand.
The reporter from the Ukrainian media social tv channel 1+1 approached Smith on the red carpet, put his hand on the actor's shoulder and tried to kiss him.
In any case, Smith appeared shocked by the journalist's behavior at Friday night's premiere in the Russian capital.
It was not clear whether reporter Vitalii Sediuk intended to kiss Smith on the cheek or on the lips.
Facebook has confirmed
that it will price its stock at $38, raising $16 billion to $18.4 billion in
its IPO.
The IPO may be the second-largest ever in the U.S., next to Visa’s. It will also
be the biggest tech IPO. Facebook will start trading Friday on Nasdaq under the
symbol “FB,” Facebook confirmed Thursday afternoon.
The price is on the high end of the $34-$38 range that Facebook had
disclosed in an amended S-1 earlier in the week.
May 18, 2012 4:17 AM GMTUpdated:
05/17/2012 09:17:37 PM PDT
After months of anticipation, Facebook on Thursday
set the share price for its first public stock offering at $38 as the social
networking giant made final preparations for a record-breaking market debut
Friday.
At that price, the planned stock sale is expected to raise $18.4 billion for
the company and some early investors, making it the second-biggest offering of
any U.S.
company in history in terms of dollars raised, behind Visa's $19.6 billion
debut in 2008.
More significantly, the price sets a total value for Facebook at $104
billion, giving it a greater worth than any other U.S. company at its stock market
debut.
n the world have debuted with market values
higher than Facebook's, according to data-tracking firm Dealogic; both of them
were Chinese banks. Facebook's IPO involves only a small portion of its
estimated 2.74 billion shares outstanding, which are held by a combination of
investors and insiders -- including co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
"There's no question: It's a lot of money. It's evidence that
entrepreneurs in the United
States have been able to create
extraordinary value with creative thinking," said Larry Harris, a
professor of finance and business economics at USC's Marshall School of
Business.
Public trading of Facebook stock is set to begin about 8
a.m. Pacific time Friday on the Nasdaq exchange under the symbol FB.
To kick things off, the company is holding an official all-night
"hackathon" starting Thursday evening at Facebook headquarters in Menlo Park, where
employees will be free to work on any project that interests them. Facebook,
which takes pride in its programming ethos, has held 30 similar all-night
coding events since 2007.
Early interest in the new stock was so feverish that Facebook this week
raised the potential range of its IPO price, which was originally listed as $28
to $35. At the final price of $38, most of the shares sold in the IPO went to
institutional funds and other big clients of the IPO's underwriters.
Now the question for many in the tech industry and on Wall Street will be
how much the price rises in open trading.
"Given the demand that they had, it doesn't take a genius to predict
the stock is likely to have a pretty good day," said Sterne Agee analyst
Arvind Bhatia. "How high does it go? It's hard to tell."
Deciding just where to price the stock is "a little bit of a fine
dance," said one person close to Facebook who has taken companies public
in the past. If there is a huge run-up once the stock begins trading
publicly, that suggests the price was set too
low and the company left millions of dollars on the table.
But if the IPO price is too high, there may be less potential for a
"pop" from public investors, which companies generally see as a badge
of honor. "The targeted pop is 15 to 20 percent," the Facebook
insider said.
Several smaller social networking companies saw their stocks dip Thursday,
including LinkedIn, Jive and Yelp. Analysts said that may be a result of a
broader market decline, although some suggested investors may be freeing up
funds to buy Facebook instead.
Some investment advisers have warned that opening-day exuberance could push
Facebook shares to unsustainable heights.
Facebook has grown rapidly and boasts more than 900 million users worldwide.
But the company, which reported $1 billion in profit last year on revenue of
$3.7 billion, still faces many challenges. Analysts say its revenue growth has
slowed and it has yet to show it can make money from the growing number of
users who access Facebook's mobile app on smartphones and other gadgets.
Facebook decided this week to increase the number of shares it planned to
sell through the underwriters of its IPO, after demand for the stock
outstripped supply. Those additional shares came not from the company but from
early investors, including PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel and venture capital
firm Accel Partners,
The IPO will raise $6.8 billion for the company, which is selling 180
million shares. Early investors and Zuckerberg will reap an additional $9.2
billion by selling 241.2 million shares.
Facebook and its investors are expected to raise a further $2.4 billion from
63 million shares that have been set aside in an "over-allotment," a
cache of stock to be sold if subsequent demand warrants. That would bring the
total value of the IPO to $18.4 billion.
Among U.S.
companies, that's second only to Visa, which raised $17.8 billion worth of
shares in its IPO four years ago and hit $19.6 billion after its over-allotment
was sold, according to figures from Dealogic and from Renaissance Capital,
another firm that tracks IPO data.
But the IPO price pushes Facebook past the previous record for a U.S. company's
total value at the time of its stock market debut. That record was held by
United Parcel Service, which was valued at $60 billion at the time of its 1999
stock debut.
Facebook's $104 billion market value makes it one of the largest companies
in the nation. By comparison, Apple (AAPL)
is now worth slightly less than $500 billion, and Google (GOOG)
is worth more than $200 billion. Hewlett-Packard
(HPQ),
an older company that has struggled with changing technology markets, is valued
at slightly more than $43 billion.
Mary Kennedy, from whom Robert F. Kennedy Jr. filed for divorce in 2010, is
dead, an employee of the Westchester County, New York, medical examiner's
office said Wednesday.
The employee, who declined to give
his name, told CNN he would provide no further details about the manner and
cause of death. Kennedy was 52.
The family released a statement
saying, "We deeply regret the death of our beloved sister Mary, whose
radiant and creative spirit will be sorely missed by those who loved her. Our
heart goes out to her children who she loved without reservation."
The Bedford Police Department earlier
confirmed they were investigating a possible unattended death at an address
owned by Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Authorities found a deceased
individual inside "an out building" on the property, police said in a
statement.
Regarding her marital status at the
time of her death, Mary Kennedy wasn't divorced from Robert F. Kennedy Jr., her
family attorney, Kerry A. Lawrence, told CNN.
Mary Richardson Kennedy was "a
tremendously gifted architect and a pioneer and relentless advocate of green
design who enhanced her cutting edge, energy efficient creations with exquisite
taste and style," Robert F. Kennedy's family said in a statement.
She advocated finding a cure for food
allergies and asthma and was a co-founder of the Food Allergy Initiative, which
is the world's largest private source of funding for food allergy research,
Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s family said.
"It is with deep sadness that
the family of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. mourns the loss of Mary Richardson
Kennedy, wife and mother of their four beloved children. Mary inspired our
family with her kindness, her love, her gentle soul and generous spirit,"
the husband's family's statement said.
The couple married in civil ceremony
in 1994 when Mary Richardson, a designer, was six months pregnant, according to
the Westchester County Journal News. One month prior to the wedding, Robert F.
Kennedy Jr. divorced his first wife, Emily Black, the mother of his two oldest
children, the newspaper reported.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a prominent
environmental lawyer who's a professor at PaceLawSchool
in White Plains, New York, is the third of 11 children born
to Ethel and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, who was assassinated when campaigning for
the Democratic presidential nomination in 1968.
Details of the couple's private
lives were exposed after Robert F. Kennedy Jr. filed for divorce in WestchesterCounty on May 12, 2010.
The next evening, according to
police records, Bedford
police responded to a 911 call. When police arrived at the Kennedy residence
they found the couple in an argument over taking their four children to a
carnival at St. Patrick's School.
According to a "domestic
incident" report filed by the officer on the scene, "Mr. Kennedy
stated that his wife was intoxicated and was acting irrational so he took the
children to the carnival to remove them from the situation."
No one was injured, the report said.
Two days later, Mary Kennedy was
arrested for driving while intoxicated. At the time, Bedford Police Lt. Jeff
Dickans told CNN that Mary Kennedy was arrested around 9:15 p.m. on May 15,
2010. Dickans said that a Bedford police officer
saw Kennedy's 2004 Volvo swerving onto the curb of Greenwich Road in Bedford and asked her to pull over.
Kennedy had slurred speech, and a
blood-alcohol content above 0.08 percent, the legal limit in New York. She was charged with driving while
intoxicated.
Kerry Lawrence, Mary Kennedy's
family attorney, said the case resulted in a reduction to a violation, the
criminal charge was dismissed and her driver's license was suspended for 90
days.
A second arrest occured in August of
the same year in the town of Pleasant Valley, in
which she was charged with driving while impaired by prescription drugs, Lawrence said. Those
charges were dismissed completely in July 2011 because all the drugs were
prescribed and taken as her physician advised, the attorney said.
As a designer, Mary Kennedy
specialized in green architecture, and in a book entitled "Kennedy Green
House" and co-authored by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., he describes how he and
his wife restored their flooded, black-mold-infested home into an eco-friendly
residence.
In the book, her husband wrote that
Mary Kennedy had worked for the design firm Parish-Hadley and worked on the
renovation of the Naval Observatory in Washington,
the official residence of the U.S.
vice president.
"We know from a history of this
family, it's very hard being a Kennedy, either being a blood Kennedy or being
married to one," Laurence Leamer, a Kennedy biographer, told CNN.
By Chris
Richards, Thursday,
May 17, 9:12 AMThe Washington Post
All songs must end, but not when Chuck Brown played them.
He spent the early ’70s trying to make a name and a living, knocking out
top-40 covers in District nightclubs and cabarets. One night, in an attempt to
keep the dance floor from thinning out, he told his band to fill the dead air
between songs with a beat. So his drummer kept the sticks moving. His
percussionist kept slapping at the conga. His audience kept their heels on the
parquet. His beat connected the songs.
Then, his songs connected the city. A proud community formed around Brown’s music. He called it go-go because it
wouldn’t stop. Day-Glo concert posters stapled to telephone poles in the ’80s
promised 4 a.m. curfews, but Brown was happy to play his guitar past sunrise.
His music endured through the dawn and through the decades, into the 21st
century, but never too far outside of Washington,
where he loomed so large.
“Chuck was like the WashingtonMonument,” says radio and
television personality Donnie Simpson. “He was like Ben’s Chili Bowl. He was the big chair. He was
all of that. Chuck Brown was Washington
D.C. . . . People feel you when it’s genuine and Chuck was always that.”
He gave ChocolateCity its own sound and
made fans a part of it through call-and-response routines that would send them
home hoarse. Night after night — at the HowardTheatre, at the MasonicTemple
on U Street,
at Kilimanjaro, at the Ebony Inn, at Pitts Red Carpet Lounge — they’d scream:
“Wind me up, Chuck!” It was a plea. A prayer. An exaltation. He’d sing back in
a rough, rumbling voice that was soaked in charisma.
“He was a symbol of D.C. manhood, back in the day, because of the authority
that he spoke with,” says Darryl Brooks, a local promoter who worked with Brown
across the decades. “He just spoke from a perspective that black men could
understand.”
As go-go bloomed in the early ’80s, New
York City musicians were using drum machines and
turntables to mint a futuristic new sound called hip-hop. Down in Washington, Brown was
sneaking Duke Ellington melodies into his urgent young music. He may have been
pioneering a new funk dialect, but he kept one foot in tradition, refusing to
let go of the blues licks he learned during his stay at Lorton Correctional
Complex.
As the ’80s blurred into the ’90s, rap music became a global phenomenon, but
go-go stayed staunchly local — and Washington
anointed Brown as “the godfather.” Has American music ever produced a figure so
singular? He was a man who could stop traffic in his city but could stroll down
the sidewalks of the world unnoticed.
But Brown’s music would still bleed into pop music from time to time. A drum
break from “Ashley’s Roachclip,” a song he released in 1974
with his band the Soul Searchers, was sampled by everyone from
Ice Cube to the Geto Boys to Duran Duran. Elements of “Bustin’ Loose,” Brown’s definitive 1978 hit,
were reincarnated in Nelly’s 2002 chart-topping rap single “Hot in Herre.”
Elsewhere, Brown’s musical influence was more intravenous. Competing funk
bands admired him, and his sound spilled into jazz when Miles Davis snatched up
Brown’s drummer in the late ’80s.
But in Washington’s
go-go scene, he remained a giant who leaves no heir.
“I lost a musical mentor and very personal friend,” says “Big Tony” Fisher
of go-go’s legendary Trouble Funk. “I don’t think I met anyone who made me
laugh more than him and made me dance — made us dance — more than him.”
“He’s like a musical father to all of us,” says Andre “Whiteboy” Johnson,
leader of veteran go-go troupe Rare Essence. “He obviously influenced
generations of people — not just one — a few generations of musicians around
here. I know what he wanted was to see the music get bigger and better, so
that’s all we can do — just keep pushing forward and try to do him proud.”
In the ’90s, Brown expressed concern about the direction of go-go. He
worried about his legacy and whether the sound would ever thrive outside of the
District. But in his later years, he showed nothing but pride in his creation.
As younger bands torqued his beat into more aggressive shapes, he was still
quick to applaud them, grateful that go-go was still going.
The sound spanned generations, and so did Brown’s fan base. “Some people
remember a Friday night in 1984. Some people remember a show from 2011,” says
local R&B singer Raheem DeVaughn. “There are so many memories.” (DeVaughn
also says Brown’s illness prevented the godfather from joining him and rap
superstar Snoop Dogg in the studio two months ago.)
The music still courses through Washington.
Even if you never dropped a bead of sweat at a Chuck Brown concert, you’ve
heard his voice blasting from open car windows, at the ballpark, maybe even on
a television commercial for the D.C. Lottery or Chips Ahoy.
There was a musicality to everything about the man — even his voice-mail
message: “Thank you for calling, now here’s what you do/Leave your name and
your number and I’ll get back to you/Have a niiiiiiiice day.”
He stretched the penultimate word out like it was music. Like it was another
song that he didn’t want to end.
Hornets.com continues its look back at the 2011-12 season
with player-by-player analysis of the team:
WHAT HAPPENED
In a season defined by uncertainty, one constant for the Hornets was the
presence of shooting guard Marco Belinelli. Though 11 different players missed
time due to injury this season, Belinelli persevered through minor ailments and
the compact schedule to play in all 66 games while starting a team-high 55 contests
including one game at small forward and the first start of his career at point
guard.
“He plays the right way. He takes big shots, he’s playing hurt. That’s the
thing I love about him. All the guys around the league sitting out because of
their bumps and bruises, but that kid just keeps playing,” said Monty Williams
of Belinelli’s toughness.
The Italian marksman’s second campaign in the Big Easy was truly a career year,
which saw him average career-bests in points (11.8) and rebounds (2.6) while setting
single-game career marks across the board in points, field goals made,
three-pointers made, free throws made, rebounds, assists, steals and minutes.
After playing for three teams in his first four seasons, it was obvious the
26-year-old welcomed the familiarity that returning to New Orleans brought with it.
“This is the second year I have played for coach Monty and I feel more
comfortable in his system (than last year). I love coach Monty and the other
coaches here. They have worked with me to develop a lot in the last two
seasons. It has been lucky for me this year to play a lot of minutes and I am
trying to produce and do whatever the team needs.”
Known for his shooting and scoring abilities, Belinelli didn’t disappoint,
leading the team with 107 three-pointers made (tied for 16th-most in the NBA),
including a stretch of 15 consecutive games with a triple between March 26 and
April 19. As players shuffled in and out around him, Marco took advantage of
the extended minutes afforded him by injuries (notably to Eric Gordon) to lead
the team in scoring 10 times and rebounding twice while scoring in
double-figures a team-best 44 times including nine games of 20-plus points.
Williams: “Marco’s been a stud for us this year. He’s one of the toughest kids I
know. He’s certainly erased all doubts about his game.”
BEST GAME
Marco’s best game may have actually been two games, both victories against the
Golden State Warriors on the road that bookended a 9-7 stretch for the team
between March 28 and April 24 as the season was winding down. In the two trips
against his former club in Oakland
this season, Belinelli averaged 22.5 points, 5.0 assists and 3.0 steals on 66.7
percent shooting (18-27) while going 6-7 from distance. In the first contest,
he tied a career high with six assists, leading Williams to reflect on his
overall contribution.
"Marco was outstanding tonight shooting the ball, getting guys involved.
It really looks good and feels good when guys go out there and play the right
way and you get the win."
Also worth noting, despite coming in a loss, was Belinelli’s season-high 27
point performance March 29 at Portland
on the strength of a Hornets individual season-high seven three-pointers. The
27-point outburst was the third-highest point total by a New Orleans player this season.
WHAT’S NEXT
After signing a qualifying offer prior to the season, Belinelli is now an
unrestricted free agent, meaning he is free to sign with any club. This will be
the first time in his career he has gone through unrestricted free agency, an
exciting but sometimes stressful time for players. Marco will find comfort in
knowing that at least one coach around the league believes in his abilities.
Hornets Head Coach Monty Williams, assistant coaches to make appearances
The
Hornets have teamed up with Audubon Nature Institute to host the Hornets Day at
the Audubon Aquarium of Americas (1 Canal Street) on Sunday, May 20 from 10:00
a.m. to noon (doors open at 10:00 a.m.). This fun-filled day will feature
appearances by Hornets Head Coach Monty Williams, Assistant Coaches James
Borrego, Dave Hanners, Bryan Gates and Fred Vinson, as well as Hugo and the
Honeybees.
Hornets season ticket holders were e-mailed a coupon to receive a discount at
the gate on Aquarium admission of $5 off each regular adult ticket and $4 off
regular children’s admission.
Hornets Emcee Rob Nice will host a Q&A with Williams and the Hornets Buzz
Patrol will be on-hand as the Hornets will host a Tattoo Parlor, Bee-Hive Hair
Salon and inflatable games for kids of all ages.
