Stocks closed in the red Friday as investors weighed upbeat remarks from Russian President Vladimir Putin about diplomatic discussions with Ukraine against a weaker-than-expected print on U.S. consumer sentiment. At this point, however, Durov had already been working on Telegram with his brother, and further planned a mobile-first social network with an explicit focus on anti-censorship. Later in April, he told TechCrunch that he had left Russia and had “no plans to go back,” saying that the nation was currently “incompatible with internet business at the moment.” He added later that he was looking for a country that matched his libertarian ideals to base his next startup. Lastly, the web previews of t.me links have been given a new look, adding chat backgrounds and design elements from the fully-features Telegram Web client. "Russians are really disconnected from the reality of what happening to their country," Andrey said. "So Telegram has become essential for understanding what's going on to the Russian-speaking world." That hurt tech stocks. For the past few weeks, the 10-year yield has traded between 1.72% and 2%, as traders moved into the bond for safety when Russia headlines were ugly—and out of it when headlines improved. Now, the yield is touching its pandemic-era high. If the yield breaks above that level, that could signal that it’s on a sustainable path higher. Higher long-dated bond yields make future profits less valuable—and many tech companies are valued on the basis of profits forecast for many years in the future.
from us
