Napa Valley RegisteR NEWS Saturday, November 25, 2023 | A13

OBITUARY
Brenda May Even
May 24, 1953—Sept. 9, 2023
NAPA—It is with great
sadness that we announce
the passing of Brenda May
Even. Brenda was born on
May 24, 1953, at Kaiser
Hospital in Vallejo, CA,
to Leman and Kathryn
Brooks.
Brenda was one of five
siblings and grew up in
Napa, CA, attending Soda
Canyon Elementary, Red-
wood Junior High and
Napa High School. This
is also where she met her
very best friend and hus-
band of 50 years, Ronald Even. Brenda enjoyed camp-
ing, reading, floating on the Russian River and murder
mystery tv shows. She was known for her Betty Davis
Eyes, her ability to fix anything, and her spunk.
Mixed finish closes
out holiday week
Brenda was unfortunately predeceased in death by
her son, Shain “Bubba” Even, who was also the love
ALEX VEIGA
Associated Press
of her life. Brenda was also predeceased by her father, Stocks drifted to a
Leman Books; her mother, Kathryn King; her stepfa- mixed finish Friday af-
ther, James King; sisters, Linda and Pamela Brooks ter a half-day trading
and her brother, Dana Brooks. session capped a holiday
Brenda is survived by her husband, Ronald Even; shortened week that left
sister, Sherrie Stone; nephews, Chris Stone (Am- the major indexes with
ber), Kurtis White (Jamie) and Jimbo Duncan (Lily); their fourth straight
nieces: Gay Gagne (Matt), Amie Ridling (Andy), Lori winning week.
Wheeler (Kyle), Margaret Booth, Vicki Whipple and The S&P 500 inched
Kathy (Ivan) Leingang and numerous great nieces and up 0.1% after wavering
between small gains and
nephews.
losses much of the day.
Brenda also wanted to acknowledge her close friend, The Dow Jones Industrial
Chris Dunham and his daughter Alani of whom she Average added 0.3% and
considered her granddaughter. the Nasdaq composite
There will not be a service for Brenda as per her slipped 0.1%.
wishes and her remains will be with her son at Tulocay All told, the S&P 500
Cemetery. Brenda’s family would like to thank Hospice added 2.72 points to
for the care they gave in her time of need. 4,559.34. The Dow rose
117.12 points to 35,390.15,
and the Nasdaq fell 15
See more OBITUARIES, Page A14 points to 14,250.85.
Trading was muted as
markets reopened fol-
and bets, that the Federal
Reserve might even con-
sider cutting rates.
Fed officials, though,
have said the outlook for
the economy remains un-
certain and they’ll make
upcoming decisions on
rates based on incoming
reports. The Fed will get
another big update next
week when the govern-
ment releases its October
report for a key inflation
measure tracked by the
central bank.
In the bond market,
Treasury yields broadly
rose Friday. The yield
on the 10-year Treasury,
which influences inter-
est rates on mortgages
and other loans, rose to
4.47% from 4.41% late
Wednesday. The yield on
the 2-year Treasury rose

Congress lags on crypto regulation

FATIMA HUSSEIN
AND KEN SWEET
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — While
the scandals in the crypto-
currency industry seem
to never end, Washington
policymakers appear to
have little interest in push-
ing through legislation to
codify the structure of the
industry.
The latest shoe to drop
is Binance’s multibillion
dollar settlement with U.S.
authorities and the resig-
nation of its CEO this past
week. Before that came the
conviction of FTX founder
Sam Bankman-Fried for
stealing billions from cus-
tomers and the implosion
of smaller crypto com-
panies that cost investors
large sums of money.
When cryptocurrencies
collapsed and a number of
companies failed last year,
Congress considered mul-
tiple approaches for how
to regulate the industry in
the future. However, most
of those efforts have gone
nowhere, especially in this
chaotic year that has been
dominated by geopolitical
tensions, inflation and the
upcoming 2024 election.
In fact, the appetite for
new rules seems more di-
minished than ever.
U.S. Treasury Secretary
Janet Yellen said Tuesday
that existing regulations
already apply to cryptocur-
rency at a news conference
announcing the $4 billion
settlement with Binance: “I
think today’s actions show
that we are serious about
enforcing strong regula-
tions that are already in
place to make sure that il-
legal transactions are not
fostered by cryptocurrency
entities,” she said.
“In cases like this, where
there are violations of a
truly egregious nature,” she
said “of course we want to
make sure our tools stay up
to date and are adjusted so
that we can address emerg-
ing threats. We believe we
have strong tools and we
have been increasingly
deploying them to counter
this type of abuse.”
And a group of more than
100 mostly Democratic
lawmakers in October said
the responsibility for pre-
venting the use of crypto to
finance terrorism belongs
to the White House, calling
for the Biden Administra-
tion to act.
Changpeng Zhao, the
CEO of Binance, pleaded
guilty Wednesday to a fel-
ony related to his failure to
prevent money launder-
ing on the platform. Zhao
stepped down and Binance
admitted to violations of
the Bank Secrecy Act and
apparent violations of
sanctions programs, in-
cluding its failure to imple-
ment reporting programs
for suspicious transactions.
As part of the settle-
ment agreement, the U.S.
Treasury said Binance will
be subject to five years of
monitoring and “signifi-
cant compliance under-
takings, including to ensure
Binance’s complete exit
from the United States.”
Binance is a Cayman Is-
lands limited liability com-
pany.
U.S. Attorney General
Merrick Garland called the
settlement one of the larg-
est corporate penalties in
the nation’s history.
lowing the Thanksgiv-
ing holiday on Thursday.
Gains in health care, fi-
nancial, energy and other
sectors helped temper
losses in technology and
communication services
stocks.
The major stock in-
dexes’ latest weekly gains
reflect a turnaround in
the market’s sentiment
in November following a
three-month slide. Trad-
ers have grown cautiously
optimistic that inflation
has cooled enough for
the Federal Reserve to
finally be done with its
market-crunching hikes
to interest rates.
Forecasts for a poten-
tial recession have been
pushed further out into
2024 while also being
softened. The rate of
inflation continues to
ease, consumer spend-
ing remains solid and
the economy is generally
humming along. That
has encouraged hopes,
to 4.95% from 4.90% late
Wednesday.
Oil prices, a key driver
of inflation, continued
to ease Friday, with U.S.
crude sliding 2%. Oil
prices have plunged in
recent weeks amid wor-
ries about a mismatch
between too much crude
supply and too little de-
mand.
Investors are watching
to see how U.S. retailers
will fare as the holiday
shopping season kicks off
with Black Friday, given
growing concerns that
spending may slow under
pressure from dwindling
savings, rising credit
card debt and inflation.
The latest quarterly
results from a string of
retailers from Walmart
to Best Buy to Saks Fifth
Avenue suggested a
weakening of consumer
appetites for spending
even as inflation eases
and employment remains
robust.

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