New CPI numbers out this week showed inflation in the U.S. rising unabated in the “month leading up to the war in Ukraine,” and the conflict is now upending hopes that 2022 would see an easing in rising prices. Certainly, the trouble it’s added to supply chain woes and energy prices will not help the cause - NYTimes and WSJ and Marketplace

Major League Baseball and its players’ union have reached a deal that will save the ’22 season after “99 days of a contentious lockout.” The new 5-year collective bargaining agreement “will increase pay for young players and better incentivize teams to compete.” Opening day is now slated for April 7 - NYTimes and WSJ and Bloomberg and Law360 and Marketplace

The IRS announced plans to hire some 10,000 new workers over the next year in an effort to “clear a backlog of more than 20 million unprocessed tax returns from previous years.” The effort is part of a new “’all hands on deck approach’ to emerge from longstanding staffing shortages that were compounded by the pandemic” - NYTimes and WSJ and MarketWatch

Stocks closed lower on Thursday, heading back down after a solid Wednesday in a session marked by, you guessed it, serious volatility - WSJ

EU and UK regulators have formally launched an antitrust probe into whether Google and Facebook “sought to illegally cooperate in digital advertising” in their “once-secret deal, known as Jedi Blue” - WSJ

Buzzy but troubled e-truck maker Rivian is dialing back production and delivery expectations for the coming year, citing supply-chain problems as its reason for producing only 25k vehicles in 2022—“half the number it said it could make” - NYTimes and WSJ and Bloomberg and TechCrunch

The Times on the ubiquity of private equity, the “once niche players” now financial conglomerates  “trying to be everything to everyone” - NYTimes

Acknowledging the disaster that its 2018 acquisition of Monsanto has meant for the company, Bayer AG is divesting its pest-control unit through a $2.6 billion sale to private equity firm Cinven. Bayer has spent the years since it bought Monsanto mired in a “costly legal fight over Monsanto’s Roundup weedkiller” and allegations that it caused cancer - WSJ

As we barrel toward the parade-filled and shamrock-festooned celebration of Ireland’s most famous saint next week, well worth taking note of the rise of another figure—Saint Brigid—whose appeal is growing even as “the Roman Catholic church is in retreat in Ireland” - NYTimes

We’re taking an early spring hiatus next week, and we’ll see you back here after that. Until then, stay safe, and have a good weekend,
MDR