The announcement of the new partnership between the St Louis Blues and BetMGM promises exclusive fan engagement opportunities for fans of the hockey team. Already, new signage and branding for BetMGM have been integrated into the Blues’ Enterprise Center for exposure during home games, with plans for more co-branded content on social media and future hospitality experiences.

@BetMGM announced today that we are now an Official Sports Betting Partner of the NHL’s @StLouisBlues, expanding our footprint in Missouri and unlocking new ways to engage with Blues fans across the state.

Key elements of the agreement include prominent BetMGM signage and… pic.twitter.com/ly6O4eSGl7

— BetMGM News (@BetMGMNews) January 20, 2026

“BetMGM has forged iconic partnerships that celebrate Missouri’s rich sports tradition, and welcoming the St. Louis Blues is an exciting milestone,” said Matt Prevost, Chief Revenue Officer at BetMGM. “With St. Louis native Jon Hamm as the face of our brand and a legendary franchise like the Blues as our partner, we’re creating unforgettable experiences for fans across the Show-Me State.”

The Blues Chief Revenue and Marketing Officer, Steve Chapman, made special mention of the gambling firm’s responsible gaming policies, coming after the company launched a fresh campaign about how to gamble safely at the end of last year.

“With their focus on promoting responsible gambling, we couldn’t imagine a partner that would better align with our interests than BetMGM,” said Chapman. “Through this new partnership, BetMGM holds a prominent place in our building and in everything we do to deliver a legendary experience for Blues fans wherever they engage with our brand.”

Prime time for BetMGM to expand its footprint

This latest partnership comes after the company had a booming financial year in 2025. The company is clearly looking to invest its money in sponsorships and relevant partnerships, confirming a push into the entertainment space with a podcast sponsorship in September 2025.

The gambling giant has also been raising its profile in its in-house marketing, featuring actor Jon Hamm in its latest batch of marketing materials in 2025.

Featured image: BetMGM

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“I feel confident. I feel bullish. Bet on Queens,” Richards said Sunday, a day before the New York Gaming Facility Location board is set to decide whether to issue up to three downstate casino licenses — with two bidders pitching locations in Queens.

“Why go to Manhattan? You can stay in Queens! Queens becomes a global entertainment hub,” Richards said.

Illustration of Resorts World casino at Aqueduct Racetrack in Queens, New York. AP

New York Mets owner Steve Cohen is leading a group that wants to build a gaming complex near Citi Field while Genting’s Resorts World is bidding for a casino at Aqueduct race track.

Bally’s is also bidding for a casino complex at Ferry Point, President Trump’s former golf course in The Bronx.

The proposed $8 billion Cohen-Hard Rock Metropolitan Park casino complex would be a tourist magnet and an economic multiplier next to the US Tennis Center, new soccer stadium and the Mets home stadium, Richards said.

He said Resorts World, which has operated a slots parlor for more than a decade, can offer live table games within months because they already have the space to do so. The expanded complex with community benefits is worth $7.5 billion.

Both bidders will build concert halls for added entertainment.

“I feel confident. I feel bullish. Bet on Queens,” Richards said. Gabriella Bass

The proposed $8 billion Cohen-Hard Rock Metropolitan Park casino complex would be a tourist magnet. Hard Rock International

Both sites are close to the borough’s two airports — Metropolitan Park near LaGuardia and Resorts World near Kennedy.

Meanwhile, Bally’s $4 billion bid has strong support from the Bronx Democratic Party elected officials, though it has faced some stiff neighborhood opposition.

Bally’s chairman Soo Kim told The Post Saturday he believes his chances of scoring a license “looks pretty good.”

“We put our best effort out there,” he said. “I don’t think we have any weak spots.”

New York Mets owner Steve Cohen (left) is leading a group that wants to build a gaming complex near Citi Field. James Keivom

Bally’s acquired the golf course at Ferry Point from the Trump Organization in 2023, and it’s now called Bally’s Golf Links at Ferry Point. It is on the Bronx side of the Whitestone Bridge that connects with Queens.

As part of the deal, Bally’s agreed to provide the Trump Organization an additional $115 million — if it wins a casino license.

The Gaming Facility Location Board is evaluating each project based on criteria set in state law. Economic activity and business development accounts for 70% of the grade, 10% for location site impact — and 20% combines for workforce enhancement and diversity framework.

Casino applicants each need to pay $500 million license fees to operate – which would go into the cash-strapped state’s coffers — as well commit to at least $500 million in capital investments on their projects.

Some of the proceeds from gaming operators will help fund mass transit.

Bally’s agreed to provide the Trump Organization an additional $115 million — if it wins a casino license. James Messerschmidt

A pool of what was once 11 bidders has dwindled to three – but there’s no guarantee each of the survivors will get licenses because the five-member board doesn’t have to award any.

But many Albany insiders said the immediate cash from the licenses will spur the state to award as many as 3.

The state Gaming Commission will have final say, ratifying or rejecting the awards made by the siting board by year’s end.

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In the trailer, we watch as the eponymous sec unit (or “security unit”), which has named itself Murderbot, is hired for security detail by a crew of scientists. Eventually, it’s discovered to have hijacked its own system and gone “rogue.” Going rogue essentially means that it, as a security/killing cyborg, has free will as opposed to being controlled. And it, naturally, uses this free will to watch hours upon hours of “content,” which includes space soap operas like The Rise and Fall of Sanctuary Moon.

We’re soon shown how free will is an issue, though, since sec units are designed for violence, and the crew isn’t sure that they can trust it. But the hostile environment they landed on means they don’t have much of a choice.

Alexander Skarsgård stars, and his comedic timing meshes perfectly with Murderbot’s awkward temperament, while the rest of the cast—David Dastmalchia as Gurathin, Noma Dumezweni as Dr. Mensah, Akshay Khanna as Ratthi, and others—feel just as equally plucked from Martha Wells’s pages.

The series debuts May 16th this year, but if you want to prep by listening to the highly entertaining (and hilarious) Murderbot series before season one drops, the award-winning Kevin R. Free’s narration is perfect.

To learn more about the series, visit Apple TV+

Find more news and stories of interest from the book world in Breaking in Books.

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Anyone who wants to keep up with President Trump’s views knows to go to his Truth Social account. There, one finds his reasoning on a panoply of issues, including military strikes in Somalia, tariffs on Canada and Mexico, relations with Russia, the causes of a deadly aircraft collision, American ownership of the Gaza Strip and a budget bill now before Congress.

On Wednesday, for instance, after initial cease-fire talks between the United States and Russia over the war in Ukraine, he employed the account to attack Ukraine’s leader. “Think of it, a modestly successful comedian, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, talked the United States of America into spending $350 Billion Dollars, to go into a War that couldn’t be won, that never had to start,” the president’s post said. “Zelenskyy better move fast or he is not going to have a Country left.”

In some ways, such statements are akin to how Mr. Trump turned Twitter, now called X, into his megaphone in his first term, when administration officials declared his posts to be official White House communications.

But one major difference stands out: Mr. Trump is the biggest shareholder in Trump Media & Technology Group, the company that owns Truth Social, and so stands to benefit directly if his posts drive traffic to the site. Even though he has put his Trump Media shares in a trust controlled by his oldest son, the president remains the main draw to the platform that is the company’s signature product.

His Truth Social posts are only one example of the intersection of Mr. Trump’s official role and Trump Media. On Wednesday, in an extraordinary move, Trump Media sued a Brazilian Supreme Court justice who is overseeing multiple criminal investigations of Jair Bolsonaro, the former Brazilian president whom Mr. Trump has described as a one of his “great friends.”

The lawsuit, which accused the judge of illegally censoring right-wing voices on social media, appeared to be an effort to pressure the foreign judge as he considered whether to arrest Mr. Bolsonaro.

Trump Media also plans to expand from social media into financial services, opening up another realm for conflicts of interest. That venture would involve investment vehicles that industry experts predicted would need approval by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Mr. Trump has nominated Paul Atkins, a longtime Republican commissioner, to be the agency’s chair. He is awaiting confirmation by the Senate.

In yet another apparent commingling of interests, Mr. Trump picked Devin Nunes, Trump Media’s chief executive, to serve as head of the President’s Intelligence Advisory Board and Scott Glabe, the company’s general counsel, as a board member.

All of this fits a pattern of far bolder violations of the norms that once governed conflicts of interest than occurred in Mr. Trump’s first term, when foreign officials and others seeking his favor flocked to Mar-a-Lago, his Florida resort, and to the luxury Trump hotel near the White House, ethics lawyers and experts say.

“The potential for conflicts of interest has broadened and deepened relative even to the president’s first term because he has stakes in a much wider range of businesses than he did when he was last in the White House,” said Daniel I. Weiner, a government expert at the Brennan Center for Justice, a nonpartisan think tank focused on democracy issues. Even the appearance that the president’s personal interests are intertwined with the public interest “is very very corrosive to our political system,” he said.

Harrison Fields, a White House spokesman, said in response to questions from The New York Times about the president’s possible conflicts of interest that “President Trump is committed to using every direct line of communication to the American people. Alongside his consistent interactions with the press corps, this cements his legacy as the most transparent president in history.”

When asked to comment, a spokeswoman for Trump Media criticized The Times, saying it was making false insinuations, but did not address questions related to his company.

Trump Media makes no bones about its heavy reliance on Mr. Trump’s fame and popularity. In a filing last week with the S.E.C., the company noted that Mr. Trump has the discretion to minimize his Truth Social posts, “which could have a material adverse effect on the business.”

But that is exactly what he should do to avoid mixing his private financial interests and his official role, said John Pelissero, a government ethics expert at Santa Clara University. “He should, as other presidents have done in the past, use just official White House communications when he’s talking about the government and not the company he owns.”

Mr. Trump’s communications also serve to boost X, which is owned by Elon Musk, now a top adviser to Mr. Trump and a special government employee. Mr. Trump’s Truth Social messages of presidential import are routinely reposted on Mr. Musk’s social media platform, typically after an interval of several hours, in an apparent effort to bolster traffic on Truth Social.

Mr. Trump has about 101 million followers on X, compared to nearly nine million on Truth Social, a number that has been growing since his election in November.

“Whether through Truth, X, Instagram or any other social media platform, the president and the White House will continue to speak directly to the American people — a long-overdue change from the last four years,” Mr. Fields said in response to questions including about the president’s reposts on X.

While social media companies are only loosely federally regulated, Trump Media’s plans to expand into financial services and products will put it more squarely under the purview of federal regulators.

Trump Media said earlier this month that it planned to invest up to $250 million in the venture to offer financial products that will be developed with Charles Schwab, one of the country’s biggest brokerage firms, and a small New Jersey investment firm, Yorkville Advisors. Industry experts said that federal regulators could feel pressured to grant favorable treatment to those products.

As of now, the commissioners can be fired only for cause, but the Trump administration is mounting a legal challenge to the independence of the S.E.C. and various other regulatory agencies. An executive order signed Tuesday requires White House review of their proposed regulations, asserts a power to block spending on efforts that conflict with presidential priorities and declares that the agencies must accept the president’s and the Justice Department’s interpretation of the law as binding.

The financial services industry is also overseen by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a federal watchdog agency that the White House is now trying to shut down. Mr. Trump has called the agency a hotbed of “waste, fraud and abuse” run by a “vicious group” whose only purpose is to “destroy people.”

Supporters point to the fact that the bureau has returned about $21 billion to consumers through its enforcement actions.

Earlier this month, Russell T. Vought, who runs the Office of Management and Budget and was named as the consumer agency’s new acting director, ordered the bureau’s staff and contractors to stop work. A federal judge ordered a temporary halt to mass layoffs, data erasures and funding cutoffs at the bureau on Friday, but the agency’s future is deeply in doubt.

Without that watchdog in place, it will be easier for financial services firms to run roughshod over consumers, said Kathleen Clark, a law professor at Washington University in St. Louis who specializes in government ethics. In light of Trump Media’s plans, “no wonder he wants to destroy it,” she said.

Ethics experts also warned during the presidential campaign that if Mr. Trump was elected, Truth Social could be a straightforward avenue to try to influence him. Foreigners, corporations and others seeking to sway him could buy shares in the companies or advertisements on Truth Social in efforts to push up stock values and enrich the Trump family.

“A foreign nation no longer has to rent out the floor of a hotel in order to line President Trump’s pocket,” Ms. Clark said.

Since Mr. Trump created Trump Media in 2021, the company has incurred hefty losses and struggled to generate revenues from advertising on Truth Social or through video streaming. Last year it reported $3.6 million in revenue — 12 percent less than the year before — and $130 million in expenses. Much of the costs apparently related to a merger and its advent as a public company.

Nonetheless, it has $777 million in cash, apparently generated through the merger and sale of stock, mainly to Yorkville. Its market value of $6.6 billion is nearly 2,000 times its 2024 revenue.

While Mr. Trump is not an officer or director of Trump Media, he owns 53 percent of the company’s shares, a stake now valued at about $3.5 billion. He transferred those shares in December to a trust solely controlled by Donald Trump Jr., his oldest son who is a company board member.

But multiple legal experts said that action does nothing to address the links between his personal financial interests and his role as president.

“Whether it is in a trust is completely irrelevant,” Ms. Clark said, “because ultimately the money ends up in Trump’s pocket.”

Julie Tate contributed research.

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Federal Reserve officials wrapped up their final meeting of 2024 with splits surfacing over how many more interest rate cuts they should make given strong economic growth, lingering inflation and huge uncertainty ahead of Donald J. Trump’s return to the White House.

Weeks later, they unanimously pressed pause on rate cuts and now appear unified in their view that the central bank should tread carefully and take its time to see how the economy is evolving under a new administration.

Mary C. Daly, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, reaffirmed that approach in an interview on Monday, saying the central bank does not “need to be pre-emptive at this point.”

“We have policy calibrated for this economy and the one we expect to have, and we’ve got time now to be actively watching to see what else is done,” she said.

The merits of that strategy were on full display on Monday after Canada and Mexico, two of America’s top trading partners, narrowly avoided steep tariffs in an 11th-hour deal with President Trump.

The prospects of another trade war — combined with large-scale deportations, reduced regulation and lower taxes — have upended economists’ expectations. They have also muddied expectations about how much more the Fed can lower rates after reducing them by a full percentage point last year. Ms. Daly said she was focused on the “net effect” of Mr. Trump’s policies, rather than assessing each one individually.

“If a policy change is going to spur growth, which ultimately pushes down inflation, at the same time that there’s something that picks it up a little bit, then you don’t know what the net effect is going to be until you have more details about the policy,” she said.

“Until we know more about scope, magnitude and timing and how those features move through the economy, then we’re really doing nothing more than speculating,” Ms. Daly added. “The easiest way for a policy mistake is to speculate.”

Ms. Daly said she was still “comfortable” with Fed officials’ projections published in December, which indicated broad support for half a percentage point in cuts this year. That would bring interest rates down to a range of 3.75 percent to 4 percent.

“I think we have to have a very open mind about whether fewer or more will be needed,” she said, referring to the number of cuts.

The range of outcomes underscores how high inflation has complicated the Fed’s job and cast uncertainty about whether its old playbooks, like those related to trade tensions, still apply.

The last time the Fed confronted a trade war that was led by Mr. Trump, it took early action to prevent the economy from weakening too much. The Fed lowered interest rates three times over consecutive meetings in the summer and fall of 2019, action that was later billed as taking out “insurance” against the economic impact of his trade war.

“The world is different right now,” Ms. Daly said. “History is a data point, but it’s not a playbook.”

At the time of Mr. Trump’s first trade war, inflation was consistently below the Fed’s 2 percent goal and global economic growth forecasts had turned downbeat. Companies across the country were also beginning to retrench, as uncertainty chilled business activity.

The biggest contrast today is that inflation is still above 2 percent. That is a problem because consumers and businesses are likely to be more sensitive to anything that may risk resurgent prices. The Fed may be compelled to act if there are signs that expectations of inflation are getting unmoored — something that Ms. Daly said was “critical” to take into account.

“The thing that’s reassuring is that longer-run inflation expectations, which is really what we keep our mind on, haven’t really moved at all,” she said.

Giving the Fed further leeway to stand pat is a labor market with “no sign” of weakness, Ms. Daly said. “The economy is in a very good place,” she added.

The Fed will monitor the January jobs report, released on Friday, for any evidence that this is changing. Economists expect slower growth than the 256,000 positions added in December, in part reflecting annual revisions by the Bureau of Labor Statistics that incorporate new data.

“There’s not pessimism among businesses,” Ms. Daly said. “In fact, if anything, they’re more optimistic now than they were in the latter half year.”

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