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By Jonathan Stempel and Luc Cohen

NEW YORK (Reuters) -Fresh off a campaign victory in Iowa, Donald Trump sat in a New York courtroom on Tuesday to defend himself for a second time against charges that he defamed writer E. Jean Carroll after she accused him of raping her decades ago.

Trump watched from the defendant’s table as his lawyers sparred with U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan over the ground rules of a civil case that will put allegations of misconduct back in the headlines while he pursues the 2024 Republican presidential nomination.

He sat two tables behind Carroll, who is accusing Trump of defaming her in 2019 by denying he had attacked her in a Bergdorf Goodman department store dressing room in Manhattan. Carroll, 80, is seeking at least $10 million in damages.

Kaplan told prospective jurors they would only have to consider how much Trump should pay Carroll in damages, not whether the alleged assault took place or whether Trump lied about it afterward. He said the trial is expected to last three to five days.

Trump, 77, has said he wants to testify at the civil trial.

He could spend much of this year shuttling between campaign rallies and courtrooms, as he seeks to win the Republican presidential nomination for 2024.

He won the first state contest in Iowa on Monday by a wide margin, and opinion polls show him leading in the next contest in New Hampshire a week from today.

Trump has pleaded not guilty in four criminal cases that could potentially land him in prison before the November presidential election, including two that accuse him of trying to overturn his 2020 loss to Democrat Joe Biden. He also is a defendant in at least two other civil cases.

Trump has cast himself as the victim of political persecution. On Tuesday, he said Kaplan should dismiss the case.

“Judge Kaplan should put this whole corrupt, Crooked Joe Biden-directed Election Interference attack on me immediately to rest,” he posted on social media. “He should do it for America.”

SECOND TRIAL

Trump’s high profile was apparent as prospective jurors were screened for the case. Many acknowledged they were familiar with Trump’s various legal troubles, though none said they knew the details of the first defamation trial.

Many said they had backed Democratic candidates in previous elections, reflecting New York City’s liberal tilt, and one said she had volunteered for Biden’s 2020 campaign. Two others said they believed Trump’s false claims that the election had been stolen from him. One said she used to work for his daughter Ivanka.

Jurors’ identities are being kept confidential.

Trump has already lost one defamation case against Carroll.

A jury last May ordered Trump to pay the former Elle magazine columnist $5 million for having sexually abused her during the encounter, and defaming her in 2022 by denying that it happened. Trump skipped that trial.

Kaplan, who has overseen both cases, has barred Trump from arguing that he did not defame or sexually assault Carroll or that she made up her account.

In both cases, Trump has said he did not know Carroll and that she invented their encounter to sell her memoir.

Trump is appealing the $5 million award, and could appeal any award at the second trial. Appeals could take years.

NEW ATTACKS

In recent weeks, Trump has escalated his attacks on Carroll, including a false accusation on social media this weekend that she did not know the decade of their encounter.

He also called Kaplan “terrible, biased, irrationally angry,” echoing attacks he has made on judges overseeing some of his other cases.

Trump may face an uphill fight to escape significant additional damages because of Kaplan’s pre-trial rulings.

These include banning Trump from suggesting he did not rape Carroll, as New York’s penal law defines the term, because the first jury did not find that Trump committed rape.

Kaplan has ruled that because Trump used his fingers in the assault, Carroll’s rape claim was “substantially true.”

Trump also cannot discuss DNA evidence or Carroll’s sexual activities, or suggest that Democrats are bankrolling her case. Carroll is a Democrat.

And as at the first trial, jurors will be able to see the 2005 “Access Hollywood” video where Trump graphically described the ability of famous people like himself to have sexual relations with beautiful women.

Trump did not retract his comments when asked about them in a 2022 deposition. Kaplan has said the video could offer “useful insight into Mr. Trump’s state of mind” toward Carroll.

Trump lawyer Alina Habba on Sunday assured Kaplan that he was “well aware” of the court’s rulings “and the strict confines placed on his testimony.”

(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel and Luc Cohen in New York; Writing by Andy Sullivan; Editing by Noeleen Walder, Mark Porter, Franklin Paul and Daniel Wallis)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Boeing on Tuesday named Kirkland H. Donald, a retired Navy admiral, as the independent advisor to lead a comprehensive quality review of Boeing’s quality management system for commercial airplanes.

Donald and a team of outside experts will provide recommendations to Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun and to the aerospace safety committee of Boeing’s board of directors, Boeing said.

The appointment is effective immediately.

(Reporting by Valerie Insinna; Editing by Chris Reese)

By Mark Trevelyan

(Reuters) – A Russian woman accused of assassinating a prominent pro-war blogger told a court on Tuesday she had thought the package she handed to him in a St Petersburg cafe contained a listening device, not a bomb.

Darya Trepova said she was acting under orders from a man in Ukraine whom she knew as “Gestalt” (German for “Shape”), who had been sending her money and instructions for several months before the killing of blogger Vladlen Tatarsky on April 2 last year.

Russia accused Ukraine immediately after the attack of organising Tatarsky’s murder. Senior Ukrainian officials have neither claimed responsibility nor denied involvement, with presidential aide Mykhailo Podolyak describing it as “internal terrorism”.

Tatarsky was killed by a bomb concealed in a statuette that Trepova handed to him in the cafe, where he was giving a talk to an audience of up to 100 people.

The figurine was a crude likeness of Tatarsky, who accepted it as a present. Witnesses have told the trial that he jokingly called it “Golden Vladlen” and turned it over in his hands before it exploded, killing him on the spot and injuring dozens.

Gestalt’s identity remains unclear.

In testimony at her trial in St Petersburg on Tuesday, Trepova, 26, said she was introduced to him by a Ukraine-based journalist called Roman Popkov with whom she had connected on Twitter. She said she told Popkov that she opposed Russia’s invasion and was sympathetic to Ukraine, and was looking for his help to come to Ukraine and work as a journalist herself.

Russian investigators have accused Popkov in absentia of “orchestrating the execution of a terrorist act”. He has denied any involvement.

STATUETTE

Trepova said that guided by Gestalt, she attended talks by Tatarsky in early 2023 and introduced herself to him, claiming to be an art student called Anastasia Kriulina.

In March, he sent her the statuette of Tatarsky by post, with instructions to hand it to him in person. She told the court it had occurred to her then that it might be a bomb and remembered the case of Darya Dugina, a pro-war journalist who died when her car was blown up near Moscow in 2022.

“I was very scared and asked Gestalt: ‘Isn’t this the same as with Daria Dugina?’ He replied that no, there was only a wiretap and a tracker,” Trepova said, according to a transcript by independent Russian news outlet Mediazona.

“Handing over a listening device is already an invasion of privacy and is illegal, and I was very worried about this, and thought it might be a bomb.”

She said she went ahead because “I didn’t think they could set me up like this”, and assumed the purpose of eavesdropping on Tatarsky was to find out more of what he knew about the war in Ukraine, which she opposed.

After the bomb went off, Trepova said, she called Gestalt to confront him.

“I swore at him and said that people were hurt there and I realised that they have done this and I was involved in it. I realised that the figurine had exploded,” she said.

Trepova said Gestalt told her she could ask questions later.

“I continued to swear. He said: ‘When you come to Ukraine and visit us, you can hit me.’ This made me very angry,” she said tearfully.

(Reporting by Mark Trevelyan; editing by Mark Heinrich)

By Howard Schneider and Ann Saphir

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The U.S. is “within striking distance” of the Federal Reserve’s 2% inflation goal, but the central bank should not rush to cut its benchmark interest rate until it is clear lower inflation will be sustained, Fed Governor Christopher Waller said on Tuesday.

And regardless of when rate cuts begin, Waller said the central bank should proceed “methodically and carefully,” not make the sort of large, fast reductions used when the Fed is trying to bail out the economy from a shock or a pending downturn.

“The key thing is the economy is doing well. It is giving us the flexibility to move carefully and methodically. We can see how the data comes in, see if progress is being sustained,” Waller said in comments in a moderated online discussion organized by the Brookings Institution. “The worst thing we’d have is it all reverses after we’ve already started to cut. We really want to see evidence that this progress…in the real data and the inflation data continues. I believe it will.”

Waller’s remarks served as a counter to market expectations that the Fed will start cutting rates at its March meeting and lop perhaps 1.5 percentage points from the benchmark policy rate by the end of the year. After he spoke traders pared bets that the Fed would in March reduce a policy rate that has been left in the current range of 5.25% to 5.5% since July.

The Fed next meets on Jan. 30-31.

SHIFT IN EMPHASIS

If Waller expressed a more careful approach to coming cuts than anticipated by investors, his remarks also showcased the debate taking shape among policymakers on the appropriate pace of cuts, and acknowledged that the emphasis has shifted from controlling inflation alone to managing a more balanced set of risks to ensure the Fed’s maximum employment goal stays in hand as well.

“While the emphasis of policy…has been on pushing down inflation, given the strength of the current labor market the FOMC’s focus now is likely to be more balanced: keeping inflation on a 2% path while also keeping employment near its maximum level. Today, I view the risks to our employment and inflation mandates as being more closely balanced,” he said.

Recent data “is almost as good as it gets” for the central bank with economic growth gradually slowing, the unemployment rate remaining low, and important measures of inflation now hitting the Fed’s 2% target for the past six months, said Waller, a key architect of aggressive Fed tightening who now agrees the time for cuts is likely approaching.

“The data we have received the last few months is allowing the Committee to consider cutting the policy rate in 2024,” Waller said in remarks prepared for delivery at the Brookings Institution event. However, he cautioned that until any risk has passed that inflation will resurge or recent trends reverse, policy changes should “be carefully calibrated and not rushed.”

“I am becoming more confident that we are within striking distance of achieving a sustainable level of 2% PCE inflation. I think we are close,” Waller said, referring to the personal consumption expenditures price index that the Fed uses to set its inflation target.

“But I will need more information in the coming months confirming or (conceivably) challenging the notion that inflation is moving down sustainably toward our inflation goal,” before backing rate cuts, he said.

(Reporting by Howard Schneider and Ann Saphir; Editing by Andrea Ricci)

DAVOS, Switzerland (Reuters) – Inflation in India is moderating and steadily approaching the central bank’s 4% target while growth prospects remain robust, Reserve Bank of India chief Shaktikanta Das said on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum annual meeting.

“Inflation has come under control and is within the band we have, which is 2% to 6%. Target is 4%,” Das said in a fireside chat at Davos organised by Invest India, the country’s national investment promotion and facilitation agency.

Core inflation has started steadily coming down and gives confidence that monetary policy is working, he added. “RBI remains fully committed to bring inflation down to the target of 4%.”

Annual retail inflation rose the fastest in four months in December but core inflation, which strips out volatile food and energy prices, dropped to a four-year low of 3.8% to 3.89% from 4.05% to 4.2% in November.

Das said India’s economic growth prospects remain robust, noting signs of sustained growth momentum in coming years.

The reduction in exchange rate volatility in India in recent years has renewed investors’ confidence in the economy, he added.

(Reporting by Swati Bhat in Mumbai; Editing by Richard Chang)

LONDON (Reuters) -Boeing’s 737 MAX 10 jet may not be certified this year, major customer Ryanair said on Tuesday.

The U.S. planemaker has said it expects the MAX 10 to be certified in 2024 and at a press briefing on Tuesday Ryanair Chief Executive Michael O’Leary initially told journalists that certification is expected in the fourth quarter of the year.

But he then backtracked and said he wasn’t sure that the largest version of Boeing’s bestselling jet would be certified before 2025.

“I’m absolutely certain the MAX 10 will get certified,” said O’Leary, who has 150 firm orders for the jet. “I’m not sure they’ll get it certified by the end of 2024.”

(Reporting by Joanna PlucinskaWriting by Conor Humphries and Valerie InsinnaEditing by Louise Heavens and David Goodman)

By Robert Harvey

(Reuters) -Oil prices edged lower on Tuesday as investors weighed the impact of tensions in the Middle East against a stronger dollar and cooled expectations of U.S. interest rate cuts.

Brent crude futures were down 46 cents, or about 0.59%, to $77.69 a barrel at 1532 GMT. The contract had traded more than $1 higher than its Monday settlement earlier in the session.

U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude was down 90 cents, or 1.24%, from Friday at $71.78 a barrel. U.S. markets were closed for a public holiday on Monday.

An escalating shipping crisis in the Red Sea and Iranian missile strikes on targets in Syria and Iraq added to the geopolitical risk premium on oil prices on Tuesday.

But prices may find a ceiling unless production is shut in, analysts said.

“Oil markets are still sensitive to tensions in the Middle East, but the base case remains that we’ll see no significant disruption to flows,” OANDA analyst Craig Erlam said.

“In the absence of actual and palpable impact on oil output, prices will remain well within the current $72-$82 range,” Tamas Varga, an analyst at PVM, said in a note.

Oil prices to be giving way to a stronger dollar and weaker equities on Tuesday, Varga added, because of cooling expectations that the Federal Reserve could start cutting interest rates as soon as March.

As the main currency oil is traded in, a stronger dollar can impact demand.

Investors were awaiting a speech by Fed Governor Christopher Waller at 1600 GMT on Tuesday for clues about when the U.S. central bank might begin to cut rates.

The European Central Bank’s interest rates are likely to come down this year, but policymakers have avoided making firm statements on the timing of such cuts.

In the Red Sea, a Malta-flagged bulk carrier was struck by a missile off Yemen on Tuesday.

NYK, Japan’s largest shipper by sales, instructed all vessels it operates not to use the Red Sea, while Sovcomflot, Russia’s leading tanker group, is also considering alternative routes.

Oil major Shell said it had suspended all shipments through the Red Sea indefinitely after last week’s strikes, the Wall Street Journal reported.

Concerns of the conflict spreading throughout the region also grew on Tuesday, as Iran’s striking of targets in the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region of Iraq triggered a diplomatic dispute. Iran also attacked Islamic State positions in Syria.

(Reporting by Robert Harvey, Arathy Somasekhar in Houston and Trixie Yap in Singapore; editing by Barbara Lewis, Jason Neely and Paul Simao)

(Reuters) -Canadian miner Barrick Gold Corp said on Tuesday its full-year preliminary production of gold fell from a year earlier, even as output rose sequentially in the fourth quarter.

The world’s second-largest gold miner said in November its 2023 gold production was forecast to be lower than expected due to equipment issues at its Dominican Republic mine and lower output at two sites in the Nevada Gold Fields project.

Barrick reported a 2.17% fall in 2023 gold output at 4.05 million ounces from a year earlier, which came below its forecast, and analysts’ average estimate of 4.16 million ounces, according to LSEG data.

Copper production also fell 4.76% to 420 million pounds. Analysts had estimated 433 million pounds of output.

Shares of the Toronto-based company fell nearly 4.1% to C$22.67, while U.S.-listed shares were down 4.7% at $16.82. Gold was down 0.8% at around 10:00 a.m. ET. [GOL/]

Barrick’s fourth-quarter output, however, rose to 1.05 million ounces of gold and 113 million pounds of copper, from 1.04 million ounces of gold and 112 million pounds of copper in the previous quarter.

The company said it expects all-in sustaining costs (AISC) per ounce of gold, an industry metric that reflects total expenses, to rise about 8% to 10% and copper’s AISC to be 2% to 4% lower from the previous quarter.

Barrick is scheduled to release its fourth-quarter results on Feb. 14.

(Reporting by Seher Dareen in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -A JP Morgan Chase & Co unit will pay a $18 million civil penalty to settle charges it violated whistleblower protection rules, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission said on Tuesday.

J.P. Morgan Securities LLC impeded “hundreds of advisory clients and brokerage customers from reporting potential securities law violations” to financial regulators, the SEC said in a statement, adding that the company also agreed to cease the alleged violations.

From March 2020 through July 2023, the firm asked retail clients to sign confidential agreements if they were issued a credit or settlement from JPM of more than $1,000, the SEC said. The agreements required the clients to keep the underlying facts of the regulators said.

Representatives for JPM did not respond immediately to request for comment.

(Reporting by Susan Heavey and Chris Prentice; Editing by Doina Chiacu, Alexandra Hudson)

By Anna Tong

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Artificial intelligence lab OpenAI is forming a new team to create democratic processes to shape how its AI software should be governed to address bias and other factors, the Microsoft-backed company said in a blog post on Tuesday.

The “Collective Alignment” team is a continuation of the work of a grant program for funding democratic process experiments that was announced in May 2023, the San Francisco-based firm said. The program wrapped up recently.

“As we continue to pursue our mission towards superintelligent models who potentially could be seen as integral parts of our society … it’s important to give people the opportunity to provide input directly,” Tyna Eloundou, a research engineer and founding member of OpenAI’s new team, told Reuters.

To ensure, for example, that only humans can vote, OpenAI could partner with Worldcoin, a cryptocurrency project founded by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman that provides a way to tell the difference between humans and AI bots, said Teddy Lee, a product manager who is the other member of the two-person team.

Lee noted that the team has not made any concrete plans yet to integrate Worldcoin.

Since OpenAI’s late 2022 launch of ChatGPT, generative AI technology that can spin uncannily authoritative prose from text prompts has captivated the public, making the program one of the fastest growing apps of all time.

There are, however, concerns about AI’s ability to create “deepfake” pictures and other misinformation, especially as the 2024 U.S. election campaign ramps up. Critics say AI systems like ChatGPT have inherent bias due to the inputs used to shape their views, and users have found examples of racist or sexist outputs from AI software.

The new OpenAI team is actively looking to hire a research engineer and research scientist, Eloundou said. The team will work closely with OpenAI’s “Human Data” team, which builds infrastructure for collecting human input on the company’s AI models, and other research teams.

(Reporting by Anna Tong in San Francisco; Editing by Paul Simao)