The National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) today released its monthly report on small business confidence in December, which showed business confidence rising by 1.8% to an index reading of 93.8. The slight gain…
Privately held Hostess Brands Inc. may file for Chapter 22 bankruptcy as early as this week according to a report in The Wall Street Journal. The company employs 19,000 people. The WSJ reports that…
Chinese customs officials report that the country’s trade surplus totaled $16.52 billion in December, more than double the expected $7.8 billion. Exports rose by 13.4% year-over-year and imports also rose by 11.8%. The rise…
Luxury retailer Tiffany & Co. (NYSE: TIF) reported this morning that same-store sales for the months of November and December combined rose 7%. Sales rose by 4% in the US, Canada, and Latin America;…
US internet coupon issuer Groupon Inc. (NASDAQ: GRPN) has signed a deal with Deutsche Telekom AG (OTC: DTEGY) to market coupons to DT’s mobile subscribers in Europe. This is Groupon’s first international deal with…
US markets opened up slightly this morning and have maintained a slight positive tone for most of the day. Today marks the unofficial beginning of another earnings season, with Alcoa kicking things off after…
Intel Corp. (NASDAQ: INTC) introduced its Ultrabook design at last year’s Computex show in May and has made a lot of noise about the competitor to the MacBook Air laptop made by Apple Inc.…
Investors in Ebay Inc. (NASDAQ: EBAY) could see a sharp increase of the value of their investment if the Internet auction site would spin-off its PayPal on-line payment unit. A report at Bloomberg News…
The number of full-time employees in the US reached 113.8 million in December, the highest its been since February 2009. The number of part-time employees also fell to 8.1 million in the month, the…
Pharmacy services company CVS Caremark Corp. (NYSE: CVS) will pay $160 million for the Medicare prescription drug business of Health Net Inc. (NYSE: HNT). The plan currently claims 400,000 subscribers. The acquisition follows the…
Dennis Lockhart, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, said in a speech today that even though the US economy is expanding and that the US inflation rate is “acceptable,” he is not…
French president Nicolas Sarkozy has gotten agreement from Germany’s chancellor, Angela Merkel, for a tax on financial transactions. The reaction from Britain, Europe’s financial center, is decidedly chilly. The US government has also come…
Canada’s largest mining company, Teck Resources Inc. (NYSE: TCK) has agreed to purchase the portion of oil sands developer privately held SilverBirch Energy Corp. (OTC: SBEXF) that Teck did not already own for about…
A survey of 14 economists by a German newspaper shows that most believe that the country’s economy is already in recession. By definition, a recession is two consecutive quarters of contracting GDP. Germany’s economy…
The long-delayed merger between Volkswagen AG (OTC: VLKAY) and Porsche Automobile Holding SE (OTC: POAHY) has finally been put out of its misery. The two companies have called off the deal as shareholder claims…
US home prices fell -1.4% month-over-month in November and -4.3% year-over-year according to the latest report from research firm CoreLogic. The year-over-year drop in October was -3.7%. The declines come following some reasonably encouraging…
A new crude oil pipeline from Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates to carry up to 2.5 million barrels/day to the Gulf of Oman was scheduled to open in April. Now, the UAE…
In its outlook for the next two years, technology research firm Forrester Research projects sales totalling $19 billion for Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL). The research firm estimates that Apple will sell $10 billion worth…
When Germany lowered its subsidy to solar electricity providers, the industry expected to see reduced demand for solar PV panels. What the industry did not expect is that the supply would explode and force…
Video-game retailer GameStop Corp. (NYSE: GME) reported this morning that same-store sales for the nine-week holiday season fell -0.3%. US sales were up by 0.3% during the period, but international sales fell by -1.5%.…