A report from Merrill Lynch shows that investors are now more worried about the “fiscal cliff” than the financial trouble of Europe: Europe is staging a comeback in investor portfolios while concerns about the…
Bundesbank leader Jens Weidmann has been unhappy with the European Central Bank’s plan to buy sovereign debt in financially weak nations since the idea was first floated. Now, he has viciously attacked the practice…
The National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo housing market index increased to a seasonally adjusted reading of 40 in September. That was up from 37 in the previous month, as well as the highest…
Lenovo, the world’s second-largest PC maker, has struck a deal to acquire U.S.-based software company Stoneware in order to boost its cloud computing operations. This is the Beijing-based company’s first acquisition of a software…
U.S. Department of Transportation’s Air Travel Consumer Report for July is out. It grades, among other things, which airlines are most likely to have on-time arrivals. The data always gets a lot of news…
Google Inc.’s (NASDAQ: GOOG) Motorola Mobility handed Intel Corp. (NASDAQ: INTC) a much-needed victory in the smartphone industry. The big chip marker has had a hard time breaking out of the PC market and into…
Global tablet sales should rise 56% to 126.6 million units, according to industry research group iSuppli. As expected, Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) has the lead in the market, but that lead may be threatened.…
The ZEW Center for European Economic Research in Mannheim said today that its index of investor and analyst expectations rose to -18.2 from -25.5 in August. Economists on average expected a gain to -20,…
Market research firm BIA/Kelsey predicts that demand from U.S. consumers for online deals will boost the market to $3.6 billion by the end of this year. If so, the online deal market — including…
Delinquencies at Capital One Financial Corp.’s (NYSE: COF) U.S. credit-card business rose in August from the month earlier, while charge-offs slipped, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The McLean, Va.-based…
AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T) claims the Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) iPhone 5 set a presale order record, supporting news over the weekend that even Apple itself is sold out. The news confirms a trend. Apple products…
The bickering over the structure that banks and sovereign bailouts should take continues among Europe’s leaders. As a meeting of the finance ministers of the region ended, two critical issues remain unresolved. The first is whether…
Looks like China’s economic slowdown has claimed another victim. Atlanta-based Home Depot Inc. (NYSE: HD) said today that it will close its remaining seven big-box stores in the People’s Republic. Home Depot chairman and…
The markets’ broad rally has left some sectors behind, most notably the PC and PC-related hardware companies. The death of the platform, which has become broadly accepted by Wall St., has not been changed by…
courtesy NintendoThe new Nintendo Wii U may be a super game console, but probably not super enough. The problems the product faces go well beyond the success of competitive products from Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT)…
The financial ministers of the euro area will meet over the next two days. There is a very wide range of topics that they might discuss. The gathering should begin with some optimism about ECB plans…
The short interest in biotech stocks is generally falling, judging by the short interest changes from August 31 settlement date versus the August 15 settlement date. We have tracked the key short interest changes…
AppleOne of the questions that came out of the unveiling of the Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) iPhone 5 is whether it can help the company’s flagging fortunes in China, the largest wireless subscriber market…
The rate of foreclosures in the U.S. has crept up again, after a number of months of improvement in some states. The way the courts in several states treat the foreclosure process is part…
Nintendo will continue its effort to make a comeback in the video game console business. It will introduce its new Wii U in Japan on December 8. It is a wonder that the Japanese…