Spain’s industrial production falls 5.1% on an annual basis in February. (MarketWatch) U.S. brokerage firms pay increasingly higher bonuses to get top producers. (Reuters) Alcoa (NYSE: AA) has a surprising first-quarter profit. (Reuters) Travelzoo (NASDAQ:…
Government policies aimed at reducing a household’s debt relative to its assets—and its debt service payments relative to its income—could be an inexpensive way to mitigate the negative effects of household deleveraging on economic…
NokiaTroubled handset maker Nokia (NYSE: NOK) cannot get a break. Its alliance with Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) was supposed to allow it to produce attractive new smartphones meant to help it claw back share from…
China is supposed to be the market which gets the global car industry back on its feet after the losses caused by three years of recession. The China market, which produced 18 million car…
Tablet PC sales will reach 119 million units this year, according to research firm Gartner. Apple is by far the dominant player in the market, and Gartner forecast that will be the case for…
24/7 Wall St. has said for over a year that Best Buy (NYSE: BBY) could not be turned around under incompetent CEO Brian Dunn. Clueless Best Buy founder Richard M. Schulze must finally have…
Who is right about what health care costs will be in the U.S. over the next decade? No one. The figure is too hard to come by, as is any number based on complex…
The Federal Statistics Office in Germany said exports rose 1.6% in February, compared to January. Also, the country’s trade surplus rose to 14.7 billion euros. The EU economy is too weak for the rise…
The Chronicle of Higher Education put out its annual salary survey for 2011/2012. Most of the headlines about the study centered on full professor pay at Harvard, which averaged $198,400. Professors at nine universities…
The Sony (NYSE: SNE) train wreck continues. The Japanese company has appointed a new CEO and will fire 10,000 workers. But annual earnings for the fiscal year are much worse than expected. Sony lost $6.4…
Charles Blahous, a George Mason University research fellow, reports that the new health care law could add $530 billion to the deficit. (Washington Post) Fed Chairman Bernanke says many banks need larger capital buffers.…
There is a relatively new reason to believe gas prices will rise, at least in part of the US. CNNMoney reports that almost 50% of the gas refinery capacity in the Northeast will be…
Honda (NYSE: HMC) is the latest multinational car company to attack China’s vehicle market. People’s Republic drivers bought 18 million cars and light trucks last year, well ahead of the 12.5 million sold in…
Facebook is rich and has money to burn. Why not spend it on odd acquisitions? The fight over the questionable value of social networks, fueled by the upcoming IPO of Facebook, got a boost…
The Sony (NYSE: SNE) train wreck continues. The Japanese company has appointed a new CEO and will fire 10,000 workers. But, annual earnings for the year which just ended are much worse than expected.…
The promise that AOL’s (NYSE: AOL) patents have value was quickly realized as the firm sold Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) $1.1 billion worth of patents. The patents numbered about 800. The news should shut up…
Many of the world’s industrialized countries have scrambled to cut their corporate tax rates to stay competitive in the face of the economic crisis. The United States is not among them. Recently, the U.S. became…
AT&T (NYSE: T) cannot fire workers it does not want. Sony (NYSE: SNE) easily can fire its unwanted workers. Leverage is at the heart of employee power, now that the recession has ended and companies do not…
Some nations with the world’s smallest gross domestic products could help decide the fates of a number of worldwide markets in the next several months. This despite what appears to be a mending global economy.…
The rapid rise in gasoline prices has stalled, although the plateau may only last a few weeks. The AAA Fuel Gauge report shows that the price of a gallon of regular, based on the…