The National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo index for February showed the confidence of builders at a five-year high. That is the best level since May 2007, which is about when the most severe period of…
Moody’s made a series of announcements about the possible downgrades of a number of banks and financial firms, mostly due to exposure to financial trouble in Europe. The warning included banks in 16 European…
Moody’s may cut Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) and UBS (NYSE: UBS) as the global euro crisis spreads. (Reuters) Officials in Japan arrest former Olympus executives. (Reuters) Congress reaches a deal on payroll tax extensions. (Reuters)…
China cut its holding of US Treasuries in December The People’s Republic dropped its U.S. debt securities by $31.9 billion from November–2.8%, to $1.11 trillion, according to the Treasury Department The general theory for…
The process of uncovering bank and financial firm violations of homeowner rights has not ended, despite a $25 billion or more settlement among five major US banks, the federal government, and state attorneys general…
Google’s gambit to get into the hardware business through a buyout of Motorola has been approved by regulators in Europe and the US. Not so in China, which could be a problem. Industry experts have faulted…
AMR, currently in Chapter 11, posted a massive loss for the final quarter of 2011. .Much of the red ink was due to write-off because of a restructuring of the airline. With lower labor costs, fewer…
Apple wants to sue Kodak over patent infringement. Since Kodak is in Chapter 11, Apple has to ask the court which has supervised the process. The suit is part of a very long line…
The EU sovereign debt crisis has spilled over into the question of whether major global financial firms will have their prospects badly damaged by the trouble in the region. Moody’s said the answer is “yes”…
A battle between Apple and Proview Technology over trademarks has cause more and more retailers in China to drop sales of the iPad. Apple faces the potential of having to fight the problem in the…
The Bank of Italy reported that the nation’s debt rose in 2010. The amount was relatively small, but it is an indication that austerity measure have not been able to offset falling GDP. This…
The Federal Reserve may find that the economy may grow more quickly than it expects. Certainly the White House Budget Office thinks so. It GDP forecast for next year is over 3%. The Fed’s…
At about the same time China’s Vice President Xi Jinping, likely the country’s next president, shook hands with President Obama in Washington, People’s Bank of China chief Zhou Xiaochuan told European leaders the People’s Republic likely…
Until very recently, many members of Congress were anxious to marry any increase in federal expenditures with budget cuts to offset them. That changed suddenly as leaders in the House and Senate agreed to arrangements that…
A team of Yahoo! (NASDAQ: YHOO) managers who were negotiating terms to sell its stake in Alibaba back to Alibaba apparently walked away from the talks, according to tech site AllThingsD. The transaction also would involve Softbank…
Chinese central bank leader Zhou Xiaochuan told European officials that his country will provide funds to aid the struggling nations of the eurozone. The money could come through the International Monetary Fund of the European Financial Stability Fund.…
China offers financial support to the fund that will be used for bailouts of the eurozone’s weakest economies. (MarketWatch) Greece is in the midst of what may be one of the deepest recessions on record. (Reuters)…
Small business is supposed to be the engine of the US economy and is said to create 50% or more of all jobs. That job creation collapsed in the recession because of sales losses at many small…
Austerity measure may not be enough to help the deficits of most EU nations of new Eurostat data is an indication. GDP contracted by .3% in both the Euro Area and EU27. There was virtually no stimulus for…
As the desire of federal officials to attack insider trading turns onto a slew of investigations, a Goldman Sachs tech analyst may have been caught in the growing net. According to WSJ Federal criminal authorities…