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Latest Articles: Business
MERS, the law, and the State
Post Date: 2012-01-17 12:12:19 by lucysmom
38 Comments
Trotter told me that the “true horror” of MERS [1818 Library Street, Suite 300 Reston, VA 20190, 1-800-646-6377] was what it could do to homeowners who were current on their mortgage payments: The “good” homeowners who still had a job and weren’t facing foreclosure. If there was no legal record of which bank owned their debt [see below if you haven't been following NC on MERS], and the MERS-mortgaged homeowners had been making payments, then who exactly was the homeowner paying? The checks, clearly, were going out every month, cashed by a bank that claimed to own the note. But without the legal record to certify the owner of the note, it followed that the bank ...
Capitalism In Crisis: Perilous Path To Prosperity
Post Date: 2012-01-17 12:11:15 by Brian S
1 Comments
A few years ago, it would have been difficult, if not impossible, to imagine European leaders, begging bowl in hand, turning to China for a financial bail-out. Equally, few would have predicted that Chinese leaders visiting Washington would publicly berate US policymakers about their mismanagement of the world’s biggest economy. But the world has changed. The implosion in 2008 of the financial system in the US and Europe and last year’s European sovereign debt crisis have accelerated the shift of economic momentum to Asia. In 2012, the US and Europe are likely to be flirting with recession for much of the time. Barring a hard landing in China, Asia-ex Japan should continue to ...
NY Manufacturing Index Makes Record In January
Post Date: 2012-01-17 11:50:08 by Brian S
1 Comments
Manufacturing in the New York region expanded in January at the fastest pace in nine months, reflecting improving orders, sales and employment. The Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s general economic index rose to 13.5, the highest level since April, from a revised 8.2 in December. That gauge exceeded the median forecast of 56 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News, which projected an increase to 11. Readings higher than zero signal expansion among companies in the so-called Empire State Index, which covers New York, northern New Jersey and southern Connecticut. Factories may keep driving the economic expansion as they maintain production to meet household and business demand. At the ...
Mafia now "Italy's No.1 bank" as crisis bites-report
Post Date: 2012-01-11 12:32:02 by lucysmom
1 Comments
ROME, Jan 10 (Reuters) - Organised crime has tightened its grip on the Italian economy during the economic crisis, making the Mafia the country's biggest "bank" and squeezing the life out of thousands of small firms, according to a report on Tuesday. Extortionate lending by criminal groups had become a "national emergency", said the report by anti-crime group SOS Impresa. Organised crime now generated annual turnover of about 140 billion euros ($178.89 billion) and profits of more than 100 billion euros, it added. "With 65 billion euros in liquidity, the Mafia is Italy's number one bank," said a statement from the group, which was set up in Palermo a ...
Job Outlook Brightens From U.S. Factories to Fracking
Post Date: 2012-01-11 12:02:45 by Brian S
0 Comments
Manufacturing and mining are set to power U.S. job gains again this year, from auto assembly plants in Ohio to the oil and gas fields of North Dakota. The two industries combined helped spark the biggest annual job gains for the economy in five years in 2011, with factory payrolls expanding the most in 14 years and mining adding more jobs than any period in the past three decades, according to Labor Department figures. Economists Peter Cappelli and John Silvia say those gains are likely to be extended in 2012. The improvement may spread beyond factory floors and hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, used to drill for oil: retailers, the leisure industry and even construction may also ...
Paul Krugman is Dead Wrong: Debt Matters
Post Date: 2012-01-10 13:25:04 by Capitalist Eric
12 Comments
Shah Gilani writes: Paul Krugman, the Princeton University economics professor, Nobel Prize winner, and regular New York Times op-ed contributor says, "Debt matters, but not that much." Not only is he off the reservation on this one, but he's completely fallen off his high horse. In the real world, debt actually matters a lot. In a Houston Chronicle opinion piece last week, Krugman, riding his horse - whose name might as well be Liberal Conscience - trampled conservatives under the guise of an economics lesson that derided "deficit-worriers" for wrongly seeing "America as being like a family that took out too large a mortgage, and will have a hard time ...
Wholesale Inventories in U.S. Rise 0.1%; Sales Gain 0.6%
Post Date: 2012-01-10 11:56:27 by Brian S
0 Comments
Inventories at U.S. wholesalers rose less than forecast in November as distributors struggled to keep up with demand, a sign gains in manufacturing will keep the economy growing. The 0.1 percent increase in inventories followed a 1.2 percent revised gain in October, Commerce Department figures showed today in Washington. Economists projected a 0.5 percent rise, according to the median estimate in a Bloomberg News survey. Sales climbed 0.6 percent in November. Wholesalers kept enough goods on hand to last 1.15 months at the current sales pace, close to the record low of 1.13 months reached in March last year. More spending on holiday items after stockpiles were drawn down in the third ...
Chris Cook: Naked Oil
Post Date: 2012-01-10 11:00:41 by lucysmom
3 Comments
snip But since all of this short term ‘micro’ manipulation or trading (choose your language) has been going on among consenting adults in a wholesale market inaccessible to the man in the street. It is pretty much a zero sum game, and for many years the UK regulators responsible for it – ie the Financial Services Authority and its predecessor – have essentially ignored it, with a “light touch” wholesale market regime. If the history of commodity markets shows us anything it is that if producers can manipulate or support prices then they will, and there are many examples of which the classic cases are the 1985 tin crisis, and Yasuo Hamanaka’s 10 year ...
Foreign Central Banks Dumping U.S. Treasury Bonds, Treasure From Treasuries
Post Date: 2012-01-08 09:11:50 by Capitalist Eric
3 Comments
“Holdings of U.S. Treasurys (sic) by foreign central banks has fallen by a record amount over the past four weeks according to the latest Federal Reserve data. “The net $69 billion drop in Treasury holdings registered at the Fed by foreign official institutions comes as benchmark yields ended 2011 near record low levels… “The decline in foreign holdings of Treasurys (sic) in recent weeks has not resulted in higher yields and lower prices because other investors have sought the safety of US debt.” “Foreign Central Banks Cut Treasury Holdings by Record” The Financial Times, www.cnbc.com, 12/30/11 Foreign Central Bank holdings of U.S. Treasuries have ...
Bloomberg Hides Government Causes of Financial Crisis
Post Date: 2012-01-07 09:51:30 by CZ82
2 Comments
Bloomberg Hides Government Causes of Financial Crisis By Peter Ferrara on 1.4.12 @ 6:08AM Media propagandists continue to advance the Democratic Party line. On December 21, Bloomberg News breathlessly reported, "The leading Republican candidates for president have embraced an explanation of the financial crisis that has been rejected by the chairman of the Federal Reserve, many economists and even three of the four Republicans on the government commission that investigated the meltdown." Reporter David J. Lynch further explained, "Both former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney lay much of the blame on U.S. government housing ...
Federal Reserve Secretly Bails Out European Banks ... Again
Post Date: 2012-01-05 18:09:46 by CZ82
0 Comments
Federal Reserve Secretly Bails Out European Banks ... Again Written by Raven Clabough Friday, 30 December 2011 12:15 Despite assertions from Federal Reserve officials that the United States would not play a role in bailing out European banks, that is exactly what has happened — again. Earlier in the month, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke (left) told the U.S. Senate that the Fed had no intention of bailing out the European banks, indicating that he “doesn’t have the intention or the authority” to do so. Senator Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) said Bernanke made it “very clear” in closed door comments that the central bank would not be rescuing European ...
Insurers Profit From Health Law They Fought
Post Date: 2012-01-05 13:12:36 by Brian S
1 Comments
Insurance companies spent millions of dollars trying to defeat the U.S. health-care overhaul, saying it would raise costs and disrupt coverage. Instead, profit margins at the companies widened to levels not seen since before the recession, a Bloomberg Government study shows. Insurers led by WellPoint Inc. (WLP), the biggest by membership, recorded their highest combined quarterly net income of the past decade after the law was signed in 2010, said Peter Gosselin, the study author and senior health-care analyst for Bloomberg Government. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Managed Health-Care Index rose 36 percent in the period, four times more than the S&P 500. “The industry that ...
U.S. Jobless Claims Dip As Hiring Starts Up
Post Date: 2012-01-05 11:50:30 by Brian S
0 Comments
Two gauges of the U.S. economy showed the number of Americans receiving government jobless benefits dropping, as the private sector started hiring at a faster pace in more than a decade Thursday. The Department of Labor said 372,000 Americans applied to receive unemployment benefits in the week ended December 31. That was a decline of 15,000 from the previous week and an encouraging sign for economists, who say the figure must get below 400,000 and stay there to indicate any real progress is being made in the U.S. job market. The U.S. unemployment rate currently stands at 8.6 per cent. The positive government data echoes another closely watched jobs indicator also released Thursday, the ...
U.S. Companies Added 325,000 Jobs: ADP
Post Date: 2012-01-05 11:44:47 by Brian S
0 Comments
Companies added more workers than forecast in December, a sign that the U.S. labor market was gaining momentum heading into 2012, according to a private report based on payrolls. The 325,000 increase was the highest in records going back to 2001 and exceeded the highest projection in a Bloomberg News survey after a revised 204,000 gain the prior month, the report from the Roseland, New Jersey-based ADP Employer Services showed today. The median estimate called for an advance of 178,000. An acceleration in hiring may spur further gains in consumer spending, which accounts for about 70 percent of the world’s largest economy. A Labor Department report tomorrow may show payrolls rose by ...
GM Leads U.S. Automakers in December to Post the Best Sales Year Since ’08
Post Date: 2012-01-04 12:02:20 by Brian S
0 Comments
General Motors Co. (GM), Ford Motor Co. (F), Chrysler Group LLC reported December vehicle sales that beat analysts’ estimates, capping the U.S. auto industry’s best year since 2008. Auto sales increased as consumer confidence reached an eight-month high in December, and carmakers aired holiday ads and continued promotions begun in late November. The U.S. automakers rallied in 2011, two years after GM and Chrysler emerged from U.S.-backed bankruptcies. Also during the year, GM reclaimed the top spot in world vehicle sales from Toyota Motor Corp., and automakers announced plans to hire or rehire at least 25,000 workers in the U.S. by 2015. “There is just a tremendous amount ...
Demand for Factory Goods Rises Most in 4 Months
Post Date: 2012-01-04 11:46:16 by Brian S
0 Comments
Orders to American factories rose in November by the most in four months, showing gains in manufacturing will help the economy grow. Bookings for factory goods (TMNOCHNG) rose 1.8 percent after a revised 0.2 percent drop the prior month, data from the Commerce Department showed today in Washington. Demand for aircraft, autos and metals compensated for a drop in computers and electronics. Improving consumer spending combined with lean inventories indicate production (IPMGCHNG) will continue to increase, bolstering economic growth in early 2012. Slowing demand for capital goods like computers is a sign business investment will cool this year, reflecting concern over a slowdown in global ...
Proposed Changes In Federal Child Labor Laws Could Affect Life On Jackson County Farms
Post Date: 2012-01-03 15:33:21 by Brian S
0 Comments
For about as long has he can remember, Jeremy Spink has been pitching in at his family’s farm. On a recent afternoon, he sat behind the wheel of a tractor and steered baled corn husks into his father’s barn in Liberty Township to spread out for four calves — a few of the dozens of animals he helps care for. “You never have your kids do chores; you do chores with your kids,” said his father, Jim Spink, as he watched his son begin to tear apart the bale. But Jeremy, 14, might be barred from completing some of those chores if proposed changes to child labor laws that focus on farm work are approved. Officials with the U.S. Department of Labor have said the changes ...
More Awful PR For Bank Of America As They Start Cutting Off Credit To Mom And Pop Businesses
Post Date: 2012-01-03 13:28:55 by Brian S
0 Comments
Apparently Bank of America has totally given up on winning hearts and minds. Because according the L.A. Times, the embattled bank is cutting off credit to small businesses in droves — maybe even in the hundreds of thousands. Take, for instance, Babak Zahabizadeh, the owner of a Burbank, California messaging service. He was told in a letter that he needed to pay off his $96,000 loan by January 25th or (another option) he could pay it off in 2 years at a 12% interest rate. That would make his payment 10 times his current payment. Via the L.A. Time:"I was like, 'Dude, you're calling a guy who's barely surviving!' " said Zahabizadeh. "My final word was that ...
Auto Dealers’ Best December in Five Years
Post Date: 2012-01-03 12:17:39 by Brian S
1 Comments
U.S. consumers, who are more confident than they have been in eight months, were lured to auto showrooms by holiday discounts and may have pushed car sales to the second fastest pace in more than two years. “From Thanksgiving on, they’ve been very aggressive,” Bob Tasca, whose family owns Ford, Lincoln, Mazda and Volvo dealerships in Rhode Island and Massachusetts, said of automaker discounts. “We’ve had the best deals of the year.” Tasca said he expects his best December in five years. Light-vehicle sales in December, set for release tomorrow, may have run at a 13.4 million seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAARTOTL), the average estimate of 13 analysts ...
U.S. Auto Sales Seen Continuing To Rebound In 2012
Post Date: 2012-01-02 17:01:20 by Brian S
0 Comments
After hitting a 30-year low in 2009, U.S. auto sales are poised for a second straight year of growth in 2012 — the result of easier credit, low interest rates and pent-up demand for cars and trucks created by the Great Recession. The sales forecast bodes well for the industry's continued recovery and for the broader American economy. Just two years ago, Detroit automakers were in peril. Car sales plunged as unemployment soared, and loans became harder to get. Chrysler and General Motors filed for bankruptcy protection. Ford avoided bankruptcy only by borrowing billions. Now credit is easier to get, interest rates are still low and Americans need to replace old cars and trucks ...
Gold Bugs’ Unmerry Christmas: But Radical Bugs Say They Know Why
Post Date: 2012-01-02 13:42:25 by Brian S
5 Comments
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Santa brought the gold bugs quite a present last week. It was very big and extremely nasty. But maybe they can send it back. From the previous Friday’s close to the low on Thursday, the CME February gold contract (CNS:GC2G) plunged $82.10 or 5.1%. The gold shares, as tracked by the NYSE Arca Gold Bugs Index (NAR:XX:HUI) , were down 6.6% at their worst. Recoveries into the week’s end enabled gold to finish down only 2.44% and the HUI down 2.54%. But by then, no doubt, most gold bulls were disgustedly drowning their sorrows. This was the reverse of what was supposed to happen. Thus, on the Friday before Christmas, the Japanese bullion dealer Mitsui ...
In a first, gas and other fuels are top US export
Post Date: 2012-01-02 10:52:05 by lucysmom
16 Comments
NEW YORK (AP) — For the first time, the top export of the United States, the world's biggest gas guzzler, is — wait for it — fuel. Measured in dollars, the nation is on pace this year to ship more gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel than any other single export, according to U.S. Census data going back to 1990. It will also be the first year in more than 60 that America has been a net exporter of these fuels. Just how big of a shift is this? A decade ago, fuel wasn't even among the top 25 exports. And for the last five years, America's top export was aircraft. The trend is significant because for decades the U.S. has relied on huge imports of fuel from Europe in ...
Libertarianism in One Lesson
Post Date: 2011-12-31 01:16:44 by mininggold
5 Comments
Part of the "Critiques of Libertarianism" site. http://world.std.com/~mhuben/libindex.html Last updated 10/25/07. No, this isn't David Bergland's evangelistic text. This is an outsider's view of the precepts of libertarianism. I hope you can laugh at how close this is to real libertarianism! Introduction One of the most attractive features of libertarianism is that it is basically a very simple ideology. Maybe even simpler than Marxism, since you don't have to learn foreign words like "proletariat". This brief outline will give you most of the tools you need to hit the ground running as a freshly indoctrinated libertarian ideologue. Go forth and ...
A Return to Gold?
Post Date: 2011-12-29 22:16:07 by We The People
0 Comments
“Lenin is said to have declared that the best way to destroy the Capitalist System was to debauch the currency. . . . Lenin was certainly right. There is no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society. . . .The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million is able to diagnose.” — John Maynard Keynes This summer marked the 40th anniversary of President Richard M. Nixon’s decision to sever the U.S. dollar’s official link to gold. On August 15, 1971, Nixon took to the airwaves in a national address from the Oval Office to declare that the U.S. Treasury ...
Secret Fed Loans Gave Banks $13 Billion Undisclosed to Congress
Post Date: 2011-12-29 17:35:10 by CZ82
1 Comments
Secret Fed Loans Gave Banks $13 Billion Undisclosed to Congress By Bob Ivry, Bradley Keoun and Phil Kuntz - Nov 27, 2011 7:01 PM ET The Federal Reserve and the big banks fought for more than two years to keep details of the largest bailout in U.S. history a secret. Now, the rest of the world can see what it was missing. The Fed didn’t tell anyone which banks were in trouble so deep they required a combined $1.2 trillion on Dec. 5, 2008, their single neediest day. Bankers didn’t mention that they took tens of billions of dollars in emergency loans at the same time they were assuring investors their firms were healthy. And no one calculated until now that banks reaped an ...
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