The bad news just keeps coming. The U.S. economy grew even less than expected in the second quarter, at a rate of 1.3%, down from what many economists predicted would be 1.8% or higher. The reasons for the continued lackluster performance haven’t changed. Consumers, squeezed by higher gas and other prices, are buying less of [...]
Early on in the financial crisis there was talk of this finally being the Wall Street recession. Investment bankers, CEOs and other high paid types would be thrown out of their jobs or see they paychecks cut. Manufacturing and other sectors that employ middle class workers would see a comeback. But, according to a new [...]
While Washington is gripped in an agonizing and potentially lethal game of chicken over the U.S. debt ceiling, the risk of sovereign defaults still remains much higher across the pond, in Europe. Sure, Europe’s leaders are probably feeling good about themselves after finally cobbling together a second bailout of beleaguered Greece last week. They also [...]
As the debt ceiling debate marches on, politicians are under more and more heat from bond investors and rating agencies to reach a deal that would avoid both a crippling default and a credit downgrade. The legal debt limit driving the deal has forced a conversation Washington has long managed to avoid, which, all in [...]
The biggest fear in Washington right now is that a standoff over the debt ceiling might lead to a swift U.S. default. But a growing chorus of economists and investors say they’re less worried about what happens on August 2 than what comes after. After all, politicians are bound to reach a compromise on the [...]
One of the oddities of the rebound from the recent recession is how much housing has lagged the rest of the recovery, and with the economy growing so slow that is somewhat of an achievement. While the economy has continued to limp along, housing has backtracked. After rising in 2009, with the help of tax [...]
A week to go until Debt Ceiling Armageddon, and the bond market and the Dow Jones industrial average seem to be taking the Washington impasse in stride. Stocks were down on Monday, but not much. The price of a 10-year government bond, which you would expect to be affected by the debt default, was down [...]
The drawn-out debt ceiling debacle has Washington politicians all in a tizzy. But financial markets — the looming force behind the Treasury’s August 2 deadline for Congress to strike a deal on raising the debt limit — still haven’t been shaken. Many worry the failure to strike a deal by the deadline would cause investors [...]
There’s been a lot of talk about what the latest eurozone deal on Greece means for Europe. But Americans may also be wondering what it means to them. The New York Times flicked at this today. U.S. money market funds are the real sore spot for Americans when it comes to the eurozone crisis. They [...]
After 18 months of dithering, bickering and delusion, the leaders the euro zone have finally conceded to the inevitable and cobbled together a second bailout of Greece. The total package agreed to on Thursday – with fresh loans of $157 billion – includes some startling breakthroughs in Europe’s approach to solving the destabilizing euro debt [...]
