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Tuesday, Feb 07, 2012 |
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Weather Forecast |
| Cities / State |
°C |
°F |
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Atlanta
(Georgia) |
6.3 |
43.3 |
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Charleston
(South Carolina) |
10.5 |
50.9 |
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Charlotte
(North Carolina) |
4.0 |
39.2 |
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Columbia
(South Carolina) |
7.8 |
46 |
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Dallas
(Texas) |
10.0 |
50.0 |
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Miami
(Florida) |
22.8 |
73 |
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Nashville
(Tennessee) |
4.0 |
39.2 |
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News » Home
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| Chase, Wells Fargo, BofA sued over mortgage databases |
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Date: 06-02-2012
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman sued banking Big Three - JPMorgan Chase & Co. Inc., Bank of America, Wells Fargo & Co. - on Friday over their use of an electronic mortgage database that played a key role in financing the nation historic housing bubble.
Schneiderman, who gained additional clout last month when President Barack Obama named him co-chairman of a new federal mortgage-crisis unit, filed suit against Bank of America, (NYSE: BAC) Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC) and JPMorgan Chase (NYSE: JPM) in New York State Supreme Court.
Those three are the biggest banks operating in Arizona. The state of Arizona has its own mortgage modification lawsuit against BofA.
The New York Times reported Friday that the lawsuit claims the database -- called the Mortgage Electronic Registration System, or MERS - resulted in deceptive and illegal practices, including false documents used in foreclosure proceedings.
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| Treasury Department Proposal would add to 401(k) options |
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Date: 05-02-2012
A new Treasury Department proposal announced Thursday could provide workers with more options for managing their 401(k) retirement savings.
When many plan participants are ready to retire, they only have two choices: Put it all in an annuity or take it all in a cash withdrawal - and nothing in between.
Retirement decisions have become more difficult because workers who have a 401(k) plan, and not a pension plan, must make sure their savings will last as long as they live. With an annuity, you give a lump sum to an insurance company, which agrees to pay you a monthly amount for life.
"When American workers take the responsible step of saving for retirement, we should do all we can to provide them with sensible, accessible choices for managing their hard-earned savings," Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner said in a statement Thursday.
Until now, few 401(k) plans have offered insurance company annuities because of complicated regulatory rules. And plans have been concerned that they'd be held responsible if an insurance company offering one of the annuities went out of business.
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| Economy likely started 2012 with solid job growth |
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Date: 03-02-2012
The economy likely produced another solid month of hiring in January, a promising start for 2012.
Economists forecast that employers added a net 155,000 jobs last month and that the unemployment rate remained 8.5 percent for a second straight month, according to a survey by Factset.
The unemployment rate has fallen for four straight months. It's at its lowest level in nearly three years.
A gain of 155,000 jobs would be down slightly from December, when employers added a net 200,000. Still, it would mark the seventh straight month in which at least 100,000 jobs have been added. That hasn't happened since 2005.
On Friday, the government will also issue its annual revisions to earlier jobs figures. The revisions are expected to show that hiring was stronger over the past two years than previously thought. The government has said the economy added about 1.6 million jobs last year, nearly twice as many as in 2010.
Even with the gains, the job market faces a long way back to full health. The nation has about 6 million fewer jobs than it did when the recession began in late 2007.
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| Bernanke defends low rate policy for weak economy |
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Date: 02-02-2012
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke on Thursday defended the U.S. central bank's policies against charges from Republican lawmakers they risked sparking inflation, saying the economy still needs plenty of support.
Testifying before Congress, the Fed chief was repeatedly thrown on the defensive as he parried critiques from Republican lawmakers over the Fed's zero interest rate policy, its focus on employment and its policy prescriptions for housing.
Bernanke told the House Budget Committee that Europe's financial crisis still threatened the U.S. recovery, and said the Fed would do everything it can to ward off damage.
"The basic reason for low long-term rates, which are also a feature of every other industrial economy, are low inflation, slow expected growth and the fact that the dollar is a safe haven," Bernanke said.
Paul Ryan, the committee's Republican chairman, took issue with the central bank's new 2 percent inflation target, saying a Fed policy statement last week suggested it would be willing to tolerate higher inflation nonetheless.
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| Manufacturing Expands at Fastest Pace Since June |
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Date: 01-02-2012
U.S. factories grew in January at the fastest pace in seven months, boosted by a rise in new orders. And builders ended a poor year for construction by spending more on homes and projects for the fifth straight month.
The reports bolster other data showing the U.S. economy started the year strong.
The Institute for Supply Management, a trade group of purchasing managers, said Wednesday that its manufacturing index rose last month to 54.1 from 53.1 in December. Readings above 50 indicate expansion.
Consumers are buying more cars and trucks, while businesses ordered more machinery and other equipment. That has driven manufacturing, which expanded for the 30th straight month.
Both new orders and order backlogs rose to nine-month highs. Increasing order backlogs suggest manufacturers are lacking the capacity to meet demand. That could mean more growth in production and employment in the near future, economists said.
Export orders also rose, a sign that U.S. manufacturers haven't yet been affected by Europe's slowing economy.
"This is a very encouraging report on manufacturing activity that shows particular strength in leading indicators," said John Ryding, an economist at RDQ Economics.
The report followed other healthy readings on manufacturing in China, Germany and the United Kingdom.
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| A look at recent tech-industry earnings |
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Date: 31-01-2012
Here is a summary of recent earnings and reports for selected technology companies and what they reveal about the state of spending and the overall economy:
Jan. 18: EBay Inc. says its net income grew sharply in the fourth quarter, helped by a gain from the sale of its remaining investment in Skype. Its results beat Wall Street's expectations, boosted by strong holiday sales at its namesake website and growth at PayPal, its online payments business.
Jan. 19: A slowdown in Google Inc.'s earnings growth alarms investors. Net income edged up just 6 percent from the same October-December period in 2010, coming off year-over-year increases of more than 25 percent in each of the previous two quarters.
IBM Corp.'s fourth-quarter earnings handily beat Wall Street's expectations, helped by higher revenue and profit margins in the technology icon's lucrative software and services segments.
Intel Corp., the world's largest chip-maker, says its profit rose 6 percent in the latest quarter, topping analyst expectations, even as hard-drive shortages held back PC makers' chip orders.
Microsoft Corp. battled through a weak PC market to post flat earnings in the latest quarter, boosting sales of servers, Xbox games and its Office productivity software while trimming losses at its Bing search engine.
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| States to decide this week on mortgage deal |
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Date: 30-01-2012
State and federal officials are close to a settlement with the largest U.S. banks over mortgage abuses, with states facing an end-of-the-week deadline to decide whether they will sign on, people close to the talks said.
The final value of any settlement will depend on which states it includes, and could drop sharply if states like California, one of the hardest hit by the foreclosure crisis, do not join.
In another sign the deal is close, negotiators have overcome a sticking point and agreed on Joseph Smith, North Carolina's banking commissioner, as a monitor to ensure the banks comply with the terms of the settlement, these people said.
Talks have dragged on for more than one year but picked up steam last week as the Obama administration announced a new federal-state working group to investigate misconduct in the pooling and sale of risky home loans, a move that signaled the settlement would only allow banks to put behind them a small slice of misconduct.
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| U.S. growth quickens, but speed bumps ahead |
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Date: 27-01-2012
The U.S. economy grew at its fastest pace in 1-1/2 years in the fourth quarter, but a rebuilding of stocks by businesses and slower business spending warned of weaker growth in early 2012.
Gross domestic product expanded at a 2.8 percent annual rate, the Commerce Department said on Friday, a sharp acceleration from the 1.8 percent in the prior three months.
It was, however, a touch below economists expectations in a Reuters poll for a 3 percent rate, and two-thirds of the increase was due to the build-up in business inventories.
Soft underlying demand and a sharp slowing in core inflation supported the Federal Reserve's decision this week to keep in place an ultra easy monetary policy to nurse the recovery.
"The areas of strength are unlikely to be strong in the current quarter and the areas of weakness are more than likely to be weaker," said Steve Blitz, a senior economist at ITG Investment Research in New York. "Frankly, I don't think there is an awful lot the Fed can do about it."
The data helped push U.S. stocks slightly lower, while longer-dated Treasury debt prices are slipped. The dollar fell against a basket of currencies.
The economy got a temporary boost from the rebuilding of inventories, which logged the biggest increase since the third quarter of 2010.
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