Fears over consumer climate send retailers and FTSE down November 3, 2010 BRITAIN’S top share index closed lower yesterday, with retailers weak as Next posted falling sales, while banks gained ground after Lloyds Banking Group poached Santander UK’s head as its new CEO. Investors were reluctant to take big positions ahead of a Federal Reserve decision on further monetary policy easing later yesterday. Markets are pricing in [...]
Wall St ticks up as Fed provides relief November 3, 2010 US stocks ended a volatile session modestly higher yesterday after the Federal Reserve detailed a plan to breathe new life into the struggling economy. Both the Dow and Nasdaq closed at levels not seen since 2008 while the S&P ended at a six-month high. The gains were preceded by an erratic session in which equities [...]
Fed stakes all on $600bn QE2 November 3, 2010 THE Federal Reserve is to pump $600bn (£372.6bn) of fresh funds into the US economy in a last-ditch attempt to revive the slowing economy and hasten the pace of recovery in unemployment. In its second-round of quantitative easing, dubbed QE2, which comes just two years after the central bank first tried to kick-start the economy, [...]
BHP’s bid for Potash is quashed November 3, 2010 CANADA has dealt a near-fatal blow to mining giant BHP Billiton’s $39bn (£24.7bn) plan to buy Potash Corp, after its industry minister blocked the bid and declared that the takeover would not sufficiently benefit the country. It is only the second time Canada has halted a foreign takeover since the power was introduced 25 years ago, [...]
Obama blames economy for heavy defeat in elections… November 3, 2010 REPUBLICANS swept to victory in the US House of Representatives yesterday, picking up 60 seats – well over the 39 needed to take control. President Barack Obama blamed the Democrats’ worst drubbing since 1948 on the fact that unemployment remains at 9.6 per cent, saying he takes “direct responsibility for the fact that we have [...]
Federal Reserve’s hubris will cost all of us dearly November 3, 2010 IT may have been slightly more than the markets were expecting – but nobody will have been shocked by the Federal Reserve’s decision to embark on another $600bn worth of quantitative easing (QE2). That doesn’t make the decision any less wrong or short-termist; the problem is that the Fed and the bulk of the US [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING November 3, 2010 FINANCIAL TIMES PRIVATE EQUITY PLANS €10BN OF PASS-THE-PARCEL DEALS Private equity groups are working on bids for European companies owned by rival buy-out firms worth more than €10bn ($14bn) in total as the industry looks set to keep churning assets through “pass-the-parcel” deals. MIZUHO EXECUTIVE ARRESTED IN FSA PROBE A Mizuho International executive has been [...]
…as Fed steps in again November 3, 2010 Q.WHAT IS QE2? A. It is the Federal Reserve’s second round of quantitative easing after its initial asset purchasing programme of $1.7 trillion started during 2009 and finished in March this year. This time, the Fed has announced a smaller programme: it plans to buy up $75bn’s worth of assets each month until June next [...]
ECONOMISTS’ REACTION: WAS RESTARTING QE THE RIGHT DECISION? November 3, 2010 MARTIN FELDSTEIN | HARVARD UNIVERSITY The Federal Reserve’s proposed policy of quantitative easing is a dangerous gamble with only a small potential upside benefit and substantial risks of creating asset bubbles that could destabilise the global economy. Although the US economy is weak and the outlook uncertain, quantitative easing (QE) is not the right remedy. [...]
The man who is helping investors to take the smartest risk possible November 3, 2010 FOR somebody who has just stepped off a night flight from New York, Michael Thompson is remarkably cheery and animated when we meet in the Canary Wharf offices of Standard and Poor’s (S&P). Perhaps it’s the large coffee he admits to having drunk earlier or maybe it’s because he has become a more regular transatlantic [...]
