Wall St steady as shopping stats flat February 14, 2012 US stocks erased losses to end little changed yesterday after a Greek government source said the conservative party leader was expected to deliver a letter of commitment to the country’s international lenders. And US retail sales fell short of forrecasts, rising 0.4 per centin January. A sign of Greece’s commitment to the tough austerity measures [...]
Modest gains for Wall Street stocks February 9, 2012 US stocks rose modestly for a third straight day yesterday after Greece reached a deal to secure a financial bailout, but investors were cautious after weeks of gains. Tech shares, led by Apple, gave a lift to the Nasdaq index and were the session’s strongest sector. Skepticism that Greece would follow through on promised austerity [...]
Grey trading on the Facebook IPO price February 6, 2012 AS THE buzz continues about the Facebook public offering later this year, IG Markets is offering grey market trading on the social networking site’s market cap. The grey market allows shares to be traded on an unofficial market ahead of the IPO expected in May. When it filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on [...]
Gloomy recruiter outlook sees shares monstered January 26, 2012 ONLINE recruitment firm Monster Worldwide yesterday forecast a weak start to the year and said it will cut jobs since it does not expect the global job market to improve drastically in the near term. Shares in the company, which will reduce its global workforce by about seven per cent or 400 jobs, tumbled 15 [...]
Ratings agencies won’t be trusted without a fight January 22, 2012 THE Big Three rating agencies hardly seem to be out of the news with their ability to move markets. Following Standard & Poor’s (S&P) decision to reduce its assessment of the health of France’s sovereign debt by one notch to AA+ from AAA status, top German politicians like Michael Fuchs and others have jumped on [...]
Wall Street’s rally leaves Citi behind January 17, 2012 US stocks advanced yesterday, pushing the S&P 500 to its highest since early August, but sharply pared gains late in the session as Citigroup’s steep drop in profit gave investors a reason to unload bank shares. The financial sector, which has outperformed the broader market so far this year, took a hit on investors’ disappointment [...]
Bankruptcy looms for Kodak January 4, 2012 KODAK shares plummeted to an all-time low as reports claimed that the camera company could be close to filing for bankruptcy. If Kodak fails to sell the 1,100 digital patents it has been trying to offload since last summer, the company’s next move would be to seek Chapter 11 protection from creditors and sell these [...]
Indices hold gains even as euro falls January 4, 2012 MAJOR US stock indices were little changed in a low-volume session yesterday, but some investors were encouraged to see equities avoid a sell-off amid lingering Eurozone debt problems. Indices held on to the previous day’s large gains even as the euro dropped sharply against the dollar. Notably, US banks held up well, even though bad [...]
US markets begin the year on a high January 3, 2012 STOCKS and the euro started the year with a sharp rally yesterday, boosted by better-than-expected global data and hopes the Fed could ease monetary policy further, even as crude surged on tensions between the US and Iran. A number of Federal Reserve officials believed economic conditions could “well” warrant a further easing of monetary policy, [...]
BofA settles loan bias case December 21, 2011 BANK of America Merrill Lynch’s Countrywide mortgage division has settled an agreement to pay a record $335m (£213.7m) for discriminating against minority homebuyers in what Justice Department officials have said is the largest discrimination settlement in US history. The case, brought against subprime mortgage company Countrywide for its conduct between 2004 and its 2008 acquisition [...]