- Last Modified: 2007-09-13 11:39:00
| FOR several years, the darkest scenarios for the world economy have involved a dollar crash. The script was simple. America’s dependence on foreign capital was a dangerous vulnerability. At some point foreign investors would refuse to pile up ever more dollar assets. If investors were spooked, say by a crisis in American financial markets, they might ditch dollars fast. The greenback would plunge. A tumbling currency would prevent the Fed from cutting interest rates, deepening and spreading the economic pain.Well, the financial shock has hit |
- Last Modified: 2007-09-13 11:22:00
- Last Modified: 2007-08-11 09:06:00
| The currency market experienced large swings in the morning amid sharp volatility prompted by heightened risk aversion to fears of a widespread credit crunch. The yen continued to benefit from such wariness, rallying across the board to 117.24 against the dollar and 160 versus the euro. Those gains were short-lived as the Fed announced that it would intervene by injecting funds “to facilitate the orderly function of financial markets”. The Fed’s decision follows similar liquidity injections from the ECB, initiated yesterday and several As |
- Last Modified: 2007-08-11 08:51:00
| (Bloomberg) -- Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said a recession in the U.S. is possible, though not probable this year as excess housing inventory is being reduced quickly.Greenspan spoke in a satellite video link to the CLSA Japan Forum in Tokyo today. His comments came from notes taken by Bernard Key, a former economics professor at Tama University in Tokyo, who attended the event. The comments were confirmed by four other people leaving the event who declined to be identified. The media were barred from the meeting and CLSA wo |
- Last Modified: 2007-02-28 22:32:00
| (Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve kept the benchmark U.S. interest rate at 5.25 percent, declaring that inflation is slowing ``modestly'' even as the economy picks up speed.The Fed's statement, which dropped language that described inflation as elevated, triggered a rally in stocks and bonds as investors concluded the central bank will keep rates unchanged for at least six months. The new wording overshadowed the Fed's retention of its bias toward tightening credit.``Recent indicators have suggested somewhat firmer economic growth, and some te |
- Last Modified: 2007-01-31 22:19:00
| (Bloomberg) -- Have you ever noticed how upbeat the supply-siders are, unfazed by the twists and turns in Federal Reserve policy? As long as there's been a tax cut --specifically, a cut in marginal tax rates or on capital gains -- in the last three to five years, nothing can go wrong with the economy.Supply-side economics is based on the idea of using tax cuts as incentives to increase, as the name suggests, the supply side of the economy, or its productive capacity.Cut the tax on capital, for example, and you get more capital investment, a lar |
- Last Modified: 2006-08-14 06:32:00
| (Bloomberg) -- The postmortems on the employment report for June, the third consecutive month of soft payroll growth, break down along ideological lines.For one group, the average monthly gain of 86,000 in private payrolls from April through June, the smallest quarterly increase since the third quarter of 2003, was a sign of weak labor demand.Construction employment has shown virtually no growth in the last four months, further corroboration of cooling in the residential real estate market. The number of retail jobs has fallen for the last thre |
- Last Modified: 2006-07-11 00:27:00
| (Bloomberg) -- The dollar fell against the euro and yen, snapping a two-week rally, as signs of slowing growth reduced expectations the Federal Reserve will lift interest rates later this month.Traders pared bets the central bank will increase borrowing costs by a quarter-percentage point for a 17th straight time after reports showed the economy added the fewest jobs since October and manufacturing slowed.``There's the sense that maybe the Fed is not going to be going as much as people had been expecting,'' said Jeffrey Young, head of currency |
- Last Modified: 2006-06-03 13:22:00
| (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Treasury 10-year note yields held near the highest in almost two months after government reports showed a drop in new unemployment claims and faster growth in labor costs.The Labor Department data may bolster speculation that the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates at least once more. The 10-year note's yield, which moves inversely to its price, has surged in recent weeks amid signs the economy is recovering from a fourth-quarter slowdown.``These are ugly numbers for bonds,'' said David Ader, an interest-rate strategis |
- Last Modified: 2006-02-02 10:04:00
|
|
