The European Central Bank is raising interest rates today for the first time in more than a decade “as it ramps up its fight against record high inflation across the countries that use the euro.” Like central bankers...more
Netflix’s bad (but not as bad as expected, thank you) year rolls on. The streaming giant announced this week that it lost 1 million subscribers in Q2, the “largest subscriber defection in company history, but . . . far short...more
As big bank earnings season rolls on, Goldman Sachs has emerged as an early winner. Even thought profits fell “nearly 50 percent from a year ago, to just under $3 billion,” analysts had been expecting far worse. That...more
Federal regulators have fined Bank of America $225 million “for mishandling prepaid debit card accounts used by a dozen states to distribute unemployment benefits during the pandemic.” Beyond the fine, the bank must also...more
New CPI figures showed U.S. inflation topping the already high expectations for June. Prices were up 9.1% from a year earlier, all but confirming another big rate hike from the Fed as it struggles to “wrestle under control”...more
Jobs Report Friday. Here’s what we’re watching for in the numbers, including speculation about some easing in the historically tight labor marke...more
U.S. job openings remained strong, “with 11.5 million positions listed as available in March, underscoring the continuing strength of the labor market.” The number of workers voluntarily leaving jobs “also reached a high” in...more
Jobs Report Friday! Here’s what we’re looking for in the March numbers after reports earlier this week suggested we remain in a period of both high openings and voluntary resignations...more
After a weekend in which the West’s major economies made it clear that they’re choosing economic isolation as the desired means of punishing Vladimir Putin and Russia for their invasion of Ukraine, Shell and BP have both...more
3/2/2022
/ Acquisitions ,
Amazon ,
Cross-Border Transactions ,
Economic Sanctions ,
Financial Institutions ,
Financial Markets ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Russia ,
Supply Chain ,
SWIFT ,
Ukraine ,
Whole Foods
Former top student loan servicing giant Navient has “reached a $1.85 billion deal with 39 states to settle claims that it had made predatory loans that saddled borrowers with crushing debts they were highly unlikely to...more
Consumer Price Index numbers out on Wednesday hit economists’ expectations, an increase of 7% as compared to a year earlier. Though the figure was expected, it was also the first time CPI rose that much since 1982, as strong...more
Despite an outwardly polite virtual meeting of FDIC board members this week, a controversy is roiling just beneath the surface, with several board members questioning whether FDIC Chair Jelena McWilliams—a holdover from the...more
In what appears to be a serious black eye for the organization, the World Bank has canceled its prominent “Doing Business” report (which rates the “business environment of the world’s countries”) after an “investigation...more
9/17/2021
/ Airplane Accidents ,
Boeing ,
British Petroleum (BP) ,
Chevron ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Criminal Prosecution ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
E-Cigarettes ,
Energy & Climate Debates ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Exxon Mobil ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Fossil Fuel ,
Global Warming ,
Infectious Diseases ,
MassMutual ,
Oil & Gas ,
Opioid ,
Oversight Committee ,
Purdue Pharma ,
Retail Sales ,
Stock Trades ,
Unemployment ,
World Bank
Markets used news of the FDA’s full approval of the Pfizer BioNTech coronavirus vaccine as the excuse they needed to jump back up after a few days of losses. All three major indices were up near the 1% range, with the Nasdaq...more
Jobs Report Friday again! Here’s what we’re watching for in the numbers, including some thoughts on recent positive trends and how the Delta variant may upend them...more
Back on the Hill on Tuesday before the House Financial Services Committee, Fed Chair Powell assured lawmakers that he was well-aware of yesterday’s CPI figures showing a 5.4% jump in prices and that inflation was “poised to...more
As expected, the CPI update for June made waves on Tuesday, with prices climbing some 5.4% last month—the biggest increase in over a decade. The jump led Federal Reserve and White House officials to issue statements to...more
Stung recently by the collapse of Greensill Capital and Archegos Capital Mgmt (the latter alone which cost it more than $5.5 billion), Credit Suisse recently “dissolved a longstanding personal lending relationship” with Masa...more
The Federal Reserve’s “first-ever foray into the corporate bond market” will wrap up by the end of the year, with the central bank pledging to sell off all of the ETF-investments and direct bond holdings it began purchasing...more
6/3/2021
/ Activist Investors ,
Blockchain ,
Corporate Bonds ,
Corporate Taxes ,
Cybersecurity ,
Decentralized Finance (DeFi) ,
Economic Development ,
ETFs ,
Exxon Mobil ,
Federal Reserve ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Foreign Investment ,
International Labor Organization (ILO) ,
Job Creation ,
Meat Processing Plants ,
Ransomware ,
Tariffs ,
Tyson Foods
In a significant departure from decades of restrictive population management efforts, China’s ruling party will now permit couples to have three children—“ending a two-child policy that has failed to raise the country’s...more
6/1/2021
/ Acquisition Agreements ,
Amazon Marketplace ,
Anti-Money Laundering ,
Beverage Manufacturers ,
China ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Deutsche Bank ,
Economic Development ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Infectious Diseases ,
Inflation Adjustments ,
Lyft ,
MGM ,
OECD ,
Open Source Software ,
Private Equity ,
Uber
The District of Columbia sued Amazon on Tuesday for allegedly “artificially raising prices for products around the web by abusing its monopoly power.” The lawsuit represents yet another sign that regulators “are increasingly...more
New numbers show that the U.S. economy “picked up speed last quarter,” expanding 1.6% in the first three months of the year [for an annualized 6.4%], as a mix of stimulus money and falling unemployment helped power consumer...more
4/30/2021
/ Abuse of Power ,
Anti-Competitive ,
Apple ,
Biden Administration ,
Big Data ,
Big Tech ,
Boeing ,
China ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Economic Growth ,
EU ,
Federal Funding ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Infectious Diseases ,
Infrastructure ,
Mobile Apps ,
Music Streaming ,
Payment Terms ,
Renewable Energy
PE firm CVC Capital Partners has made an unsolicited bid to acquire Japan’s Toshiba Corp. “in a deal that could be valued at more than $20 billion if completed.” The proposal, which would need Japanese government approval...more
4/8/2021
/ Airlines ,
Bonds ,
Credit Cards ,
DoorDash ,
Federal Reserve ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Hong Kong ,
IKEA ,
Interest Rates ,
JPMorgan Chase ,
Microchip Technology ,
Retail Market ,
Supply Chain ,
Target ,
Tax Reform ,
Toshiba ,
Toyota
The latest and greatest from Fed Chair Powell as the Fed’s March Open Markets Committee meeting wrapped yesterday, including a markets-pleasing assurance that better-than-expected economic growth wasn’t enough to push the...more
3/18/2021
/ Administrative Appointments ,
Aircraft ,
Biden Administration ,
Boeing ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Disney ,
Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) ,
Federal Reserve ,
Filing Deadlines ,
Financial Markets ,
Financial Services Industry ,
GameStop ,
Infectious Diseases ,
Interest Rates ,
IRS ,
Retail Investors ,
Stock Trades ,
Supply Chain ,
Tax Returns
Walmart’s recent move to hire away a “pair of senior Goldman Sachs bankers” to head up the retailer’s new fintech startup (a collaboration with Ribbit Capital) has tongues wagging about the company’s ambitions to shove its...more
3/1/2021
/ Berkshire Hathaway ,
Biometric Information ,
Biometric Information Privacy Act ,
Credit Suisse ,
Data Collection ,
Facebook ,
Facial Recognition Technology ,
Financial Markets ,
Financial Services Industry ,
FinTech ,
GameStop ,
Mail ,
Market Manipulation ,
McDonalds ,
Private Investment Funds ,
Reddit ,
Settlement Agreements ,
SoftBank ,
Stock Trades ,
United Airlines ,
Wal-Mart