Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told Congress on Wednesday that the outlook for the economy remains “unusually uncertain” as the US gauge of future economic activity dropped in June, the second decline in past 3 months, suggesting the economic recovery is weakening.
The U.S. Senate had finally, and unexpectedly, passed the much ballyhooed Wall Street Reform legislation. The Senate vote, 59-39, represents a major achievement for the Obama administration despite strong GOP opposition and coming just months after the historic, but substantially watered-down, Healthcare reform package.
With last week’s welcomed news of robust jobs growth, and yesterday’s announcement that consumer prices fell in April for the first time in 13 months as energy prices tumbled and high unemployment limited the private sector’s ability to raise prices.
Obama is beginning to look like a financial guru with investment performance that puts even the brightest Wall Streeters to shame. The Administration is presently making final preparations to sell its stake in the New York bank, according to one of my reliable industry sources. At Friday’s closing price for Citibank, the sale would net over $8 billion – by far the largest profit returned from any firm that accepted bailout funds
According to an interesting empirical study commissioned by Capitol Hill’s weekly newspaper and the leading publisher of the nation’s legislative record, Congressional Quarterly, President Obama has accummulated an impressive string of legislative accomplishments unrivaled by any previous POTUS.
A Year-end Round-up of major events and happenings in the Global Markets, Global Economy & International Trade arena, naming the Global Markets & Foreign Policy blog’s Person-of-the-Year, and our outlook for 2010.
The Federal Reserve chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, speaking at a Brookings Institute Conference, said Tuesday that it was “very likely” that the recession had ended although he cautioned that it could be months before unemployment rates dropped significantly.
Mon, 14 Sept – President Obama reinvigorated his administration’s effort to reform the financial regulatory system by taking his bare knuckled message directly to Wall Street. Speaking at Federal Hall and using the one year anniversary of the Wall St. collapse the president reminded prominent financial industry executives of their role and risk-taking behavior that led to a global economic melt-down.
According to an article in today’s (2 Sept 2009) Wall Street Journal, Goldman Sachs’ Cheif U.S. Economist says that President Obama’s economic stimulus package is beginning to boost U.S. economic performance.
According to the most recent economic data released this week, the U.S. trade deficit in July hit the highest level in six months as a record rise in imports outpaced a third straight month’s increase in foreign demand for American products, according to government data released Thursday. This is a boon for the Obama recovery stimulus paln.
The FOMC today announced plans to buy $300B in treasuries and up to $750B in mortgage-backed securities, effectively agreeing to print a trillion dollars. Well, we knew the money had to come from somewhere. When the federal government wants money, there are four places they can get it: 1) Take from other parts of the […]