By Jason Simpkins Staff Writer Expect increased trading volume and market volatility today (Friday) as index futures, market index options, stock options, and stock futures all expire on the same day. While index futures and options typically share simultaneous expirations on the third Friday of every month, quadruple witching days usually only come about on […]
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Federal Reserve System
Global Business Roundup: BoE Injects $20B, Steel Prices Surge, Arcelor on the Prowl, Mitsubishi Plugs Into Russia, H-P is Taken With Taiwan, Hyundai Eyes China, and More
In other top business and financial stories from around the world: The Bank of England said yesterday (Wednesday) that it would inject $20 billion into the long-term money markets next week because of the ongoing worldwide credit crunch. The British central bank is addressing liquidity issues in the so-called “Interbank” market – where commercial banks […]
U.S. Fed Readies Itself For All the Right Moves
As we await the announced decision of U.S. Federal Reserve policymakers today, there are some very important facts to keep in mind. First and foremost is this: The fears of a recession are highly exaggerated. The U.S. economy has good momentum, the American consumer is still spending, and we believe that central bank will reduce […]
How to Play Today's FOMC Meeting
By Martin Hutchinson Director of Global Investing Research Wall Street has firmly got it into its tiny overpaid noggin that the Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke and the central bank's Federal Open Market Committee will slash interest rates today. I'm not so sure. Whatever Bernanke & Co. does will indicate the medium-term future of Federal […]
What To Do if The 'Do Nothing Fed' Doesn't Do Anything
By Keith Fitz-Gerald Contributing Editor In a column just a few weeks ago, I wrote to you and explained that I thought the odds were high that Fed policymakers would do nothing at their next meeting – which is now only a day away. When we last addressed this issue, the dollar was getting crushed. […]
Greenspan: Market Bubbles are Human Nature
From Staff Reports Commenting that “the human race has never found a way to confront bubbles,” former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said the whipsawing financial markets are enduring today are in many ways "identical" to those he had to deal with in 1987 and 1998, while he was still head of the central bank. […]
What Nobody Will Say About The Subprime Mess
By Keith Fitz-Gerald Contributing Editor I've been waiting for a few weeks to see if anybody will say it – and, not surprisingly, nobody has. So I will. The truth about who caused the subprime mess. In my humble opinion, it was the Fed. Sure there were contributing parties, so I’m not pointing the […]
"Shocker" Jobs Report Brings Rate Cut Closer
In several of my economic-analysis reports leading up to – and immediately following – the address that U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke made at the Kansas City Fed's annual economic symposium a little over a week ago, I said that an interest rate cut that Wall Street had been clamoring for was far […]
Surprisingly Dismal Jobs Report Unleashes Its Fury on the Federal Reserve and Wall St.
By Jason Simpkins Staff Writer For U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke and policymakers at the central bank's Federal Open Market Committee, the verdict is in. A mediocre – or even week – jobs report for the month of August might have been enough to secure an interest-rate cut at the FOMC's Sept. 18 […]
Fed Chief Keeps His Options Open
During a widely anticipated speech in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, last Friday, U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke acknowledged the ongoing problems in both the housing and asset-backed-commercial-paper (ABCP) markets – as well as quickly spreading global credit crunch. But Bernanke didn’t rush to signal there would be a cut in the benchmark Fed Funds […]