‘Significant chance’ of second financial crisis

There is now more than a one-in-five chance of another asset price bubble implosion costing the world more than £1 trillion, and similar odds of a full-scale sovereign fiscal crisis, a key report warned. Read more

Why debt at Dubal World is

As conglomerate Dubai World delays debt payments, most analysts look for Arab Monetary Fund to step in to avert a crisis in financial markets. That’s not likely, though, until Sunday.

How can Dubai, a tiny emirate on the Persian Gulf, shake financial markets from Shanghai to New York?

The answer is familiar to tens of thousands of Americans struggling to make payments on their mortgages or credit cards: too much debt… On Thursday, Dubai World, a conglomerate, shook world financial markets by asking for a six-month moratorium on Read more

Renters becoming latest victims as foreclosure crisis widens

From The Washington Post

Some tenants left in dilapidated buildings

NEW YORK — A new wave of foreclosures stands to hurt people who may have never taken out a mortgage: renters. In cities such as New York, Chicago and Los Angeles, where many investors are carrying upside-down mortgages on large rental buildings, some tenants are watching their homes fall apart along with the financing. Read more

Can Business Journalism Save the World?

From Vanity Fair.com

Can business journalism save the world? Or, to be a bit less grandiose about it: Should business writers concern themselves first and foremost with telling great stories or with educating the public. For Niall Ferguson, the Scottish-born Harvard historian who discovered the subject of finance while investigating the causes of Hitler’s rise in Germany, writing about bank balance sheets is almost a holy mission. Read more

America Begs China for Money—and the Chinese Laugh!

On Monday, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told Chinese government officials that their money was safe and that America wants a strong dollar. His Chinese audience broke out in loud laughter. The cost of borrowing is going up, and America’s desperation is making it an international laughingstock.

Read more

G.M. Seeks Bankruptcy and a New Start

General Motors filed for bankruptcy on Monday morning, submitting its reorganization papers to a federal clerk in Lower Manhattan.

G.M. said it had $82.3 billion in assets and $172.8 billion in debts. Its largest creditors were the Wilmington Trust Company, representing a group of bondholders holding $22.8 billion in debts, and affiliates of the United Auto Workers union, representing nearly $20.6 billion in employee obligations. Read more

Trade War

The United States depends on other countries for its military superiority, and that’s a good thing.

Driving an import: The Army’s ultrasafe MRAP vehicle, on patrol in Iraq, relies on manufacturers in four continents.

Since U.S. President Barack Obama has taken office, the debate between Read more

A biblical lesson for today’s bankers

In a talk to European bankers last month, the governor of the Bank of Spain cited a Bible story to illustrate how modern economies might ameliorate the tendency for busts to follow booms in the business cycle.

Miguel Fernández Ordóñez spoke of Joseph’s interpretation of a dream by Egypt’s Pharaoh of seven fat and seven lean cows as indicating seven years of “great plenty” followed by seven years of “famine” (Genesis 41). [read more]

By David R. Francis | oncsmonitor.com | posted: 8 Dec 2008

What makes a car American?

By Ashley Fantz (CNN.com) — With the top U.S. automakers in economic survival mode, “Buy American” is a frequent cry among those trying to save jobs at home.

But buying a car to benefit the U.S. economy has become an ambiguous, complicated challenge.

“How you define an American car is one of the great conundrums of this world,” said Dutch Mandel, [read more ]

Pass the plate

If Detroit’s disintegrating carmakers are bailed out, Europe’s will be next in line

IT IS not just in Washington, DC, that a fierce debate is being conducted about whether to provide state aid to the beleaguered car industry. On Tuesday November 18th, just as the bosses of General Motors (GM), Ford and Chrysler were lining up with their begging bowls before the Senate banking committee, the directors of the European Investment Bank, the European Union’s lending arm [read more]

From The Economist inline | 19 November 2008

Next Page »