The events of the past few weeks have made increasingly probable what was once considered impossible: Greece may exit the euro.
U.S. stocks struggled during a choppy trading Tuesday as investors digested mixed news out of Europe.
U.S. stocks were poised for a positive start Tuesday, following better-than-expected economic growth in Germany.
The decisions of former JP Morgan Chief Investment officer Ina Drew that cost the nation's largest bank $2 billion.
JPMorgan Chase can be considered a systemically dangerous institution, which means that it is "too big to fail" because the government fears that its collapse would cause a global financial crisis.
Greek voters look set to punish the country's mainstream parties in elections on Sunday.
While the election of a new French President will be making headlines around the world on Sunday night, it may well be that the Greek parliamentary election results -- marginal as they may be, obscure and hardly decipherable -- will turn out to be more important for the future of the EU and the euro.
A basic premise of work in America is that your paycheck will inch up over time to reflect hard work, experience and rising living costs. But a lot of people aren't making any more this year than they did last year -- in fact, they're making less.
European Central Bank officials voted Thursday to hold interest rates steady, even as the euro area economy slides towards recession. But ECB president Mario Draghi appeared to hint that there could be rate cuts in the future.
Yields on benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury bonds are back below 2%. They really shouldn't be this low. Most fixed income investors agree that's the case. Yet, people keep clinging to long-term securities like Linus Van Pelt does to his baby blue security blanket.
Blogger Kathleen Geier observes:
U.S. stocks finished in the red Monday, ending a mostly sour month on a weak note.
May begins next week. Or, as I like to call it, the 17th month of 2011.
The U.S. Department of Labor recently announced that the unemployment rate fell to 8.2%. That should have been a signal that jobs are coming back and that the economy is about to rebound. But, as many economists say, the numbers fell primarily because unemployed Americans have become so discouraged with trying to find a job that they've simply quit looking.
To those of us who have studied the largest wave of immigration in history from a single country to the United States -- the four-decade-long influx of millions of Mexicans -- it seemed inconceivable that it would ever come to a halt. Yet, as our new Pew Hispanic Center report has shown, it has.
First quarter earnings have been decent, if not spectacular. And many corporate executives are issuing cautiously optimistic guidance for the rest of the year.
A political backlash against fiscal austerity left mainstream French and Dutch politicians struggling on Monday to shore up support as a key economic indicator highlighted the eurozone's slide into deeper recession.
European political uncertainty and another sign of a slowdown in the Chinese economy pushed stocks down Monday, with the three major U.S. indexes falling more than 1% before rebounding somewhat in afternoon trading.
Referring to the European debt crisis with the cutesy shorthand acronym of the PIIGS just doesn't seem right anymore.
Two years ago, I visited a Michigan jobs bank to see how the Great Recession had altered the economic balance between the sexes. Though the recession was technically over, the intake room was full of men: laid-off factory and construction workers, former auto industry employees, all of them struggling to adapt to a changing economy -- and master a computerized jobs database.
Writer Paul Gilding says "the world is full" and explains how to deal with the coming crisis.
For 50 years the environmental movement has unsuccessfully argued that we should save the planet for moral reasons, that there were more important things than money. Ironically, it now seems it will be money -- through the economic impact of climate change and resource constraint -- that will motivate the sweeping changes necessary to avert catastrophe.
There was nothing good about the Good Friday jobs report. But was the slowdown in hiring in March bad enough for the Federal Reserve to once again consider more stimulus for the economy?
The problem has become so complicated, that perhaps only a child can solve it. An 11-year-old Dutch boy, Jurre Hermans, entered a serious economics competition with a plan for bringing the Greek economy back from the brink.
Greeks paid tribute Thursday to an elderly man who took his own life in central Athens in an apparent response to the hardship caused by the austerity crisis.
U.S. economic growth at the end of last year was as strong as everyone thought, but most economists expect things to slow in the next couple of years.
CNN's John Defterios explains how emerging markets are countering Europe's debt crisis.
Bamboozled by eurozone debt crisis jargon? CNN is here to help you tell your bond yields from your banking interventions, your defaults from your haircuts. And if you need anything more explained, please submit your questions to Soundoff at the bottom of the story.
The rise in entrepreneurship seen in the United States during the recession hit a speed bump last year, according to an economic report that keeps a close eye on new firms.
CEO of Ryan Air, Michael O'Leary, talks to CNN's Juliet Mann about expanding one of Europe's largest airlines.
The head of Dublin-based budget airline Ryanair says that airport operators are holding the aviation industry back -- and describes the average airport as an unnecessary "international shopping center."
Federal regulators have taken a chainsaw to executive compensation at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
Germany's economic rebound, which has helped counter gloom created by Europe's debt crisis, was set back in January by an unexpectedly sharp fall in industrial orders, especially from beyond the eurozone.
Fortune: Wal-Mart's makeoverupdated: Mon Mar 05 2012 13:17:00
What happened to the smiley face? It's long gone from Wal-Mart marketing after years as the corporate symbol, and its disappearance is part of a much larger story. It's hard to believe, but for decades the world's largest retailer wasn't much of a marketer. It spent little on marketing, and its efforts, epitomized by the grinning circle, could be charitably called down-home and realistically described as amateurish. Change finally began four years ago when Stephen Quinn was made chief marketing officer of Wal-Mart U.S. He exiled the smiley face to the land of e-mail emoticons and developed a new theme -- "Save money. Live better" -- that became a statement of corporate purpose. Current TV commercials actually include some wit while hammering home the message.
It's boom times once again for Ohio's manufacturing industry.
Those hoping for gas prices to turn around and start falling should be careful what they wish for. If consumers get significant relief from prices, it could well be due to a new recession that's far more painful than the gas pains they're now feeling.
Widespread joblessness in Greece and Spain pushed the unemployment rate in the eurozone to the worst level since the currency was introduced in 1999.
Economic growth was stronger than originally thought at the end of 2011 as consumers increased their spending and businesses stocked up their inventories.
Economic growth in India slowed at the end of last year, the government reported Wednesday, raising concerns about whether emerging markets will continue to be the engine of global growth.
Everyone is familiar with the story, but very few are able to see the Titanic in real life -- unless they can shell out $60,000.
CNN's Candy Crowley reports that the chance of a new candidate emerging before a brokered GOP convention is unlikely.
Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum made their final push for votes Monday on the eve of primaries in Arizona and Michigan, as new polls indicated that the Republican presidential race remains close and volatile.
As the presidential race moves to Michigan for Tuesday's primary, a lot of focus is on the state's economy -- one of the hardest-hit by the recession.
While most economists have stopped worrying that the U.S. will fall into a double-dip recession, one influential economist maintains his position that the nation won't be able to avoid a new downturn.
U.S. stocks were headed for a slightly higher open Thursday, on the back of strong European economic data.
Since the economy dropped off a cliff in 2008, members of Congress have not exactly been shy about casting blame for no-or-slow growth on a variety of bureaucrats, outside institutions and Wall Street power players.
Once again, Greece appears to have been snatched back from the brink of default with the promise of more bailout money.
EU ministers want to see more before signing off on a Greek austerity plan. CNN's Jim Boulden reports.
Eurozone finance ministers have agreed a second bailout package for Greece, giving it the funds it needs to avoid a potential default next month.
Michael W. Klein is a professor at Tuft University's Fletcher School and a Non-Resident Senior Fellow in Economic Studies at The Brookings Institution. Klein recently served as chief economist for the Office of International Affairs at the U.S. Treasury in the Obama Administration.
Influential short-seller Jim Chanos is still on a China rampage.
Berluti CEO Antoine Arnault talks about his company's continued growth despite economic uncertainty.
For years it has been dominated by women, but now luxury fashion is kicking off its high heels and slipping into something more masculine as it strides through the economic downturn.
Douglas J. Elliott, who worked as an investment banker for two decades, is a fellow at the Brookings Institution.
The eurozone economy shrank in the fourth quarter of 2011, but pockets of strength from France and Germany offset some of the contraction.
With each passing day, Greece's economic and political malaise deepens despite one massive International Monetary Fund-European Union bailout package after another to keep that country afloat. And with each passing day, as the Greek economy continues its downward spiral under the weight of externally imposed draconian budget austerity, there is the increased risk that a disorderly Greek euro exit could result in real contagion to the rest of the European periphery and especially to Italy, an otherwise solvent country.
Stocks are soaring this year. Everywhere. And if you think the rally has been big in the U.S., just check out emerging markets.
Chinese imports fell sharply in January, a sign of sluggish domestic demand that will fuel concerns about whether the fragile global economy can count on China as a bastion of growth.
Faced with a strong jobs report Friday, Republicans tried out a new rhetorical message: This isn't a disaster, but Ronald Reagan could have done better.
Companies are saying the job market is getting better. Workers are saying it's already kicked into high gear.
That loud noise you heard Friday morning? Cheers from the White House and President Barack Obama's campaign headquarters in Chicago.
It's not tough to find critics of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae on either the right or the left. But there has been little progress made in rehabilitating the mortgage giants.
Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich both accused each other of having financial interests in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac during the Republican debate Thursday night.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel launched an outspoken defense of the European project on Wednesday, but warned that the bloc's richest nation would not make bailout promises to solve the eurozone crisis that it cannot keep.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel calls for reform at the World Economic Forum while avoiding bailout promises.
The British economy shrank by an estimated 0.2% in the last quarter of 2011, the Office of National Statistics announced Wednesday, but the country is not yet in recession because growth was positive in the quarter before that.
President Obama = big government.
Republicans focused on the Obama administration's job record during their rebuttal to Tuesday night's State of the Union address.
Freddie Mac is in the spotlight of the Republican presidential contest, as Mitt Romney attacks Newt Gingrich for his 2006 work for the mortgage finance firm.
The International Monetary Fund lowered its outlook for the world economy on Tuesday, and warned that the global financial system faces growing risks from the debt crisis in Europe.
The one thing Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich seem to agree on about Freddie Mac is that it played a significant role in the housing bubble -- and the subsequent financial meltdown that followed when it burst.
At first glance, South Carolina would seem to be in pretty bad shape.
In their attacks on the food stamp program, some Republican presidential candidates are leaving a deeply misleading impression of the nation's leading anti-hunger program. No one aspires to enroll, but for those who must, it is an essential lifeline that addresses one of the harshest impacts of poverty and unemployment -- hunger.
The economy is slowly but surely getting better. That's the good news. The bad news is that the market has already figured that out.
The World Bank Wednesday slashed its 2012 growth forecasts for both emerging and developing economies from its estimates of only six months ago, and warned the world is on the cusp of a new global recession that could be as bad as the crisis four years ago.
Federal aid helped many cash-strapped Americans keep a roof over their heads during the prolonged economic slump, but the number of people living a step away from the streets has grown sharply, researchers reported Wednesday.
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich was asked about his previous statements concerning the food stamp program during Monday's presidential debate.
It has been more than three years since then Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson fired his famous metaphorical bazooka and the federal government seized control of mortgage agencies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
Italy's prime minister is in debt talks with Germany's chancellor in Berlin. Diana Magnay reports.
Germany's economic recovery went into reverse at the end of last year but the country still notched up 3 per cent growth in 2011 -- twice as fast as in the US and the rest of the eurozone.
CNNMoney: Middle class dropoutsupdated: Wed Jan 11 2012 05:23:00
Nearly one third of Americans who were raised in the middle class dropped down the economic ladder as adults -- and that's before the Great Recession hit.
The Securities and Exchange Commission charged six former executives of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac with securities fraud on Friday for misrepresenting their holdings of high-risk mortgage loans.
Fannie Mae CEO Michael Williams plans to resign, the government-controlled mortgage giant said Tuesday. Williams, who took over as president and CEO of the troubled company in 2009, will continue as CEO until Fannie Mae's board names a successor. The firm did not provide a specific reason for Williams' departure; in a statement, Williams said only that he had decided that "the time is right to turn over the reins to a new leader." Williams will leave behind a firm still struggling to get its finances in order. In November, Fannie Mae reported a net third-quarter loss of $5.1 billion. The loss forced the firm to ask for another $7.8 billion in funding from the Treasury Department, a request that took its bailout total to $112.6 billion. Federal regulators put Fannie Mae and fellow government-sponsored enterprise Freddie Mac into conservatorship during the financial meltdown in September 2008. The sister companies now depend on government help to cover losses on the
Money Magazine: Are we the next Japan?updated: Wed Jan 04 2012 18:19:00
There's no shortage of debate as to whether the Obama administration and Congress have done the right things in attempting to avert a debt crisis and revive the stalled economy.
The starkly contrasting economic trajectories of countries inside the eurozone were highlighted on Tuesday as Germany reported unemployment at 20-year lows while Spanish jobless figures rose for the fifth consecutive month.
French presidential candidate Francois Hollande opened the new year with a shot across the bow of rival President Nicolas Sarkozy Tuesday.
Manufacturing grew at a faster pace in December, according to a closely-watched reading on the health of the sector.
Investors may be saying good riddance to a choppy year, but they'd better buckle up. The first quarter of 2012 is going to be a roller coaster ride, with Europe front and center.
Until 2011, we were in a Rip Van Winkle-world. Events unfolded so fast that every morning, we seemed to wake up in circumstances unrecognizably transformed from those of the previous night. Yet this year has broken the mold. Nothing happened: certainly, nothing worthy of record by an historian like me.
Economists are a bit more optimistic about the U.S. economy as 2011 comes to a close. But only a bit.
Consumer confidence shot higher for the second month in a row in December, according to a survey from The Conference Board.
The U.S. economy was weaker than previously thought in the third quarter, according to a government report, although economists are expecting stronger growth in the final three months of the year.
A top White House economic adviser said on Wednesday that congressional deadlock on extending payroll tax cuts and unemployment insurance benefits could threaten the U.S. economy.
If Congress fails to pass an extension of the payroll tax holiday, it would put a serious dent into economic growth in 2012 and could even help tip the U.S. back into a recession, according to economists.
Richard M. Kovacevich is the retired Chairman & CEO of Wells Fargo. William M. Isaac is Global Head of Financial Institutions at FTI Consulting and former Chairman of the FDIC. The views expressed are their own.
If Congress doesn't extend unemployment benefits in the next few weeks, millions of jobless Americans will find themselves without a vital safety net in 2012.
President Barack Obama accused Republicans of making a blunt political calculation after his election three years ago, deciding to resist his initiatives, skirt compromise and bank on the economy getting worse to bolster their re-election prospects.
Some 32,885 people died on the nation's roadways in 2010 -- a number that, while slightly higher than preliminary figures released in April, shows the downward trend in traffic deaths is continuing, now reaching low levels not seen since 1949, the U.S. Department of Transportation reported Thursday.
Europe's debt crisis has dragged on for nearly two years and has only intensified by the day as leaders fail, time and time again, to deliver a credible solution. Yet investors and economists continue to bank on a big breakthrough.
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