Economy

In the video below, William Black, a well-known Associate Professor of Economics and Law at the University of Missouri – Kansas City and former top regulator at of the Federal Home Loan Bank Board during the S&L crisis, holds court.…

Barack Obama’s health insurance reform initiative is clearly foundering. So, his administration has pulled out the big guns. Health and Human Services Secretary Sebelius on the Sunday morning talk shows. Obama himself had a prime time press…

Right now many economists believe the US economy is poised for recovery.  Even I believe the economy will recover by year’s end. But for the man in the street, things hardly look like a recovery right now. Harried by falling house…

Today, Swedbank, a Swedish bank with huge Baltic loan loss exposure, surprised investors with a second rights issue in less than a year.  In going to investors for more money, the company said its doing so in a fully underwritten deal…

It has been my thesis for some time that we are seeing a secular change in consumption patterns in the United States.  This will have grave implications for a world economy used to seeing the American consumer as an economic growth engine…

Many economic prognosticators believe Chinese consumption growth is key to a global economic recovery.  The US consumer, who had been the buyer of first and last resort during the bubble years, is tapped out and indebted.  The new engine of…

The Unemployment Insurance Weekly Claims Report was released this morning, showing a slight increase in initial jobless claims to 558,000. Continuing claims came in at 6.2 million, down from 6.3 million the week before.  All of…

I have been taking a bit of a break as my trip to the Ontario’s Lake Country winds down.  It’s a beautiful place.  But, as Marshall Auerback and I were lamenting, it has become the Hamptons of Canada as everyone from Toronto is up…

This entry from Gary Shilling comes via John Mauldin’s site InvestorInsight.com where he highlights commentary from some of the best economic thinkers. Shilling, who correctly predicted problems in residential real estate in the US, is in…

If you recall, at the end of May, I wrote a post “Both initial claims and continuing claims now pointing to recovery” that said jobless claims data were pointing to an imminent recovery.  The general gist of my argument was recovery…