Economy

It's a done deal. The Citigroup - Morgan Stanley dance is now over. The price for a 51% stake Smith Barney was $2.7 Billion. The seems like a very low valuation here but I haven't looked through the terms of the deal in depth. This is…

A friend living in Latvia wrote that he was "stunned by the chaos that broke out in Riga this evening." I had heard absolutely nothing about it until he told me. Apparently, a peaceful protest outside Parliament turned bloody when the…

Vikram Pandit understands the seriousness of the challenge ahead, if Citi wants to remain a going concern. He must break the firm up and end Citi's disastrous experiment with becoming a financial supermarket.

Today, the Seattle Federal Home Loan Bank (FHLB) has admitted that it is on the verge of collapse and may need to avail itself of conservatorship, much as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac did previously. One should see this announcement as a…

I think this video is an example of the most self-reflective you will see the current U.S. President George W. Bush become. In it, he talks about his mistakes, grappling in front of the camera with how historians may look back on his stint…

The Chief Economist of Goldman Sachs sat down with the FT's David Oakley and had a go on a number of topics from the financial crisis, investments in Emerging Markets, the future of the Bric (Brazil, Russia, India and China) economies, to…

This just hit the wires. Apparently, Bob Rubin has tendered his resignation at Citigroup. Here is he story from the Wall Street Journal:

If you recall, last month the figure was quoted at 533,000 jobs lost in November and unemployment came in at 6.7% (now revised up to 6.8%), up from 6.5% in October. The consensus estimate for December, according to Bloomberg was for 7.0%…

Jobless claims fell yet again last week to 467,000. And on the surface this would be comforting. However, the data are marred by seasonal adjustments. The actual non-adjusted data tell a completely different picture of a deteriorating…

ADP, the payroll data company, has shown that the United States is going to see an even larger loss of jobs in December than we saw in November when the Bureau of Labor Statistics releases its figures this Friday. The number ADP put out is…