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• Mortgage Rates for 30-Year U.S. Loans Fall to a Record-Low 3.78%
  U.S. mortgage rates for 30-year loans fell to a record low for a fourth straight week, reducing borrowing costs as a housing recovery takes hold. The average rate for a 30-year fixed mortgage dropped to 3.78 percent in the week ended Thursday from 3.79 percent, Freddie Mac...
• Economic Data Suggest Moderate US Expansion
  New U.S. claims for unemployment benefits fell slightly last week and demand for long-lasting manufactured goods edged up in April, suggesting the economy continued to expand at a moderate pace. Initial claims for state unemployment benefits slipped 2,000 to a seasonally...
• Data Indicate Darkening Clouds over Global Economy
  The shadows over the global economy darkened on Thursday as data showed the eurozone's private sector contracted, U.S. manufacturing growth slowed and China's once-booming factories faltered. In Europe, a downturn that started in smaller states on the eurozone's periphery is...
• China Reiterates Pledge to Focus Efforts on Growth
  China's leaders pledged to intensify "fine tuning" of policies, in the second government statement in four days signaling a commitment to growth as domestic demand slows and Europe s debt crisis escalates. "We must proactively take policies and measures to expand demand and...
• Jump in New-Home Sales May Help Recovery Build Support
  Demand for new U.S. homes increased more than forecast in April as low prices and mortgage interest rates drew buyers.
• Altman: Volatile Markets May Force DC to Avert ‘Fiscal Cliff’
  Wall Street could force Washington to address a pending fiscal nightmare, says Roger Altman, chairman at Evercore Partners and former Deputy Treasury Secretary. At the end of the year, tax breaks are set to expire while automatic spending cuts are set to kick in, a...
• Mortgage Applications Jump Amid Refinancing Rise
  Applications for U.S. home mortgages rose last week, fueled by demand for refinancings as mortgage rates hit fresh record lows, an industry group said on Wednesday.
• Martin Sieff: Obama Is a 'C-Minus President, at Best' as US in Shambles
  President Barack Obama is barely passing when it comes to managing the economy and ensuring the country remains competitive in global trade arenas, says Martin Sieff, author and chief global analyst at The Globalist research center. Like those before him, Obama is not doing...
• Global Economic Group: Americans are Wealthiest but Not Happiest
  Money can't buy happiness, researchers at a Paris-based economic think tank have concluded.
• Majority Of Unemployed Attended College
  Disputing the widely held belief that having a college education will reduce the likelihood of unemployment is the fact that most of today's unemployed workers attended college.
• CBO: 'Fiscal Cliff' Could Push US Back Into Recession
  A stalemate over how to tackle a series of fiscal deadlines at year's end would likely push the United States economy into recession in the first half of next year, the Congressional Budget Office warned. A wave of U.S. tax hikes and automatic spending cuts dubbed the ...
• Moody's: States' Debt Rose 2.5% to $510 Billion in 2011
  Tax-supported debt for U.S. states rose to a net $510 billion in 2011 from $497 billion in 2010, according to Moody's Investors Service. The year-over-year increase of 2.5 percent is down from an annual rate as high as 10 percent in the previous two years, the New York-based...
• Texas Grid Operator Warns of Power Shortages Ahead
  Rolling blackouts may hit Texas years sooner than expected, the state electric grid operator warned on Tuesday in a report that intensified the call for more power generation to keep pace with growing demand over the next decade. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas...
• Rasmussen Poll: 50% Say US Will Go Bankrupt
  
  Two new polls show Americans remain pessimistic about the economy — by far the key issue heading into the November presidential election.
• Home Resales Rise, Boding Well for Economy
  Sales of existing U.S homes rose in April for the first time in three months, indicating the industry is stabilizing.
• Merkel Pressed to Share German Debt Costs
  Chancellor Angela Merkel is being pushed by German states to share their borrowing costs to ease their budget squeeze, a policy she has opposed to confront the financial crisis in the rest of the euro region.The opposition Social Democrats plan to press Merkel on so- called...
• Global Economic Group OECD Warns Eurozone of 'Severe Recession'
  The 17-country eurozone risks falling into a severe recession, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development warned on Tuesday, as it called on governments and Europe's central bank to act quickly to keep the slowdown from dragging down the global economy.OECD...
• Study: Older Americans Are Quickly Getting Poorer
  The rate of poverty is rising among older Americans as they age — as is the number of people entering poverty — according to a new study from the Employee Benefit Research Institute.
• WSJ: Most States Still Years Away From Getting Back Lost Jobs
  Only four states — Alaska, North Dakota, Texas, and Louisiana — can boast that their unemployment rates have returned to prerecession levels, according to economist Steven Frable of IHS Global Insight.
• Creaking Infrastructure Seen Hampering Economic Recovery
  Ramshackle roads, crowded waterways and other creaking infrastructure could slow recovery as businesses spend more time and money sidestepping roadblocks or paying for more expensive shipping, experts say. Bottlenecks and other logjams could mean less business for the U.S.,...
• Greenlight's Einhorn: Housing Rebound 'Broadly Based'
  Hedge fund manager David Einhorn, who is also the chairman of reinsurer Greenlight Capital Re Ltd., told his reinsurance investors on Monday that the housing market is improving. Einhorn, speaking at a Greenlight Capital investor conference, said that the improvement...
• End of Extended Benefits May Lower Jobless Rate
  The declining U.S. jobless rate may soon get another push downward as Americans lose extended unemployment benefits.
• Healthcare Costs Rise Faster Than US Inflation Rate
  Doctors, hospitals and drugmakers raised prices faster than inflation in 2010, driving U.S. health costs higher as fewer Americans sought care after the recession.Spending on workers covered on the job grew 3.3 percent per person in 2010, twice the general inflation rate,...
• Economists More Upbeat About Job Growth, Housing
  A new survey shows economists are growing slightly more optimistic about recovery in the job and housing markets but expect other pillars of the economy to remain weak.The National Association for Business Economists says in a report issued Monday that its forecasters...
• Money Manager: We're ‘One Recession Away’ From Next Bull Market
  Money manager John Mauldin says there's another recession yet to come before the next true bull market.

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