One of the biggest threats to financial stability in the eurozone comes from the region’s exposure to central and eastern European banks. Indeed, more than 80% of emerging Europe bank assets are owned by western European banks. This was fine…
It’s a really disappointing quarter. The surprise is that the bigger disappointment came on the media networks side instead of the theme parks. They took a real hit at ESPN and in the broadcast business, which reflects the tough advertising…
Our sales stayed pretty strong through October and well into November. We pretty much hit a wall in December. – Jim Owens (subscription required), CEO Caterpillar The depth and duration of economic decline throughout the world makes it very difficult to…
U.S. officials are wary about taking the most extreme step — nationalizing banks altogether… But as the market value of many firms evaporates, they may be left with no other alternatives to raise cash. From a political standpoint, there’s not…
At the first sign of strength, most investors become amnesiacs. They become so concerned with making money, or missing the chance to make up losses, that they rush into stocks at the very time they should be most cautious. Now,…
Demand for our services weakened sequentially throughout the quarter and global economic trends continue to worsen, substantially reducing our second half outlook. – Alan Graf Jr., CFO, Federal Express Yesterday after the close, Federal Express (FDX) took down their full…
A story in today’s New York Times brought home the severity of the economic crisis to me: “Luxury Prices Are Falling; the Sky, Too”. When designer shoes and bags are being marked down to these levels, that’s a clear sign…
This is almost indescribably terrible – Ian Shepherdson, High Frequency Economics Quite simply, there was nothing good in this report – David Greenlaw, Morgan Stanley The November decline stands as the largest single month drop since December 1974 – David…
The barrage of bad news continues today with a number of companies announcing layoffs: AT&T said they will layoff 12,000, 4% of their total workforce. Dupont said they will layoff 2,500 full time and 4,000 contractor positions with more to…
As expected, November retail sales were just terrible. Here are same store sales* for some retailers: Kohl’s: -17.5% Macy’s: -13.3% JC Penney: -11.9% Neiman Marcus: -11.9% Target: -10.4% Gap: -10.0% Saks: -5.2% Costco U.S.: -2.0% Walmart U.S.: +3.0% * Last…