- 15Nov
(Reuters) - MUFG raised its full-year profit forecast by a quarter and said it is buying project-finance assets from Royal Bank of Scotland worth 3.8 billion pounds ($6.1 billion), expanding its overseas reach as loan demand remains tepid in Japan. Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG), Japan's biggest bank by assets, joined smaller rivals Mizuho Financial Group and Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group in raising its forecast, after bond trading gains and lower credit costs helped its second-quarter net profit nearly triple.
- 10Nov
(Reuters) - General Motors Co GM.UL posted a $2 billion third-quarter profit on Wednesday, driven by an accelerating turnaround in North America as it rushes to complete an initial public offering of stock set for next week. GM said it expected to post solidly profitable results for 2010, its first full-year profit since 2004. A large part of that profit could be attributed to North America, which formerly had posted deep losses.
- 10Nov
(Reuters) - Google Inc will give its staff a 10 percent pay increase at the start of next year, according to website Silicon Alley Insider. Chief Executive Eric Schmidt informed Google's more than 23,000 employees of the raise by email, the Wall Street Journal later reported.
- 10Nov
(Reuters) - Claims for unemployment benefits fell more than expected and a moving average fell to a two-year low, pointing to some relief in the weak jobs market, a government report showed on Wednesday.
- 10Nov
(Reuters) - Was the creation of the Financial Stability Board last year a bloodless coup by the world's central bankers? A repeal of the U.S. Declaration of Independence? That's certainly how some in America view the new body which is supposed to plug the holes in the world's financial regulations. Here's a taster from Ellen Brown, author of "Web of Debt: The Shocking Truth about our Money System", on huffingtonpost.com in June 2009. Pointing to the fact that the FSB's secretariat is based at the Bank for International Settlements' headquarters in Basel, Switzerland, Brown warned that "to the wary, this is not a comforting sign. The BIS has a dark and controversial history", and was, according to one professor she quotes, created as the apex of "a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole."
- 10Nov
(Reuters) - Oil slipped toward $87 per barrel on Wednesday as the impact of a stronger dollar and a fall in Chinese oil imports outweighed news of a big drop in U.S. crude oil inventories. The dollar rose around 0.40 percent against a basket of currencies, its fourth day of gains after several months of losses ahead of the announcement of a second round of monetary stimulus.
- 09Nov
(Reuters) - Growth prospects across the rich world have not budged since the Federal Reserve announced a second round of bond purchases worth $600 billion, according to the latest Reuters poll of more than 200 economists. The latest consensus forecasts lend support to critics of the Fed's hotly-debated policy of further expanding its balance sheet to boost the economy who say it will do more to lift already-soaring asset prices instead.
- 09Nov
(Reuters) - BP and its partners all made serious mistakes in the run-up to the largest offshore oil spill in the U.S. history, illustrating the need for a better safety culture in the oil drilling sector, White House oil spill commission co-chair Bill Reilly said on Tuesday. Complacency at BP, as well as Transocean Ltd and Halliburton, led to serious missteps prior to the rig explosion that unleashed millions of barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico over the summer.
- 09Nov
(Reuters) - Goldman Sachs Group Inc's (GS.N) mortgage servicing unit has suspended evictions and foreclosures in some states, according to a regulatory filing on Tuesday. Goldman has been reviewing the practices of its Litton Loan Servicing unit after regulators and states attorneys general asked for information about its practices, as part of an industry-wide probe into banks' foreclosure practices, the firm said.
- 09Nov
(Reuters) - Gold hit record highs for a fourth day in a row on Tuesday, as fresh concern over the debt burdens of several euro zone member countries prompted safe-haven buying, while palladium rallied for a fifth day. Silver touched $28.90 an ounce, the highest since March 1980, palladium saw $732.50 an ounce, its highest since April 2001. Platinum hit $1,795.50, its highest since July 2008.
