The Bureau of Labor Statistics showed non-farm payroll report showed that the economy lost 62,000 jobs in June, which was the sixth straight and the longest job loss streak since 2002. June unemployment remained at 5.5%, after jumping .5% to it’s current 5.5% level in May — this is the highest level in four years.
July 2008
In an effort to fight inflation, the European Central Bank hiked their benchmark rates for the 15-country Euro zone by .25% today as expected, but implied that this is not the beginning of a campaign: “On the basis of our current assessment, the monetary policy stance following today’s decision will contribute to achieving our objective.”
RESPA PRIMER “Here in California why is it that a real estate agent (through their broker of record), can refer business to another, and ask/get a referral fee, while, for a loan agent, we cannot refer business to another loan agent, and get a referral fee, even if it was paid to our broker of
Apparently John McCain has found a campaign finance loophole to help raise more money for his presidential bid and to compete with Obama who raised so much money from individual contributors, he has opted out of the public financing model which limits him to $80m. Not that the 527 Group structure doesn’t already engineer its
The ADP Employment report showed 79,000 jobs lost in June. In recent months, the ADP report showed positive numbers and then the subsequent Bureau of Labor Statistics jobs reports have come in negative. The ADP report is produced by payroll processing company ADP, and they describe it as follows: The ADP National Employment Report® is
In their “Obligatory Green Issue” this week, The Onion recycled (get it? recycled?) a November 2000 story entitled 98% Of U.S. Commuters Favor Public Transportation For Others. Still rings true. Even amidst the gas crisis — and even though the 98% stat is a joke — you’d be hard pressed to find anyone outside of
The traditional definition of a bear market is a 20% market decline. It’s hard to peg an official bear market because maybe one index drops that much but the others don’t. Or maybe things rebound quickly after a drop. But as of today it seems to be real: Since their peaks in October 2007, the
Today, the Wall Street Journal ran their latest round up of UBS woes. But it wasn’t so much the story itself that’s news but the checklist they ran in their print edition on the cover of the Money and Investing section. The checklist pretty much sums it all up. This is what is before new
It seems that not a day goes by without someone asking, “Why are the numbers on a telephone key-pad reversed from those on a computer keyboard?” I don’t know why, but if one is really curious, or for that matter hadn’t even noticed until I just wrote that, click here. MARKET & ECONOMY UPDATE Why
My Mother liked to say, “No man has ever been shot while doing the dishes.” I can’t tie that in to RESPA news, but thought it was pretty witty. Speaking of matters related to doing dishes, any single guys looking for houses in Florida might be interested in this. Now that June is over with,