Only One Fund Manager Made Money in 2008

Low interest rates entice small, leveraged players

(NEWSER) - Trading volume is rising on Wall Street, but it’s not because of renewed confidence from long-term investors. The surge has instead been powered by a 14% jump from online brokerages like Charles Schwab and TD Ameritrade, and much of the money has been funneled into volatile parts of the market. Day traders, in other words, are back, trying to ride the latest market rally, the Wall Street Journal reports. More»

(NEWSER) - President Obama wants to put the so-called dark markets under control, the New York Times reports, seeking congressional approval to regulate the byzantine world of derivatives trading—which played a large role in the current financial mess. In a letter to lawmakers, Treasury chief Timothy Geithner calls for an oversight system to be run either by the Securities and Exchange Commission or the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. More»

(NEWSER) - NBC CEO Jeff Zucker said today that Jon Stewart’s Daily Show attacks are “incredibly unfair to CNBC and the business media,” Broadcasting & Cable reports. “CNBC is a spectacular organization and in particular Jim Cramer,” Zucker continued. “What is going on now is absurd.” The media isn’t responsible for the financial crisis, he said, in the same way it’s not to blame for the Iraq war. More»

Both possibilities hard to believe, friends say of inseparable couple

(NEWSER) - Bernard Madoff and his wife, Ruth, have been married for nearly 50 years and are practically inseparable. They worked together, and the outgoing blonde with the all-American look attracted friends to his hedge fund, the New York Times reports. So did she know or didn't she? "It’s hard to imagine that she could live with the guy for 50 years and have no inkling," one investor and old friend said. More»

(NEWSER) - Amid dire economic projections, the maker of Jack Daniel’s Tennessee whiskey is having a banner year, the LA Times reports. “We had a nice quarter,” Brown-Forman’s CEO said of sales and income that bested Wall Street estimates. Even a bad employment report today couldn’t sink the spirit seller, whose shares rose more than $4 today, a 9% bump. More»