Stories related to: finance

If college grads are looking glum this year, it's likely because they face a tighter job market once they turn their tassels. More than one million grads will look harder to find work, the Christian Science Monitor reports, and job growth has hit a 5-year low. Companies "are just being a lot more cautious," one analyst said. "It's just starting to hit the college market." More »

The Group of Seven's finance ministers are getting more aggressive about stopping the greenback's decline, the Wall Street Journal reports. In what counts as blunt words for the group, a statement yesterday expressed concern about the plummeting dollar's "possible implications for economic and financial stability." The change in tone since the group's last meeting a year ago is aimed at sending a signal to traders; the ministers stopped short of using G-7 money to buy up dollars to push the currency upward. More »

The Bear Stearns crisis was bad news for many, but it was good news—or at least good business—for financial analysts at London-based Breaking Views. The credit crunch is increasing demand for the company’s financial insights, offered online and, through various partnerships, in print. Breaking Views is seizing the moment, courting more newspapers and offering free online columns, the Guardian reports. More »

Investment banks got a brief lift from Wall Street results this week, but surprising reports from Credit Suisse are likely to send their confidence back into the basement, the Financial Times reports. The Swiss firm issued an unexpected first-quarter profits warning yesterday—and said “intentional misconduct” from its own traders was partly to blame. Credit Suisse's shares took a 9% dive following the disclosure. More »

Investment manager Joe Rosenberg takes a swipe at Microsoft's bid for Yahoo in this week's Barron's , disparaging both the deal and CEO Steve Ballmer's financial acumen, Reuters reports. "It's a bad reflection on Ballmer that he's willing to pay a ridiculous price for Yahoo,” says Rosenberg. “Microsoft is not going to earn anything like a reasonable rate of return in Yahoo." An increased bid, which Yahoo is seeking, would be even worse, he says. More »

Death won't stop Comcast's founder from being paid: A deal signed last week ensures that his heirs will receive checks for five years after Ralph J. Roberts, 87, dies, the AP reports. They will also get unpaid funds from his annual performance-based bonus, and his wife will receive health and welfare assistance for life. Roberts, whose 2006 salary was $1.8 million, remains on Comcast's board of directors. More »

The government of Abu Dhabi, through its investment arm, bought an 8.1% stake in Advanced Micro Devices for $622 million. It will receive 49 million newly-issued AMD shares, but won't get any board representation. The computer chip maker desperately needs the cash after a $396 million loss during the third quarter, reports the Wall Street Journal . More »

Some earn money; some write about it. Some do both. CNN Money recommends these six memoirs about money: getting it, managing it, spending it, and not having enough of it: The Age of Turbulence by Alan Greenspan Reminiscences of a Stock Operator by Edwin Lefevre American Sucker by David Denby More »

Don't let emotional pain cloud your judgment on financial matters—you may both end up the poorer for it. Here are five divorce pitfalls to avoid, from USA Today : Clinging to the house if you can't afford the upkeep. Not making a clean break on joint accounts. More »

Two financial giants posted dramatic earnings this morning: Goldman Sachs wowed investors with a 79% surge in third quarter net income, while Bear Stearns’ dropped 61% thanks to massive hedge-fund losses. The two were on opposite sides of the subprime collapse. Bear Stearns is among the top packagers of mortgage-based securities, which Goldman short-sold for huge gains. More »

Almost $140 billion in commercial paper has matured and is up for renewal by next week, and banks need to attract buyers to pay it off. The yield on the short-term loans, which are entangled in the subprime mortgage crisis, is skyrocketing. "This could be a pivotal seven to 10 days,'' one credit strategist tells Bloomberg. More »

The feds don’t know what happened to the millions of dollars that disappeared from the books of a Chicago-area cash management firm, but they don’t believe upheaval in the credit markets is to blame. Days after Sentinel Management blocked investors from withdrawing their investments, the company filed for bankruptcy, citing market turmoil—an excuse the SEC calls “false and misleading.” More »

Freddie Mac posted a 45% drop in net income for the second quarter, and said the outlook wasn't rosy for the third. The home-mortgage financier was hit with a $320 million loss on new mortgages. Freddie Mac doesn't buy subprimes directly, but is still affected by the general mortgage turmoil. More »

Get where you want to be with these sound tips from the top, courtesy of Money Magazine: Be humble in the face of uncertainty. Take calculated risks. Have an emergency fund. More »

The subprime mortgage crisis may spark another financial disaster: bad credit card debt. When rates hit 50-year lows, many owners borrowed against their homes to pay off high-interest credit cards. Now, with rates increasing, many may not be able to pay down both their mortgages and their credit cards, the Chicago Tribune reports, and will default or go bankrupt. More »

The FT leads with a prediction that market volatility will decrease over the next week for a simple reason: everyone's going on vacation. Major decisions by banks, hedge funds and mortgage lenders will be on hold as the financial world bails New York, London and Frankfurt for the end of the summer season. More »

Unrest in the financial markets and housing sector has consumers on edge, a new survey says. The Washington Post /ABC News "consumer comfort index" nosedived this week, displaying the biggest 1-week plunge in the poll's 22-year history, the newspaper reports. The current reading nearly matches the lows reached after Katrina struck 2 years ago. More »

The Economist takes the long view on the turmoil that has engulfed the financial markets, noting that investors have long wondered whether the "the securitisation of just about every form of debt into a tradable asset" would, in the end, spread risk efficiently or lead to cataclysmic failure. The immediate threat, it argues, is to the banking system, where lack of confidence in lending can cripple otherwise solvent institutions. More »

In a surprise move, the Fed cut its discount rate, which it charges on direct loans to banks, from 6.25% to 5.75% this morning. The central bank acted to calm fears about uncertainty in the global markets surrounding the worsening credit crunch and underlying subprime-loan crisis. The federal funds rate, which banks charge each other, was unchanged at 5.25%. More »

The Dell computer company will have to restate four years of financial data after an audit revealed that executives inflated numbers to meet quarterly goals, firm officials announced yesterday. The adjustments would lower the company's stated net income by as much as $150 million, Reuters reports. But analysts say the news is better than expected, with Dell rising 3 percent in after-hours trading. More »