Friday, August 17, 2007

Today's Headlines

Bloomberg:
- In the world’s financial markets, the subprime mortgage collapse may finally be contained.
- Hurricane Dean strengthened into a major hurricane today as it slapped the islands of St. Lucia, Martinique and Dominica with torrential downpours and gusting winds, then plowed into the eastern Caribbean Sea.
- Research In Motion(RIMM), the maker of the BlackBerry e-mail device, rose as much as 7.4% in Nasdaq Stock Market trading after an analyst said the company’s third-quarter forecast will “blow away” estimates.

- Goldman Sachs(GS) said the Federal Reserve will cut the overnight target interest rate to 4.5% from 5.25% this year, citing “sharp tightening in financial conditions” and expectations the economy will slow.
- A majority of Americans surveyed in new CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll said President Bush and the Democratic Congress are “failures.”

Wall Street Journal:
- With risks to the economy from financial market turbulence rising “appreciably,” the Federal Reserve on Friday lowered the rate it charges banks on loans they receive from the Fed’s discount window by one-half-percentage point to 5.75%, though it opted not to cut its primary policy tool, the federal funds rate.
- As a presidential candidate, Democrat John Edwards has regularly attacked subprime lenders, particularly those that have filed foreclosure suits against victims of Hurricane Katrina. But as an investor, Mr. Edwards has ties to lenders foreclosing on Katrina victims.

- With stocks advancing after the Federal Reserve stepped toward a possible cut in its key rate, Wall Street worked to assess just how much its move would matter for financial markets roiled by the drying-up of liquidity.
- The US needs more spending on infrastructure and fewer pork-barrel handouts, Harold Ford and Jim Hall wrote.

Digitimes:
- Nintendo Co. has delayed plans to expand production of its Wii games console because of a shortage of components.

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