After years of costly layoffs and plant closings, things are looking up for the heavy-machinery giant Caterpillar, which forecasts solid global sales growth and increased demand this year. Yet despite the corporate investment incentives at the center of President Trump’s tax overhaul, the company’s executives have no plans to supercharge investment or expansion. Caterpillar’s plans […]
Read more
INTEREST rates are heading higher and that is likely to put financial markets under strain. Investors and regulators would both dearly love to know where the next crisis will come from. What is the most likely culprit? Financial crises tend to involve one or more of these three ingredients: excessive borrowing, concentrated bets, and a […]
Read more
BUSINESS school graduates do not all want to work in investment banking these days. The industry does not have the same kind of cachet it did before Lehman Brothers went bust. Still, 31% of those who left Harvard Business School last year went into financial services. That made it easily the most popular sector, as […]
Read moreHome prices have been rising steadily since the recession, but the gains are suddenly accelerating as spring demand heats up in an already highly lean and competitive market. Prices surged 7 percent higher in March compared with a year ago, according to CoreLogic. That is the biggest gain since May 2014. All 50 states saw […]
Read moreCurrency, United States Finance
Why the ‘lone jihadi’ poses the greatest terror threat to this summer’s World Cup in Russia
Security experts have named “lone jihadi” attacks the biggest terror threat during the 2018 World Cup in Russia this summer. Sunni Islamist militants, particularly Russian jihadists returning from conflict zones, are the primary source of concern for Moscow, according to a report released Tuesday by Jane’s, the defense and security wing of IHS Markit. The […]
Read moreU.S. factory activity slowed for a second straight month in April, weighed down by shortages of skilled workers and rising capacity constraints, but strengthening global demand continues to support manufacturing. The Institute for Supply Management (ISM) survey published on Tuesday also showed a jump in the cost of raw materials, with prices for steel and […]
Read moreBritain is set to enforce greater transparency in tax havens after a minister for the U.K. government announced Tuesday it would not oppose a legal amendment proposed by a cross-party alliance of lawmakers. Some overseas British territories that are notorious for being tax havens for the world’s wealthiest, such as the Cayman Islands and the […]
Read moreCurrency, United States Finance
US needs to catch up with Europe to regulate tech giants like Facebook, congressman says
The United States is failing to keep up with Europe in regulating technology corporations like Facebook and Google, a congressman told CNBC on Monday. Rep. John Sarbanes, D-Maryland, said that he was concerned about the U.S.’s lack of tools for dealing with tech companies that fail to prevent the misuse of users’ data. Facebook has […]
Read moreAmazon is adding 2,000 jobs to its Boston tech hub in fields including cloud computing and speech science, the company announced Tuesday. Boston is one of the tech giant’s largest footholds and is a finalist to win the company’s second headquarters. Amazon has been paying visits to each of the 20 North American finalists. Amazon […]
Read moreCurrency, United States Finance
Trump looks set to scrap Iran's nuclear deal — and this is where it'll hurt the most
Iran’s fragile economic recovery is in jeopardy with President Donald Trump widely expected to scrap an internationally-brokered nuclear deal and re-impose sanctions against the regime. Trump has given the European nations that helped broker the 2015 nuclear deal — which he called “terrible” — until May 12 to change it, but that is looking increasingly […]
Read more