The Trump administration’s moves against China have cooled some business activity in the central Chinese province of Shaanxi, according to a local official. “America’s 301 article investigation I believe … has poured cold water on those who strive to build the U.S.-China relationship,” an official from the Shaanxi Provincial government told a few U.S. journalists […]

Equifax shares fell 8 percent on Monday on top of a 13 percent tumble on Friday after the credit reporting company disclosed a data breach affecting the personal information of 143 million people. John Gamble, Equifax’s chief financial officer, had been scheduled to speak at the Barclays Global Financial Services conference in New York at […]

Stock markets around the world are rallying quite nicely on Monday as Hurricane Irma did not cause as much damage as previously feared, and North Korea did not launch another missile over the weekend. The S&P 500 and the Dow are set to see their best sessions since March 1, and their second-best gains of […]

The difficult trading environment on Wall Street in 2017 appears not to be getting much better, with Citigroup warning Monday that its revenue probably will be off 15 percent in the third quarter. Speaking at a Barclays banking conference, Citi CEO John Gerspach predicted the decline amid subdued market volatility. Gerspach said volatility “has remained […]

Both cotton and orange juice futures fell sharply on Monday as destruction from Hurricane Irma appeared less than feared. Orange juice futures traded about 3.5 percent lower after jumping nearly 13 percent last week ahead of anticipated crop destruction from the huge storm. That was orange juice futures’ best week since Oct. 16, 2015 when […]

At last year’s Delivering Alpha conference, Bill Miller of Miller Value Partners opened with a quote read by someone at a party honoring Marxist revolutionary leader Leon Trotsky decades after his death: “Proof of Trotsky’s farsightedness is that none of his predictions have come true yet.” One year later, some of Miller’s predictions at that […]

If you subscribe to Nobel Prize winner Paul Samuelson’s philosophy that “investing should be more like watching paint dry or grass grow,” then you’re likely drawn to indexing. Given the sheer number of index funds, an all-index portfolio is not hard to come by. “For the vast majority of investors, putting together a simple, straightforward […]

Check out which companies are making headlines before the bell: Insurance stocks – Florida-based insurers and their reinsurers are in focus today as the impact from hurricanes Irma and Harvey is assessed. Among them: HCI Group, Universal Insurance Holdings, Heritage Insurance, XL Group, and Everest Re Group. Johnson & Johnson – J&J’s Janssen pharmaceutical unit […]

A veteran Wall Street forecaster is out with a warning, and it has nothing to do with a broad-based stock market sell-off. Wunderlich Securities’ Art Hogan is arguing you’ll “get your face ripped off if you’re in the wrong sector.” The issue has to do with the lengthy low-yield environment. He says the impact would […]

September so far is living up to its reputation as the market’s cruelest month. Major indexes are uniformly negative so far, with the once-untouchable tech shares leading the way lower. Things don’t get any easier, even though it looked like Monday was going to get off to a strong start. As Hurricane Irma tears its […]