The feared recession in the US economy has already arrived, according to a report from Merrill Lynch. It said that Friday's employment report, which sent shares tumbling worldwide, confirmed that the US is in the first month of a recession.
Barack Obama and Mike Huckabee have won their party caucuses in the US state of Iowa, the first test in the race to choose the candidates for president.
Toyota Motor Corp. overtook Ford Motor Co. to become the No. 2 automaker by U.S. sales in 2007, using new products and relentless strategy to break Ford's 75-year lock on the position. General Motors remained the US sales leader with 3.82 million vehicles.
The United States manufacturing sector will face turbulent times next year due in large part to the continuing housing collapse. As a result, the economic landscape will remain highly volatile in 2008 before rebounding in 2009, according to the Manufacturers Alliance/MAPI Quarterly Industrial Outlook, a report that analyzes 27 major industries.
The U.S. Congress has approved a historic energy bill that increases U.S. fuel efficiency standards in cars and trucks. President George Bush is expected to sign the measure into law.
The US Federal Reserve approved Tuesday measures to give mortgage holders far more protection to prevent the current housing crisis from worsening further. Tough new regulations will ensure lenders take into account a borrower's ability to repay a loan and would not penalize those making early repayments.
The 800,000 dollars cash suitcase scandal extending from Miami to Caracas and Buenos Aires could send three Venezuelans and a Uruguayan, if convicted, to a US federal prison for up to ten years and a 250.000 US dollars fine.
The United States Federal Reserve, European Central Bank and central banks from the UK, Canada and Switzerland are to jointly help banks deal with the credit crunch. Each has announced that they will provide billions in loans to banks in order to lower interest rates and ease the availability of credit.
The U.S. subprime mortgage crisis was an accident waiting to happen as a period of unprecedented global growth seduced investors into under-pricing risk, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan argued in an article published by The Wall Street Journal on Wednesday.
As anticipated by markets and concerned with slower economic growth and softer business and consumer spending the United States Federal Reserve cut on Tuesday the basic interest rate 25 points to 4.25%.