business - "credit"

AP - Washington Mutual Corp., hard-hit by the mortgage and credit crises, said Monday it will replace Chief Executive Kerry Killinger as chairman of the board and take other steps to improve corporate governance.

Worrying news from the UK and US banking sectors heightened concerns that the financial crisis still had further to run and unsettled equity and credit markets on both sides of the Atlantic

AP - wall street retreated Monday on more signs of economic weakness and executive shake-ups at two major banks ? reminders of the ongoing fallout from the credit crisis. The Dow Jones industrial average fell more than 130 points.

Wall street stocks ended a four-session winning streak after shake-ups at two leading banks revived fears that the costs and casualties of the credit crisis would continue to mount

U.S. stocks slid on Monday on renewed fears the credit crunch has yet to run its course after Standard & Poor's downgraded debt ratings of three big securities companies and Wachovia , the fourth-largest U.S. bank, ousted its chief executive.

Move comes after big loan losses and regulatory embarrassments at the fourth largest us bank by assets, in a sign that the credit crisis has now reached the country's retail banking sector

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Downgrades of three U.S. investment banks, an ouster of Wachovia's chief executive, and a bleak U.K. housing market outlook from a British mortgage lender shook markets on Monday, reigniting fears that the global credit crunch will continue to hurt the world economy.

U.S. markets were rocked Monday as S&P slashed the credit ratings of some of the top investment banks in the United States.

NEW YORK, NY (MARKET WIRE) Kamakura Corporation announced Monday that its monthly index of troubled public companies showed strong improvement in May after deteriorating in 9 of the previous 10 months. Kamakura's troubled company index decreased significantly in May to 12.7%, down from 13.7% in April. The 1.0% decline is the biggest monthly improvement in credit quality since January 2007. At the current 12.7% level, the index shows that credit conditions are better than 48.7% of the monthly periods since the start of the index in January 1990. Kamakura defines a troubled company as a company whose default

THE future of BankWest is in doubt with its parent coming under severe funding pressure due to the global credit crunch.