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I guess yesterday was the pause that refreshed the bulls because today we got a nice extension of Tuesday’s rally. There’s probably a lot of short covering going on so we’ll have to see if the volume can stay at relatively high levels once the panic buying dies down. I was a [...]

The Future of Capitalism: With lavish executive pay, inadequate boardroom expertise and a short-term shareholder focus all blamed for bringing about the crisis, Anglo-Saxon business approaches are likely to face wrenching changes

The Future of Capitalism: With lavish executive pay, inadequate boardroom expertise and a short-term shareholder focus all blamed for bringing about the crisis, Anglo-Saxon business approaches are likely to face wrenching changes

Billy Bragg was back on the barricades this week, and not just playing gigs to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the miners’ strike. The protest singer wants to play a part in setting up a t...

Jack Welch, who is regarded as father of the 'shareholder value' movement, has said the obsession with short-term profits and share price gains that has dominated the corporate world for over 20 years was 'a dumb idea'

At the moment everyone on the planet would like a cheaper currency, but the problem is that not everyone can devalue at once, writes John Authers

The new, easier rules to claim service tax refunds announced on Thursday were still falling short, say exporters, who have Rs 2,000 crore pending with the finance ministry.

Gold prices surged on a windfall of events this morning that ignited a strong 'Flight to Quality' move among investors. Several key global events acted as a catalyst to rising gold, first of which was worst than expected unemployment data out of Australia at 5.2%, the highest rate in several years. In the US, GE long term debt was downgraded from AAA to AA+ this corporate paper...

These are some stocks that have been tagged by users over at StockTickr: INGN: INTROGEN THERAPEUTICS INC Outlook: Short Industry: Drug Related Products New low on 36.35 times average volume: 2,035,531 vs. 56,000 (tags: short, New Low on Huge Volume) LMNX: LUMINEX CORPORATION Outlook: Long Industry: Medical Instruments Supls New high on 4.68 times average volume: 1,323,724 vs. 283,117 (tags: long, New High on Huge [...]

Insurance firms teeter on the brinkIF BANKS go bang, life insurance firms sputter. That was the theory going into the crisis. Both hold financial assets, like corporate debt, that have incurred losses, but the nature of insurers’ liabilities should allow them to ride out short-term volatility. Banks depend on nervy depositors and wholesale lenders. Life insurers typically have low gearing, and the policyholders who fund the bulk of their assets are “sticky”, with long-term contracts that incur penalty charges if they are cancelled. As a result regulators and credit-rating agencies promised to avoid knee-jerk reactions to mark-to-market losses. They were further reassured by the shift of insurers in the past decade from equities into supposedly safer credit investments, and their low exposure to the toxic structured-credit assets that blew up many banks.Yet a year and a half into the financial crisis, this defence looks hollow. America’s life insurers are now und