Even as unemployment keeps falling, wages just aren’t picking up. With nobody confidently able to explain why, the Federal Reserve should have the confidence to take it slow on raising rates. The U.S. added 252,000 jobs in December, the Labor...
A mixed December jobs report likely keeps the Federal Reserve on course to remain patient about raising short-term interest rates, meaning no action at least until April and probably longer. Payroll employment growth has clearly picked up and the jobless...
After six straight months of plunging oil prices, U.S. shale drillers have sent the clearest signal to date that they’re retreating. Thirty-five horizontal rigs, their weapon of choice for reaching oil deposits in tight-rock formations such as North Dakota’s Bakken...
Believing as I do in the sage advice of Mr. Graham, I recently set out to quantify my growing unease with the heights obtained by the bull market of the last five-plus years. As you read below, please realize that...
European government bond prices surged to highs after weak manufacturing data reinforced hopes that the European Central Bank will expand its asset-purchase program to include government debt early this year. The yield on the 10-year German bund sank below 0.5%...
Pacific Investment Management Co.’s biggest mutual fund suffered about $19.4 billion in withdrawals in December, the 20th straight month of redemptions, capping a year that included the surprise departures of Bill Gross and Mohamed El-Erian. Redemptions from the Pimco Total Return Fund (PTTRX) in...
The U.S. economy enters 2015 with the strongest momentum in at least a decade and as the fittest of all the industrialized nations. The question is whether that muscle can help yank the rest of the world out of its...
The U.S. economy is rounding out 2014 in a sweet spot of robust growth, sustained hiring and falling unemployment, stirring optimism that a postrecession breakout has arrived. A fuller picture of the year-end trends emerged Tuesday when the Commerce Department,...
Everybody loves a big, round number, especially in the stock market and especially when that number is climbing higher rather than plunging lower. Investors have endured both over the past seven years, watching as the widely watched Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed...
The average price of regular gasoline at U.S. pumps slid to the lowest level since May 15, 2009, dropping 24.68 cents in the two weeks ended Dec. 19 to $2.4713 a gallon, according to Lundberg Survey Inc. Prices are 79.05...
The Federal Reserve is edging closer to raising interest rates from record lows given a strengthening U.S. job market and economy. But it says it will be "patient" in determining when to raise rates. The Fed said Wednesday after a...
The aggregation rule will only apply to distributions from different IRAs if each of the distributions occurs after 2014. The Internal Revenue Service has expanded the transitional relief from the limitation on individual retirement account rollovers to one in 12...
To you, the money you’re thinking of rolling over into an IRA represents a lifetime of saving you’re counting on to sustain you in retirement. But to some financial advisers, it’s a commission honey pot. If you’re like most people,...
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe announced on Tuesday a delay in a second sales tax hike a day after Japan stunned economists when the country unexpectedly fell into recession. Abe also called for a snap election in a bid to get...
More than 50 popular tax provisions expired at the end of 2013. Without legislative action, businesses won't get a credit for research activities or be able to immediately deduct one-half of the cost of new business equipment. Individuals would lose...
