Imagine that you want to buy a home. You might find a real-estate agent to show you around, which is a very 20th-century way of doing things. Or you might go 21st century and use the Web to research prices and available properties and to take a few virtual tours.
Read moreSubprime Loans Are Back!
Five years after the worst of the financial crisis, subprime loans are creeping back, this time primarily in the form of auto loans. As U.S. auto sales have surged, credit standards have moved lower, with more than a quarter of all auto financing now classified as subprime.
Read moreThe Zombie Numbers That Rule the U.S. Economy
This Thursday the Conference Board, a global business association, released its monthly index of “leading economic indicators.” Like the unemployment and inflation, housing starts, G.D.P. changes and other figures, these numbers arrive in metronomic waves.
Read moreA House Is a Home—Not an Investment
Five years after the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the onset of the 2008-2009 financial crisis, the U.S. housing market is at last starting to thrive. It has, in fact, been steadily improving over the past years, and that trend has only accelerated of late.
Read moreA recovery without a home
Five years after the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the onset of the 2008-2009 financial crisis, the U.S. housing market is at last starting to thrive. It has, in fact, been steadily improving over the past years, and that trend has only accelerated of late. Housing is widely perceived as a key ingredient to a healthy economy, and so the revival in the housing market has been heralded as a positive step for an American system that has been sluggish at best. Similar trends in the United Kingdom and parts of the EU are greeted as positives as well.
Read moreZACHARY KARABELL ON JPMORGAN CHASE'S RISKY BUSINESS
Question: When does risk aversion become risky behavior? Answer: when you are a large financial institution in today’s world, especially a behemoth bank like JPMorgan Chase, attempting to navigate both labyrinthine regulations and shareholder demand for endless profit.
Read moreDUBAI: TOO BIG TO FAIL
The recent gala opening of the Atlantis hotel on Dubai's Palm island gave one a strong sense the emirate's elite were fiddling while Rome burned. The sheets had hardly been stripped from the beds of the departing guests when the hotel's developer, the government-owned Nakheel Properties,
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