Archive for July 28th, 2009

NEW YORK: Microsoft and Yahoo have finally come to a search deal and will announce the details of the agreement in the next 24 hours, according to a report.It is not clear whether the two companies have signed any official papers, but the negotiations of the deal, which also includes advertising, have finally come to a close, The Wall Street Journal said Tuesday. Yahoo (YHOO, Fortune 500) and Microsoft (MSFT, Fortune 500) have been in talks for some time to join forces on Internet search and advertising technology. Together, the two could stand a better chance to gain market share from rival Google (GOOG, Fortune 500). 0:00
/5:11Tech earnings strengthMicrosoft launched its own Internet search portal, Bing, in early June. While Bing met with initial success, Microsoft has still been unable to post a profit in its online advertising business.Microsoft and Yahoo would share revenues on the deal, and Yahoo would not get any money up front, according to the Journal.

Source:CNN

NEW YORK (CNN) — Certified Public Accountant Tom Critelli has never regretted the day 18 years ago when he gave up a secure accounting job to become a homebuilder. But he’s thought about it recently as the housing market has continued to sink.”I’ve always said to my wife we can go back to doing that,” reflected Critelli, President of New Jersey-based Danitom Development Inc.Before retreating to number crunching, which he concedes was “boring,” Critelli is making every effort to remain in business, even as competitors are folding. He’s slashed his staff, now employing only two full-time workers, down from a dozen; he’s sold off the majority of plots on which he had planned to build, enabling him to pay off millions in bank debt; and, he’s broken ground on only three homes this year compared to more than 50 just a few short years ago. It still hasn’t been enough.”We’re struggling. There’s only so long you can stay on,” said Critelli.So, the accountant-turned-homebuilder is now looking to Uncle Sam, not for a bailout, but for a piece of the economic stimulus pie. In partnership with contractors who have experience working for the government, Critelli is bidding to repair military recruiting centers and facilities at New Jersey’s Fort Dix.”We’re trying to not put all our eggs in one basket anymore,” said Critelli. “I’m hoping a government contract can save the business, to keep going for the next year or two, till we get out of the housing crisis.”Though not as severe as the Sun Belt’s decline, New Jersey’s housing market has suffered. State building permits for the first five months of the year were down 65% from the comparable time frame in 2005, a record year, according to the U.S. Census Bureau and the New Jersey Homebuilders Association.”It’s been a crash and most people will tell you it’s been a depression,” Critelli said.0:00
/1:58Builders hope for piece of pieDanitom Development specializes in building single-family homes for first-time home buyers, typically priced near 300,000, relatively low for New Jersey. In today’s economy, Critelli points out, some of his potential buyers are unable to get mortgages from banks that several years ago were happy to take them on as leveraged buyers.The National Association of Home Builders says first-time buyers usually are instrumental to picking up the housing market during recessions.”The first-time buyer doesn’t have to sell a house. That’s important in this cycle with values falling, a repurchaser has less equity and has to find a buyer before they can shop,” said David Crowe, Chief Economist of the Association.But, Critelli has yet to see any bounceback. Two of the three homes Danitom has under construction are unsold.”What was projected to be a 400,000 house is now down to 359,000 and it’ll probably sell for something less than that, 10-20,000 less, below what we’re asking right now,” Critelli said, walking through one of his construction sites.Much is riding on Critelli’s bid for new business since he has a son in college and a daughter about to enroll. The Critellis already have had to sell their beach home, raid their 401(k), and tap other savings. But, Tom Critelli — who has a “Never Give Up” slogan posted in his office — is confident not only that he’ll win a government contract, but also that the home building business will eventually come bouncing back so he can rebuild his business.”I hope to be in it for the long haul. I mean people need places to live, that is the American Dream,” Critelli said.

Source:CNN

(breakingviews.com) — GE Capital is taking on the doubters. The finance arm of General Electric (GE, Fortune 500) on Tuesday addressed investors skeptical of its fit within the industrial conglomerate.Chief among the messages: The business is adequately funded; it has enough capital to handle potential loan losses; and it is basically above average in what it does relative to big U.S. banks. But if that’s all true, why does GE Capital need the special treatment it is fighting for on Capitol Hill?The Obama administration’s regulatory reform plans would ramp up the constraints on financial firms that are big enough to represent a systemic risk. But GE Capital is lobbying to exempt its 650 billion balance sheet from such a high level of oversight. But if it’s so good at what it does, it shouldn’t need that kind of help.The full-court press the company is unleashing in Washington is also at odds with what GE Capital itself conveyed to shareholders. The first slide of its 63-page manifesto says its loan portfolios are “performing as expected or slightly better” and exhibiting loss rates “most below the Federal Reserve Base Case.” It expects loan losses in 2010 to mirror those of the current year, and it doesn’t need more capital “even under adverse scenarios.”GE Capital rolled out the numbers to buttress its above-average banking prowess. The company said it has 25 billion of financial receivables to U.S. consumers, with reserves equal to 6.6% of these loans — above the 6.1% average held by the top three American banks. Similarly, it has reserves equal to 1.5% of the 93 billion of loans extended to U.S. businesses, higher than the 1.1% held by the big banks.But here’s the problem. If GE Capital really is adequately capitalized to handle rising defaults, manages to get more than rivals from customers who can’t pay their bills, and has enough funding to weather ructions in the capital markets, it makes special treatment as a non-bank financial institution seem unnecessary.The company also considers itself to be an “important source of liquidity to U.S. businesses and consumers.” GE Capital’s balance sheet would make it the country’s fifth-largest bank. So GE Capital is right that it’s an important player in the financial system. And that’s how it should be regulated.

Source:CNN

NEW YORK: Loan servicers will “significantly” increase the pace of mortgage modifications under the Obama foreclosure prevention program, the Treasury Department said Tuesday.The Obama administration wants to see 500,000 trial modifications in place by Nov. 1. Currently, 200,000 are underway.Officials called executives from 25 servicers participating in the program to Washington Tuesday to discuss improving the 5-month-old plan’s implementation. Both the Obama administration and the industry are feeling mounting pressure from borrowers who say their servicers are not responding to their calls and applications, losing their paperwork or not making decisions.”[T]oo many homeowners are at risk of foreclosure right now,” Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner said in a statement Tuesday. “Today’s meeting was an opportunity to identify ways to accelerate the program and bring relief faster.”Announced in February, the loan modification plan allows eligible borrowers who are in or at risk of default to lower their monthly payments to no more than 31% of their pre-tax income through a loan modification. The adjustments are made permanent after the homeowner makes three on-time payments. Homeowners, servicers and mortgage investors receive incentive payments in hopes of increasing participation.So far, the government has committed 20 billion to the effort and has said it would provide 75 billion overall.0:00
/3:57Hope Now’s foreclosure fightMost servicers started implementing the program in April and May, but soon faced harsh criticism as applications flooded in. CNNMoney.com has heard overwhelming negative reviews from the nearly 500 people who wrote in about their experiences.”Obama’s plan is a joke,” wrote Jean in Michigan. “The banks are a joke. fax, fax, fax, call, call, call and no response for months. Even washington rep can’t get an answer or help, what a sham!!!!”Also, the number of people falling behind on their payments continues to mount, especially as unemployment rises. Some 1.5 million people fell into foreclosure in the first half of 2009, up 15% from a year ago.Even President Obama acknowledges that the program is failing to stem the foreclosure tidal wave. “Our mortgage program has actually helped to modify mortgages for a lot of our people, but it hasn’t been keeping pace with all the foreclosures that are taking place,” Obama said last month. The administration has said the plan could help up to 4 million people avoid foreclosure. Though officials said they are on track to reach their goal, the Government Accountability Office cast doubts in a report last week on whether this number could be achieved.To help servicers speed up the modification process, the administration said it will work with the institutions to set more exacting performance measures, such as average borrower wait time, document handling and response time for completed applications. Officials will release their first progress report on each servicer — detailing the number of trail modification offers were extended and are underway — by Aug. 4.Servicers were spending all of Tuesday meeting with Treasury and Housing department officials in the morning and early afternoon, and then with housing counselors in the latter part of the day.In the morning session, servicers said they would like to see a standardization of documents and definitions, which will speed their application review process. Also, they asked the administration to create a Web site where borrowers could apply for a modification and submit their documentation electronically, rather than fax them in. And financial institutions said they are looking into why only 50% of the troubled borrowers they contact respond.”Everyone said they are working hard,” said an industry insider briefed on the discussions.How has President Obama’s 787 billion stimulus program affected you or your community? Are you seeing a benefit from the Making Work Pay tax cuts or the additional 25 in unemployment benefits? Are you seeing construction jobs or other stimulus-funded work in your neighborhood? Do you still have a job because of stimulus funds? We want to hear your experiences. E-mail your story to realstories@cnnmoney.com or send in an iReport and you could be part of an upcoming article. For the CNNMoney.com Comment Policy, click here.

Source:CNN

NEW YORK (Fortune) — Word is that the Commodities Futures Trading Commission is set to do an about-face on the role speculators play in setting oil prices. According to the Wall Street Journal, a CFTC study set to be released next month will find speculators to blame for last year’s high prices. Presumably, the study will provide some intellectual justification for the Obama administration’s plan to rein in oil speculators.I’m on record in this space arguing that traders who flip futures contracts — in other words, speculators — cannot have a material impact on price if they’re never taking physical delivery of the commodity. Until now, that’s been the position of the CFTC, and it has also been the finding of countless academics who’ve studied this subject.0:00
/3:05Indonesia attracts oil investorsYes, oil companies also faulted speculators for high prices last year, but who can blame them for wanting out of the political firing line? Oil company traders knew full well that the commodity funds that buy and sell futures contracts are not equipped to take or make delivery of oil. Oil refiners understood that speculators must sell their futures contracts before they expire. That’s why the near-future price of oil — the price of oil for September delivery, say — cannot get too far away from the realities of supply and demand in the physical market. No oil company trader worth his salt is going to pay an above-market price to a commodities fund manager who is under time pressure to sell.Indeed, this helps explain why at the peak of the oil market last June, the average commodities hedge fund, as tracked by the FTSE CTA Managed Futures Index, had a minus-2.2% trailing 12-month total return. Speculators’ poor returns also demonstrate that a lot of them were, contrary to popular myth, betting that oil prices would go lower, not higher. In other words, they were speculating the wrong way.So what happens if the anti-speculator lobby gets its way? Stop Oil Speculation Now, a coalition of airlines, gas-station owners, and heating-oil companies, wants legislation that would put strict limits on futures trading by anyone who does not intend on taking delivery of oil. U.S. Rep. John Larson of Connecticut, chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, has introduced legislation that would do just that.My response: Be careful what you wish for. If you tell investors that they have to take delivery in order to invest in oil, that’s exactly what they will do. They will store oil in every onshore oil tank or offshore supertanker they can get their hands on, thereby siphoning off oil that would otherwise be available to consumers. It will be a replay of the late 1970s, when the Hunt Brothers took delivery of 10% of the world’s silver supply, causing silver prices to quadruple.Don’t believe me? Consider what happened in January, when the price of oil futures four months out was 15 a barrel higher than the spot price, which incentivized oil companies and investment banks to store oil like crazy.So if Congress and President Obama really want to enact regulation that encourages hoarding, I say go right ahead. It will prove my point — albeit at the expense of 300 million American consumers.

NEW YORK (Fortune) — Investors have been putting more money into Japanese equity funds than they’ve been taking out for four straight weeks, according to fund flow tracker EPFR. The streak is the longest since the third quarter of 2008.According to EPFR, investors are taking a more positive view of the export-dependent Japanese economy because they believe it will benefit from “demand from China… and the U.S. and the yen’s recent depreciation versus the U.S. dollar.”So are investors onto something?This question gets an adamant no from economist Carl Weinberg with High Frequency Economics.”I think Japan has appeared to be a safe haven to some investors,” he says, “and I don’t understand it.” He notes that industrial production there is down about 30% and exports have dropped almost 40%. Moreover, Weinberg thinks Japan, with its huge fiscal deficit and exploding debt-to-GDP ratio, is in worse shape than Europe and North America. And he says he has found no evidence that the new government likely to take power after elections in August has any plan to close the deficit. “Structurally, cyclically, and super-cyclically Japan is flawed,” says Weinberg. “I think Japan is economically broken.”0:00
/1:01Japanese electronics sufferStuart Schweitzer, global markets strategist for J.P. Morgan’s Private Bank, believes investors may be turning to Japan because they think the worst is over. When the credit crisis hit last year, “Japan suffered disproportionately,” he says, “and people are hoping it will benefit disproportionately to the upside.”But Schweitzer doesn’t completely agree with the optimists. “Every time Japan has started to do well, something has happened to knock it back down,” he says.Japanese manufacturing activity slowed severely last year and early this year, so it might rebound more than manufacturing activity in other places, he says. However, that may not translate into increased profitability. Japan’s unit labor costs are reaccelerating, while in the U.S. they’ve been slowing. So U.S. manufacturers may get more of a boost from an economic recovery.Investors might also be looking to get into Japan, because it’s powered in large part by technology companies, Schweitzer says, and tech has been leading this rally. However, he notes that the economies of Singapore, Taiwan, Korea, and China are all more tech-heavy than Japan’s.Schweitzer thinks that the rest of Asia has been a better place to invest and expects it to remain so in the months ahead. “It remains incredibly dynamic and has huge tailwinds from developments in China,” he says, adding that non-Japan Asia also has more policy support for growth.His bottom line: “Japan is a country very slow to change, in contrast with much of Asia and America,” he says. “I think there are more attractive places for capital these days.”Richard Jerram, chief economist at Macquarie Securities in Tokyo, doesn’t think that U.S. investors actually have that much of an appetite for Japan right now. He sees the current rally being driven by domestic individual investors, not foreigners. He notes that this dynamic is unusual because typically foreigners are the most aggressive in recognizing cyclical swings.Jerram believes that any investor enthusiasm is driven by the rise in production and exports during the second quarter, when export growth compared to the first quarter was the strongest on record.While people recognize that, he says, they don’t seem to be brimming with enthusiasm to put money into Japan.”Skepticism in the durability of the improvement is leading people to be more cautious than in the past,” he says. “They’re probably too cautious. You should see positive earnings surprises in the next year.”

Source:CNN

NEW YORK: There’s a reason not to bad mouth your former employer, and it’s not just because it’s unprofessional.Nearly a fifth of laid-off workers return to the company that issued their pink slip, a survey said Tuesday. Eighteen percent of displaced employees who landed new positions were rehired by the same employer that let them go, up from 13% in 2005, according to Right Management’s outplacement services, a division of Manpower.More than 17,000 outplacement candidates were surveyed by Right Management between June 2008 and June 2009.”In some instances, organizations are realizing that they may have cut too deep and are bringing people back in consulting roles or for project work,” Melvin Scales, senior vice president for global solutions at Right Management, said in a statement. “Former employees have the organizational knowledge and skills to jump back into roles quickly to get the job done,” Scales said.But redundant firing and hiring can be disruptive to workforce performance and costly for the company, he noted.Scales recommends that employers consider redeploying workers as an alternative to layoffs. “It’s a way of leveraging the skills and talents of existing employees and reassigning them to new roles within the organization. It provides an opportunity to retain valued talent, reduce the cost of turnover and leverage knowledge transfers within the company,” he said.Previous research conducted by Right Management found that only one in two employers offer redeployment before layoffs.The battered U.S. labor market has witnessed severe job cuts across the board over the course of 2008 and 2009.Nearly 3.4 million jobs have been lost already in the first half of 2009, more than the 3.1 million lost in all of 2008.

Source:CNN

NEW YORK: It may not be long before shareholders have more control over how much money top executives across the country make.This week, both the Senate Banking Committee and the House Financial Services Committee are tackling the issue of “say on pay” — which would allow investors to vote on compensation packages.. Experts think Congress could soon pass such legislation and have it on President Obama’s desk as early as this fall.”Unless there is something that takes executive compensation out of the headlines, I think it is likely these provisions will become law,” said Michael Melbinger, a lawyer at Winston & Strawn, who serves as chair of the firm’s executive compensation practice.From exorbitant salaries to outsized bonuses, corporate compensation practices have remained a lightning rod of criticism from lawmakers and taxpayers for much of this year.Two weeks ago, Goldman Sachs (GS, Fortune 500) was roundly panned amid speculation that it was considering paying its employees some of the largest bonuses on record, despite having accepted 10 billion from the Treasury Department’s Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP, last fall. (The investment bank has paid the government back, however.)Earlier this month, outrage over bonuses paid out by bailed-out insurer AIG (AIG, Fortune 500) bubbled back to the surface after The Washington Post reported that AIG was seeking the government’s consent to make a scheduled performance bonus payment of 2.4 million to 43 of its top-ranking executives.A handful of different Democratic proposals on executive compensation reforms are currently making the rounds on Capitol Hill, including one from the White House that was delivered to Congress just two weeks ago.Under the Obama plan, shareholders would get an annual non-binding vote on compensation packages for top executives at all publicly-traded companies. Companies would no longer be able to load up their compensation committee, which is responsible for setting pay packages for senior management, with sympathetic board members. Instead, companies would be required to fill those positions with independent directors who are looking out for the interest of shareholders.This and similar proposals from lawmakers have run into resistance from business industry groups like the Business Roundtable and U.S. Chamber of Commerce. But few doubt that Republican members will put up much of a fight against them considering that many Americans remain angry about financial bailouts.Will it work?If a bill is passed, the U.S. would be the latest nation to adopt the notion of “say on pay”. In 2002, the United Kingdom embraced the practice, and it has subsequently been taken up in Australia and Sweden.Some American businesses have already adopted “say on pay” practices as well. Twenty three companies have agreed to give shareholders an annual vote on executive compensation, including Aflac (AFL, Fortune 500) and Verizon (VZ, Fortune 500), according to the advisory firm RiskMetrics. And more than 80 others agreed to take the issue under consideration at their annual shareholder meetings this year.So far, such programs have fared rather well. One 2004 Deloitte survey of U.K. shareholders cited by the White House revealed that there has been a sharp increase in companies actively consulting shareholders on their pay plans for top executives since the U.K. approved “say for pay.”Richard Ferlauto, a leading shareholder activist who serves as director of corporate governance and pension investment at the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, has taken on misaligned pay practices at some of the nation’s largest publicly-traded firms. He believes the same scenario would play out among American companies.0:00
/4:39Goldman’s compensation gambleUltimately, firms will be forced to talk with its big shareholders about the compensation plans before their annual shareholder meeting, Ferlauto notes. That means shareholders have a better chance of getting some concessions, particularly for poorly performing CEOs.”Right now compensation [for executives] is created in a black box,” Ferlauto said. “This vote forces directors to the table with shareholders to discuss what is appropriate and what is not.”But even if the new rules are imposed, there are many unanswered questions about whether “say on pay” will have any real impact on curbing excessive compensation. Some experts have pointed out that a “non-binding” vote means board members have the right to reject investors’ wishes.David Wise, a senior executive pay consultant at Hay Group, said the opposite could happen though. Shareholders may wind up exerting too much influence over board members.Wise said one concern is that directors could agree to slash a CEO’s compensation package in order to appease shareholders — even though that executive might have done a good job of managing the company. And since it’s important to have the most capable managers in place to lead companies out of this downturn, Wise said shareholders could be doing themselves a disservice if they go overboard and don’t adequately reward top executives. “That may not be what is in the shareholder’s interest in the long run,” Wise said. “If the right exec is in place you want to make sure they are being compensated competitively and fairly.”Talkback: Do you think shareholders should have a say on how much CEOs and other executives make in salary and bonuses? Share your comments below.

Source:CNN

NEW YORK: Health care costs keep growing fatter in part because Americans are, too.More than 25% of the increase in medical costs between 1987 and 2001 is attributable to obesity and obesity-related conditions such as hypertension and diabetes, according to a new report from the non-partisan Urban Institute.Come 2015, it is estimated that 40% of American adults will be obese, which is more than double the rate 40 years ago.And today, close to 20% of children are obese, up from 4% four decades ago.”What does that mean for health care costs years from now?” said Paul Fronstin, director of the health research program at the Employee Benefit Research Institute.All told, 9% of health spending last year — or more than 200 billion — was spent on obesity-related costs, according to Urban Institute. Half of that bill was footed by taxpayers through Medicare and Medicaid.A recent article in the journal Health Affairs estimates that obesity-related costs were 147 billion last year, and that higher rates of obesity were responsible for nearly 40 billion of increased medical spending through 2006, including 7 billion in Medicare prescription drug costs.Taking their cue from steep taxes on tobacco, which have helped reduce smoking rates, the health policy experts who wrote the report argue that a tax on fattening foods could not only raise a lot of revenue to pay for health reform but could also help curb obesity and thereby slow the growth in health care costs over time.”Aggressive policy remedies like those used with tobacco deserve serious consideration, in view of the terrible and rising toll that obesity is taking on the United States,” the authors write.Depending on how it’s set up, the authors estimate that a 10% federal tax of fattening foods could raise up to 530 billion over 10 years. That would be more than half the estimated cost of reform.Of course, low-income Americans would be disproportionately affected by such a tax, both because they spend a higher percentage of their disposable income on groceries and because they tend to have a higher incidence of obesity-related conditions, at least some of which are attributable to diet.To relieve that burden, the authors suggest 180 billion of the revenue raised be used to subsidize low-income families’ purchase of fruits and vegetables and to otherwise make healthier foods available to them.Stan Dorn, one of the authors and a senior research associate at the Urban Institute, noted that one study shows that states that already tax sodas and snack foods are much less likely to rank among states with the highest growth rates in obesity.And that’s just with a very limited tax on specific kinds of fattening foods, Dorn said. When a tax is limited to specific unhealthy foods, studies show that consumers tend to reduce consumption of the taxed product but then switch to other unhealthy foods that aren’t taxed.Could it work?The authors of the Urban Institute study say a tax alone would not be sufficient to reduce obesity rates. They also recommend measures such as bans on advertising fattening foods to children and more explicit labeling on fattening foods.”It’s a multi-pronged approach,” Dorn said.They also concede, however, that enacting a tax on fattening foods would be a long and uphill battle, given the powerful interests involved in food production.As it is, lawmakers already appear to have tabled a proposal to tax sugar-sweetened beverages as a way to pay for health reform. The Congressional Budget Office had estimated such a tax could raise 50 billion over 10 years.0:00
/1:59Health care squabbleBeyond the lobbying obstacles, however, some experts believe that the idea of taxing fattening foods per se isn’t a good one.Calling the proposal “social engineering,” Joseph Antos, a health care scholar at the conservative Heritage Foundation, also thinks that changing the way Americans eat in ways that would significantly improve their body-mass index — a key measure of obesity — is a very long-term prospect. “If it did have an effect it would be over decades,” Antos said.In the meantime, both obese and non-obese people would be paying tax on items with saturated fat.”It’s not efficient,” said economist Erik Finkelstein, author of “The Fattening of America: How the Economy Makes Us Fat, If It Matters and What to Do About It.” If the goal is to reduce obesity rates, Finkelstein argues, why not charge obese people higher insurance premiums. Or, Finkelstein said, “by the same logic, you could tax things that promote sedentary behavior, such as the use of computers and the Internet.”Whether or not taxing fattening foods is a good idea, the proposal shines a light on one of the big cost drivers in health care and just how hard it is to change behavior and reduce costs.But sustained reduction in health costs won’t happen if obesity is ignored, the authors of the Health Affairs article wrote.”Although health reform may be necessary to address health inequities and rein in rising health spending, real savings are more likely to be achieved through reforms that reduce the prevalence of obesity and related risk factors, including poor diet and inactivity.”

NEW YORK (Reuters) — The dollar rebounded from its lowest level this year versus a basket of currencies Tuesday as weaker U.S. consumer confidence data rekindled worries about the economy, enhancing the greenback’s safe-haven allure.The yen also rallied across-the-board as U.S. stocks fell and investors dumped riskier assets.U.S. consumer confidence fell more than expected in July, Conference Board data showed, recording its second consecutive decline as sentiment remained hampered by a difficult job market.”Consumers are feeling no love in this recovery,” said Boris Schlossberg, director of currency research at GFT Forex in New York. “All this suggests is that the critical assumption by the recovery bulls that consumption will come back as the recovery takes hold is faulty.”0:00
/3:17Weak dollar worriesThe ICE Futures U.S. dollar index, which measures the performance of the greenback versus a basket of six currencies, rose 0.3% to 78.893It had earlier fallen to a low of 78.315, the lowest since December.The euro fell 0.5% to 1.4173, having earlier climbed as high as 1.4303, its highest since early June, according to Reuters data.”We’ve seen some rolling over in the euro/dollar with some people returning to dollars because consumer confidence was a bit disappointing,” said Brian Kim, currency strategist at UBS in Stamford, Connecticut.”Fundamentally, there’s cause for concern even though some of the data has been better.”The dollar fell 0.7% to ¥94.56 while the euro dropped 1.2% to ¥133.92.Traders awaited the outcome of a sale of 42 billion of two-year U.S. government paper later in the day. A record 115 billion in new debt is being auctioned this week, including 96 billion in new coupon securities.

Source:CNN