– FACTBOX – Banks, funds, insurers cut 312500 jobs in crisis (Forbes)
– Daschle withdraws as health secretary nominee (Guardian)
– Obama: Enough Of This Crap (The Market Ticker):
This is FOUR people who you’ve appointed that can’t pay their damn taxes, including your Treasury Secretary?
The latest is that Daschle has withdrawn, of course. CHANGE WE CAN BELIEVE IN?
“Make no mistake, tax cheaters cheat us all, and the IRS should enforce our laws to the letter.” Sen. Tom Daschle, Congressional Record, May 7, 1998, p. S4507.
– Firms’ secret tax avoidance schemes cost UK billions (Guardian):
British taxpayers are being left to plug a multibillion-pound hole in the public finances as hundreds of the country’s biggest companies increasingly employ complex and secretive tax arrangements to limit the amount they hand over to the exchequer.
– Now China’s premier gets flying shoe treatment (Independent)
– Central bank tested as rouble hits floor (Financial Times)
– Beijing rocked by 26 million lost jobs (Independent):
Before the Telegraph reported: 40 Million Chinese Set to Lose Their Job as New Year Celebrations End
– New Jersey earthquake sparks panic (Telegraph)
– California Cut to Lowest Credit Rating Among States (Bloomberg)
– IMF almost halves Asia’s growth prospects (Financial Times)
– Worse Than the Great Depression (Gold Seek)
– Bad bank, bad plan (Guardian):
(Dean Baker is co-director of the Centre for Economic and Policy Research.)
– Iran launches first homemade satellite (Guardian)
– Funding crisis forced lenders to access Bank for £185bn (Telegraph):
Britain’s lenders have borrowed £185bn from the Bank of England in a desperate attempt to fund themselves through the financial crisis.
– Hitachi set for biggest loss suffered by Japanese firm (Guardian)
– US car sales near 27-year low (Reuters)
– GM, Chrysler Look to Cut Workforce (Washington Post)
– BP ahead 39% to record $25.6bn (Financial Times):
He also warned that the company needed an oil price of $50-$60 a barrel to be able to pay for its capital spending and dividends without borrowing, compared with a price of about $40 on Tuesday morning.
– Hawker Beechcraft announces 2300 layoffs (Forbes)
– German memory-chip maker closing US plant (IHT)
– Fidelity starts second round of layoffs (Reuters)
– EU Raids Undersea Power Cable Makers in Cartel Probe (Bloomberg)
– European equity issues could raise €300bn (Financial Times)
– German Jews break with pope (IHT):
BERLIN: A leading member of Germany’s Jewish community said Monday that Benedict XVI, the German-born pope and leader of more than a billion Roman Catholics worldwide, was sowing divisions and abetting far-right groups by rehabilitating four ultra-conservative bishops, one of whom has denied the Holocaust.
– Gingrich: Economy headed ‘off a cliff’ (Washington Times):
Says Obama response is ‘more of the same’
– Israel restrictions on al-Jazeera (BBC News)
– Ehud Barak proposes tunnel connecting Gaza to West Bank (Telegraph)
– Your ISP is watching you (Guardian):
Did you know … BT wants to monitor your online activities to serve you targeted ads? Don’t let it spy on you
– Snow Britain: Another 10 inches of snow to hit by Thursday (Telegraph)
– Pentagon Letter Complicates Blackwater Case (Washington Post):
The Pentagon wrote in 2007 that Blackwater Worldwide contractors in Iraq are not subject to U.S. civilian criminal laws, a position that undercuts the Justice Department’s effort to prosecute five Blackwater security guards on manslaughter charges.