The most important fact about the economic and earnings data in the past couple weeks is that it has generally been worse than the already lowered numbers predicted. We have seen this again this morning, with the exception of the Productivity number.    Read More

Hong Kong dropped 12 percent to its lowest level in 5 years, S&P futures have swung in a 60 point range this morning, though they are well off their lows.    Read More

The Fed, the European Central Bank, Bank of England, Bank of Japan, Bank of Canada, and the Swiss National Bank are all pumping dollars into the global system. Fed made an additional $180 billion available to central banks to lend out.    Read More

While the financial sector looks gloomy as Lehman Brothers continues its search to find a suitor, there are still attractive companies in the sector, Wouter Weijand, chief investment officer for high income equity of Fortis Investments, told CNBC Friday.    Read More

Not enough: that's the general verdict of the Street on the Lehman announcement. They pre-announced a loss of $5.92. They're selling a majority stake in its investment management division and spinning off commercial real estate assets into a separate public company.    Read More

After taking the lead in the qualifying rounds, France's CAC 40 is now in sixth place in our World Markets Challenge.  YTD the index is down over 19%.  Here are some key stats on France's economy and markets.   Read More