Archive for the 'Economy' Category
Gun Dealers Report Shortages of Ammunition
February 18th, 2013I’ve heard from a few friends and some other Cryptogon readers who have emailed me with messages along the lines of: “Do you know that .22-long is sold out over here?” I remember past waves of panic buying, but I don’t ever remember .22-lr being sold out before. Via: USA Today: Retailers say much of […]
The Fed’s Continuing Bailouts of Bank of America
February 17th, 2013Via: New York Times: MANY people became rightfully upset about bailouts given to big banks during the mortgage crisis. But it turns out that they are still going on, if more quietly, through the back door. The existence of one such secret deal, struck in July between the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and […]
Microsoft Office 2013 Ties Install to Single PC
February 17th, 2013I’ve been fed up with MS Office for a long time. So much so, that I’ve struggled with slow performance, bugs and crashes with OpenOffice since the early 2000s, and more recently with LibreOffice. If your experience with these free packages has been crap, I understand. The last couple releases of LibreOffice, however, have been […]
Israeli Banks Said to Be Implicated in U.S. Tax Evasion
February 17th, 2013Via: Bloomberg: A California man born in Israel agreed to plead guilty to conspiring with people at Bank Leumi Le-Israel Ltd. and Mizrahi Tefahot Bank Ltd. to hide offshore accounts and income from the U.S. Internal Revenue Service, according to court filings and people familiar with the matter. Zvi Sperling was accused Feb. 14 by […]
Facebook Gets a Multibillion-Dollar Tax Break
February 16th, 2013Via: Bloomberg: It hasn’t drawn much attention, but Facebook’s first annual earnings report contains an accounting gem: a multibillion-dollar tax deduction for the cost of executive stock options and share awards. Even though Facebook (FB) reported $1.1 billion in pre-tax profits from U.S. operations in 2012, it will probably pay zero federal and state taxes—and […]
SEC Files Lawsuit Against ‘Certain Unknown Traders’ Over Heinz Call Options
February 16th, 2013*yawn* Via: CNBC: Acting just one day after the surprise announcement that H.J. Heinz would be acquired by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway and Brazil-based 3G Capital for $23.3 billion, the SEC has gone to court to freeze assets associated with what it calls “highly suspicious options trading.” Related: Insider Crimes, Funny Money and Options Rackets
Vatican’s New Bank Chief Has Military Ship Links
February 15th, 2013Via: AP: The Vatican was drawn into a new controversy Friday after acknowledging that its bank’s new president is also chairman of a shipbuilder making warships — a significant conflict for an institution that has long shunned ties to military manufacturing. The Vatican announced to great fanfare that Pope Benedict XVI had signed off on […]
Berlusconi on Bribery
February 15th, 2013Via: Financial Times: Former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi has defended the need for bribery in winning contracts for Italy’s multinationals, as politicians campaigning in general elections have been forced to respond to a welter of corruption scandals revolving around the nexus of politics and business. “Bribes are a phenomenon that exists and it’s useless to […]
Indiana Soybean Farmer Sees Monsanto Lawsuit Reach U.S. Supreme Court
February 13th, 2013Via: Guardian: As David versus Goliath battles go it is hard to imagine a more uneven fight than the one about to play out in front of the US supreme court between Vernon Hugh Bowman and Monsanto. On the one side is Bowman, a single 75-year-old Indiana soybean farmer who is still tending the same […]
China Eclipses U.S. as Biggest Trading Nation Measured in Goods
February 11th, 2013Via: Bloomberg: China surpassed the U.S. to become the world’s biggest trading nation last year as measured by the sum of exports and imports of goods, official figures from both countries show. U.S. exports and imports of goods last year totaled $3.82 trillion, the U.S. Commerce Department said last week. China’s customs administration reported last […]
