The Bank of America Institute’s recent report has shed light on the escalating childcare costs in the US, which are now averaging $700 per household per month. This represents a 32% increase since 2019, leading to a faster depletion of families’ savings and a slowdown in their spending habits. The…

The numbers: A survey of consumer confidence fell to a five-month low of 102.6 in October amid worries about inflation, rising interest rates and fighting between Israel and Hamas. The closely followed index slipped from a revised 104.3 in September, the Conference Board said Tuesday. Economists polled by the Wall…

Reserve Bank of Australia’s (RBA) assistant governor, Brad Jones, recently warned industry leaders about the potential threats posed by artificial intelligence (AI), climate change, cyber attacks, and rapid bank runs in the digital age. Speaking at an Australian Finance Industry Association event, he emphasized the importance of resilience within the…

The new rate for Series I Bonds starting on Nov. 1 will be 5.27% – a combination of a 1.3% fixed rate and a 3.94% inflation rate, according to the TreasuryDirect.gov website. That’s the highest fixed rate since 2007, notes Ken Tumin, editor of DepositAccounts.com.   Investors who flocked to…

SEOUL (Reuters) – South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol said on Tuesday the economy in 2024 would exceed the potential growth rate after picking up pace in the second half of 2023, and pledged closer ties with the United States to bolster crisis management capabilities. The government is closely monitoring…

A Ned Davis strategist thinks it’s too early for investors to embrace the idea that benchmark U.S. borrowing costs have found a peak. Investors appeared more comfortable lately with a backdrop of a roughly 5% 10-year Treasury yield, BX:TMUBMUSD10Y after a sharp selloff in longer-dated government bonds wiped out yearly…

Investing.com– The Bank of Japan held interest rates at ultra-low levels on Tuesday and slightly altered the rhetoric around its yield curve control (YCC) policy, while also forecasting higher inflation levels in the coming years.  The BOJ left its , and said it will use the upper end of its…

House Republicans have released a proposal to grant Israel billions of dollars in military aid and to pay for it by cutting funding to the Internal Revenue Service, but experts say that the move would increase the federal budget deficit by more than the cost of the aid itself. The…

TOKYO (Reuters) – The Bank of Japan modified its bond yield control again on Tuesday by re-defining 1.0% as an “upper bound” with room for allowance, rather than a rigid cap. “The BOJ will regard the upper bound of 1.0% for the 10-year Japanese government bond (JGB) yield as a…

The focus of the country is about to switch to 24/7 wall-to-wall coverage of the presidential election, including primaries, debates, campaign-spending totals, and poll results.  But in reality, what really matters most in the 2024 presidential election will be how successful Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell and his colleagues will…