Friday, March 14, 2008
U.S. stocks briefly collapse on Bear Stearns bailout news
U.S. stocks briefly collapse on Bear Stearns bailout news
News that Bear Stearns was receiving a financial rescue sent U.S. stocks
into a freefall breifly, before the market stabilized and moved off its
lows.
Bear gets help from Fed, J.P. Morgan in liquidity crisis
Bear Stearns Cos. says it got short-term financing from J.P. Morgan and
the Federal Reserve as its liquidity has "significantly
deteriorated" during the past 24 hours.
Financial Stocks: Bear's 32% drop drives sector down
NEW YORK
Shares of troubled Wall Street firm Bear Stearns Cos. fell more than 30%
in early trading Friday, plunging after the company reported
deterioration in its liquidity position and said it's reached an
agreement to secure financing from J.P. Morgan Chase and the U.S.
Federal Reserve.
Economic Report: Consumer inflation moderates in February on energy's
drop
Led by a quirky decline in energy costs, U.S. consumer inflation
moderated in February, opening the door for the Federal Reserve to keep
cutting interest rates to support flagging economic growth. The consumer
price index was flat in February, the Labor Department said Friday. Wall
Street economists had expected a 0.2% increase. In addition, core prices
-- which exclude volatile food and energy costs -- were also unchanged,
below the 0.2% gain in retail-level inflation that economists surveyed
by MarketWatch had been looking for. This was the lowest core rate since
November 2006.
