FEDERAL RESERVE

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, in a speech in Indiana, went back to explaining why the Fed is good for us.

U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke Monday robustly defended the bank's unconventional program to stimulate the U.S. economy, quantitative easing.

Applications for U.S. home mortgages rose last week as interest rates dropped to record lows in the wake of the Federal Reserve's latest stimulus efforts, data from an industry group showed on Wednesday.

Uncertainty since the start of the 2008 financial crisis may have caused the U.S. unemployment rate to rise.

FedEx's forecast cut, signs of stagnation in Germany, drops in oil price and looming political tensions spell trouble for the global economy.

Three key U.S. housing reports Wednesday are expected to show small improvements in the market.

Occupy Wall Street returned to the Zuccotti Park in a Monday celebration of the movement's one-year anniversary. And while the occasion was replete with the drums, banners and heated political discussions that pervaded Zuccotti a year ago, it seemed unlikely that another occupation was imminent.

London copper slipped on Monday, but still retained most of the previous session's steep climb to a 4-1/2 month top as a new round of U.S. monetary stimulus measures and a weak dollar continued to support prices.

Financial markets yawned Monday in the face of an anemic U.S. manufacturing report from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York that showed industrial production in the Northeast falling to a nearly two-year low.

Asian stock markets ended mixed Monday after they rallied to a four-month high in the previous session following the U.S. Federal Reserve's move to boost growth in the world's largest economy with a third round of bond purchases.

The U.S. stock index futures point to a lower open Monday after the rally seen last week following the announcement of the Federal Reserve's plan to buy mortgage securities.

European markets fell Monday as investor sentiment turned negative after fears of the debt crisis affecting the euro zone were revived undermining the optimism over the stimulus measures announced by policymakers to bolster economic growth.

Most of the Asian markets dropped Monday after the rally last week when investor confidence was buoyed by the optimism that the stimulus measures announced by the central banks in the U.S. and the Europe would help revive the global economic growth momentum.

The Occupy Wall Street protest movement is expected to resume Monday, on the 1-year anniversary of the protests. Is the coalition passé and irrelevant? Or is it a canary in a coalmine - an indicator of worsening economic and social problems in the United States?

Asian stock markets posted their biggest weekly gains in almost nine months after the U.S. Federal Reserve announced that it would purchase $40 billion in mortgage-backed securities per month for an open-ended period until the labor market improved substantially.

If sales following the iPhone 5 release date are as high as analysts predict, the Apple smartphone could aid the struggling US economy. .

Most of the Asian markets gained in the week as investor confidence was lifted following the announcement of another round of quantitative easing by the U.S. Federal Reserve which is expected to rejuvenate the economic growth.

The continued weakness of the global economy will probably leave the two regional manufacturing PMI (Empire State and Philly Fed) and the national Markit PMI at low levels in September. Meanwhile, economists expect August?s data on housing starts and existing home sales to show that the housing recovery remains intact.

Thursday's announcement by the U.S. Federal Reserve that it would be engaging in a third round of open-ended bond-buying, known as QE3, to energize the economy saw a resoundingly positive reception in the foreign financial markets, where indexes rose Friday. But market-watchers were expecting the global equity party would lead to an inevitable hangover soon, in the form of intervention by central banks around the world, to stop massive inflows of dollars into non-U.S. economies -- in short, a...

Ron Paul's campaign against the Federal Reserve had made some headway last summer, but even Republicans who dislike the Fed's decision to start a new round of easing aren't as drastic as him in attacking the central bank

Asian stock markets rallied to a four-month high Friday after the U.S. Federal Reserve launched another large scale of asset purchase program overnight to stimulate the world's largest economy.