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RGE Monitor MEDIA ALERT: Nouriel Roubini predicts the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression and the worst U.S. Recession in the last few decades. New York, July 15, 2008- In a series of recent writings on the RGE Monitor Nouriel Roubini - Chairman of RGE Monitor and Professor of Economics at the NYU Stern School of Business - has argued that the U.S. is experiencing its worst financial crisis since the Great Depression and will undergo its worst recession in the last few decades. His analysis leads to the following conclusions: This is by far the worst financial crisis...

So much for that second-half rebound. Truth be told, that was always more of a wish than a serious forecast, happy talk from the Fed and Wall Street desperate to get things back to normal. It ain't gonna happen. Not this summer. Not this fall. Not even next winter. This thing's going down, fast and hard. Corporate bankruptcies, bond defaults, bank failures, hedge fund meltdowns and 6 percent unemployment. We're caught in one of those vicious, downward spirals that, once it gets going, is very hard to pull out of. Only this will be a different kind of recession --...

The euro, worth 83 cents in the early George W. Bush years, is at $1.45. The British pound is back up over $2, the highest level since the Carter era. The Canadian dollar, which used to be worth 65 cents, is worth more than the U.S. dollar for the first time in half a century. Oil is over $90 a barrel. Gold, down to $260 an ounce not so long ago, has hit $800. Have gold, silver, oil, the euro, the pound and the Canadian dollar all suddenly soared in value in just a few years? Nope. The dollar has...

<p>NEW YORK (Reuters) - Countrywide Financial Corp Chief Executive Angelo Mozilo said on Thursday the U.S. housing downturn is likely to lead the country into recession, but that the largest U.S. mortgage lender will survive.</p> <p>In an interview, Mozilo also said that to promote liquidity, the U.S. Federal Reserve should cut the rate it charges banks to borrow.</p>

NEW YORK - Bad credit has supplanted terrorism as the gravest immediate risk threatening the economy, a key national research group reported Monday. Borrowers' withering ability to pay their bills and the subsequent fallout in the credit markets this summer topped the list of short-term risks on peoples' minds, according to a survey of 258 members conducted by the National Association of Business Economics. NABE, a Washington-based association, said 32 percent of its surveyed members cited loan defaults and excessive debt as their biggest near-term concern. Only 20 percent of members cited defense and terrorism as their biggest immediate worry,...

Subprime-battered mortgage lenders are shutting down, fewer homes are being built, and even some of the big U.S. retailers are planning conservatively for Christmas holiday sales. It will take a few months to show up in the economic data that Wall Street and the Federal Reserve watch, but the slowing U.S. economy is hitting the job market, and economists say it is only a matter of time before unemployment ticks up. "Growth is skimming along at around 2 percent, and that is not strong enough to keep the unemployment rate from rising," said Brian Bethune, U.S. economist with Global Insight...

Until a few months ago, it seemed that anyone who could fog up a mirror could get a mortgage. Now, with a credit crisis roiling the industry, some consumers might think they have a better chance winning the lottery than finding a home loan. The truth is that you can still get a mortgage. It just may not be as easy--or as cheap--as it was over the past few years. "If you have good credit, can document your income and have money for a downpayment, it’s largely business as usual," says Greg McBride, senior financial analyst at Bankrate.com. Borrowers seeking...

Countrywide CEO: Mortgage Crisis Persists Despite BofA Stake Topics:Subprime Lending | Mergers & Acquisitions | Banking | Mortgages Companies:Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc | Countrywide Financial Corp | Bank of America CorpBy CNBC.com | 23 Aug 2007 | 01:31 PM ET Font size: The chief executive of Countrywide Financial told CNBC that Bank of America's $2 billion investment in the struggling mortgage lender was a "priceless endorsement" for Countrywide but said the crisis in the housing and mortgage markets isn't getting any better. "It's a great endorsement of Countrywide," CEO Angelo Mozilo told Maria Bartiromo in an exclusive interview. "It's important...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Jennifer Falke and her family had been in their Columbus, Ohio home for nearly 12 years when they hit a rough patch in 2006. Falke was out of work and fell behind on the mortgage. Falke said a flood of mailings and flyers then arrived at her door promising help from foreclosure rescue companies claiming to act as an intermediary between her and her lender to keep her from losing her home. According to Falke, the company she contacted, Foreclosure Assistance Solutions (FAS), simply took her money and did nothing for her. And by delaying a...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Ford CEO Alan Mulally became the latest high-profile business executive to suggest that the Federal Reserve needs to cut interest rates, according to a report published Friday. Noting that credit conditions were posing a "big headwind" to the company's turnaround plan, Mulally told the Financial Times he is concerned about the state of the larger economy. Next victim of mortgage mess: Auto sales Video More video Fortune's Sue Callaway reviews and compares the Audi S4 and the BMW M5. Play video "It is a really important job to manage inflation and economic growth [but] focusing on...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Tens of thousands of frightened homeowners looking to get out from under the crumbling walls of the subprime mortgage collapse have found refuge in a variety of programs. When Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd mentioned the national Homeowner's HOPE Hotline in comments Tuesday, it triggered some 3,000 calls. An announcement in April that the Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America would be offering $1 billion in rescue money to beleaguered borrowers has prompted more than 50,000 inquiries, according to the organization. And in Ohio, New York, Massachusetts, Maryland and other states, distressed mortgage holders are clamoring...

The Fed hit the market with a surprise 50-basis-point discount rate cut that caught many traders leaning the wrong way Friday. The rate cut came in response to the subprime crisis and is giving the credit markets the one thing that they need the most, liquidity. Options House Zecco.com Fidelity Investments Charles Schwab E*TRADE FINANCIAL TD AMERITRADE The Fed is hoping that by injecting liquidity into the credit markets, it can avert a meltdown of the financial system. If the Fed has to take further action in response to the subprime crisis and continue pouring in liquidity, we may see...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Housing starts and permits both fell to the lowest levels in more than a decade, as the latest reading on the battered housing and home building markets both came in below expectations Thursday. Housing starts fell to an annual rate of 1.38 million in July from a revised 1.47 million rate in June. Economists surveyed by Briefing.com had forecast starts would fall to a 1.41 million pace in June. Housing starts and permits are at the lowest level in more than a decade. The latest reading is the lowest level of starts since January 1997. Building...

1. VMware IPO Debut Dazzles 2. Thornburg Postpones Dividend 3. Top 10 Potential Takeover Targets 4. The Top Buffett Value Stocks 5. The House That Won't Sell: Walk Away? Fidelity Investments E*TRADE FINANCIAL TD AMERITRADE Options House Zecco.com Charles Schwab The run on Countrywide (CFC - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr - Rating) stock intensified Thursday morning after the struggling mortgage lender said it drew down its $11.5 billion unsecured bank credit line. The Calabasas, Calif., lender said it made the move as it "supplemented its funding liquidity position." The announcement came just a day after Merrill Lynch cut its rating...

The Federal Reserve is playing a tricky hand as calls for an emergency rate cut get louder after another day of significant stock market losses. Through its open market activities, the Fed has virtually cut the fed funds rate already, but officially left the target rate steady at 5.25%. "The target funds rate is meaningless for the time being," says James Bianco, president of Bianco Research. The Fed has injected enough liquidity into the banking system to bring the effective fed funds rate, or the rate that banks lend to each other, below 5% for three days now. This average...

LONDON (CNNMoney.com) -- Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said the current turmoil in financial markets will slow economic growth but should not spark a recession, according to a report published Thursday. Paulson told the Wall Street Journal that the turmoil "will extract a penalty on the growth rate" of the U.S. economy, but that "the economy and the markets are strong enough to absorb the losses" without triggering a recession. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson expects the current market turmoil will slow U.S. economic growth, but he doesn't see a recession occurring. Paulson, the former CEO of Goldman Sachs (Charts, Fortune 500),...

Stocks dropped sharply in Asia and sold off in Europe as well as the U.S. credit crunch continues to worry investors. 1. VMware IPO Debut Dazzles 2. Thornburg Postpones Dividend 3. Top 10 Potential Takeover Targets 4. The Top Buffett Value Stocks 5. The House That Won't Sell: Walk Away? TD AMERITRADE Charles Schwab Zecco.com Fidelity Investments E*TRADE FINANCIAL Options House Japan's Nikkei dropped 2% and Hong Kong's Hang Seng gave up 3.3%, and those were some of the smaller drops. Stocks dropped 6.9% in Seoul, 5.9% in Jakarta, 4.6% in Taipei and 4.3% in Mumbai. Even China's highflying Shanghai...

AMERICAN manufacturers no longer make subway cars. They are imported now, and the skills required to make them are disappearing in the United States. Similarly, imports are an ever-bigger source of refrigerators, household furnishings, auto and aircraft parts, machine tools and a host of everyday consumer products much in demand in America, but increasingly not made here. [...] the experts shifted the emphasis from production to design and innovation. Let others produce what Americans think up. [...] But over the long run, can invention and design be separated from production? That question is rarely asked today. The debate instead centers...

Foreclosure activity surges in Mass. Numbers up nearly 300% from last year By Kimberly Blanton, Globe Staff | December 13, 2006 Massachusetts experienced the second-biggest increase in foreclosure activity in the country last month, according to a report yesterday from a firm that tracks the housing market. The Bay State came in second only to Alabama in the rise in total properties that entered some stage of foreclosure, including lenders' initial notices that homeowners were in default, foreclosed property sales and auctions, and lenders' sales of repossessed property, said RealtyTrac , an Irvine, Calif., company that researches and provides information...

Dec. 11, 2006 Greenspan sees a sinking dollar Bloomberg News Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said the dollar will probably keep falling because it's unlikely that international fund managers will continue to increase their allocations to the U.S. currency. Russia and other oil-producing currencies are shifting their assets out of dollars toward the euro and yen, a Bank for International Settlements quarterly report showed Monday. Greenspan said the dollar, heading for its fourth annual decline in the past five years, will probably keep falling until the U.S. current-account deficit diminishes. "It's imprudent to hold everything in one currency," Greenspan...