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magine waking up to find out that as much as 40 percent of the money you thought was safely deposited in the bank was seized, without your permission, to bail out a near-bankrupt government. That's just what thousands of large depositors in Cyprus woke up to Monday morning after European Union officials accepted a last-minute deal offered by the island's lawmakers to secure a $13 billion bailout to avert imminent financial meltdown.

<p>High level meetings are happening among the Eurogroup leadership and Cyprus, according to ekathimerini.com. That is, Northern Europe wants to bail out Cyprus, but under pretty stiff conditions. Cyprus wants a bailout, but without any conditions. Russians want a bailout of Cyprus and its banks, but wants Northern Europe to pay for it.</p>

As we rapidly approach Christmas and the Holiday Season, it will be interesting to see what happens to checking account and credit card balances after it is over. It is interesting to note the surge in demand deposits at commercial banks since the end of 2008. A similar measure, Total Checkable Deposits (TCDSL), has also surged. Between anemic GDP growth and the rapid growth in bank deposits (at incredibly low deposit rates), it is no wonder that M2 Money Velocity is dead. Of course, the crash of the housing market and the loss of consumer confidence in the economy may...

The New Year is shaping up to be a rough one for community lenders. Dozens if not hundreds of small banks figure to disappear in 2010, as a weak economy and regulatory pressure lead to more failures and mergers. President Obama met Tuesday with eight community bank executives, including the chiefs of German American Bancorp (GABC) and Monadnock Bancorp. Obama hailed the bankers as playing a "vital function," and cited "enormous opportunities" for economic growth if they keep lending. The community bankers surely made for a more receptive audience than the big-bank CEOs Obama addressed last week. Small-business lending, after...

Are Bank Safe Deposit Boxes Safe? No Commodities / Gold & Silver 2009 Nov 02, 2009 - 06:02 PM By: David_Vaughn Got a lot of email when I suggested that safe deposit boxes are not safe from bank or government intrusion. In most minds the “safe deposit box” is the “holy grail.” Our comfort will always be OK as long as our safe deposit box remains safe from others ill intent. Noticed the last few years how the Swiss Banks are no longer confidential places for one to store anything of value? The US government has applied pressure on Switzerland...

The United States may need to insure wholesale deposits to ease the credit crisis and restore confidence because the collapse of Lehman Brothers has damaged trust among institutional investors, Barclays said on Thursday. "What happened in September was the wholesale equivalent of an old fashioned bank run," Laurence Kantor, head of global research at Barclays Capital, told reporters in Singapore. "The markets are still unwinding the damage from Lehman." He said the commercial paper market lost $200 billion in two weeks after Lehman collapsed as investors turned to safer government paper, and even after two months private investors are still...

Five banks have gone into receivership this year, the latest of which is IndyMac which became the largest OTS-regulated savings and loan to fail and second-biggest financial institution to close behind Continental Illinois in 1984, according to the FDIC. Nonetheless, the FDIC is very fond of saying "No saver has ever lost a dime in federally insured deposits." That's fine and dandy but inquiring minds are looking ahead and asking "How much uninsured money is at risk, not just at IndyMac but in the entire system?" It's a good question, but first let's dig a litter deeper into what is...

Our Association consists of state officials charged with the responsibility of collecting and reuniting lost owners with their unclaimed property. This site was developed by state unclaimed property experts to assist you - free of charge - in your efforts to search for funds that may belong to you or your relatives. If you are ready to begin looking for possible lost assets, select the "Find Property" link on the left side. If you have questions about unclaimed property, we invite you to go to the other sections of our site using the navigation links at the side and top...

It resembles a giant bamboo shoot, can carry people more than a kilometre skyward in less than 40 seconds, and yesterday it was officially declared the world's tallest building. The 508 metre tall building in Taipei's Hsinyi district is 56 metres taller than the previous record holder, the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur. The opening of Taipei 101 - a reference to the number of floors - was attended by local dignitaries keen to bask in the glory of one of Asia's most ambitious engineering projects ever. As an opera company entertained the crowd, the world's fastest passenger lifts whisked...

Scientists are divided about the use of the Moon as a base to develop ways to travel to Mars, according to reports given to the US government. Some have said the possibility of water-ice existing at the lunar poles would allow a moonbase to use the ice as rocket fuel for a Mars mission. Others contend that it would be too difficult to extract. And there is disagreement about whether the moon is a good alternative to space as a base for advanced telescopes. In January, President Bush redirected the US space effort sending astronauts back to the Moon and...