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That Miserable Jobs Report, And The Case For A Stronger Q4 David Kotok, Cumberland Advisors Sep. 4, 2011, 9:45 AM My long-time friend and fishing guide Ray Sockabasin put the onion rings in a special beer batter concoction that he characterizes as an “old Passamaquoddy Indian recipe.” With the frying pan on the fire, in went the onion rings… sizzle, sizzle, sizzle, and out they came – fabulous. They were so light you could think of them as almost floating – why, you might use one as a ‘bobber’ if you were bait fishing in Big Lake in Grand Lake...

<p>The U.S. economy accelerated in the fourth quarter, the Commerce Department reported Friday. Real gross domestic product rose at a 3.2% annualized rate in the fourth quarter, up from a 2.6% rate in the third quarter. The gain was slightly below expectations.</p>

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Alcoa Inc., as is the custom, ushered in the fourth-quarter earnings season after Monday's closing bell. For those who like to think a big aluminum company can double as a barometer for how the rest of the earnings season is likely to go, it was an ugly start. Yes, Alcoa /quotes/comstock/13*!aa/quotes/nls/aa (AA 17.45, +0.43, +2.53%) managed to trim its losses in the fourth quarter to a mere $277 million. And sales were up, a good sign. But after stripping out all the one-time items, the company's bottom line showed a profit of only one cent a...

Japan's GDP slumps an annualized 12.7% on-quarter in Q4 By V. Phani Kumar Last update: 7:27 p.m. EST Feb. 15, 2009 Comments: 121 HONG KONG (MarketWatch) -- Japan's economy slumped at a larger-than-expected 3.3% in the October-December period from the previous quarter as the impact of the global financial crisis hit its exports hard, according to data released Monday. The steep fall reportedly represents the biggest drop since 1974. On an annualized basis, the gross economic product slumped 12.7% during the quarter, data from the Cabinet Office showed,