This is the beginning of a slowdown!

Bloomberg reports tonight, Macy’s planning to cut 1500 more jobs as sales slide:

(as the link doesn’t seem to copy to mw properly, it can be found under the following title:” Macy’s Said to Be Eliminating 1,500 Store-Level Positions” dated Jan 27th 2010 19:13 EST)

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=am_zGo2nGAnE&@#$%&!=5

Whilst people are focussed on Asian markets and the President’s State of the Union address, Greece heads closer to sovereign default, which would make it the first developed country to default on its sovereign debt in modern times, the cost of insuring against the default rises substantially as credit default swaps rise fastest on record. Credit default swap bets on Italy have also risen sharply:

http://www.businessinsider.com/traders-aggressively-buying-credit-default-swaps-against-sovereign-debt-2010-1
http://draglobal.com/?p=9847
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-01-27/greece-denies-ft-report-of-eu25-billion-bond-deal-with-china.html

The Markit iTraxx SovW Western Europe Index of credit default swaps on 15 governments soars 9.25 basis points to 87.25 and on Greece soaring 48 basis points to 373 to a new record:
http://remington-work.blogspot.com/2010/01/greek-government-five-year-bonds-tumble.html

Japan Retail Sales Unexpectedly Slide for 16th Month (Update2)

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601068&sid=a.fJCVtmRa7w

The benefits of the nation’s export-led recovery haven’t spurred hiring or paychecks for the nation’s households, hurting companies including Right On Co. Today’s report indicates the stimulus from emergency government spending that helped pull the nation out of a recession is starting to fade, according to economist Hiroshi Shiraishi.

“This is the beginning of a slowdown,” said Shiraishi, an economist at BNP Paribas in Tokyo. “And with winter bonuses plunging as much as they did, households’ incomes are still far from improving.”

- LearnFromMistakes

Related Posts:

• In DANGER of DEFAULT
• Must-Know News - Feb. 16
• Sad: Bankrupt California cries harder each day
• U.S can’t afford to wait for a sustained recovery to cut deficit.
• A little more humor for today on the economy - and the deficit:

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