CBRE, the world’s largest real estate services firm, has agreed to pay $1.3 billion in cash for 60-percent ownership of London-based Turner & Townsend Holdings, one of the world’s largest firms that manages major construction projects. The buy comes as developers prepare for a wave of infrastructure spending on roads, water and sewer system repairs...
Category: TRENDS ON THE U.S. ECONOMIC FRONT
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CITIZENS TO BUY INVESTORS BANCORP FOR $3.5 BILLION
Citizens Financial Group, the 15th largest U.S. bank by assets, according to bank services firm MX, will buy Investors Bancorp for $3.5 billion in cash and stock, The Wall Street Journal reported. Investors Bancorp operates about 150 locations in New York and New Jersey. The sale will give Citizens a sizable footprint in lucrative markets...
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COMMERCIAL REAL ESTATE CRISIS?
It was a big story in The Wall Street Journal last week. Happy days are here again was the drift of the lengthy article. It began by noting that sales of commercial real estate have bounced back to pre-2020 levels, notching $144.7 billion in this year’s second quarter, according to data firm Real Capital Analytics. ...
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BIG BANKS: WE LOVE THE RICH
Bank of America, Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, and Morgan Stanley loaned more than $600 billion to their wealthiest clients in this year’s second quarter, 17.5 percent more than a year earlier, the Financial Times reported. These loans now encompass 22.5 percent of the banks’ total loan portfolios, compared to 16.3 percent in mid-2017, according to the...
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CONSUMER SPENDING GAINED IN JUNE
Consumers spent 1 percent more in June, year over year, including 1.2 percent more on services and 0.5 percent more for goods, the U.S. commerce department reported. Household spending contracted 0.1 percent in May; consumers had satisfied their need for merchandise by then and began redirecting dollars to services, according to The Wall Street Journal. ...
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US GDP GROWTH: A BRING DOWN FOR ECONOMISTS
The U.S. economy grew 6.5 percent in this year’s second quarter, the U.S. commerce department announced, an astonishing pace in normal times but less than expected during recovery from a once-a-century economic crash, CNBC reported. The growth rate barely edged past the first quarter’s downwardly adjusted figure of 6.3 percent. Dow Jones had estimated an...
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WAGES, INFLATION ON THE RISE
The U.S.’s economic bounce pushed prices 4 percent higher in June than they were a year before, according to the Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index, the U.S. Federal Reserve’s preferred gauge of inflation. The 4-percent rate is the fastest since 2008. And according to The New York Times, it is a rate greater than analysts...
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WILL FED REDUCE BOND PURCHASES LATER THIS YEAR?
“With progress on vaccinations and strong policy support, indicators of economic activity and employment have continued to strengthen,” the U.S. Federal Reserve’s Open Market Committee said in a statement following its 28 July meeting. “The economy has made substantial progress toward” the Fed’s goals of economic recovery and maximum employment and the committee will “assess...
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U.S. MARKET OVERVIEW
EQUITY MARKETS GAINED AGAIN IN JULY Despite momentum slowing in recent weeks, and slipping on the month’s last trading day, stock markets booked another positive month in July. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1.3 percent, the NASDAQ gained 1.2 percent, and the S&P added 2.3 percent last month. The Stoxx Europe 600 index also...
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POLL: TODAY’S CHILDREN WILL BE POORER THAN THEIR PARENTS
Sixty-four percent of adults across 17 countries believe their children will live in worse financial condition than their parents, a new Pew Research Center poll has found. In the U.S., the proportion was 68 percent; in France and Japan, the belief is held by 77 percent of people responding to the poll. Baby Boomers largely...