UniTopic

Now that housing and even unemployment are showing signs of improvement, Wall Street wants consumers to do their part to heal the economy.

Investors get some insight this week into how consumers are spending from a government report on July retail sales. They’ll also find out if consumers helped major retailers including Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Macy’s Inc. join the stream of companies that reported better-than-expected second-quarter earnings and forecasts.

“What we’ll see now is close attention to consumer behavior,” said Joe Heider, president of Dawson Wealth Management in Cleveland.

Analysts say investors need to see evidence that consumer spending is picking up before they’ll keep the market’s summer rally going. Despite signs the recession is easing, investors are still worried that consumers, whose spending accounts for 70 percent of all U.S. economic activity, could hurt the economy’s chances for a robust recovery if they continue to limit what they buy.

The stock market has soared in the last month as reports showed steady increases in home sales, improving corporate earnings and a stabilization in the manufacturing industry. On Friday, investors cheered an unexpected dip in the unemployment rate.

The Standard & Poor’s 500 index is up 15 percent in just four weeks and 49 percent from a 12-year low in early March. All the major indexes now stand at their highest levels since last fall.

Lackluster sales reports from some of the nation’s retailers last week were a reminder that consumers are still nervous. But Friday’s surprisingly positive employment report, which showed job losses slowed last month and the unemployment rate fell to 9.4 percent from 9.5 percent in June, could signal brighter days. If job losses are stabilizing, that should give consumers more confidence to buy beyond their basic needs.

One potential problem that could deter consumers and stifle the economy’s rebound is rising interest rates. As the economy improves, the Federal Reserve may be forced to raise its benchmark federal funds rate, which stands at a record low of near zero, to prevent a surge in inflation. That would force up borrowing costs including mortgage rates.

Linda Duessel, equity market strategist at Federated Investors, said these fears could weigh on the market, especially as the Fed readies for a two-day meeting that begins Tuesday.

“The people that are going to look for an excuse to pull this market back might look at the fear of the Fed raising rates too soon,” she said.

Still, expectations are for the Fed to keep rates steady at least through the end of the year. Investors, though, will be watching closely for any changes in the Fed’s assessment of the economy that accompanies its interest rate decision. Up until now, the Fed’s stance has been cautiously optimistic, warning that growth will be slow and controlled.

The market will also want to see how well Treasury auctions go this week. The Treasury Department is issuing $75 billion of long-term notes as part of its ongoing effort to fund the government’s stimulus programs. Treasurys have tended to sell off ahead of the auctions, which drives yields higher, as investors fear there won’t be enough demand to support the flood of supply. Long-term Treasury yields are closely tied to rates on mortgages and other types of loans, so when yields creep higher, investors get nervous.

So far, the auctions have been going relatively smoothly.

Aside from the risks posed by a slack in consumer spending and higher interest rates, the traditional summer slowdown on Wall Street in August could threaten the market’s rally. As traders and investors leave for vacation, there will be lighter trading volume, and therefore increased volatility in the market, especially considering stocks have barely taken a breather after such a considerable run.

“Equities seem to be on a one-way train here,” said Todd Colvin, vice president at MF Global. “That sets us up for a potential pullback.”

A handful of early signs suggest America’s housing market is on the mend. Construction starts and new house sales were up nicely in June. Prices rose from April to May, the first monthly increase in nearly three years.

Time to buy, then? Perhaps, but be cautious about how and where you shop.

I’m no evangelist for the financial merits of homeownership. Two years ago I argued here that house prices in the U.S. had grown so bloated that renting had become a better deal than owning. Since then, prices have plunged 30%, or about 36% after inflation. Nationally, they still seem too high, as I’ll show in a moment, and May’s gain could prove illusory — SmartMoney’s Aleksandra Todorova points out that it disappears after adjusting for seasonality, and that the numbers probably got a temporary boost from government freezes on foreclosure proceedings.

Still, a handful of major markets now look affordable, and all of them are closer to sane.

Returning to Ordinary

Before you look at Table 1, allow me to try to convince you of something: Houses are ordinary goods. They’re wood and stone and metal and plastic, and not much else. They don’t spend their days dreaming of ways to become more valuable. They just sit there. Such being the case, house prices over long time periods should track inflation, which is, after all, a rise in the price of ordinary goods (or a drop in the value of the money that buys them). To nitpick, house prices should actually lag inflation by an almost imperceptible amount, since houses aren’t consumed like oil and aren’t as durable as gold, but rather decay like cars, only much more slowly. Yale economist Robert Shiller studied house prices from 1890 to 2004 and found they outpaced inflation by just 0.4 percentage points a year. That’s a small enough difference from zero to be attributable to the crudeness of early data, to bubbly 2004 prices or to government-created demand shifts along the way, such as down-payment subsidies, tax incentives for those who borrow to buy houses and so on.

Table 1 shows the race between house prices and inflation since 1987. Houses behaved like ordinary goods until around 2000. That year the Federal Reserve began a three-year campaign to reduce core interest rates from 6.5% to 1%, which brought mortgage rates down, too. A giant bubble ensued. Encouragingly, house prices are now converging on the inflation line, where they would have been without the bubble. For the two lines to rejoin, house prices don’t necessarily have to fall further. They could flatten for a couple of years and let inflation catch up. (Of course, they could also overcorrect.)

Affordable, Nearly

House buyers perhaps don’t care about the historical relationship between houses and inflation. They care about whether they can afford their mortgage payments, and about whether buying is a better deal than renting. The National Association of Realtors publishes an affordability index that says terrific things about buying houses now, but to use it is to take buying advice from people who are paid to sell. I prefer to roll my own.

Table 2 shows the trend of two price ratios since 1987. The blue line is the ratio of house prices to rents and the red dots show the ratio of house prices to median household incomes. Income figures are only available through 2007, so I gave America a 3% raise for 2008 and another 1.5% increase for 2009 through May. (Don’t think I haven’t noticed how hard you work around here.)

The two trends track each other closely because neither rents nor incomes has done anything exciting since 1987. The chart movement is dominated by changes in house prices. Again, we see a bubble, a bust, and the approaching — but not quite reaching — of a normal level of affordability.

Buy Here, Rent There

In April 2007, when I wrote my rant on renting, there was little reason to compare local markets. So out of whack were prices that just about everywhere within an hour’s drive of a big city was a bad deal. Now, however, things are mixed.

Table 3 shows price/rent ratios for six markets — ones for which local price and rent data were available for each month since 1987. The lines are a bit crowded, but two trends are clear. First, some are shifted higher than others over the whole period. That suggests that Miami residents, for example, can generally get a good deal on rent relative to house prices, while San Francisco residents (who pay dearly either way) might as well buy.

Second, some of the lines have plunged harder than others of late. For those who wish to buy in Chicago, Miami and San Francisco, there’s good news: The froth seems to have been let out of the market. Meanwhile, New Yorkers, Bostonians and Angelinos might want to wait. Of course, averages are just that. Careful shoppers can find good deals in expensive markets, while imprudent ones can overpay just about anywhere.

Renters, take heart. I’m still one of you. I’m not shopping yet. Prices aren’t at once-in-a-lifetime lows. They’re returning from (hopefully) once-in-a-lifetime highs. But for those for whom the pride of home ownership beckons, the payoff might soon be calling, too.

Timing the market to land a mortgage with the lowest rate possible is like trying to hit a moving target. It’s not impossible, but it takes patience and a keen eye, particularly in today’s volatile market.

Mortgage rates can fluctuate over a few days or several weeks. The leading indicators that influence rates vary depending on the type of mortgage for which you’re approved and whether it’s a fixed rate or an adjustable rate (or ARM).

Before the downturn, some mortgage rates could be tracked and predicted relatively easily because a few leading indicators were more closely bound to rates, says Keith Gumbinger, a vice president at HSH Associates, a mortgage-data tracking firm. For example, fixed-rate mortgages moved in closer lockstep with 10-year Treasury yields than they do now. Now, those rates are heavily influenced by other factors, including the unemployment rate, consumer spending and fear of inflation, he says.

According to the most recent data from HSH Associates, average mortgage rates are down from one month ago. The average rate for a 30-year conforming mortgage was 5.42% for the week ending July 31, compared to 5.55% for the week ending June 26. The average rate on a 15-year mortgage for the last week of July was 4.85%, down from 5.01% in the last week of June. And the average rate on a 5/1 ARM (the most common ARM, whose interest is fixed for the first five years and then becomes variable) was 4.89%, down from 5.14% in the week of June.

These lower rates are well above the near-historic lows they touched earlier this year. For the week ending May 1, the average rate on a 30-year fixed mortgage hit 4.96%.

“Trying to time the bottom of the marketplace is like trying to time the stock market,” Gumbinger says. “Even insiders don’t know when interest rates may change quickly.”

Borrowers can lock in a mortgage rate with a few weeks or more left until closing is completed. This is particularly useful if the borrower believes rates will soon increase. But navigating this process can become tricky and even costly.

Here’s what borrowers should know about locking in mortgage rates.

When is the right time to lock in a mortgage rate?

In most cases, buyers must first find the home that they want to buy and sign a purchase agreement on it. That often requires a deposit of around 5% of the home’s purchase price, says Gibran Nicholas, the chairman of the Ann Arbor, Mich.-based CMPS Institute, which trains and certifies mortgage lenders and brokers.

Then, once your lender has told you the mortgage for which you have qualified, ask if you can lock in the rate through the closing process, which usually lasts around 30 to 45 days.

How much does it cost to lock in a rate?

Lenders who allow borrowers to lock in a rate for around 30 days often won’t charge a fee, says Chip Cummings, president of Northwind Financial, a Grand Rapids, Mich.-based training and consulting firm for mortgage and realtor firms.

Borrowers who anticipate that closing will take longer, can request to lock in a rate for 45 or 60 days, which most lenders will let you do for free or for a one-time fee of up to 0.50% of the total loan, Nicholas says. Some lenders permit lock-ins for up to 90 or 120 days for, say, borrowers who haven’t found the home they plan to purchase, but you’ll have to pay a fee of 0.50% to 2% of the total loan amount.

Home buyers who have about a week left until their lock-in expires should contact their mortgage company to confirm that their closing will wrap up within the week or to inquire about extending their lock, Cummings says.

What are the pros of locking in a mortgage rate?

Locking in a mortgage rate eliminates uncertainty for the buyer, says Buz Livingston, a fee-only certified financial planner in Santa Rosa Beach, Fla. You’ll know whether you can afford your mortgage and in most cases what your monthly mortgage payments will be.

When a shopper finds a mortgage at a price level that they can afford, they should lock it in, says Gumbinger. Otherwise, they run the risk of ending up with a higher rate, which could result in a smaller mortgage that doesn’t cover the cost of the home.

What are the risks?

Consumers who pay a fee to lock in a rate could end up losing out on the savings they’re after, Cummings says. Even if the lock-in rate is lower than rates four months from now, the fee you’ve paid could wipe out the savings you had hoped to reap from the lower rate.

Those who walk away from a mortgage after they lock in a rate stand to lose the money they gave the lender, including an application or appraisal fee or the fee they paid to lock in the rate or extend the lock, Cummings says. Fees vary, depending on the lender.

Also, by locking in a rate now, borrowers stand to lose out should mortgage rates drop. Few lenders offer a float-down option, which allows you to qualify for the lower rate should it kick in between now and the closing, even if you locked in a higher rate. This option could cost another 0.25 to 0.50 points of the total loan amount, Nicholas says. (On a $200,000 mortgage, this option could cost between $500 and $1,000.)

What questions should you ask a lender before locking in a mortgage rate?

Find out how long you can lock in a rate and at what cost. And find out if you can sign on for a float-down option and what money you’ll recoup if you back out of the mortgage. Make sure that all of this information is included in a written rate-lock agreement.

Also, ask how long closing is likely to take; in July, new regulations in the mortgage industry (including changes in the appraisal process) that may delay loan processing went into effect, says Nicholas.

What are the leading indicators that are pegged to mortgage rates? >

Interest rates on fixed mortgages are determined by mortgage-backed securities or mortgage bonds that trade on the bond market, Nicholas says. When there’s demand for mortgage bonds, mortgage rates drop, and when that demand declines, rates increase. The Federal Reserve plan to purchase more than $1 trillion of mortgage-backed securities by the end of the year, which has helped lower rates, Nicholas says. (Reliable mortgage lenders will keep track of when the Fed buys mortgages to handicap a rate drop, he says.) Also, as economic indicators – including unemployment figures, consumer spending and concerns about inflation – worsen, rates on fixed mortgages drop, Gumbinger says.

Interest rates on ARMs are typically tied to either short-term Treasurys or the LIBOR, which is the interest rate that banks charge each other for short-term loans. The rate on the 5/1 ARM is often pegged to the 12-month LIBOR, Nicholas says.

What kind of buyer is best suited for fixed-rate mortgage vs. an ARM?

Buyers who plan to stay in a home for the long term or who can’t stomach the risk of a variable mortgage rate are better off with fixed-rate mortgages, Livingston says. Long-term homeowners often include families with young children that move into a neighborhood for the schools.

ARMs make sense for borrowers who plan to stay in a home for the number of years that the mortgage’s rate is fixed, especially if that temporarily fixed rate is significantly lower than what’s offered in a fixed-rate mortgage, Cummings says. Newlyweds who plan to upgrade or individuals who are transferred to new locations for work every few years often benefit from an ARM.

What about locking in when refinancing?

The benefits of locking in a rate when you’re refinancing become apparent more quickly than when you’re buying a home. That’s because once you’re quoted a new mortgage rate, you can compare it to the rate you’ve been paying so far. Assuming the new rate is lower, you should consider locking it in, Nicholas says.

Before you can lock in a rate, you’ll typically have to pay for a home appraisal (costs vary, but they are often around $500) and around $30 to $50 for your credit report.

With the economy strengthening but still fragile, Federal Reserve policymakers are expected to hold a key lending rate at a record low this week and will weigh whether to extend some programs that were created to ease the financial crisis.

Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and his colleagues also are likely to signal that while the recession is winding down, the pain isn’t over.

Though the unemployment rate dipped to 9.4 percent in July — its first drop in 15 months — economists predict it will start climbing again. Many, including people in the Obama administration and at the Fed, say it could still top 10 percent this year.

For months, consumers have pulled back on spending and borrowing. To try to stimulate economic activity, Fed policymakers are all but certain to keep the target range for its bank lending rate between zero and 0.25 percent at the end of their two-day meeting Wednesday.

That means commercial banks’ prime lending rate, used to peg rates on home equity loans, certain credit cards and other consumer loans, will stay around 3.25 percent, the lowest rate in decades.

Fed policymakers also will probably pledge anew to keep rates there for “an extended period,” which economists interpret to mean through the rest of the year and into part of 2010.

“We’re doing everything we can to support the economy,” Bernanke said recently. “We will try to get through this process. It’s going to take some patience.”

By holding rates so low, the Fed hopes to induce consumers and businesses to boost spending, even though banks are still being stingy about extending credit.

“The Fed will be guardedly optimistic,” said Brian Bethune, economist at IHS Global Insight. “We’re seeing initial signs of the economy moving toward recovery … (but) the underlying fundamentals are still weak.”

With numerous signs that the recession is finally ending and financial stresses easing, the Fed will consider whether some rescue programs should continue. Any such decisions, though, might not come at this week’s meeting.

One such program, aimed at driving down interest rates on mortgages and other consumer debt, involves buying U.S. Treasurys. The central bank is on track to buy $300 billion worth of Treasury bonds by the fall; it has bought $236 billion so far.

Another program, the Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility, or TALF, is intended to spark lending to consumers and small businesses. It got off to a slow start in March and is slated to shut down at the end of December. Despite this program, many people are still having trouble getting loans, analysts say.

The Fed isn’t expected to launch any new revival efforts or change another existing program that aims to push down mortgage rates. In that venture, the Fed is on track to buy $1.25 trillion worth of securities issued by mortgage finance companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac by the end of the year. The central bank’s recent purchases have averaged $542.8 billion.

In the meantime, the economy has shown clear signs of improvement. Employers cut only 247,000 jobs in July, the fewest in a year, the government said Friday. Wages and workers’ hours also nudged up — encouraging signs that companies no longer see the need for drastic cost-cutting. Those developments could deliver a psychological boost to both companies and consumers.

The economy in the second quarter contracted at a pace of just 1 percent, suggesting that the recession, which started in December 2007, is ending.

That dip came after a dizzying free-fall in the first three months of this year. The economy had plunged at an annual rate of 6.4 percent in the first quarter, the worst showing in nearly three decades.

With the economy improving but still weak, inflation should stay low, the Fed says. Given consumers’ caution, companies won’t have much power to raise prices.

And the weak job market will limit wage growth. Companies aren’t going to feel generous about wages and benefits until they are confident a recovery will last.

French advertising company Publicis Groupe SA has agreed to buy Microsoft Corp.’s digital advertising firm Razorfish in a move to boost its share of advertising on the Web, according to a joint statement released Sunday.

The deal is valued at $530 million, comprised of cash and 6.5 million Publicis Groupe treasury shares. The two companies also signed a five-year strategic alliance agreement that will allow Publicis to purchase display and search advertising from Seattle-based Microsoft on favorable terms across Microsoft’s digital properties in exchange for certain minimum guaranteed purchases.

Under terms of that agreement, Razorfish will continue to be a preferred provider to Microsoft for digital strategy, creative and marketing services and Microsoft has committed to spend a minimum amount for those services each year.

In addition to Microsoft, Razorfish’s major clients include Ford Motor Co., Best Buy Co., McDonald’s Corp. and Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc.

Razorfish will continue to operate under its brand name and be part of VivaKi, the new Publicis Groupe entity created in June 2008 to reflect independent operations of Digitas, Starcom MediaVest Group, Denuo and ZenithOptimedia. Razorfish’s management team, led by Chief Executive Officer Bob Lord, will remain unchanged.

“The acquisition of Razorfish is another step forward in realizing our strategic vision of building a world leader in digital communications, a critically important space for our clients,” said Maurice Levy, chairman and chief executive of Publicis Groupe in a statement. “More than anything, this acquisition should demonstrate that Publicis Groupe now presents a wider pool of resources, talent and expertise that will help our clients market their products or services in a way that takes maximum advantage of the new digital world.”

Levy added that when the transaction is completed, about 25 percent of the company’s annual revenue will come from digital communications, up from around 21 percent currently.

The cash component of the purchase price will be based on the shares’ value, calculated by the average closing price of Publicis Groupe stock during the 20-trading-day period ending on the eighth business day prior to the closing date of the transaction. The transaction is expected to close during the fourth quarter of 2009.

Publicis is the world’s fourth largest communications company with ad agencies including Leo Burnett,Publicis, Saatchi & Saatchi and media buyers Starcom MediaVest Group and ZenithOptimedia. In digital advertising, it owns Digitas.

Razorfish became part of Microsoft’s umbrella as part of the company’s $6 billion acquisition of aQuantive Inc. in May 2007.

That’s what marketing gurus say General Motors Co. must do as it begins a massive overhaul of advertising worth more than $2 billion a year now that it’s out of bankruptcy protection.

Since emerging from bankruptcy court last month, GM is looking to revive sales as it focuses on its four remaining brands: Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet and GMC. Experts say it has to get back to basics and tell consumers why they should choose its cars over those made by rivals like Ford, Toyota and Honda.

The company can do that, they say, by showing how its vehicles perform and by staking out stronger identities for the brands. There’s no better time than now, as thousands of Americans who normally wouldn’t be buying cars are lured into showrooms by the government’s “cash-for-clunkers” trade-in program, promising up to $4,500 off a car if vehicles with poor gas mileage are traded in.

GM knows it has work to do, and it assigned the job to legendary auto executive Bob Lutz, not exactly known for his marketing experience but a longtime product development chief known for his blunt style.

Lutz, now in charge of the largest U.S. automaker’s ad content, promised “quick” and “drastic” changes to GM’s tone after he took the job last month. But the company hasn’t announced its new strategy yet, other than Lutz saying he wants to position Buick as a competitor to Lexus and Cadillac to BMW.

“My top priority now is to enhance the ability of GM to let the public know about what great cars and trucks we build,” Lutz said in an online chat last month. “For all the money spent in the past, this seemingly simple task has eluded us.”

The company says it is reviewing accounts with its many ad agencies. Lutz told The Associated Press in an e-mail that the marketing revamp is well under way.

“The new stuff is in the works, and it’s great,” he wrote, though he declined to say when it would start airing.

Chances are, the company may want to do it soon so it can capitalize on “cash for clunkers,” which made last month the best for auto sales in nearly a year. Sales improved from previous months for GM, but they were still down 19 percent from the same time last year, while rival Ford Motor Co. posted a 2.4 percent increase.

Marketing hasn’t always been a problem for GM. After all, it created some of the world’s most legendary brands.

Decades ago, GM’s ads helped link America’s love of cars with the Detroit automaker. A generation grew up singing “See the USA in your Chevrolet” with Dinah Shore in the 1950s. Decades later, the company used rocker Bob Seger’s song “Like A Rock” to sell Chevy trucks.

But particularly in the past five years, the campaigns became more varied and incongruent. Remember the 2007 Super Bowl ad featuring a robot who killed himself in a dream sequence?

“These were all over the place,” said Deborah Mitchell, a marketing professor at Wisconsin School of Business. “One might say they should be all over the place because they’ve got different brands. But the problem is even within the campaigns, there was a lot of jumping around.”

Consumers don’t know what separates the company’s brands like Chevrolet and Buick from each other or competitors, experts say. That’s why sales were soft even before the recession started.

In the past four years the company racked up more than $80 billion in losses, even as it spent about $10 billion on advertising from 2005 through the first quarter of this year, according to TNS Media Intelligence.

GM has at least been quick to pull ads that aren’t working, like a recent one for the redesigned Buick LaCrosse. The ad was widely criticized for, among other reasons, not having much to do with the vehicle. In the ad, where the sedan is featured as though it were a model, a director says he only takes pictures of “beautiful things” as the car is attended to by crew members, rests by a pool and on the beach.

A male voice at the end says: “You’ve changed. And I love it.”

But few people did. Some in the marketing industry panned the ad for being too light and not making enough sense. Even when asked how the ad could have aired, Lutz said in an online chat that it tested well. GM pulled the spot after a month.

So what should GM do?

First, stop apologizing. The company must distance its corporate identity from its brands, said Jim Wangers, the marketing guru behind the Pontiac GTO, GM’s first muscle car in the 1960s.

The company shouldn’t do any more with its “reinvention” campaign, which admits the company made mistakes but promises change, he said.

“I would like to see them forget about apologizing, get out from under that GM umbrella and start beating somebody and start talking to me about that fine line of Chevys, Caddies and Buicks,” he said.

But it’s not simply a matter of telling the public through advertisements, said veteran marketing strategist Al Ries. GM must define niches for its brands and let consumers know, for example, how a Chevy is different from a Toyota, Ries said.

GM has been so focused on making its cars better that its brands are confusing to consumers, and this will take years to undo, he said. Consumers don’t really know what makes a car “better” but they do respond to “different,” he said, citing the success of brands with unique niches like Porsche, Volkswagen and Mini Cooper.

“You won’t solve the problem by making better cars,” Ries said. “You’ll solve the problem by making different cars that stand for something.”

The company’s lineup is among the best in its history, said Peter De Lorenzo, publisher of autoextremist.com, who used to work in automotive advertising and marketing. But consumers think only two words when they hear GM, he said: “bad” and “bankruptcy.”

“The negativity of what happened with GM will eventually recede into the background if the products are so good that they can’t be ignored,” De Lorenzo said. “But that will take time.”

AP Auto Writer Tom Krisher contributed to this report.

สัญญา ทองคำตลาดนิวยอร์กปิดร่วงลง เพราะได้รับแรงกดดันจากสกุลเงินดอลลาร์สหรัฐที่แข็งค่าขึ้นเมื่อเทียบกับยู โรและปอนด์ นอกจากนี้ นักลงทุนยังมีท่าทีระมัดระวังก่อนที่กระทรวงพลังงานสหรัฐจะเปิดเผยข้อมูล จ้างงานในช่วงเย็นวันศุกร์ตามเวลาประเทศไทย

บลูมเบิร์กรายงานว่า สัญญาทองคำได้รับแรงกดดันจากสกุลเงินดอลลาร์สหรัฐที่แข็งแกร่งขึ้นเมื่อ เทียบกับยูโรและปอนด์ หลังจากธนาคารกลางอังกฤษและยุโรปตัดสินใจคงอัตราดอกเบี้ยในการประชุมเมื่อ วานนี้ นอกจากนี้ นักลงทุนยังมีท่าทีระมัดระวังก่อนที่กระทรวงพลังงานสหรัฐจะเปิดเผยข้อมูล จ้างงานในวันศุกร์

นักวิเคราะห์ส่วนใหญ่คาดว่าตัวเลขว่างงานจะลดลง 325,000 ตำแหน่ง ซึ่งเป็นการลดลงในอัตราที่ช้าลงเมื่อเทียบกับเดือนมิ.ย.ที่ทรุดตัวลง 467,000 ตำแหน่ง และคาดว่าอัตราว่างงานเดือนดังกล่าวจะพุ่งขึ้นแตะระดับสูงสุดในรอบ 26 ปีที่ 9.6%

- ทองคำ ส่งมอบเดือนธันวาคม ปิดที่ 962.90 ดอลลาร์สหรัฐ/ออนซ์ (-3.40 ดอลลาร์สหรัฐ/ออนซ์)
- เงิน ส่งมอบเดือนกันยายน ปิดที่ 14.645 ดอลลาร์สหรัฐ/ออนซ์ (-0.11 ดอลลาร์สหรัฐ/ออนซ์)

นายอัมรินทร์ คอมันตร์ ประธานบริษัทไทยสตาร์ชิปปิ้ง จำกัด เปิดเผยว่า แม้หลายฝ่ายประเมินว่า เริ่มมีสัญญาณฟื้นตัวของเศรษฐกิจ แต่ส่วนตัวกลับมองว่า การฟื้นตัวจะเป็นในช่วงระยะนี้เท่านั้น ซึ่งผู้ประกอบการไม่ควรประมาท และต้องการให้ภาครัฐดูแลเงินบาทให้อ่อนค่ากว่

Author : Thserv News Master
Read More…
 

พ.อ.นที ศุกลรัตน์ ประธานคณะทำงานด้านวิทยุชุมชน และอนุกรรมการวิทยุกระจายเสียงและวิทยุโทรทัศน์ กล่าวว่า ขณะนี้มีกลุ่มนักการเมืองและนักธุรกิจพยายามปล่อยข่าวไม่ให้มีการลงทะเบียนเพื่อยื่นขอรับใบอนุญาตวิทยุชุมชน เพราะเกรงว่าตัวเองจะเสียผลประโยชน์ คณะทำงานด

Author : Thserv News Master
Read More…