Stock Markets News
Fee income boosts S.Africa's Investec FY earnings by 18 pct
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South African investment bank and asset manager Investec reported an 18 percent rise in full-year profit on Thursday, boosted by strong income from fees and commissions. Investec, which is also listed in London, said diluted headline earnings per share totalled 30 pence in the year to end-March, compared with 25.4 pence a year earlier. Headline EPS, the main measure of profit in South Africa, excludes certain one-time items. Fee and commissions rose 10 percent to 972. ...
Average U.S. 401(k) balance tops $80,000, up 75 percent since 2009
BOSTON (Reuters) - The average 401(k) retirement balance for U.S. workers hit a record high of $80,900 in the first quarter, a growth spurt of 75 percent since the stock market's nadir in March 2009, Fidelity Investments said on Thursday based on a survey of its accounts. Most of the recovery is linked to a stock market rally that has lifted the broad S&P 500 Index 145 percent since the close of trading on March 9, 2009. The 401(k) recovery looks even better for workers 55 and older, according to Boston-based Fidelity, the largest U.S. administrator of 401(k) retirement plans. ...
Kenyan lender I&M looks to list shares by June
NAIROBI (Reuters) - Kenyan lender I&M plans to list shares on the stock market by next month after it completed a merger with small investment company City Trust, I&M said on Wednesday. I&M and City Trust combined through a share swap and the new company, named I&M Holdings Limited, holds the assets of both banks. "The transaction ... provides us with the platform to raise additional capital in the future to facilitate the achievement of our long-term growth and expansion strategy," Arun Mathur, I&M Bank's chief executive, said in a statement. ...
Lenovo shares jump more than 4 percent after earnings beat forecast
HONG KONG (Reuters) - Shares in Chinese personal computer maker Lenovo Group Ltd jumped more than 4 percent after it reported a forecast-beating 90 percent rise in quarterly profit, its fastest in seven quarters. The stock rose as much as 4.3 percent in afternoon trade to HK$7.49 after it posted net profit of $126.9 million in the quarter ended in March, up from $66.8 million a year earlier, based on Reuters calculations using full-year and nine-month financial data. (Reporting By Christina Lo and Anne Marie Roantree; Editing by Daniel Magnowski)
Wall Street falters in volatile session on Fed worries
By Angela Moon NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks fell on Wednesday with the S&P 500 posting its biggest decline in three weeks, after minutes from the latest Federal Reserve meeting showed some officials were open to tapering large-scale asset purchases as early as at the June meeting. Trading was volatile - the Dow and the S&P indexes both rose more than 1 percent during the morning, but fell more than 1 percent in the afternoon. ...
Stocks tumble after Fed meeting
Stocks slipped back from their opening highs as investors struggled to digest conflicting remarks by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke over when the central bank may begin easing off the stimulus gas pedal.
Bernanke: Economy still needs Fed's help
The Federal Reserve's monetary stimulus is helping the U.S. economy recover, and the central bank needs to see further signs of traction before taking its foot off the gas, central bank chairman Ben Bernanke said on Wednesday.
Economy is on the move again -- and so are Americans
Americans are on the move again. Thanks to the slowly brightening employment picture, along with the uptick in the housing market, more and more people are packing up and relocating.
Poverty increasingly pushing into the suburbs
When Americans think about poverty, chances are they don’t picture places such as the suburbs surrounding Cape Coral, Fla., Colorado Springs, Colo., and Atlanta. But a new book, “Confronting Suburban Poverty in America,” finds those were among the suburban areas that saw some of the biggest increases in the number of poor people between 2000 and 2010.
Bonuses for top federal workers know no sequester
While some federal workers are being hit with furloughs due to the sequester, other high-level federal executives are scheduled to get millions of dollars in bonuses, unless there's a law to stop them.