Month: July 2022

One of the few numbers growing faster than energy stock dividends is the size of crowds convinced they are not sustainable. I’ve never witnessed a consensus opinion as negative on an entire sector as on traditional energy. The debates are so one-sided that dividends’ simple clues are being overlooked, and instead more focus is placed on when traditional energy businesses

Everything costs too much these days. The good news is, consumers can afford to scrimp on streaming in August. While almost every major streaming service has a blockbuster series on the way, in most cases they don’t have much else new. So August’s picks come down to which services offer the most bang for the buck right now, knowing viewers

Wall Street breathed a sigh of relief after Big Tech produced results that were largely not as bad as feared (except for Facebook), but the harder part of this earnings season may arrive in the coming week. A parade of smaller tech companies in sectors that received a huge pandemic bounce that may be coming back to earth will report

An executive for the Siegel Group, a Las Vegas-based real estate company, allegedly told staff in Texas they could “get rid” of a past-due tenant without an eviction order last May by calling child protective services if too many people were in the home, misleadingly suggesting a federal eviction ban was no longer in effect, or having security knock on

Dear MarketWatch, I hope you can help me figure this out. I am 69 years old and will turn 70 at the end of the month. I’ve been offered a cash out refinance loan and need to decide whether to take a 15- or 30-year loan. My monthly obligation would obviously be higher for the 15-year loan. I may not

The official scorecard for the U.S. economy contracted in the spring for the second quarter in a row, matching an old rule of thumb for when an economy is in recession. Is the U.S. really suffering its second downturn in three years? If not, why not? And what comes next for the economy? Is the U.S. in recession? No, at

Both the Senate and the House of Representatives have approved $52 billion in grants and $24 billion in tax credits that advocates say will strengthen the production of semiconductors in the U.S. while increasing national security. Now U.S. semiconductors SOX, +0.77% could join wool, mohair, helium, soybeans, ethanol, steel and credit unions as industries thought to be so important as

Elon Musk is certainly self-confident, perhaps overconfident, but what about his hubris? Confidence and hubris reside at opposite ends of self-image, with overconfidence in between. Confidence is essential in life and overconfidence can be good or bad in business and investing. Hubris precipitates peril.  Hubris — arrogance or excessive pride — may befall any of us, but Musk may be

After a long, loud battle, the victory has come quietly. Over the past few months, deposits have started appearing in the accounts of former truckers, iron workers and other retirees across the country–restoring pension benefits that these people had earned after decades working some of America’s most back-breaking jobs, only to have them ripped away in their retirement years. The

More people die in flash floods in the U.S. each year than from tornadoes, hurricanes or lightning. That’s a reminder from the National Weather Service (NWS) after sudden, heavy downpours drenched Las Vegas on Thursday night, sending water gushing into casinos and onto city buses, as well as stranding cars and leaving citizens and tourists scrambling. Kentucky and broader Appalachia

After super charged, double-digital growth during the pandemic, the results from the five biggest U.S. tech giants this week showed a slowdown as they grapple with inflation, looming recession and an overall slowing economy, but they were largely rewarded by Wall Street because their size shows their strength. During the last week, all of Big Tech reported second quarter earnings,

A bill introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives would amend U.S. labor law to establish a new classification for gig workers, denying them the right to a minimum wage and other employment protections. The “Worker Flexibility and Choice Act,” or HR 8442, would change the Fair Labor Standards Act so that “employee” does not include a person who has

‘‘We are now at levels broadly in line with our estimates of neutral interest rates, and after front-loading our hiking cycle until now we will be much more data-dependent going forward.’’ — Jerome Powell, July 2022 FOMC press conference The Federal Reserve on Wednesday raised interest rates by another 75 basis points despite acknowledging that economic growth is clearly slowing.

Moderna MRNA, +3.81% and Pfizer PFE, -0.41% have not yet started clinical trials for the new COVID-19 shots that are expected to better target the BA.4 and BA.5 strains of the virus.  It has long been expected that the COVID-19 vaccines need to be reformulated to better protect against currently circulating variants. The Food and Drug Administration in June recommended

The housing market is cooling off. After two years of red-hot sales, economic data paints a tale of a market that’s seeing weaker sales, plunging sentiment among homebuilders, and rising mortgage rates.  But economists are divided over whether the U.S. housing sector is in a recession. Some economists say it is. Given that the decline in housing activity is across

First inflation came for grocery bills and gas prices, now it’s showing up in Yelp reviews complaining of meager portions at dining establishments and rising costs at businesses generally.  Customers mentioning the word “inflation” in Yelp reviews or describing “inflationary experiences” such as higher prices hit a record high in the second quarter, rising 7% from the previous quarter and

The U.S. housing sector is finally cooling off. For those looking to buy, there are homes in several parts of the country that are on sale right now, according to new data. Sellers slashed home prices in June in areas that saw red-hot price appreciation earlier in the pandemic, including Reno, Nev., Austin, Texas, and Boise, Idaho, according to Realtor.com.