| About:Carlo Gabriel Simbajon- Website
- Profile
- Carlo is Assistant Editor and business writer. He is a former senior government economist and was a senior editor for a Bloomberg publication.
About:Carlo Gabriel Simbajon- Website
- Profile
- Carlo is Assistant Editor and business writer. He is a former senior government economist and was a senior editor for a Bloomberg publication.
February 9th, 2011, Carlo Gabriel Simbajon  Rising profits and dividends appear to be not enough incentives for businesses to start hiring. Even with earnings and sales in the fourth quarter of 2010 up from the same quarter of 2009, job growth remains to be the elusive a report by the Wall Street Journal said. The Journal reported, “With 73% of the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index by market value having reported fourth-quarter results, earnings are up 28% from a year earlier and sales are up 7.7%.” However, only 36,000 jobs were generated in January, the report said citing data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Economists were projecting over 130,000 new jobs during the first month of 2011 → Read More February 8th, 2011, Carlo Gabriel Simbajon  America’s largest bank announced recently it will be creating a separate unit to deal solely with foreclosures and discontinued loan products, the Associated Press reported. Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) said its Legacy Asset Servicing unit will be tasked with resolving issues involving faulty mortgage paperwork. BofA, and a number of other banks, was embroiled in an industry-wide scandal involving the use of “robo-signers” – bank employees and contractors who rubber-signed foreclosure documents without checking their veracity. Because of the robo-signing allegations, BofA suspended foreclosures in all 50 states last October and resumed them in December after a review of procedures. → Read More February 7th, 2011, Carlo Gabriel Simbajon  Cash-strapped states received some advice from the Obama administration on ways to cut Medicaid spending. Medicaid is normally the first or the second largest item on a state’s budget. Secretary Kathleen Sebelius of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services advised governors to consider generating savings through several approaches: like charging higher rates of co-payments for certain services, putting a limit to certain benefits, more efficient management of high-cost patients, putting a stop on improper payments and bringing down the cost of drugs. → Read More February 6th, 2011, Carlo Gabriel Simbajon  Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Ex-Florida Governor Jeb Bush are urging Congress to pass a bill that would allow states to declare bankruptcy. The proposed measure is a way to aid cash-strapped states around the nation, Gingrich and Bush said recently in an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times. The Republican duo said “Federal bailouts must come to an end.” They argued that “Congress must allow a safe, orderly way under federal bankruptcy law for states to reorganize their finances.” Their proposal, they say, will be “fair, orderly, predictable and lawful approach,” to helping financially struggling states. → Read More February 4th, 2011, Carlo Gabriel Simbajon  Senator Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) wants Congress to raise the age of retirement to 69, a report by The Hill said. Graham said the measure will help Social Security to address its solvency problems. Speaking to WVOC radio in his home state, Graham said “I’m looking for a process that will lead to a vote on saving Social Security from bankruptcy this year, that would adjust the age.” Senator Graham made reference to the gradual increase in the retirement age in the 80s that was a product of an agreement with then President Ronald Reagan, a Republican and Democratic House Speaker Tip O’Neill (Mass.). That agreement brought in a phased increase in the retirement age to 67, the Hill report said. → Read More February 3rd, 2011, Carlo Gabriel Simbajon  A member of the U.S. House of Representatives is set to dig deeper into the $160 million used in the legal defense of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and their former officials. Republican Congressman Darrell Issa of California has requested the Federal Housing Finance Agency for documentation behind the decision to use taxpayer’s money to fund the legal costs, an Associated Press report said. Rep. Issa, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee said “”At a time of runaway federal deficits and 10 percent unemployment, it is extremely distasteful for the American taxpayers to be forced to pay the legal bills of former executives of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, companies which were central players in the financial crisis.” → Read More February 2nd, 2011, Carlo Gabriel Simbajon  A U.S. District Court Judge in Pensacola, Florida is expected to declare President Barack Obama’s health care reform law as unconstitutional. Judge Roger Vinson is expected to issue a decision today in a lawsuit filed by 26 states against the controversial law, a Reuters report said. The law reforming the nation’s health care system is one of the major thrusts of the Obama administration. It targets the expansion of health insurance to cover millions of Americans who are uninsured while at the same time curbing costs. The administration stands by its belief that the law is constitutional and is required to address the rising cost of health care in the country. → Read More February 1st, 2011, Carlo Gabriel Simbajon  The Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission (FCIC) is placing the blame on American households for the financial crisis of 2007-2010, according to a report from Yahoo!’s Contributor Network. The report said the FCIC blasted households “because they borrowed too much and saved too little,” that they took “too much risk by over-extending themselves,” and, that they placed record debt “on themselves and by overstating their income on mortgage applications.” The Commission said the collapse of the housing and mortgage markets “all came home to roost,” because of “the lack of transparency, the extraordinary debt loads, the short-term loans, and the risky assets.” The FCIC said the outcome was panic. “We had reaped what we had sown,” the Commission concluded the report said. The FCIC was created under the Fraud Enforcement and Recovery Act of 2009 and is tasked to investigate the causes of the financial crisis of the last decade. → Read More | Listen to Mike Colliss Interviews |
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