Shinzo Abe

Policymakers in Washington continued to struggle with passing a spending bill that will keep the government going past October 1. Unfortunately, even if the bill is passed, most see this battle as just the tip of the iceberg as US Treasury Secretary Jack Lew has indicated that the US will reach...

The suggestion that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad could avoid military intervention by giving up his chemical weapons to international regulators has quickly grown into a possible non-violent resolution to the crisis in Syria. The proposal, backed by Russia, has been named a possible...

The FOMC minutes’ release continues to be the main driver in the markets. The minutes, to be released at 18:00 GMT, will hopefully provide some guidance about when the Fed will begin to taper its bond buying stimulus. Top News In other news around the markets: The euro/dollar...

Stocks in Japan dropped to a seven-week low overnight on reports that the world's third-largest economy grew much slower than expected in the second quarter. Inflation also ran at a higher rate than anticipated, raising fears that the extraordinary expansionary policies of the both the Bank of...

Futures Higher On China Trade Data U.S. equity futures shrugged off fears of Federal Reserve tapering in early trade and moved slightly higher following a largely better than expected trade report from China for July. Also, the European Central Bank issued its monthly report, revising down growth...

Ahead of this weekend's Japanese elections that will decide control of the country's upper house of parliament, stocks in the world's third-largest economy tumbled. During Friday's Asian session, the Nikkei 225 lost almost 1.5 percent. At this writing, USD/JPY is down almost 0.2 percent and,...

Abenomics, the colloquial term for Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's agenda to rejuvenate the world's third-largest economic, could get a boost this weekend. That is when Japanese voters head to the polls to decide which political party will gain control of Japan's upper house of parliament...

Yields on 10-year U.S. Treasurys are trading lower Tuesday, but a one-day pullback does not entirely erase the 52-basis point increase that occurred from June 3 through July 8. Ten-year yields reside at just over 2.6 percent at this writing, but investors may not want too comfortable with that...

Thanks to a strong jobs report, U.S. stocks soared last Friday with all three major indexes gaining about one percent. After the U.S. Labor Department said 195,000 new jobs were added last month and that the April and May figures were revised higher, the S&P 500 settled the week with a gain...

Benzinga Pro analyst Matthew Kanterman sat down with Forexlive.com's editor Adam Button for a radio interview. The Fed, the ECB and Japan took center stage while the analysts discussed further the recent drop in gold concurrently as the yellow metal plunged through the $1,200 per ounce level for...

A rough week for stocks has come and gone with all three major U.S. indexes settling lower. The S&P 500 shed nearly 1.2 percent as traders fretted over global central bank policy, namely the 800-pound gorillas in the room, those being the Bank of Japan and the Federal Reserve. Speaking of...

When China did what China always does and announced uninspiring economic data over the weekend when much of the world wasn’t watching, this looked like bad news for the Monday trading session in Japan but that wasn’t the case. The Nikkei ended higher by nearly five percent. Reuters reported...

In what has been an all-too constant story over the past two weeks, the Nikkei Index has finally entered a bear market. Overnight, the index dropped to a new intra-day low which now places the index in bear market territory. Massive Retracement The Nikkei Index closed down 0.21 percent overnight,...

Futures Slightly Lower on Global Economic Data U.S. equity futures traded slightly lower in early Wednesday trade after stocks broke the 20-Tuesday winning streak yesterday. Markets eye key economic reports from around the world heading into trading Wednesday as global service PMIs are due out...

Remember the days when only the most sophisticated of investors knew about the eurozone? Americans with more of a world view knew that it was a collection of countries in Europe but beyond that, there was very little to talk about. As the contagion from U.S. markets during the recession reached...