Star Athletes Real Estate Investment Sours

New England Patriots offensive lineman Matt Light and about 20 other star athletes loaned more than $8 million to a California real estate company that teamed up with Fidelity Investments and Citigroup Inc. to invest in apartment complexes before collapsing and filing for bankruptcy protection.
Light, Toronto Blue Jays ace Roy Halladay and Los Angeles Angels [...]

For Some Speculators, Safaricoms 50 Percent Gain Was Not Good Enough

Even as Safaricom notched a stellar 50 per cent increase in its share price on the first day of trading, for some investors, it was not a good debut for the telecoms giant.
For thousands of investors, many of who had borrowed expensively for interest rates of up to 20 per cent, Safaricom represented a major [...]

Major Economic Indicators Perform Negatively In 2007-08

ISLAMABAD: All major economic indicators, Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), exports, Large Scale Manufacturing (LSM), saving and investment and tax collections witnessed negative growth in the outgoing fiscal year 2007-08.
Foreign Direct Investment: According to the State Bank of Pakistan data, the net foreign private investment during July-March 2007-08 has declined by 46.3 percent over the corresponding [...]

Commercial Property Bucks Gloomy Trend In Housing Market

The media are bombarding us with bad news stories about the residential property market.
For example, it was reported the Nationwide Building Society’s latest survey showed house prices recorded their largest monthly fall since 1991.
Prices dropped 2.5 per cent in May and are apparently now 4.4 per cent lower than a year ago, a fall of [...]

Investment Houses Pull Back On Emergency Fed Loans

Wall Street investment companies are borrowing less from the Federal Reserve’s emergency lending program.
A Fed report Thursday says the companies averaged $12.3 billion in daily borrowing over the past week. That compares with $14.2 billion the previous week.
The program begun March 17 is one of several steps the central bank has taken in response to [...]

Is Canada Recession Bound

Canadian growth shrank 0.3% in the first quarter, as a wrenching restructuring in the manufacturing sector hobbled an economy half-way in recession.
It was the first decline in annualized growth in nearly five years and the weakest in the Group of Seven, behind the United States, Britain, Europe and even Japan.
“This is a bitterly disappointing and [...]

Blackstone Group And Private Equity Peers Fall From Wall Streets Heights

A year ago, private equity executives were Wall Street’s new masters of the universe, riding an era of easy money to unparalleled success by pulling off record-setting buyouts and pulling down monstrous paydays.
The industry became so synonymous with making money that buyout giant Blackstone Group, a specialist in taking companies private, itself went public in [...]

Beware Propertys Inflation Hedge Siren Call

Real estate has a justified reputation for protecting the investor from inflation — but only in the long-term and only if it is the right kind of inflation.
So investors worried by the growing menace of inflation should think twice before upping their exposure to the asset class, even as property markets sag and valuations become [...]

Great Portland Adjusted Net Assets Fall 2 Pct

Great Portland Estates (GPOR.L: Quote, Profile, Research) posted a 2 percent fall in adjusted net asset value on Wednesday and said demand for its core London properties would cling to long-term average despite shaky economic conditions.
In results for the year to end-March on Wednesday, Great Portland said its adjusted net assets per share fell to [...]

Corrected-Red Tape Slows Big Growth Market For U.S

Government red-tape is keeping millions of American workers in small firms from saving for retirement, a U.S. mutual fund trade group executive said on Wednesday, limiting a huge potential market for the $11.7 trillion industry.
“Any employer thinking about offering a 401(k) plan today encounters a profusion of regulatory requirements, head-scratching complexities, and sobering legal liabilities,” [...]