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George
Foreclosure growth slows
Foreclosure listing service RealtyTrac says the number of households facing foreclosure last month grew 6 percent from a year ago.
It was the smallest yearly increase in four years. Foreclosures have started to fall in Nevada, Arizona and California, all of which have been hard hit by the foreclosure crisis.
Experts warn that hundreds of thousands of homeowners being evaluated for help under loan modification programs are likely to fail. And Florida remains a severe trouble spot. Foreclosures there are still soaring.
GE sees upswing, hiring
General Electric is hiring back workers as the economy has begun to expand and growth in emerging markets has continued unabated, Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey Immelt said.
Global demand for health-care services and locomotives will drive growth at the world’s biggest maker of jet engines, medical-imaging equipment and locomotives, Immelt said. About 50 percent of that demand will be from outside the United States, he said.
Dem will push regulation
Unable to muster bipartisan agreement on key banking provisions, Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd said Thursday he will offer his own version of a sweeping overhaul of financial regulations without Republican support. “Clearly, we need to move along,” he said.
A month of talks between Dodd and Republican Sen. Bob Corker had found common ground, but details on key provisions, including consumer protections and other sticking points, remained unsettled.
He said he hoped the Senate could act on a bill sometime in the spring.
Pa. labor leader retiring
After 20 years as the face of organized labor in Pennsylvania and 50 years since the United Steelworkers issued his first union card, Bill George is stepping down as the state president of the AFL-CIO.
George, who will turn 69 in August, said Thursday he’ll retire sometime after his successor is elected at the labor federation’s biennial convention in Pittsburgh next month and before his term expires in June.
China inflation rises
China’s inflation reached a 16- month high, industrial output climbed and new loans exceeded forecasts, adding to the case for the government to pare back stimulus measures.
Consumer prices rose 2.7 percent in February from a year earlier, the National Bureau of Statistics said in Beijing Thursday. Seasonal factors stemming from a weeklong holiday may have boosted prices. Production rose 20.7 percent in the first two months of 2010, the most in more than five years.
Any steps that slow China’s growth could have repercussions for its trading partners if that erodes demand for imports.