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It's Only Money

By Maxine Shapiro, KERA 90.1 business commentator

Dallas, TX – It's Friday, so "It's Only Money," a review of the big and not-so-big stories of the week. I'm Maxine Shapiro with KERA Marketplace Midday.

You know the tune - "You got to accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative." Well, that's the song that everyone is singing on Wall Street today. Forget that last month's 6.1% unemployment rate is the highest it's been in 9 years, and May payrolls only fell by 17,000. Economists expected 30,000 jobs cuts. And after revising April's figures, the Labor Department reported no jobs were lost in that month instead of the 48,000 that was reported earlier. Productivity is up and so are earnings - slightly. In other words, some workers are getting paid for all that overtime. Based on yesterday's retail sales figures, shoppers are still not back in the saddle. So with retail inventories high, expect June to be the month for sales.

Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan hinted earlier in the week there might be another interest rate cut. He's still disappointed in the labor market. So today, the Dow is getting comfortable over the 9,000 mark and the S&P 500 is flirting with a 52-week high.

And no, I did not forget about Martha. I'm actually waiting for the dust to settle and see what the government does about the other corporate culprits they're investigating. As I said earlier this week, a group of regulatory agencies have subpoenaed records from the 12 largest Wall Street CEO's. This is in reference to the fraudulent research scandal and who knew what, when. If this inquiry should quietly fade away, kind of like how Kenneth Lay is still enjoying his freedom, then we'll know. Martha Stewart is the scapegoat. She was the most obvious to choose. Her perfectionist, I-can-turn-water-into-wine attitude made her an easy target. And she might very well be guilty. But she is definitely not the only one. Now we'll have to wait and see if any of her male counterparts will join her at the courthouse. For KERA Marketplace Midday, I'm Maxine Shapiro.

 

Marketplace Midday Reports air on KERA 90.1 Monday - Friday at 1:04 p.m.

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