EconomicCrisis.US

The U.S. Mint circulated more quarters, dimes, nickels and pennies last year. And that’s a good thing.

When the economic crisis hit a few years ago, people turned to one of the most traditional safe havens for savings: piggy banks.

“People went into their piggy banks and their coin jars and spent those coins,” U.S. Mint Deputy Director Richard Peterson told NPR’s Planet Money. “Those coins flowed back into the banks and then ultimately back to the Federal Reserve. The Federal Reserve started filling up and they turned off the spigot of new coin production from the United States Mint.”
Read the rest of this entry »

A continued drop in the number of people seeking new unemployment benefits in the U.S. last week and a large gain in private sector employment reported by payroll giant Automatic Data Processing offered fresh signals that the labor market began to stabilize as 2011 drew to a close.

Separately, service-sector activity in the U.S. economy grew in December, at a pace similar to the prior month.

Initial jobless claims fell by 15,000 to a seasonally adjusted 372,000 in the week ended Dec. 31, the Labor Department said Thursday.
Read the rest of this entry »

New claims for unemployment benefits rose more than expected last week, a government report showed on Thursday, but the underlying trend continued to point to improving labor market conditions.

Initial claims for state unemployment benefits increased 15,000 to a seasonally adjusted 381,000, the Labor Department said. The prior week’s claims data was revised up to 366,000 from the previously reported 364,000.

Economists polled by Reuters had forecast claims rising to 375,000. A Labor Department official said that because of a public holiday on Monday, claims from seven states – including California and Virginia – had been estimated.
Read the rest of this entry »

Gold fell on Tuesday but remained range-bound around $1,600 as investors stayed on the sidelines in the final week of the year, subdued by concerns about the euro zone debt crisis.

Recent U.S. economic data had spurred a rally in riskier assets including equities and industrial metals and sent gold prices up about half a percent last week.

Investors will look for more signs of recovery in the United States from data this week, including consumer confidence for December due later on Tuesday.

“Gold prices may be under pressure from a strengthening dollar in the next few months as the brightened economic prospects in the United States are likely to further boost the dollar index,” said Li Ning, an analyst at Shanghai CIFCO Futures.
Read the rest of this entry »