Mail an article...

Is Lehman's Loss Wells Fargo's Gain?

Frozen Al: for the last time, the source html goes in the source box, not embedded as a link in the text. I don't have the time (or patience) to keep cleaning these up. AoS.

I am including this as a counter point to all of the doom and gloom being spread about the economy recently. Some little known facts:
The balance sheets of U.S. corporations as a whole, including many with headquarters in the Twin Cities area, are healthier than they've been in years. Corporate America was sitting on $14 trillion in cash in the second quarter, according to Federal Reserve flow of funds statistics. That's an 18 percent gain since 2002, after adjusting for inflation. Meanwhile, corporate debt over the same period rose only 8 percent.

That means many companies will be able take advantage of strategic opportunities.

"Clearly, the need to borrow is not that high," said Nariman Behravesh, chief economist at Global Insight, a leading economic forecasting firm based near Boston. "As a result, the corporate sector is somewhat insulated from this financial crunch that seems to be going on."
Posted by: Frozen Al 2008-09-21

http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=250618