Shares of J.P. Morgan Chase fall along with the broader financial sector, unmoved by the blue chip's deal to buy Cazenove, its U.K joint venture partner, for about 1 billion pounds ($1.67 billion).

AOL: Back in the day, it was bigger than Google, at least in terms of investment hype.

In what should be no surprise banks are cutting back on small business loans. Please consider CNN Money's Small business loans: $10 billion evaporates.  Eight months after President Obama began prodding the nation's banks to increase their small business lending the loan numbers continue to move in the opposite direction.The 22 banks that got the most help from the Treasury's bailout programs cut their small business loan balances by a collective $10.5 billion over the past six months according to a government report released Monday.Three of the 22 banks make no small business loans at all. Of the remaining ...

Just in time for the holidays, the Federal Reserve announced new rules that will restrict fees and expiration dates for gift certificates, store gift cards and general-use pre-paid cards. Alas, like a gift card that was improperly activated, the Fed only provided the rules, it didn’t put them into place.

The past quarter decade was a fun one for the American consumer. But after all that borrowing and spending consumers have re-discovered the benefits of thrift and prudence. This is good news for personal balance sheets but bad news for credit card companies.In a recent report Fitch Ratings forecast that US credit card issuers will continue suffering with respect to their earnings over the near term as a result of the lousy labor market bankruptcies and losses. The report as summarized here for us by the gang at Zacks Equity Research notes that major credit card issuers are still ...

OPEN for Government Contracts: Victory in Procurement

American Express Business Insights Goes Beyond Traditional Market Research to Help Companies Reach Customers and Build Their Business

Philanthropy, Friends and Fido Stay on This Year’s List;