1 hr 59 mins ago

SEOUL (AFP) – US Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke on Monday called for the Group of 20 world powers to more closely coordinate financial reforms in a bid to strengthen the global economy.

Addressing a Bank of Korea conference via video link, Bernanke said there was a need for “extensive international cooperation” as governments overhaul market rules in the wake of the global economic downturn.

“On a global level, the leadership of the… G20 — which Korea is currently chairing — will be essential in ensuring that reforms are not only strong and effective but also consistent and coordinated across countries,” he said.

G20 finance ministers will meet in Busan, South Korea, later this week with talks likely to be dominated by the continued fallout from the global crisis.

“Strengthening the international financial system and ensuring that financial institutions are carefully regulated, well capitalised, liquid, and transparent will require extensive international cooperation,” Bernanke said.

Across the globe, governments are drawing up new measures to curb the excesses of financial institutions blamed for pushing many economies to the brink.

But critics say national efforts will be largely ineffective in an age when banks and investment houses can make cross-border trades in a fraction of a second.

G20 ministers will also grapple with the ongoing European debt crisis, which has called into question the strength of the global economic recovery.

G20 leaders will meet in Canada in late June.

By ANNE D’INNOCENZIO, AP Retail Writer Anne D’innocenzio, Ap Retail Writer   – Sat May 29, 9:04 pm ET

NEW YORK – Wal-Mart is counting on $1 ketchup bottles and sub-$4 cases of Coke to get its low-price mojo back.

The sharp cuts at its U.S. Walmart stores, which came ahead of Memorial Day weekend, have already pushed rivals such as Target into price wars. And the markdowns are expected to keep coming throughout the summer.

They’re one of the boldest moves the world’s largest retailer is making to turn around sluggish business at its U.S. namesake chain and win back shoppers from rivals. The cuts aren’t across the store but target 22 foods and other essentials at an average savings of 30 percent — splashy enough to get attention and perhaps change perceptions.

The world’s largest retailer is also restoring items like certain soups and laundry detergent it stopped carrying when it tried to declutter its stores. It’s also pushing more basic clothing such as socks and underwear after putting too much focus on trendy items that didn’t sell.

Wal-Mart was one of the few beneficiaries when the Great Recession began, as shoppers traded down to save money. Now it’s having trouble keeping customers in a slowly recovering economy. Cash-strapped shoppers are looking elsewhere for better deals such as dollar stores and local grocery chains. And some wealthier customers, feeling more flush, are starting to head back to the mall.

Wal-Mart, which generated more than $400 billion in revenue in 2009, has blamed stubbornly high unemployment and tight credit for adding even more financial strain on its blue-collar customers, some of whom have limited access to financial services and are running out of unemployment benefits.

But it also takes part of the blame for four straight quarters of declines in revenue at Walmart stores open at least a year. That’s a key indicator of a retailer’s health.

“Wal-Mart is all about price, and they’re all about one-stop shopping. Those are the key ingredients,” said Bob Buchanan, a former retail analyst who now teaches finance at Saint Louis University. “Now, you kind of scratch your head and wonder if either of them are true.”

“Wal-Mart has made a lot of noise, but customers want to see it in the stores,” he continued. “This action is long overdue. They need to drive that message hard.”

Deloris Harris, 72, of Ridgeway, S.C., said she pulled back from food shopping at Wal-Mart in the last year because chains such as Food Lion were offering even better deals.

“Some of the stuff isn’t that cheap,” said Harris, who picked up 10 ears of corn for $2 and hamburger rolls for 99 cents at Food Lion on Friday. But the 24-pack of Coke for $5 at Wal-Mart caught her attention Thursday night on a run to buy Tylenol. She grabbed it and planned to go back Friday to pick up deals on cleaning supplies.

Wal-Mart acknowledged during its latest conference call with investors that its moves to carry fewer items went too far. It’s now replenishing 300 it had dropped. Analysts estimated that Wal-Mart pared up to 15 percent of its inventory, sending shoppers elsewhere in search of their favorite brands.

Wal-Mart is still making big profits. Its first-quarter net income rose 10 percent, fueled by cost-cutting and growth overseas. Wal-Mart’s thinking: Lower costs let it lower prices, which in turn should drive up revenue and that money would be invested to yield more cost savings.

In fact, Wal-Mart is bearing the cost of some of the deep price cuts, not its suppliers, according to Bill Pecoriello, an analyst who heads ConsumerEdge Research LLC, based on discussions with industry officials.

According to Pecoriello, on a basket of five food items, from Coke to Lay’s potato chips, the total price was $11.23 at Wal-Mart, 24 percent less than it was a year ago. It’s also almost 14 percent lower than Kroger and almost 26 percent lower than Safeway, according to Pecoriello’s estimates. The firm gathers pricing data representing 15,000 stores across the country.

That doesn’t include Wal-Mart’s move to lower cans of name-brand Coke and Pepsi further in the past few days, from the announced discounted price of $5 to as low as $3.77 in certain markets. The original price was $6.98 for a 24-pack.

Pecoriello noted in his report that Target was selling 12 packs of soda for $2, roughly matching Wal-Mart’s price, while Kroger was selling 12 packs for $2.50, less than a year ago.

Some Wal-Mart stores have sold out of the cans and suppliers are having trouble keeping up, Pecoriello said. He added he hasn’t seen such low prices on soda in at least five years and estimates that the overall price of soda is down about 20 percent from a year ago.

Linda Blakley, a Wal-Mart spokeswoman, declined to comment on sales and said it has the lower-price 24-packs only where it faces “regional competitors.”

PepsiCo declined to comment, and officials at Kroger Co., Safeway Inc., and Coca-Cola Co. didn’t immediately return calls.

Though it sells all kinds of items, groceries are what keep customers coming back, and hits hard on the theme of splashy low prices in recent TV commercials. One shows a friendly associate walking down the store aisle placing the discounted items, from Heinz ketchup to Breyers ice cream. The ads put the splashy low prices, such as the $1 deal for a big, 40-ounce ketchup bottle, at center stage. The original price was $2.42.

Wal-Mart has returned to advertising some of its deals in newspapers, the first time since June 2006, according to Michael Exstein, an analyst at CreditSuisse. In addition to its store circulars, Wal-Mart advertises in newspaper inserts like Parade, which have lower costs and require a longer lead time, Exstein said.

“We are working hard to bring our customers the best prices on items they need right now; and to share the news of these price cuts aggressively,” Blakley said.

By JEANNINE AVERSA, AP Economics Writer Jeannine Aversa, Ap Economics Writer   – 1 hr 20 mins ago

WASHINGTON – The economy trudges ahead yet debt dogs many Americans, stressing them out even as they firm up their own financial foundations.

There are new jobs produced but old worries persisting for people despite belt-tightening and boosted savings, according to an Associated Press-GfK poll.

About 46 percent of those surveyed say they’re suffering from debt-related stress, and half of that group described their stress as “great deal” or “quite a bit.” On the other hand, about 53 percent say they feel little or no stress at all.

That’s in line with findings from last year, even though times seem better today: The economy is growing and generating jobs, and households have made progress in repairing their financial footing, trimming debt, watching spending and saving more.

It’s a big turnaround from a year ago — a shrinking economy, jobs jettisoned as businesses struggled to survive the deepest recession since the 1930s.

So why aren’t the stressed — and the not-so-stressed — feeling better?

For starters, it just doesn’t feel much like a recovery to many people.

Unemployment is stubbornly high — 9.9 percent. The jobless face fierce competition for work. Those with a job are watching their paychecks shrink.

A growing number of people are at risk of falling into foreclosure, and only those with the most stellar credit probably can get a new loan. AP-GfK polls show that only 20 percent say the economy is good, compared with 15 percent last year.

Cynthia Bryant, 73, feels stress from her bills — much of that heartburn related to medical expenses.

“I need a different car. I can’t afford it. I have to watch every penny that comes in,” says Bryant, who worked as a purchasing agent for a computer company before she retired. Bryant, who lives in a Denver suburb, gets by on a fixed-income that hasn’t budged, although her expenses — rent, groceries and other basics_ have risen.

Ken Goldstein, economist at the Conference Board, a research group that keeps close tabs on consumers, says it’s people’s individual circumstances — more so than their sentiment about the economy — that shape their confidence and their stress over debt. “It’s about what happens to me — my house, my car, my job,” he says.

Christina Standridge, 33, of Milwaukee, says she’s stressed about her debts, including car payments.

Laid off twice in the past two years, Standridge has watched her income drop. She worries about losing her current job as an administrative assistant for a company that designs and builds waste water control systems.

Standridge and her husband, who works at a factory fixing machines, have one daughter. The family is watching the pennies. “We’re trying to spend less and pay off the bills,” she says. “We’re cutting corners wherever we can. We’re trying to do things that are relatively cheap,” she adds, such as having a backyard barbecue rather than going out to eat or to the movies. “Bills gotta be paid,” she says.

People are whittling their debt.

The average amount owed on credit cards is $3,900, the poll said. That’s down from $5,600 in the fall and $4,900 last spring.

Families with incomes over $50,000 have sliced their credit card debt by more than half, yet their stress from debt hasn’t changed much — it’s moderately low. Families with incomes under $50,000, however, have added only slightly to their debt, while their stress level rose sharply.

Goldstein says human nature can factor into people’s feelings of debt-related stress.

“You have the optimists and the pessimists. You get half the world looking up at the stars and the other half with their head down looking at the mud,” he says.

More broadly, people are cutting their debt at the fastest rate in more than six decades, according to the Federal Reserve. People defaulting on mortgages and other loans factor into the reduction, economists point out.

Household debt fell 1.7 percent last year to $13.5 trillion, according to the Fed. It was the first annual drop, based on records going back to 1945.

People on average carry around $44,000 in debt — mortgages, credit cards, auto loans and other consumer debt. That’s a far bigger load than in the early 1980s, when unemployment topped 10 percent. In 1982, per capita debt totaled about $14,000 in today’s dollars.

At the same time, people are building up their savings — 4.2 percent of their disposable income last year, the most since 1998, the Commerce Department says.

A Debt Stress Index tied to the AP-GfK poll was 29.2 in May, unchanged from a year ago. The reading signals moderately low stress.

Paul J. Lavrakas, a research psychologist and AP consultant who analyzed the AP-GfK survey, finds that among those with the most stress from debt are women, married couples, people age 30-44, and the poor — households with incomes less than $20,000.

Those with the least debt stress include men, retired people, single people, those 60 and older, and the wealthy — households with incomes greater than $100,000, he says.

Last year, Democrats felt better about their finances than Republicans, despite generally being in worse shape. That sense seems to have worn off: Democrats now report higher debt stress levels on average than Republicans.

Retired mechanical engineer Patrick Burns, 60, of Allyn, Wash., is among those who isn’t stressed over debt. He keeps his IOUs to a minimum.

“I’ve never really gotten into debt,” he says. “I’ve always kind of lived within my means, and I’ve found there’s a lot less stress with that.”

The AP-GfK poll involved interviews with 1,002 adults and was conducted May 7-11. The margin of sampling error was plus or minus 4.3 percentage points.

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AP Director of Polling Trevor Tompson and Associated Press Writer Christine Simmons contributed to this report.

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By ANNE D’INNOCENZIO, AP Retail Writer Anne D’innocenzio, Ap Retail Writer – Thu May 27, 5:35 pm ET

NEW YORK – Jewelry and gift seller Tiffany & Co.’s net income more than doubled in the first quarter as its revenue rose in the U.S. and soared 50 percent in Asia, the company said Thursday.

Tiffany, based in New York and known for its silver jewelry and signature turquoise gift boxes, also forecast higher full-year profit than Wall Street expects. Shares rose 7.5 percent, or $3.27, to close at $46.86 Thursday.

The robust earnings report offers signs that affluent shoppers are keeping their spending up, even buying jewelry for more than $50,000 apiece, after they pulled back during the depths of the recession. The company cautioned that spending is being compared with sharp declines from a year ago. Chairman and CEO Michael J. Kowalski said “it is prudent to maintain a modicum of caution in our outlook due to global economic uncertainties.”

Kowalski said the chain plans to build on this “exceptional” performance by expanding and introducing new products to take market share from rivals.

The jeweler said it earned $64.4 million, or 50 cents per share, in the three months ended April 30. That compares with $24.3 million, or 20 cents per share, a year earlier.

Its revenue rose 22 percent to $633.6 million.

Analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters expected earnings per share of 36 cents on revenue of $611.9 million.

Revenue in the Americas increased 22 percent to $315.3 million. That compares with a 31 percent drop in the year-ago period. Adjusted for currency fluctuations, revenue rose 20 percent, and revenue at stores open at least a year rose 15 percent, led by the flagship store on New York’s Fifth Avenue, where the figure rose 26 percent.

Other branch stores open at least a year saw revenue rise 13 percent, while Internet and catalog revenue in the Americas rose 23 percent.

More than half of the revenue growth came from increased spending by U.S. customers with a smaller contribution from foreign tourists, who reduced their travel to the U.S. because of the volcanic eruption that disrupted global air traffic, Mark Aaron, vice president of investor relations told investors during the conference call.

Company officials noted that customers spent across a wide variety of product categories; it saw considerable growth in jewelry priced over $50,000, a category that was the most depressed a year ago. It also reported an increase in transaction size.

Revenue at stores open at least a year is considered a key indicator of a retailer’s health because it isn’t skewed by expansion or stores closing.

In the Asia-Pacific region, which doesn’t include Japan, Tiffany’s revenue soared 50 percent to $122.3 million. During the first quarter, the company opened its third store in Shanghai; by the end of the period, it operated 11 stores in China. Company officials said that they plan to have a total of 30 stores in China within the next five years.

In Japan, revenue slipped 2 percent to $115 million. Business in Europe rose 25 percent to $68.6 million.

Tiffany said it now expects profit for the year to be $2.55 to $2.60 per share, up from the original $2.45 to $2.50 per share. Analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters expects $2.50 per share.

Tiffany expects revenue to be up 11 percent for the year. With annual revenue of $2.71 billion last year, that would mean it projects $3.01 billion for the current year. That is in line with analysts expectations.

Source: Yahoo News !