AFP - The dollar stayed firm in Asian trade Tuesday as investors welcomed a large cash infusion into Merrill Lynch amid the subprime mortgage woes, dealers said. Read more…

AP - Panden Rota, a Nepalese producer of fine rugs, is about to become a Manhattanite, the owner of a sumptuous apartment in the luxurious downtown neighborhood of Battery Park City. Read more…

Reuters - Merrill Lynch & Co Inc , hit by huge subprime mortgage losses, said on Monday it would boost its capital by raising up to $6.2 billion in a private placement with Singapore's Temasek Holdings and Davis Selected Advisors. Read more…

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FT.com - US consumer confidence is sinking, weighed down by high energy prices and the downturn in the housing market. In a quiet week for data releases, a further decline is expected in US consumer confidence data for December, due on Thursday. The consensus forecast is for a fall from 87.3 in November to 86.8 but the risk is for a larger decline as confidence sinks towards the trough reached in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and the resulting devastation in New Orleans. Read more…

FT.com - Northern Rock is considering a plan to run the stricken mortgage lender as a smaller entity if efforts to find a buyer prove unsuccessful. Read more…

Reuters - Investors have only a sprinkling of economic data on their plates in the last full week of 2007, but if the numbers come through as expected, stocks may extend Friday's early Santa Claus rally. Read more…

FT.com - Though it is a bit like taking a second job after the house has been repossessed, the Federal Reserve's proposals for new regulations on mortgage lending and advertising deserve support. They will reduce - although never eliminate - the kind of sharp practice that led to this year's subprime debacle. But as well as changing the rules, the authorities need to toughen up their enforcement of them. Read more…

AFP - UBS is reportedly facing shareholder opposition to a huge injection of funds from Singapore and the Middle East to help the Swiss banking giant overcome the US subprime mortgage meltdown. Read more…

FT.com - Northern Rock is set for a showdown with its two largest investors after it recommended on Friday that shareholders vote down proposals which would limit the board's ability to make changes at the stricken mortgage lender. Read more…

AP - Consumers put aside worries about slumping home sales and soaring gasoline prices and headed to the malls in November, pushing spending up by the largest amount in 3 1/2 years. Read more…

AFP - The dollar fell against the euro on Friday as news of a big loss at investment bank Bear Stearns sparked fresh concern about fallout from the US subprime loan crisis. Read more…

BusinessWeek Online - Dan Fasulo crunches data for commercial real estate investors all day. Still, the managing director of researcher Real Capital Analytics doesn't understand what's happening with one stock in his personal portfolio, AvalonBay Communities . The real estate investment trust (REIT) has an interest in more than 51,000 apartments in coastal cities such as Boston, New York, and San Francisco, where rents are high and new construction is hard to pull off. Yet the stock is down 27% this year. "These are premium assets," says Fasulo. "Someone should tell Wall Street." Read more…

BusinessWeek Online - With the subprime mess working its way into every back alley of the stock, bond, and money markets, this is a tricky time to be searching for income. Anyone looking for a steady paycheck from an investment portfolio in 2008 will have to negotiate a maze of falling interest rates, shrinking dividends, and potential bond downgrades. Read more…

AFP - German state-owned bank KfW will carry a burden on its balance sheet of about five billion euros (seven billion dollars) until 2017 owing to trouble at subprime-hit lender IKB, of which KfW owns 38 percent, a press report said on Friday. Read more…

Reuters - U.S. regulators, led by the Securities and Exchange Commission, are probing how financial firms priced mortgage securities on their books and whether they should have told investors earlier about the declining value of those securities, The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday. Read more…

Reuters - International Monetary Fund Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn said on Friday global financial stability had taken a blow from the subprime crisis and European and U.S. growth will be weaker as a result. Read more…

FT.com - Keller sought to ease concerns about its exposure to the US housing market and the weakening dollar, saying it expects to beat profit forecasts for the year. Read more…

FT.com - Markets across Asia followed a similar trajectory in 2007 - in four distinct phases. First came a steady rise in the first half of the year, then a big sell-off in July and August as subprime worries came to the fore. Third, there was a new boom amid talk of Asian decoupling, before finally shares sold off again towards the end of the year as subprime worries returned. Read more…

Reuters - MBIA Inc , the world's largest bond insurer, said it had guaranteed $8.1 billion of the riskiest mortgage securities, imperiling its entire net worth and sending its shares plunging 26 percent. Read more…

FT.com - UBS (NYSE:UBS), one of the biggest casualties of the US subprime turmoil, faces a shareholders' revolt over plans for a massive infusion of funds from Singapore and the Middle East to improve its capital ratios. Read more…

Reuters - President George W. Bush on Thursday signed into law a measure that will waive taxes on many homeowners who must restructure their mortgages as they face foreclosure. Read more…

AFP - French bank Credit Agricole said Thursday that higher writedowns and provisions stemming from the credit crisis will have an additional 1.6-billion-euro (2.3-billion-dollar) impact on its 2007 earnings. Read more…

FT.com - The devastating credit squeeze that has been gumming up the interbank and commercial paper loan markets for months shows few signs of letting up. The underlying problem remains firmly in the market for subprime mortgages. Read more…

Reuters - Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said the housing finance sector is dealing with an "unprecedented situation," and the Treasury's plan to freeze rates on some mortgages is designed to help the industry cope with its predicament, The Los Angeles Times reported on Thursday. Read more…