Top Interest Rate Headlines: 07-25-11: Rival Debt Plans Unveiled As Deadline Nears

US debt limit: Rival plans unveiled as deadline nears
BBC News
Senate Democrats and House Republicans have unveiled competing plans to cut the US budget deficit and raise its debt limit to avoid a default.
http://jlne.ws/pO9KnJ

House Leaders Call for Short-Term Rise in Debt Ceiling
The New York Times
House Republicans intend to push for a vote this week on a two-step plan that would allow the federal debt limit  to immediately rise by about $1 trillion and tie a second increase next year to the ability of a new joint Congressional committee to produce more deficit reduction.
http://jlne.ws/oE30Lv

Cost of Treasury futures set to rise
http://jlne.ws/ngGGtH

Moody's Cuts Greek Debt Rating Further
By NATASHA BRERETON-FUKUI And MARCUS WALKER, WSJ.com
European bond markets fell on Monday after Moody's Investors Service cut Greece's credit rating three notches deeper into junk territory, warning that the country's latest bailout deal implies a default.
http://jlne.ws/ow2pJH

Deutsche Eyes Jain for Co-CEO Post
By LAURA STEVENS, WSJ.com
Anshu Jain, Deutsche Bank  AG's Indian-born, London-based head of investment banking, looks set to take over as joint chief executive and become the real power at Germany's most powerful bank, according to people familiar with the matter.
http://jlne.ws/nSJ1Gq

China's urban unemployment rate stands at 4.1% at June end
People's Daily Online
China's registered urban unemployment rate stood at 4.1 percent at the end of June, with 9.08 million people being registered to be unemployed, the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security said on Monday.
http://jlne.ws/raQqgl

Weekly T-Bills Go At 0.060%, 0.100%
The Bond Buyer
Tender rates for the Treasury Department’s latest 91-day and 182-day discount bills were higher, as the three-months incurred a 0.060% high rate, up from 0.020% the prior week, and the six-months incurred a 0.100% high rate, up from 0.060% the week before.
http://jlne.ws/pDfFAz

FINRA Warns Investors About Chasing Returns in Structured Products, High-Yield Bonds and Floating-Rate Loan Funds
Press Release
The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) today issued an Investor Alert warning investors about putting their assets into riskier and sometimes complex products that promise higher returns than more traditional investments. With yields on many fixed-income investments at historically low levels and a volatile stock market, investors may be tempted to chase returns by investing in structured notes with principal protection, high-yield bonds, floating-rate loan funds and leveraged products.
http://jlne.ws/ocb0Wd

Moody's warns Greek default almost certain
Reuters
Moody's cut Greece's credit rating further into junk territory on Monday and said it was almost certain to slap a default tag on its debt as a result of a new EU rescue package.
http://jlne.ws/qufWOb

Gold hits record as U.S. debt talks grind on
By Claudia Assis and Virginia Harrison, MarketWatch
Gold futures traded in record territory Monday as U.S. debt-ceiling talks to avert a default continued, with little to indicate progress toward a deal, and as a debt-ratings agency further downgraded Greece.
http://jlne.ws/qh0KOS

Goldman Succession May Be Hurdle for Cohn
By Max Abelson and Christine Harper, Bloomberg
Michael Ovitz, the former Hollywood agent whose company was said to have created enemies “the way a hurricane produces raindrops,” first met Gary Cohn over lunch at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS)’s headquarters in June 2009.
http://jlne.ws/pDmkXP

Free-marketeers and inflation: Missing Milton Friedman
The Economist
TIM LEE asks an important question: why are conservatives and libertarians so uniformly hawkish about inflation? Mr Lee (a friend and former colleague) notes that this regularity is far from inevitable. Milton Friedman, a revered figure in right-of-centre circles, famously pinned the severity of the Great Depression on contractionary monetary policy. Scott Sumner, a professor of economics at Bentley University who identifies himself as a "neo-monetarist", has argued that Friedman would have supported monetary stimulus. And he has argued, on neo-Friedmanite grounds, that tight monetary policy both precipitated and exacerbated our recent recession.
http://jlne.ws/rsSeJI

Policymakers must reduce reliance on credit ratings
By Deven Sharma, Financial Times
What is the appropriate role of independent credit ratings in the financial system? That is the question raised by recent events in the eurozone and one that has prompted a flurry of suggestions from European policymakers, from intervening in ratings methodologies to suspending certain sovereign ratings.
http://jlne.ws/n2YFlA

U.S. Default Bets Eclipsed By Super Bowl Wagers: Credit Markets
By Shannon D. Harrington and Abigail Moses, Bloomberg
Credit-default swaps traders seeking to profit from concern that the U.S. will default as lawmakers clash over the debt ceiling are betting a missed payment may trigger a payout of about 22 times the cost of the contracts.
http://jlne.ws/nlvSrk

Collateral Rules Criticized
BY AARON LUCCHETTI, WSJ
Some lawmakers and financial firms are resisting rules being written to implement last year's Dodd-Frank law that could require banks to set aside more collateral when they make certain trades in the derivatives market.
http://jlne.ws/q7Wd33

Moody's Cuts Greek Debt Rating Further
By NATASHA BRERETON-FUKUI, WSJ
SINGAPORE—Moody's Investors Service Monday slashed the Greek government's debt ratings three notches deeper into junk territory, warning that the nation's newest bailout deal implies a temporary sovereign default and sets a bad precedent in the 17-country euro zone.
http://jlne.ws/paxPw5

Central Bank May Be Winner in Europe’s Debt Talks
By JACK EWING, NY Times
FRANKFURT — Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and other European leaders appeared to act in defiance of the European Central Bank when they insisted that banks contribute to the latest rescue plan for Greece. But the central bank president, Jean-Claude Trichet, may consider himself the real winner of the week.
http://jlne.ws/p9bN2C

Investors to Buy Into Bank of Ireland
BY EAMON QUINN, WSJ
DUBLIN—Investors plan to buy a large stake in Bank of Ireland PLC, helping to keep the country's largest lender out of majority government ownership, Irish Finance Minister Michael Noonan said Monday.
http://jlne.ws/nh2IFj

Bank of China a likely buyer for RBS jet unit: report
Reuters
Bank of China is a leading contender in the race to acquire the aircraft leasing business being sold off by Royal Bank of Scotland , the Sunday Times reported without citing sources.
http://jlne.ws/rfdm2s