U.S. markets lose ground
NEW YORK, March 19 (UPI) -- U.S. stock indexes slipped Thursday after rallying following the Federal Reserve's decision to spend more than $1 trillion.
The Fed Wednesday said it would buy $300 billion in U.S. Treasuries, pulling down Treasury yields and weakening the dollar but boosting equities. The Fed also said it would lend credit a hand with $750 billion in purchases of mortgage-backed securities.
In late-morning trading, the Dow Jones industrial averagewas down 89.05 points, or 1.19 percent, to 7,397.53. The Standard & Poor's 500 fell 0.98 percent, 7.76 points, to 786.59. The Nasdaq composite index was off 7.28 points, 0.49 percent, to 1,483.94.
The benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury bond rose 8/32 to yield 2.521 percent.
The euro rose to $1.3652, compared to Wednesday's $13491. Against the Japanese yen, the dollar fell to 94.70 yen, compared to Wednesday's 96.19 yen.
In Tokyo, the Nikkei average fell 0.33 percent, 26.21 points to 7,945.96.
Travel into, out of Canada down in January
OTTAWA, March 19 (UPI) -- Fewer trips into and out of Canada were made in January than a month prior, the federal Statistics Canada agency reported from Ottawa Thursday.
Travel out by Canadian residents totaled 3.8 million, a 2.4 percent decline over December. Of those trips, 690,000 were to overseas countries, the report said.
"Canadians took 1.7 million same-day car trips to the United States, down 0.8 percent, while the overall number of overnight U.S. trips fell 1.9 percent to 1.4 million," StatsCan said.
There were 2.2 million trips into Canada in January, a decrease of 2.5 percent from December. U.S. residents accounted for about half of the inbound trips, which was a monthly decline of 3.3 percent, the report said.
Of incoming trips, visits from China posted a 20.4 percent increase, while trips from Japan fell 14.5 percent, StatsCan said.
Mortgage giants schedule bonus checks
WASHINGTON, March 19 (UPI) -- Two U.S. mortgage giants that fell into conservatorship last year revealed in regulatory filings that losses didn't stop their executives from reaping bonuses.
Billed as retention pay, executives at the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp. and the Federal National Mortgage Association are receiving six-figure bonuses, in spite of the companies losing more than $100 billion last year, Conde Nast Portfolio.com reported Thursday.
The benefits are smaller than those at American International Group Inc. and Merrill Lynch that have provoked vehement reactions from the public and politicians. Nevertheless, in appearance at least, they fall under the same category of using taxpayer funds to reward executives for failure.
The largest bonus revealed in Securities and Exchange Commission filings will go to Fannie Mae's Chief Operating Officer Michael Williams, who will get $611,000 on top of a $676,000 salary. Fannie Mae's Executive Vice President David Hisey is to receive a bonus check of $517,000.
Freddie Mac spokeswoman Sharon McHale told Portfolio.com the retention pay, a percentage of which is paid out on a schedule to reward longevity, was a replacement for annual bonuses but was in place before the government seized control of the company.
Judge orders BOA to reveal names
NEW YORK, March 19 (UPI) -- A judge said Bank of America must reveal the names of employees who received bonuses that New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has called extravagant.
Citing the employees' right to privacy, the bank filed a petition to block Cuomo from revealing the names.
On Wednesday, New York State Supreme Court Justice Bernard Fried denied the bank's motion to allow the state to have the names under a confidentiality agreement. The judge also denied a motion to shield Merrill Lynch's former Chief Executive Officer John Thain's subpoenaed testimony from pubic scrutiny.
The judge said he found the bank's petition hypocritical, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday. "The record indicates that Bank of America has not taken the kind of measures to protect the secrecy of its employee-compensation information that one would expect it to have taken if this information were a trade secret," the judge said.
A spokesman for the company said the bank would comply with the order.
The state has claimed the $3.6 billion in bonus checks given to Merrill Lynch employees before Bank of American took it over was extravagant given the billions of dollars in taxpayer funds the banks accepted in the midst of a financial crisis.
