Markets mixed after Fed move
NEW YORK, June 20 (UPI) -- U.S. stock markets were mixed Wednesday after the U.S. Federal Reserve said it would extend a securities swap program to put pressure in interest rates.
The central bank's Open Market Committee said the bank would continue with its "operation twist," in which proceeds from maturing short-term securities are used to buy long term securities.
The program is designed to convince businesses that interest rates would remain low for an extended period.
Markets opened with a modest downturn. The Fed's announcement was then met with a dull thud.
In early afternoon trading on Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrial average shed 8.85 points or 0.07 percent to 12,828.48.
The Nasdaq composite index rose from virtually flat to a gain of 3.40 points to 2,933.16.
The Standard and Poor's 500 lost 1.28 or 0.09 percent to 1,356.70.
The benchmark 10-year treasury note fell 12/32 to yield 1.664 percent.
The euro rose to $1.2705 from Tuesday's $1.2686. Against the yen, the dollar rose to 79.58 yen from Monday's 78.95 yen.
In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 index added 1.11 percent, 96.44 points, to 8,752.31.
In London, the FTSE 100 index added 0.64 percent, 35.98, to 5,622.29.
Wells Fargo to outsource jobs overseas
CHARLOTTE, N.C., June 20 (UPI) -- U.S. banking giant Wells Fargo & Co. said it will relocate jobs in its institutional retirement division from North Carolina to overseas locations.
In a memo to employees, Wells Fargo said some of the jobs would go to the Philippines, while others would go to India.
Wells Fargo is attempting to trim operating expenses by $1.5 billion per quarter, the Charlotte (N.C.) Observer reported Wednesday.
The bank has about 20,500 employees in the Charlotte area. That number is not expected to change dramatically, the newspaper said.
Some of the service center jobs are to be relocated to a bank facility in Waco, Texas.
"Wells Fargo has thoughtfully considered building small teams overseas as a business strategy for many years. Our customers are international, demand round-the-clock service, and expect faster turn-around for decisions and responses. Global expansion of our workforce allows us to do these processes faster, with more flexibility," bank spokesman Josh Dunn said in a statement.
Eurozone economics delicate, BOE says
LONDON, June 20 (UPI) -- The Bank of England said Wednesday that a gross domestic product increase of 0.5 percent in Germany offset troubles in Italy and Spain in the first quarter.
In minutes describing its June 7 policy meeting, the BOE said that the GDP of the eurozone "was estimated to have been unchanged in the first quarter."
"Within that," the bank's meeting minutes said, "GDP had increased by 0.5 percent in Germany, which had been more than accounted for by the strength of net trade. By contrast, there had been further falls in output in Spain and Italy."
The BOE in its policy meeting earlier in the month left its monetary policies intact, leaving its key lending rate at 0.5 percent and continuing with a $437 billion asset purchasing program.
The bank's lending rate has remained at this historic low for the past 39 months.
The BOE also pointed out the delicate political situation in Europe, which has been seriously disrupted by a sovereign debt crisis that has affected the entire eurozone with Greece, Portugal, Ireland and Spain requiring international aid to keep from going into default.
"It was highly probably that business sentiment had been affected by the continuing financial and political tensions within the euro area," the BOE minutes said.
"Perceptions of the likelihood of a disorderly outcome had risen again," the bank noted.
Job candidates are not always forgiving
CHICAGO, June 20 (UPI) -- Poor experiences among job seekers can backfire on a recruiting company, a survey of U.S. companies found.
More than three out of four job candidates, 78 percent, indicated they would discuss with family members and friends a negative experience in applying for a job, human resources firm CareerBuilder said Wednesday.
Seventeen percent indicated they would post something on a social media Web site concerning a negative experience with a company where they were applying for work. Six percent indicated they would describe the negative experience in a blog, CareerBuilder said.
If a company did not get back to a job applicant, 32 percent of job applicants indicated they would be less inclined to buy a product from that company. Forty-four percent indicated their opinion of that company would decline.
Fifteen percent of job applicants indicated their opinion of a company declined after they were contacted for an interview.
Fifty-six percent of companies responding to the survey indicated a job applicant had turned down a job offer from the company in the past 12 months.
The No. 1 reason people indicated they applied for specific job, named by 45 percent of job applicants, is location, not money, CareerBuilder said. The No. 2 reason is also not money -- 33 percent of job applicants indicated the desirable industry was the reason they applied for a job.
Twenty-five percent indicated the company's reputation was the reason they applied for a specific job.
Competitive compensation was considered "critical," but it still came in as the sixth most-common reason applicants indicated they were applying for a job -- after location, desirable industry, company reputation, interesting assignments and advancement opportunity.
The survey involved 800,000 job applicants was conducted June 1, 2011, through April 30, 2012, on behalf of 1,500 companies, CareerBuilder said.
The figures have a 95 percent probability of being accurate within a range of plus and minus 0.11 percentage points, CareerBuilder said.
