Survival News Network

Source: The Independent

The number of unsold homes on the market in the United States is at levels not seen for at least 40 years, and prices are continuing to slide, according to a disheartening new survey.

With participants throughout the financial system saying that the credit crisis cannot end until the US housing market stabilises, the monthly data from the National Association of Realtors (NAR) failed to show any unequivocal improvement.

The July figures did show an increase in the number of buyers, lured by the prospect of getting a long-term bargain. However, two out of every five sales are now distressed sales – such as foreclosed homes put on the market by banks – and desperate sellers are continuing to drop their prices.

The median price of a US home fell in July to $212,400, down 7.1 per cent on a year ago, according to the NAR. There was a 3.1 per cent increase in the seasonally adjusted number of sales last month compared with June, better than economists had predicted, but activity levels were 13.2 per cent lower than July 2007, and the number of homes coming on to the market also rose in July, meaning that it would take 11.2 months to clear the backlog at the current pace. That figure is the highest since the NAR began collecting data in 1968.

All the figures exclude newly built homes, of which there is a glut and whose latest monthly sales data is released today.

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Source: money.cnn.com

National U.S. home prices fell a record 15.4% in the second quarter compared with last year, according to a report released Tuesday.

The latest S&P/Case-Shiller national home price index is down 18.2% from its peak in the second quarter of 2006, and there are no signs that the pace of home-price declines is easing. The second-quarter loss was even larger than the record 14.2% drop posted in the first three months of 2008.

Both the Case-Shiller 10-city index (down 17%) and 20-city index (down 15.9%) also posted record year-over-year losses in the second quarter.

A small piece of good news: In June the pace of monthly declines slowed ever so slightly compared with May. Prices for the 10-city index declined 16.9% year-over-year and the 20-city index was down 15.8%.

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Source: The Guardian

Russia was last night on another collision course with the west after Russian MPs voted unanimously to back independence for Georgia’s two breakaway republics of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. The move - which requires the approval of Russia’s president, Dmitry Medvedev - gives a strong domestic legal basis for the Kremlin to take control of the areas after Russia’s invasion of Georgia this month.

Russia’s upper house, or Federation Council, voted by 130-0 to call on Medvedev to support South Ossetia and Abkhazia’s independence. The Duma passed the same motion by 447-0. Both houses are known for their slavish loyalty to the Kremlin.

The US and the EU swiftly denounced the vote. George Bush said he was “deeply concerned” by the move, and the White House said the vice-president, Dick Cheney, would visit Tbilisi next week. The EU said the breakaway regions should remain in Georgia. The German government called the move “in no way appropriate to either calming or defusing tensions”.

But there were strong signs last night that Moscow remains unmoved by the threat of western sanctions, which have been growing since Russia invaded Georgia after Georgia’s military incursion into South Ossetia this month.

The US, France, Britain and other EU countries are considering punitive measures. These include ending Nato cooperation with Moscow, freezing Russia’s application to join the World Trade Organisation, and suspending its participation in G8 summits.

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Source: Telegraph

One of the group said he was “going to shoot Obama”, who is in Denver, Colorado, for the Democratic National Convention, “from a high vantage point using a rifle sighted at 750 yards”.

Police said that one of the suspects “was directly asked if they had come to Denver to kill Obama. He responded in the affirmative”.

The shooting was planned for Thursday, when Mr Obama is set to accept the nomination as the Democratic Party’s presidential candidate for the November election at the 75,000-seat Invesco stadium.

Tharin Gartrell, 28, who was wanted on numerous warrants, was arrested on Sunday after police found two high-powered rifles, boxes of ammunition, a rifle scope, a bullet-proof vest, walkie-talkies and methamphetamine in a rented truck he was driving.

Gartrell then led police to a hotel, where a second man, Shawn Robert Adolph, 33, tried to jump out of a sixth-storey window. After landing on an awning and trying to escape with a broken ankle, Adolph, who had a handcuff ring and was wearing a swastika, according to reports, was eventually arrested.

An associate of Gartrell and Adolph, Nathan Johnson, 32, and his girlfriend, Natasha Gromek, were also arrested. Johnson is understood to have told authorities that the two men “planned to kill Barack Obama at his acceptance speech.”

It is thought the men may have ties to Sons of Silence, an outlaw biker group, with suspected connections with white supremacists. However, federal sources have said that the incident may have had more to do with drugs than with a plot to assassinate Mr Obama, despite local police claims.

The federal officials said that the verbal threats against Mr Obama were made during one of the arrests, but were not considered credible. “It could turn out that these were nothing but a bunch of knuckleheads, meth heads,” a US government source has claimed.

The US Attorney’s Office in Denver has scheduled a press conference to discuss the incident, but Attorney Troy Eid said he did not believe there was a real threat to Mr Obama.

The alleged plot was being investigated by the Secret Service, which is co-ordinating security for the Democratic Party convention, as well as the FBI and the joint terrorism task force.

Mr Obama has been under Secret Service protection for over a year after receiving credible death threats.

Source: Reuters

Cash-strapped U.S. consumers could be turning their backs on two of the biggest trends in the food business — organics and convenience — in order to save money.

Food industry executives and analysts interviewed in the past week pointed to those two categories as among the most vulnerable to consumers trying to stretch food budgets. While cash-strapped consumers may be eating more at home, they are also cutting out some of the little time-saving or health- conscious luxuries to which they had grown accustomed.

These changes could be a boon to companies such as Kraft Foods Inc, General Mills Inc and J.M. Smucker Co, whose products are seen as building blocks to home- made lunches and dinners.

But forays by food producers such as Chiquita Brands International Inc and by supermarket chains such as Whole Foods Market Inc and Safeway Inc to sell pre-cut packages of fresh fruits and vegetables or prepared meals at a premium could be among the casualties.

“When the $75 doesn’t buy what it used to buy, you change what you buy,” said Bob Goldin, executive vice president at food and restaurant industry consulting firm Technomic. “Consumers really are willing to sacrifice convenience to manage their budgets.”

Demand for organic milk and meat remains strong, while purchases of packaged organic products such as crackers have dropped off, said Laurie Demeritt, president of market research firm Hartman Group in Bellevue, Washington.

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