Audit Notes: Ma Bell II—Duopoly Edition

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 23, 2011 at 11:51 PM

The Financial Times's John Gapper has an excellent column on why the AT&T's proposed deal for T-Mobile should be shot... More

Some Questions on the Debit-Reform Story

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 23, 2011 at 07:38 PM

It strikes me that this Wall Street Journal story on the banks' "strange bedfellows" opposing debit-card rules probably should have... More

WSJ: Federal Regulator Bares Fangs At Wall Street

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 23, 2011 at 06:11 AM

The Wall Street Journal has a reports this morning that federal regulators are playing smashmouth with Wall Street over their... More

Audit Notes: The Fed and Labor, Revolving Door Watch, Bank Dividends

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 22, 2011 at 08:24 PM

Mike Konczal, aka Rortybomb, has a very interesting post asking questions about the impact of Federal Reserve policies have had... More

AT&T’s Cellphone Industry Rollup Gets Second-Day Scrutiny

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 22, 2011 at 01:28 PM

The business press continues to be skeptical in its second-day coverage of AT&T's $39 billion deal for T-Mobile. That's a... More

Good Consolidation Coverage for a Change on AT&T Deal

The business press is skeptical of creating a duopoly in cell phone service

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 21, 2011 at 07:41 PM

Fortune's Seth Weintraub pulls a four-year-old Stephen Colbert clip that's as good a place as any to kick off a... More

Supremes Rule for Bloomberg Over the Banks

A big press win as Mark Pittman’s lawsuit pries bailout records from the Federal Reserve

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 21, 2011 at 11:45 AM

Chalk one up for the people's right to know over the bank arm of the government's right to spend our... More

The New York Times Paywall Looks Good

Leaky enough to preserve traffic and ads, but strong enough to add incremental revenue

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 17, 2011 at 12:32 PM

The New York Times paywall is here, and it's about time. Don't ask me why it took so long and... More

The Journal Shines a Light on Modern Debtors’ Prisons

The paper finds creditors, including folks like AIG, getting thousands thrown in jail

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 17, 2011 at 11:30 AM

The Wall Street Journal has an excellent story today reporting on the country's modern-day debtors' prisons, which I'd thought were... More

The Libor Lag

Why are investigators only now looking into things that happened three and four years ago?

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 16, 2011 at 07:12 PM

The business papers all report news that the Department of Justice, SEC, and Commodities Futures Trading Commission (and apparently other... More

Gingrich’s Disingenuous Journal Op-Ed

Misleading on Obama, the Bush tax cuts, and the economy

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 16, 2011 at 05:33 AM

Newt Gingrich is no doubt a smart man. So he surely knows better than to write what he and his... More

Audit Notes: Two Economies, Red-Handed Raj, Life at SXSW

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 15, 2011 at 08:30 PM

Steven Pearlstein of the Washington Post comments on a new study out from an NYU prof that shows how globalization... More

As the Revolving Door Turns

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 15, 2011 at 02:44 PM

The Wall Street Journal reports today that the head of the Federal Housing Administration, David H. Stevens, will become CEO... More

Audit Notes: When a Loss Isn’t a Loss, Lehman, WSJ on Nukes

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 15, 2011 at 01:01 AM

You're going to hear a lot about all the "losses" insurers are going to be taking on the catastrophe in... More

Breakingviews Misses on the Fed’s Debit Card Rules

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 14, 2011 at 07:20 PM

The banking lobby is pushing back bigtime against the Federal Reserve rules that would force it to stop gouging consumers... More

Watchdogs Eye the AG’s Foreclosure Fraud Settlement

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 14, 2011 at 02:41 PM

Gretchen Morgenson yesterday criticized the states attorneys general for their proposed foreclosure fraud settlement, writing that it's a slapdash rush... More

Audit Notes: Lehman’s Green Monster, Sands Storm, Amazon Taxes

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 11, 2011 at 07:55 PM

Bloomberg's Christine Harper Richard and Bob Ivry circle back to the Fenway deal Lehman Brothers made with Hudson Castle that... More

A Zombie Lie Is Born

CNBC’s false welfare-state story spreads far and wide

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 11, 2011 at 12:21 PM

Two days ago I fisked a false report from CNBC that said more than a third of all wages and... More

The WSJ Flags an Accounting Trick on Private Pensions

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 10, 2011 at 03:25 PM

The Wall Street Journal had an excellent story yesterday on how major companies are playing around with their pension accounting... More

Audit Notes: More Murdoch, Hiltzik on the Social Security Trust Fund

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 9, 2011 at 07:45 PM

A couple of weeks ago, Allan Sloan wrote about Rupert Murdoch is using $673 million of his shareholders' money to... More