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• United/Continental Merger Hits Snag at Senate - 1 June 2010

With a merger being agreed upon by the relevant management teams and board members of Continental and United airlines, and varying opinions being aired as to possible benefits or disadvantages thereof, it seems the proposed merger to create the world's largest airline has hit a snag at Senate level. The CEOs of the two airlines faced a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee's Antitrust, Competition Policy and Consumer Rights subcommittee on Thursday May 27, to defend issues and concerns related to the proposed merger, which would result in the formation of a holding company – United Continental Holdings – with the airline operating as United Airlines.

• Darwinomics: Competition vs Cooperation - 27 may 2010

Even those who have not studied the works of Charles Darwin, readily equate the basic principle of 'survival of the fittest', otherwise known as the 'principle of natural selection', with the legendary evolutionist. This theory has two main elements to it: firstly, that nature is never static and a species that does not adapt to the ongoing changes in nature will eventually become extinct; and secondly, intense competition pervades any given habitat and only the fittest, or most adaptable, will survive. Recognizing that these principles apply to economics, the term Darwinomics was coined and apparently first used in an episode of the political TV drama West Wing. While these principles certainly apply to the economy of a country, they can also apply in business. This has become painfully apparent during the economic crisis that continues to wreak havoc around the world, where only the fittest (or some would argue that only those who have been at the front of the government bailout queue) continue to survive, and with the economic climate being a lot more volatile than nature, adapting to rapid change is key to survival.

• Wal-Mart Results Reveal Shaky Consumer Confidence - 24 may 2010

While the state of the economy of a number of European Union countries continues to be a cause for concern, and the Euro continues to flounder, US stock market players will no doubt be turning their attention to their home ground as they face a flood of reports indicating the economic health of the United States in the coming week. Among the reports expected this week are key readings on labor, individual income, housing, consumer sentiment and spending trends, and the country’s GDP.

• FINRA Proposes New Measures to Curb Market Volatility - 20 may 2010

The dramatic 'flash crash' on Wall Street on May 6 served as a wake-up call to regulators that the growing trend of automated high-speed trading calls for updated regulations in order to deal with stock market volatility. With this in mind, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) filed a proposal for public comment on Tuesday 18 May whereby trading on individual stocks will be paused if the price moves either way by 10 percent or more within a period of five minutes. Should the proposal become a reality, it will most likely be instituted as a six-month pilot program to test the waters, starting mid-June.

• The Perils of High-Speed Trading - 17 may 2010

While talk of a stock exchange generally brings to mind the vibrant organized chaos of dealers on the floor shouting buy and sell instructions - scoring spectacularly, or failing dismally, wiping out fortunes in a heart-beat - the reality of modern-day stock market trading is quite different. The majority of today’s trading is carried out by state of the art technology, often being referred to as high-frequency trading, or high-speed trading – an apt description by any measure. On Thursday May 6, the Dow Jones Industrial Average experienced an intraday drop of close to 1,000 points, and although stock market regulators have not yet pinpointed the cause of the dramatic drop, it has been conceded that high-speed trading is likely to have contributed to the incident, but was unlikely to have been the sole cause. Critics of the constantly evolving manner of modern trade, however, point to this incident as being evidence of the risks linked to high-speed trading.

• United-Continental Merger Raises Fare-Price Concerns - 13 may 2010

With any merger between two key players within an economic sector there are bound to be objections from many quarters, as well as concerns regarding competition, or rather lack thereof, and avoiding the creation of a monopoly. The merger of United Airlines and Continental Airlines (the third and fourth largest commercial airlines in the US) is no different, especially when taking into account that the merger will reportedly create the world's largest airline, with estimated revenue of around US$30 billion and carrying in excess of 120 million passengers annually. It has been proposed that the holding company will be called United Continental Holdings, while the airline itself will operate under the banner of United Airlines.

• The Fat-Finger Phenomenon - 11 may 2010

The gut-wrenching intraday drop of 998.5 points in the Dow Jones Industrial Average on Thursday last week has raised speculation that it was due to a so-called 'fat-finger' incident in which a trader inadvertently hits the wrong keys when placing a trade on the market. Unnamed, but apparently reliable, sources have been quoted as saying that a fat-fingered trade took place on the Nasdaq exchange involving an exchange-traded fund holding shares of some of the market's most widely traded stocks.

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