Business fun facts!

Bill Gates is worth more than the GDP of countries like Slovakia, Qatar, Libya, Luxembourg, Sri Lanka, and many more.

If Bill Gates was a country, its GDP would rank close to 60^th out of 180 countries in the world.

Top 10 richest Americans are in total worth more than $270 billion. If they all decide to be a country, its GDP would rank in the top 30 of 180 countries. Its GDP would be larger than the countries like Denmark, South Africa, Iran, Ireland, Argentina, Finland, Thailand, Portugal, Hong Kong, and the likes.

Markets drop on flood of bad news! . More bad news from banking sector home loans problem created a wide spread concern that the economy is in trouble and slowing down faster than most experts expected. Markets continued the slide in panic selling where the S&P500 dropped 78 points (drop of 5.5%), the DOW dropped 514 points (drop of 4.1%) and the NASDAQ dropped 131 points (drop of 5.3%) for the week ending Jan-18, 2008. . Continued bad news from the banking sector loomed heavily over investors and markets. Financial giant Citigroup (Ticker C) announced major losses worth $22 billion due to bad housing loans. Citigroup also announced it will lay-off 4,200 of its employees. This number is on top of 17,000 job cuts announced this past spring. JPMorgan (Ticker JPM), Merrill Lynch (Ticker MER), Washington Mutual (Ticker WM), and other banks have also announced significant losses due to the bad housing loans. . There was some good news from the industrial giant, General Electric (Ticker GE), which announced better than expected strong profits. GE’s key businesses, jet engines, rail road locomotives, and water treatment, plants helped GE’s profits grow. GE profits rose to $6.7 billion in fourth quarter of 2007, from 6.44 billion in a year earlier. “Every place we went, there's a need for power, there's a need for planes, and there's just no signs that this global infrastructure boom is slowing at all," chief executive Jeff Immelt told investors in a conference call. . Investors are now looking at the US government and the Federal Reserve to take more aggressive actions to jump start the economy and help the consumers. President Bush has proposed $150 billion to help the economy and the consumers. Most experts are now forecasting that the Federal Reserve may cut interest rates more aggressively by as much as half a point to jump start the economy.

Let us learn more about GE . In 1876, Thomas Alva Edison invented an incandescent electric lamp, known today as an electric light bulb. By 1890, Edison established the Edison General Electric Company by bringing his ideas and businesses together. Competition from the Thomson-Houston Company, a strong electrical innovation company, made it difficult for both companies to make profits, and therefore two companies merged to be called the General Electric Company (GE) in 1892. . Today GE continues to make products of Edison's early business ideas, including lighting, transportation, industrial products, power transmission, and medical equipment. The first GE Appliance was an electric fan, produced as early as the 1890s, while a full line of heating and cooking devices were developed in 1907. GE’s Aircraft Engines, began its story in 1917 when the U.S. government began its search for a company to develop the first airplane engine "booster" for the struggling U.S. aviation industry. Thomas Edison's experiments with plastic filaments for light bulbs in 1893 led to the first GE Plastics department, created in 1930. . GE's leaders through the years have built a very diverse group of six leading businesses. For example, GE offers financing for businesses worldwide to grow their products and services. It offers healthcare products to predict, diagnose, inform, and treat diseases with its cutting edge technologies. GE Infrastructure business helps developing and developed countries with its safer and cleaner technologies by providing traditional and renewable energy systems, aircraft engines, oil and gas technology, locomotives, and water treatment systems. GE’s NBC Universal company offers media and entertainment. . GE is the largest industrial company in the world with $160 billion in sales and $26 billion in profits in 2006. GE has customers in more than 100 countries and it employs more than 300,000 people worldwide. It has more than 2,500 researchers working toward the next generation breakthrough invention to improve the lives of people.' . GE is the only company listed in the DOW today that was also listed in the original DOW in 1896.	General Electric



Learn more about... What is Credit History? Why is it important to have a good credit history? Volume 12. What is Economy, Business, Workers, Goods, Services, Stock, DOW, S&P500, and NASDAQ in Volume 16. Does it pay to study hard? Volume 17. What is Currency and Foreign Currency Exchange rate? Volume 14. What is stronger or weaker currency? Volume 20. What does the dollar slide mean? Volume 32. How does money grow in a bank? Volume 21. What is Fed Funds rate and Discount rate? Volume 22 What does the interest rate cut mean for you? Volume 23. How to read stock information? Volume 25. What is "Black Monday"...Crash of 87"? Volume 31. Who are CEO, CFO, Shareholders, and the Board of Directors? What is SOX? Volume 33 How did year 2007 do? Volume 39.

Jan 14-18, 2008

Weekly Stock Market

Bear Market-Stocks down!

Index

Change

Last

DOW

Down 514

12,099

S&P500

Down 78

1,325

NASDAQ

Down 131

2,340

**Foreign Exchange Rate**

**$1 is equal to**
Currency	Change	Last
Euro (€)	+0.01	0.68
Yen (¥)	-1.88	106.93
Pound (£)	+0.00	0.51
Yuan ()	-0.01	7.25
Rupee (Rs.)	-0.06	39.23
Canadian (C$)	+0.01	1.02

**Your Favorite Stocks**
Company	Bought one stock in Jan-08	This week stock is?	Your gain or loss?
	$31.84	$28.51	-$3.33
	$51.57	$48.56	-$3.01
	$58.10	$52.40	-$5.70

We use multiple information resources, such as, websites, companies, stock exchanges, newspapers, text books, and others.