Tonight's presidential debate is ostensibly about foreign policy, but budget politics will underlie everything the two candidates say. That's because America's foreign policy is scripted by two factors: its pocketbook and its willingness to write checks for overseas military engagements.
For years, Barack Obama's critics have positioned him as the scourge of big business. Last week, however, the co-founder of one of America's biggest companies, Costco, offered a strong rebuttal to the Obama-as-villain argument.
In another example of how Mitt Romney's Bain Capital creates jobs, we learn that Bain has for months been dismantling and shipping to China a Freeport, Ill., car parts plant -- and requiring the soon to be laid-off U.S. workers to personally train their Chinese replacements.
GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney spends a lot of time touting his record on job creation. But when he ran Bain Capital, he also made jaw-dropping profits in leveraged buyouts of companies that later went bust, costing more than 11,000 Americans their jobs.
With all the talk about Mitt Romney's worth -- as much as $255 million, we learned Friday -- we were intrigued by Monday's report on the holdings of Queen Elizabeth II. Turns out they have more in common than you'd guess, and the candidate could learn a thing or two from the monarch.
President Obama has made assailing Bain Capital a centerpiece of his campaign against Mitt Romney, the private equity firm's former CEO. But former President Clinton isn't on board with that line of attack.
Bidders may be lining up for Sara Lee as private equity firm Apollo assembles an investor group to explore a possible offer and Brazilian meat-processor JBS considers coming back with a better deal.
Gold is on a record bull run, up from $328 in 2002 to $1,375 an ounce today. What caused that steep rise wasn't any inherent increase in gold's value to society, but a clever marketing scheme that allowed it to be traded easily without the hassle of physical delivery: The SPDR Gold ETF.
After seeing interest from potential buyers, children's clothing retailer Gymboree has hired Goldman Sachs to auction itself off, and more private-equity firms have already stepped in to say they want to play. Gymboree executives are reportedly looking for price of $55 to $60 a share.
Private equity is starting to ramp up dealmaking, as Bain Capital agreed to pay $1.63 billion to Dow Chemical for Styron.
Now that private equity is no longer producing monster returns, it's time to assess its value. By using debt, buyout shops have taken over struggling companies and enriched investors. But critics say the practice leads to more layoffs and the "flipping" of companies.
