The Morning Roundup distills the top financial stories from the region and around the globe into bite-sized chunks for your daily consumption.
International story of the day:
US bank stress test results are released amid less-terrible-than-before economic data
It has been an interesting weekend across the Atlantic. As expected, the US government on Thursday
[ released stress-test results ]
for the country's major banks, and it turns out that most won't need to raise new capital. Those that do, including Citi,
[ Wells Fargo ]
and Bank of America, are to
by November, a lower figure than analysts expected. Wells Fargo and Morgan Stanley have
[ already raised fresh capital ]
, though
[ Morgan ]
needs way more than the $1.8bn it was told to raise. Meanwhile, GMAC, the financing arm of General Motors, appears to be in
[ bad shape ]
. It may need a
[ $11.5bn bailout ]
from the government. And America's regional banks are
of their own, which
may cause a wave of mergers. Also over the weekend, American jobs figures came in, showing that
[ people are still losing jobs ]
, but at a slower pace than before.
Regional story of the day:
Taking stock
First-quarter results continue to pour in from companies in the region, and overall, things are looking a little more positive and less uncertain than was the case a few months back. Markets have been on an upward swing lately, punctuated by better-than-expected results from a bevy of local companies late last week and into the weekend. Air Arabia's first-quarter profits
; Mashreqbank also
. Shuaa Capital, the Dubai-based investment bank,
[ reported a loss ]
late on Thursday, but the results came out a bit better than in previous quarters. Kuwait's central bank governor said over the weekend that his country's financial system was
. Today's
may shed more light on just where we stand on the path to recovery as GCC officials push towards a delayed monetary union.
The rest:
Personal finance gurus: all wrong, all the time? [
[ The Big Money ]
]
The US bailout won't work, a large hedge fund firm says [
[ Dealbook ]
]
Ratings agencies must reform, might even be controlled by investors [
[ The Deal ]
]
An
excellent
interactive chart on US banks' capital needs [
[ WSJ ]
]
Can it really be this bad? A cemetery in the US files for foreclosure [
[ Freakonomics ]
]