direct statement on the one thing virtually all investors are focused on the timing and speed of rate hikes. central banks benchmark short-term rate which affects everything from mortgage rate to auto loans has been near zero since december 2008 and since they ve been so low for so long a lot of anticipation aboutn liftoff might occur. yellin s comments come weeks before the next meeting and despite the concerns the economy might be slowing. steve leishman has the details. janet yellen saying today she believes the rate hike will be appropriate this year if the economy improves as she expects. i think it will be appropriate at some point this year to take the initial step to raise the federal funds rate target and begin the process of normalizing monetary policy. to support taking this step though i will need to see continued improvement in labor market conditions and i will need to be reasonably confident that inflation will move back to 2% over the medium term. yellen
thing virtually all investors are focused on the timing and speed of rate hikes. central banks benchmark short-term rate which affects everything from mortgage rate to auto loans has been near zero since december 2008 and since they ve been so low for so long a lot of anticipation aboutn liftoff might occur. yellin s comments come weeks before the next meeting and despite the concerns the economy might be slowing. steve leishman has the details. janet yellen saying today she believes the rate hike will be appropriate this year if the economy improves as she expects. i think it will be appropriate at some point this year to take the initial step to raise the federal funds rate target and begin the process of normalizing monetary policy. to support taking this step though i will need to see continued improvement in labor market conditions and i will need to be reasonably confident that inflation will move back to 2% over the medium term. yellen was clear expectation is fo
melissa francis. here s what s money tonight. brace for impact. senate majority leader harry reid says it looks like we ll head over the fiscal cliff. with just four days until the deadline can president obama and congress still pull out a deal in the nick of time? senator john hoeven of north dakota joins us to respond. plus, a game-changer for the insurance industry. an auto insurer unveils new policies that charge by the mile, giving a big potential boon to drivers. can it drive the competition off the road? the ceo of metro mile is here to take the wheel. and big beer companies putting beer goggles on their customers. the market for kraft beer is booming and big labels are battling to get a foothold but they may be using crafty tactics to sell you the same flat brew in different packaging. less filling tastes great. even when they say it s not it is always about money adam: before we serve you that beer let s look at the day s market headlines. stocks fell for their
defund the health care bill. among our newsmakers on the topic this morning, we have former oh bam in omb director peter or zaszag. then coming up at 8:30 eastern, we have former vice chair alice rivlin. and aei senior fellow kevin hassette. and in other washington news, the federal housing administration will likely soon take a cash infusion from the treasury. the agency needs help to cover losses from souring loans. jcpenney looking to raise as much as $750,000 to $1 billion to build up its cash reserves. the retailer is leaning towards issuing new shares. but other methods of raising capital are erroredly on the table. goldman sachs says it expects the retailers to move more slowly. anyway, another hard hit stock this year, blackberry, we talked bit almost every morning. fairfax financial says it is confident it can find the money to fund its $4.7 billion for the smartphonemaker. but shares did fall yesterday on doubts about that bid. meantime, t-mobile, i don t know, be
last four sessions. at this pointed, the dow is now back in positive territory for the year. still, if you look at where we stood just a week ago with some of the concerns about what was happening, it looked like things were going to expire, but we re headed back there now. we ll see what happens as we get through to some of the news coming out today. we do have on our agenda this morning economic data and earnings from the world s largest retailer. at 8:30 eastern time, we have two reports. jobless claims and july import prices. walmart is set to post quarterly results. that s expected around 7:00 eastern time this morning with all that we ve heard from the retailers including macy s with numbers not as strong as people had expected. that s going to have people watching very closely to see what walmart has to say about the consumer. we ll be hearing from kohl s before the opening bell and then this afternoon we have jcpenney. weird about europe, is it not? when they finall