Finance & Business World

China’s economic growth slowed to its lowest level in nearly three years in the first quarter amid lending controls and weak trade.

The world’s second-largest economy grew by 8.1 percent in the three months ending in March, its weakest expansion since the second quarter of 2009, data showed Friday. It grew 8.9 percent in the last quarter of 2011.

China’s growth has declined steadily since mid-2010 as global demand for exports weakened and Beijing tightened lending and investment curbs to cool an overheated economy and surging inflation.

Most analysts expect China to achieve a “soft landing,” with its slowdown bottoming out later this year and growth rebounding. But some worry growth might fall too abruptly, raising the risk of job losses.

A sharp slump could have global repercussions, hurting demand for oil, industrial components and consumer goods at a time when U.S. and European growth are weak.

Other data reported Friday showed China’s factory output, retail sales and other economic indicators weakening, though still at robust levels. Factory output rose 11.6 percent over a year earlier in the first quarter. Retail sales were up 10.9 percent.

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U.S. local-government payrolls increased last month for the first time since August, easing the drag on the economy brought on by budget-cutting cities, counties and school districts.

The U.S. Labor Department reported today that local- government employment, adjusted for seasonal swings in hiring, expanded by 2,000 in February as school districts boosted hiring. State payrolls slipped by 1,000 after rising by 11,000 in January.

Jim Diffley, an economist with IHS Inc. who tracks regional growth, said it

Bill Gross is now officially in the ETF business. Pimco launched the ETF version of its Total Return Fund Thursday, and experts say it could be a game changer.

The Pimco Total Return ETF () aims to mirror the performance of Pimco’s Total Return Fund (), the world’s largest bond mutual fund with nearly $245 billion in assets. And it will be managed by Pimco founder and chief investment officer Gross himself.

The fact that it is a version of such a popular fund and has Gross’ star power makes Pimco’s newest ETF a litmus test for the actively-managed ETF space.

So far, a good chunk of the 40 or so actively-managed ETFs, which represent just 0.5% of the total ETF market, have struggled to attract sizable assets and trading volumes.

The end of mutual funds is coming

But ETF industry watchers have been hoping Pimco’s ETF will usher in a change.

So does Gross.

"The Total Return ETF harnesses Pimco’s time-tested investment process and our skills as an active manager, and we believe it signals an important new phase in the development of the ETF marketplace," he said Thursday in a statement low fee payday advance.

Earlier this year, Gross said he expects the Total Return ETF will follow in the footsteps of its mutual fund version to become the largest ETF in the world.

But Standard and Poor’s cautions investors from flocking to the ETF out of the gates.

While the ETF version is less expensive that its mutual fund counterpart, boasting an gross expense ratio of 0.55% compared to 0.85%, it’s more expensive than the larger fixed income ETFs in the market, notes Todd Rosenbluth, S&P Capital IQ ETF analyst.

Rosenbluth also warned that the ETF’s holdings are likely to vary slightly from the mutual fund’s holdings, since the Securities and Exchange Commission restricts the use of derivatives in new ETFs.

Trading volume for the Pimco Total Return fund topped out at 550,375 shares, trading just under $100 apiece.  

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South African Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan may push back next year

Stocks are edging lower Monday morning as talks drag on between Greek political leaders over a fresh austerity package required for the country to get more bailout loans.

The Dow Jones industrial average fell 36 points to 12,825 a half-hour before noon. That’s a drop of 0.3 percent. American Express Co. led the Dow lower, losing 1.4 percent.

Sam Stovall, chief equity strategist at S&P Capital IQ, said he thinks investors are starting to realize the stock market is vulnerable to a big drop. Trading has been subdued compared with the wild swings of 2011. The S&P has closed up or down by more than 1 percent only three times since the year began. In December, that happened nine times.

“I look at it like a very low tide warning of an impending tsunami,” Stovall said of the recent calm stretch. “We’re setting ourselves up for a decline, the sort of decline that would make you sit up and take notice,” he said.

In other trading, the Standard & Poor’s 500 index fell 3 points to 1,341, for a drop of 0.2 percent. The Nasdaq composite fell 7 points to 2,898.

The declines follow a big gain Friday after a surprisingly good U.S. employment report. Large gains in the stock market are often followed by modest moves, as traders pull some of their winnings off the table. On average since 1950, whenever the S&P rose by 1 percent or more in a trading day, the index has inched up just 0.1 percent the next day, according to S&P Capital IQ.

Greece’s Prime Minister Lucas Papademos will meet with negotiators from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund in the afternoon and then with the leaders of the three parties backing his coalition government. The Greek parliament must sign off on any budget deal.

Among companies making big moves:

_ Boeing Co. fell 1.3 percent following reports that the company found a problem in its 787 Dreamliner.

_ Netflix Inc. fell 3 percent after Verizon Communications and Coinstar Inc. said they will launch a video-streaming service later this year, a challenge to Netflix. Coinstar is the parent of Redbox, a DVD rental company. Coinstar rose 1.4 percent and Verizon less than 1 percent.

_ Micron Technology Inc. fell 2.5 percent following news that the chip maker’s CEO died in a plane crash. Steve Appleton, 51, was at the helm for 18 years, leading the only company he’d ever worked for.

_ Humana dropped 5.6 percent, the biggest loss in the S&P 500 index. The health insurance company reported revenue that fell short of analysts’ expectations. Humana also raised its earnings outlook for 2012 but that, too, was below analysts’ forecast.

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Foreign direct investment in China fell for the second straight month in December as global financial turmoil dimmed companies

Three Federal Reserve policy makers called on the U.S. government to try new programs to revive the housing market while differing over whether the central bank should take more steps to cut borrowing costs.

New York Fed President William C. Dudley said in New Jersey today that

Eleventh-hour contract talks have started between two Saint Louis area hospitals and a leading insurer who had been locked in an impasse, according to officials on both sides.

Representatives of St. Louis University Hospital and Des Peres Hospital as well as Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Missouri and HealthLink Inc., confirmed Tuesday that limited talks occurred last week.

So far, negotiators have failed to reach an agreement that may avert an end-of-the-year contract deadline. And the impasse may result in thousands of patients fleeing to other medical providers.

Both sides offered widely different accounts Tuesday of their recent talks, which were apparently held via phone calls, conference calls and emails, but not in person. They accused each other of undermining or walking away from the negotiations. And they could not agree on which offer or counter-offer is currently on or off the table - or even if talks will likely move forward. 

A spokeswoman for Tenet Healthcare Corp. of Dallas, which owns the two hospitals, said that WellPoint Inc. of Indianapolis, which owns the two health insurance plans, had delivered an ultimatum in the form of a new, only slightly better contract proposal that the hospitals rejected last Friday.

“They’ve said, ‘Take it or leave it,’” said Laura Keller, a spokeswoman for SLU Hospital. “They offered an increase that is so low it doesn’t keep up with the increase in cost of taking care of patients.”

But a spokesman for Anthem insisted that the negotiations were still ongoing - and that the insurer is in fact examining an earlier offer from the hospitals.

“We are incredulous,” said Deb Wiethop, an Anthem spokeswoman. “We’re not aware that the negotiations are over. … We received a proposal from Tenet on Dec. 19. We’re going to look at it and get back to Tenet in January.”

Wiethop acknowledged that the hospitals had rejected an offer last Friday from the insurer. “It’s not a ‘take it or leave it’ proposal,” she said.

The two hospitals announced in early December that - because of a breakdown in talks - they would cancel their managed care contracts with Anthem as well as HealthLink as of Jan. 1. This termination does not apply to SLUCare physicians.

Without the contracts, Anthem and HealthLink customers would pay significantly higher rates next year for out-of-network care at both of the hospitals. And if that occurs, it would no doubt drive away many patients who would ordinarily visit Des Peres Hospital or SLU Hospital to other competing St. Louis-area hospitals that accept WellPoint’s health plans.

Under the existing contracts, the two hospitals’ agreements with HealthLink patients will end on Dec. 31. However, patients covered by the Anthem contract will continue to receive care at ‘in-network’ rates until Feb. 22.

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The bottom line is that Germany is likely to be the last man standing. The Euro is important to them and the responsibility for saving it will be decided in Berlin - not Paris, Brussels, or Frankfurt. It will be messy and will involve revamping the main treaty - the Treaty of Lisbon cashadvance.

Cam Harvey provides an overview of some of the finer points. Click here for blog.

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London officials attached eviction notices to protest tents outside St. Paul’s Cathedral on Wednesday, asking the demonstrators to remove them within a day or face legal action.

The notices posted by the City of London Corporation said the protest camp was “an unlawful obstruction” of a sidewalk, and asked protesters to take down “all tents and other structures” by 6 p.m. (1800 GMT, 1 p.m. EST) Thursday.

The cathedral and the corporation had suspended legal action to remove the camp two weeks ago, and offered the protesters a deal to allow them to stay until the new year if they then agreed to leave. But the corporation said Tuesday that talks had failed and it was resuming legal action.

If the tents are not removed, the corporation says it will go to court seeking an eviction notice _ a process that could take weeks.

More than 200 tents have been pitched outside the iconic church since Oct. 15 in a protest against capitalist excess inspired by New York’s Occupy Wall Street, and the protesters said they would resist attempts to move them.

“We will contest it,” spokeswoman Naomi Colvin said. “We will be speaking to our legal team and we will be fighting it.”

The governing Chapter of St. Paul’s Cathedral said in a statement that it recognized “the local authority’s statutory right to proceed with the action it has today,” but would continue to meet with protesters in a bid to find a peaceful solution.

Police in the U.S. have been moving in to clear away similar protests, breaking up camps in Portland, Oregon, on Sunday, Oakland, California, on Monday and on Tuesday in New York, where about 200 people were arrested.

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