WHITE HOUSE WANTS CLINTON EMAILS INVOLVING OBAMA KEPT PRIVATE

As the U.S. Department of State continues to release thousands of pages of former secretary Hillary Clinton’s private server emails, the White House wants some electronic communications between she and President Barack Obama to remain private.

The State Department on Friday released 7,000 additional pages of Clinton’s emails that were kept on a non-government email server while she was the department chief — its sixth and largest mass email release so far this year.

More than half of Clinton’s private server emails have now been released, in accordance with a lawsuit filed under the Freedom of Information Act.  Read more

Google plans to kill Chrome OS, fold it into Android

ChromeOS has been a success in many respects. While not universally loved, and still limited compared to Windows or OS X, the simple operating system has a small, loyal following, and laptops based off it often appear on Amazon's top-selling list.

Yet that's not enough to earn it a stay of execution, as The Wall Street Journalreports that insiders say Chrome OS will soon be given the axe. It apparently will be folded into Android next year, and Chromebooks will no longer be sold as of 2017.

Google's decision to get rid of its desktop operating system is apparently linked to a planned revision of Android that will help it span multiple categories of devices, including 2-in-1s. This interest isn't a huge surprise given the recent announcement of the Pixel C, an Android powered tablet with an optional keyboard cover.  Read more

Personal Spending, Income Miss Expectations

American consumers edged up their spending in September at the slowest pace since January, suggesting slowing job creation and economic turmoil overseas may be introducing some caution into purchasing habits.

Personal spending, which measures how much Americans paid for everything from sofas to taxi rides, rose 0.1% in September from a month earlier, the Commerce Department said Friday. Consumption climbed 0.4% in August and 0.3% in July.

Personal income, reflecting Americans' pretax earnings from salaries and investments, climbed 0.1% in September. That was the smallest increase since March 2015.  Read more

Icahn Sees 'Grave Risk' to US as Pfizer Looks to Move Offshore

Carl Icahn, the billionaire investor who Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump wants to name Secretary of the Treasury, is urging Congress to change the tax code so that companies don't have an incentive to move outside the U.S.

His latest warning followed confirmed merger talks between Pfizer Inc., the largest U.S. drugmaker, and Ireland-based Allergan Plc. The companies have a combined market value of about $320 billion, which would be a record-breaking deal for the pharmaceutical industry.  Read more

Gallup Poll: Blacks Worse Off Now Than in Obama's First Term

African Americans say that their lives are worse off during President Barack Obama's second term than during his first four years in the White House, a new Gallup Poll released Thursday says.
In a "well-being" poll conducted by Gallup and Healthways, Americans were asked whether they considered themselves as "thriving," "struggling" or "suffering" based on a numbered scale.

Their responses were then averaged on a percentage basis. They were asked these questions earlier this year and in 2012.  Read more

Europe's Last Dictator Has Become the Darling of the Bond Market

He’s known as Europe’s last dictator, he mangles financial terminology and his secret service once jailed the chief executive officer of the world’s biggest potash miner. He’s also turning into a darling of the bond market.

Alexander Lukashenko, president of Belarus, is showing a softer side that’s helped cut the premium on the country’s debt to the lowest in almost a year compared with other emerging markets. The bonds have climbed at twice the pace of Russia’s since February. And Ashmore Group Plc, which owned Belarus Eurobonds as of the end of September, says the rally has further to go.  Read more

China's Graying Migrants Have a Hidden Stash of Money to Spend

Migrant worker Guo Huailiang is planning to live it up a bit in his retirement.

After 19 years living in cramped quarters in Beijing, rising at 5:30 a.m. for a 12-hour shift, the 52-year-old construction worker is socking away money that would allow him to return to his eight-room house and 4-acre plot in the countryside, spend a bit of cash and travel. He’s dreaming of trips to Hainan Island, Taiwan and even South Korea.

Multiply Guo by the millions who migrated to China’s cities, toiling away in factories and building sites for decades, and you have a hoard of savings that stands to revolutionize China’s consumer market. It turns out that China getting old may just help create the balanced economy its leaders have been aiming to engineer.  Read more