California Home Loan 360

Bear Stearns, squeezed by the sub-prime crisis, needs an emergency loan. Its stock plunges, and wariness grows. The battered global financial system looked a lot more fragile Friday as one of Wall Street's biggest investment houses was forced to get an emergency loan from the Federal Reserve, raising the specter of more giant securities firms laid low by the global credit crisis.

British lawmakers, criticizing bankers and financial supervisors over their handling of the global credit crisis, warned investment banks to make their financial products more transparent or face extra regulation.

The Federal Reserve trimmed two short-term interest rates yet again Tuesday, a sign that its previous rate cuts weren't enough to keep the widening mortgage crisis from freezing up global credit markets and possibly triggering a recession.

The Federal Reserve trimmed two short-term interest rates yet again Tuesday, a sign that its previous rate cuts weren't enough to keep the widening mortgage crisis from freezing up global credit markets and possibly triggering a recession.

The Federal Reserve trimmed two short-term interest rates yet again Tuesday, a sign that its previous rate cuts weren't enough to keep the widening mortgage crisis from freezing up the global credit markets and possibly triggering a recession.

Canada's central bank unexpectedly lowered its key interest rate by a quarter of a point Tuesday to combat threats to the country's economy posed by a strong Canadian dollar and the global credit crisis.

In further signs of an easing in the late summer global credit squeeze, issuance of commercial paper by U.S. financial firms rose by the most since July this week, while London interbank deposit rates for three-month euros fell for a seventh straight day on Thursday.