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Are global sharemarkets completely ignoring the growing economic storm clouds as they stage their dizzying rally?

The Australian Office of Financial Management, under the auspices of the world’s greatest Treasurer, Wayne Swan, has been spending billions of dollars of taxpayer money propping up the non-bank mortgage sector.

It is not a surprise that the US housing sector is deeply depressed.

Perhaps Business Spectator’s legendary columnist Robert Gottliebsen isn’t reading Steve Keen’s columns (or these ones) particularly closely. If he did, he probably wouldn’t be blaming the bankers’ communication skills for their current public relations foibles.

Global sharemarkets were cheered by a rebound in US home sales last month but top US officials are grimly aware of the damage that the impending foreclosure debacle is about to unleash, both on the country’s housing market and on its banking system, writes Karen Maley.

The US foreclosure crisis continues with the “robo-signing” scandal already costing US banks $US50 billion in market value.

Las Vegas is no longer the exception to the rule and is now a symbol of the broader social and economic problems the United States now faces, writes Crikey reader Clair MacDougall.

When I saw Wall Street falling last night under the weight of disappointing economic data it was clear that the housing crisis in the US is still affecting the economy in a way many Wall Street analysts can’t understand, writes Robert Gottliebsen of Business Spectator.

A growing economy has led Ireland out of recession, the housing market in the US is still in a bad way and the Slovakia government is a new worry for Europe.

World markets rose because of leaks out of China, but world prices for oil, metals and grains were lower , thanks to China importing less and other business news of the day.

Foster’s to separate wine and beer, tens of billions of dollars were wiped off global markets, US consumers are unmoved, a new iPhone is on the way, so the price plummets and other business news.

More tremors felt around Greece … US investors are ignoring reality, while interest rates there rose alarmingly and investors ignored a surprise 18,000 rise in the number of weekly jobless benefits … Bankruptcies in Ireland are on the up …

It looks as if Greece will be supported and stopped from defaulting on its billions of debt, Lehman Brothers sacked a whistle blower just weeks after he raised concerns about accounting practice, the Tiger Woods circus is about to hit the road again, and more business briefs.

The finger of fate is pointing at those responsible for the collapase of Lehman’s, the bottom has fallen out of the US tomato industry, which in turn is having a disastrous effect on the fast-food business and other business news of the day.

The revolutionary war fought by the Americans was rooted in part in the overthrow of a banking order imposed on the colonies. That war continues to this day, writes David Hirst.

The black hole that is the US housing crisis continues to widen, sucking in more and more American homeowners and making a mockery of the confident assertions of politicians, policymakers and the stockmarket that the worst is over.