02nd March 2010
FirstCaribbean Daily Markets Report
Friday, February 26th, 2010

Global Markets
• The U.S. economy expanded at a 5.9% annual rate in the fourth quarter, more than the government reported last month, reflecting stronger business investment and a greater contribution from inventories.
• Sales of previously owned U.S. homes unexpectedly declined in January for a second month, signaling the government’s extension of a tax credit is being limited by a lack of job growth.
• Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke told the Senate Banking Committee that it would be a “grave mistake” to remove the Fed’s authority to oversee banks, as the panel’s chairman, Christopher Dodd, has proposed.
• Britain emerged from recession at a faster pace than previously estimated in the fourth quarter as services output jumped, providing a boost for Prime Minister Gordon Brown as he prepares for a general election within weeks.
• Europe’s economy may be coming unstuck from the global recovery as governments to the south of the region struggle to reverse budget deficits and consumers in the north pull back spending.
• Lloyds Banking Group Plc, Britain’s biggest mortgage lender, posted a wider-than-expected full-year loss as loan write-offs rose “significantly” in 2009 on the bank’s takeover of HBOS
• Crude oil is poised for the biggest monthly advance since October as the U.S. economy starts to recover and fuel inventories fall.

Caribbean Markets
Bahamas: Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham advised the House of Assembly that total revenue collected during the period of July to December 2009 amounted to $634.9 million, an increase of $8 million over the same period in the previous year. The Prime Minister explained that these collections included a one-off tax receipt of $84 million assessed on the sale of a company in Grand Bahama.The Prime Minister further also noted that as of the end of December 2009, The Bahamas public debt level stood at 46% of GDP.
Barbados: Harold Codrington, advisor to the Governor of the Central Bank of Barbados has noted that Tourism is not performing as predicted and as a result foreign reserves are falling.
Cayman: A report released this week claims that spending by the Cayman Islands government “is wholly out of line with its peers, having far higher levels of public spending than any other comparable jurisdiction. The report, compiled by Richard Teather, a senior lecturer in taxation, points out that the Cayman Islands government has acknowledged that the growth in public sector jobs and the contingent pension liability cannot be sustained and is now looking at various options including trimming jobs and amendment to health and medical benefits.

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