Segments From This Episode

• No recalls on bad investments

  by Bob Moon

  Thanks to the subprime mess, China now has its own problems with tainted imports. Its been buying products of the financial variety from American banks and brokers — including big slices of mortgage-backed securities. Bob Moon reports on whether that could be a problem.

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• Week on Wall Street

  by Kai Ryssdal

  Stockbroker and business analyst David Johnson talks with host Kai Ryssdal about how the markets are adjusting to the credit crunch and what may lie ahead.

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• Putting new interest in payday loans

  by Marketplace Staff

  Check-cashing outlets pull in pretty good profits by offering short-term loans at what can be triple-digit interest rates. The FDIC wants the nations' 22,000 payday lenders to lower those rates — and competition's the best way to do that. Mhari Saito reports.

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• It’s time for a sit-down strike

  by Marketplace Staff

  Commentator Moira Manion works at a shop where she's on her feet eight hours a day. A few customers have told her she should sit down. She has a radical idea to make that point to her employer.

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• Retailers try return policy on their stock

  by Stacey Vanek Smith

  

  Things seem to be falling apart at the seams for some of this country's biggest clothing retailers. Ann Taylor posted a 27% decline in profits, and the Gap is cutting 2,200 jobs with sales down 5%. But both announced big stock buybacks. Why? Stacey Vanek-Smith found out.

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• Looking good, America! . . . Er, wait

  by Jill Barshay

  Today's reports say new-home sales are up 2.8% and U.S. factory orders nearly 6%. But, wait. Those are the numbers from July — before the subprime debacle and the credit squeeze. Jill Barshay has more.

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• ‘I partied and I unlocked the iPhone!’

  by Kai Ryssdal

  George Hotz, 17, has posted on his blog the instructions for how to fiddle with an iPhone so it can be used with a wireless carrier other than AT&T. Kai Ryssdal figured that was worth a conversation and called him up.

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• No, my lord, you may not rule the village

  The days of the feudal system and its hierarchy of serfs and vassals collapsed in the 1600s. But one self-proclaimed lord of the manor in England is trying to bring those days back — for a price. Stephen Beard reports.

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