BY THE time JPMorgan Chase finished reporting its fourth-quarter results on January 14th, any optimism about a lovely, if surprising, sign-off to a difficult year had been squashed. Its return on equity was just over 11%, and if that is how the institution widely thought to be the best managed and best balanced of the big American banks performed,...

A CATCHY new phrase has been added to the Orwellian lexicon of Euro-speak, where terms such as “stability and growth” actually mean the opposite. This is “private-sector involvement” (PSI), which is code for imposing losses on Greece’s private creditors.

The International Monetary Fund’s most recent review of the Greek economy, in December, gives a...

AMERICA’S trade deficit with China hit another record last year. Estimated at almost $300 billion, it made up over 40% of America’s total deficit. Yet official data grossly overstate US imports from China.

Take the iPad, which America imports from China even though it is entirely designed and owned by Apple, an American company. iPads are assembled...