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The Federal Reserve on Friday morning moved to increase liquidity in an ever-tightening credit market, pledging to inject an additional $140 billion in short-term credit and to take on hard-to-sell asset-backed paper as collateral. The Fed's term auction facility, created in December as a measure to provide direct lending to banks that have been reluctant to lend to each other in the credit crunch, will inject $50 billion into the banking system through auctions Monday and March 24. The two 28-day auctions were originally planned to be $30 billion, up from the original $20 billion offered in December. The Fed also said it would initiate on Friday what is expected to be $100 million in 28-day term repurchase agreements in which it will accept as collateral any type of securities used in conventional open-market operations, including Treasuries and debt or mortgage-backed paper backed by government-sponsored mortgage buyers Fannie MaeFNM and Freddie MacFRE. Rapidly waning confidence in such agency-backed securities has led to a run of margin calls at lenders such as Thornburg MortgageTMA and Carlyle Capital, a fixed-income investment firm run by an affiliate of the private-equity firm Carlyle Group. Fears about the plummeting value of the paper and the viability of the companies that hold it hit stocks hard Thursday, sending the Dow Jones Industrial Average down more than 214 points. The Fed said it would continue to increase the amount offered through both the repos and term auction facility "if conditions warrant."
The Labor Department says 63,000 workers were shed last month, following a downwardly revised loss of 22,000 in January.
McCain will attack the Democrats on national security, and will pay special attention to Iraq.
Rates followed bond yields lower after weak data on jobs and consumer confidence.
Yahoo! is among the most searched stocks on TheStreet.com. Here's what Cramer had to say about the stock recently.
Catch up on his thinking on the hottest topics of the past week.
Investors will have to deal with a Fed meeting and another flood of earnings and economic data.
Ensco International and Echelon have the potential to move higher in coming days.
See who made what calls.
The addition of video is helping telecom companies compete against cable and satellite companies.
The June West Texas Intermediate contract reflects selling pressure ahead of Tuesday's expiration. But stocks in the sector are generally trading higher.
See who made what calls.
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