Wall St ends lower; strong retail sales stoke interest rate worries

By Saeed Azhar, Amruta Khandekar and Shristi Achar A NEW YORK (Reuters) – Wall Street’s main stock indexes closed sharply lower on Tuesday after stronger-than-expected retail sales data stoked worries interest rates could stay higher for longer, while U.S. big banks dropped on a report that Fitch could downgrade some lenders. The Commerce Department report…

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How much worse can China’s economic slowdown get?

HONG KONG (Reuters) -China’s economic activity data for July, including retail sales, industrial output and investment failed to match expectations, fuelling concern over a deeper, longer-lasting slowdown in growth. THE DEMISE OF CHINA’S GROWTH HAS BEEN MISTAKENLY FORECAST BEFORE. IS THIS TIME DIFFERENT? Activity data has been missing forecasts since the beginning of the second…

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Southwest Airlines reaches tentative agreement with transport workers union

(Reuters) -Southwest Airlines Co said on Tuesday it had reached a tentative agreement with the union that represents about 17,120 transport workers who handle ramp, operations, provisioning and cargo. The workers will now earn $36.72 per hour, higher than the hourly wages at United Airlines Holdings and Delta Air Lines Inc, based on the tentative…

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