The Market: March 23, 2012

Laura Shin

Posted on Mar 23, 2012

Rejoice! Congress this week passed a ban on its own members engaging in insider trading, an issue we have reported on previously here and here. Unemployment claims again dipped to a new four-year low. Also, Apple answered a question that had been dogging the company for a while—what to do with its huge hoard of cash—by announcing it would begin releasing dividends to holders of Apple stock.

Meanwhile, news in other parts of the world was grimmer: A Frenchman shot and killed seven people in France this week and last week and then was himself killed in a police raid. An American soldier shocked the world last Friday when he killed 16 Afghan villagers. And protesters around the country expressed indignation over the Florida shooting of an unarmed black teenager, Trayvon Martin, by a neighborhood-watch captain who was never arrested or charged with any crime.

The presidential campaign continued on, with Mitt Romney winning the primary in Illinois. Meanwhile, it looks like corporations are funneling a lot of money into this year’s presidential election. We look at why this is happening now and how they can do so, and we also explore the theory that women make better investors than men.

Corporations Are People? What You Need to Know

It defies logic to call corporations people, but the law does so—and has for a long time. Here’s how it works, both for the good and the bad.

Why Women Can Make the Best Investors

What if the stock market was more … personable? What if it had moods and feelings? Newsflash: It does, and we can read them to invest better.

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