MILAN (AFP) ― Italian financial markets fell sharply on Monday, with investors finding no reassurance in the adoption of a huge austerity budget as the eurozone debt crisis savaged confidence.Milan’s main index, the FTSE MIB, fell steadily through the day and closed down 3.06 percent at 17.885,74 points, with bank shares the worst hit. A man looking a stock exchange board monitor is reflected in

NEW YORK (AP) ― Gold’s reputation as a safe place for your money sent it above $1,600 for the first time.Investors are worried about debt problems on both sides of the Atlantic. So they bid gold up $12.30 an ounce Monday to settle at $1,602.40. That’s a record for the market price for gold, but below its 1980 peak after adjusting for inflation. An ounce of gold at that time cost $850, or about $2,

NEW YORK (AP) ― Time is running out for Washington to raise the country’s borrowing limit and avoid a default. Wall Street isn’t panicking yet. But if the unthinkable happens, a default could strike financial markets like an earthquake.“If we just get higher longer-term interest rates, we’d be lucky,” said John Briggs, Treasury strategist at the Royal Bank of Scotland.What might markets look like

WASHINGTON (AP) ― Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke may feel surrounded when he testifies before Congress this week.From his left, Democrats will demand to know what the Fed can do to create jobs, especially after the government reported last week that unemployment rose to 9.2 percent in June and the economy generated just 18,000 net new jobs.From his right, Republicans will likely question th

IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde conducts a press conference in Washington, D.C. on July 6. (AFP-Yonhap News)WASHINGTON (AP) ― The International Monetary Fund’s new chief foresees “real nasty consequences” for the U.S. and global economies if the U.S. fails to raise its borrowing limit.Christine Lagarde, the first woman to head the lending institution, said in an interview broadcast Sunday