Personal Finance

LONDON - Britain's competition watchdog, the Office of Fair Trade, on Tuesday said that fees charged by members of credit card association MasterCard UK are effectively a tax on consumers' purchases and infringe anti-trust rules, Reuters reports.

WASHINGTON - Enrollment in the U.S. food stamp program will climb by nearly one million people in fiscal 2004 due to the soft economy and restoration of benefits to legal immigrants, the Bush administration said on Monday.

NEW YORK - Consumer confidence fell in January for the second straight month, largely because Americans are less optimistic about the job market and any increases in their incomes, the New York-based Conference Board reported Tuesday.

NEW YORK - U.S. consumer confidence fell hard to a new nine-year low last week as renewed war fears and rising oil prices dampened faith in the Bush administration's handling of the economy, a report said on Tuesday.

NEW YORK - Retailers hoping for positive holiday sales might not like the latest report from New York-based The Conference Board, which reports that its already declining Consumer Confidence Index deteriorated even further in October.

NEW YORK - A depressed job market and stock market losses pushed U.S. consumer sentiment in early October to its lowest level in nine years, raising concerns the consumer-driven recovery could be in jeopardy, Reuters reports.

NEW YORK - The University of Michigan's preliminary September consumer sentiment index fell to 86.2, remaining at its lowest level since November 2001, from a final reading of 87.6 in August, market sources said on Friday.

NEW YORK - Wal-Mart Stores Inc. last week sued its life insurers, American International Group Inc. and Hartford Financial Services, to get back $150 million it says it lost through a life insurance policy for employees, Reuters reports.