President Obama just finished delivering a speech from NY’s Federal Hall, a day before the anniversary of the collapse of Goldman Sachs.

Obama urged Congress to pass a sweeping bill by the end of this year to help ensure firms don’t make irresponsible trades or make irresponsible lending decisions.

Obama said, “I did not run for president to intervene in financial markets,” but gave a stern warning that, “Those on Wall Street cannot resume taking risks without regard for consequences, and expect that next time, American taxpayers will be there to break their fall.”

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The most successful investor in the world, Warren Buffett, has announced his investment firm, MidAmerican (part of Berkshire Hathaway), would increase its financial stake in the Chinese automobile battery producer turned carmaker BYD Corp, sending the stock rallying up today.

BYD Chairman Wang Chuanfu said today, “MidAmerican has always intended to raise its stake in BYD because it believes BYD has good prospects in the development of renewable energy,”

The exact stake increase is currently unclear.

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According to new data released today by the National Association of Realtors (NAR), July marked the fastest sales growth in homes that we’ve seen in the last two-years.

In July, the annual rate of home sales hit 5.24 million homes (7.2-percent up), beating analyst expectations of only 5 million units. Just a month before, in June, that number was 4.89 million.

The rate also grew consecutively in the last four-months, the last time there was a four-month consecutive upswing was in June 2004.

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ExxonMobil Corp announced today a massive $26 billion investment with TransCanada Corporation for the US Alaska natural gas pipeline project.

Upon completing, the project would provide access to 36 trillion cubic ft of natural gas in the Arctic region. The pipeline would provide up 4-4.5 billion cubic ft in daily natural gas.

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Top U.S. Trade Representative Ronald Kirk said today that the U.S. would not try to redraft NAFTA. Kirk said, “The president has said we will look at all of our options, but I think they can be addressed without having to reopen the agreement,”

Redrafting NAFTA was a campaign promise made by Obama that was aimed to address labour union concerns of NAFTA hurting American jobs.

During the U.S. campaign, a leaked memo indicated Obama’s economic adviser told Canadian Consul General Georges Rioux that Obama’s statements should not be taken seriously Read the full story

American homes facing foreclosure were up 24% in Q1 of 2009. 804,000 homes got foreclosure notices, up from 650,000 in the same period last year. 191,000 properties completed foreclosure in Q1 2009.

The news comes as banks will start to reissue foreclosure notices after a government backed foreclosure break. The numbers are only expected to get worse.

President Obama is also set to put his mortgage plan into action, offering banks $75 billion in incentives to help curb the foreclosure crisis with modified loans.

In Obama’s latest bid to try ease relations between the U.S. and communist Cuba, Obama has outlined plans to allow U.S. telecommunications companies to place bids for licenses to supply their services in Cuba. The new rules will allow U.S. telecoms to setup networks, including fiber-optic cables and satellites to link the U.S. with Cuba.

This could pave the way to bring more affordable communication systems to Cuba, and will increase the follow of information to the island.

The move comes about a week ahead of the Summit of the Americas meeting in Trinidad.

Obama most recently announced plans to removed some travel restrictions to Cuba, with the hope of eventually completely eliminating travel restrictions to the island (which would require congressional passing).

Obama has just lifted significant travel restrictions for Cuba. Americans can now travel to Cuba assuming they meet certain restrictions such as cultural and educational restrictions. In addition, family members will now be able to travel to Cuba once every year, and can now send more money to family members annually. Under the Bush administration, each American family could only send up to $300 per quarter. That amount has now been changed to $700. It is widely expected that Obama will push to allow Americans to travel to Cuba for any purpose as many times they want anytime they want. A removal of the current Cuban trade embargo is not expected and would require a congressional passing.

An arbitrator has ruled Canada should pay the U.S. $46.7 million in penalties resulting from an apparent 2006 softwood lumber breach. Canadian International Trade Minister Stockwell Day said today the money will become available to Washington soon. The U.S. alleges Canada subsidizes softwood lumber production with aid programs and low stumpage fees.

The Canadian government announced plans today to offer GM, Chrysler up to $4 billion in bridge loans to continue operations.

Under the announced plan today, the Canadian government will earmark $1 billion for Chrysler, $250 million of witch will become available immediately, and an additional $500 million by sometime in April. Part of the deal, Chrysler must interest notes equal to 6.67% of the aggregate loan.

GM would receive the remaining $3 billion. Read the full story