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Mortgage rates retreated further this week, with the benchmark conforming 30-year fixed mortgage rate dropping back to 5.09 percent, according to Bankrate.com's weekly national survey. The average 30-year fixed mortgage has an average of 0.45 discount and origination points.

Accounting professionals and small businesses are poised for progress as long as they continue to invest in new technologies, marketing and advertising and face-to-face time with clients.

Beyond.com, Inc., the world’s largest network of niche career communities, released its Fourth Quarter 2010 Career Trend Analysis Report, which revealed that the largest percentage of online job postings are for positions with less than one year of experience, capturing 78 percent of all postings across the network. This represents more than a 13 percent jump compared to entry-level job postings from one year ago, indicating a healthy uptick in the creation of jobs, particularly for this new generation entering the workforce.

In the EU27, housing conditions differ considerably between Member States. These differences can be seen both in the type of housing in which people live and in the housing problems they encounter. On average in the EU27 in 2009, 42% of the population lived in a flat, 34% in a detached house and 23% in a semi-detached or terraced house. Of the EU27 population, 18% lived in an overcrowded dwelling, while 16% lived in a dwelling where a leaking roof or damp were perceived as a problem, 7% considered their dwelling to be too dark, 4% had no indoor flushing toilet and 3% no bath or shower.

The Corporate Executive Board released results from its quarterly Business Barometer survey, which pointed to several signs of economic improvement in the fundamentals of U.S. businesses. Driven by anticipated increases in consumer confidence, hiring and capital spending, the collective optimism of the more than 400 senior executives who participated in the survey boosted its sentiment index by 1.5 – to 50.6 in Q1 2011 from 48.9 in Q4 2010 – marking the second consecutive quarter of executives' improved economic outlook.

Despite a U.S. economic recovery from the depths of the financial crisis, nearly half of Individual Investors trusted financial services companies less in 2010 than the previous year. Edelman's second annual Trust in U.S. Financial Services Survey found that of the 46 percent of respondents whose trust levels declined, most (57%) cited financial services companies "acting in a greedy manner" and 18 percent maintained that the "industry itself has made the problems worse." Individual Investors are those with household incomes of at least $50,000 and that have at least $10,000 of investable assets.

Since the recession began, more workers are starting their work day on time. A new CareerBuilder survey reveals that 15 percent of workers said they arrive late to work once a week or more, down from 16 percent in 2009 and 20 percent in 2008. This national survey was conducted among 2,482 U.S. employers and 3,910 U.S. employees between November 15 and December 2, 2010.

In December 2010 compared with November 2010, the euro area (EA16) industrial new orders index rose by 2.1%. In November the index grew by 2.2%. In the EU27, new orders increased by 2.5% in December 2010, after a rise of 1.7% in November. Excluding ships, railway & aerospace equipment, for which changes tend to be more volatile, industrial new orders increased in December 2010 by 1.3% in both zones.

With unemployment rates still high, analysts believe emergency savings accounts are more important than ever. However, this month's study, released by Bankrate Inc., shows that little more than half of Americans have more money in savings than credit card debt.

The Commission adopted a proposal to interconnect business registers within the EU. Company registers provide company information that is essential for consumers and business partners alike, such as information on a company's legal form, its seat, capital and legal representatives. Today's proposal will help to facilitate cross-border electronic access to business information, by ensuring business registers are updated, and business information is more easily and readily accessible. These changes are crucial for companies when setting up branches, conducting cross-border trade or providing cross-border services in the EU. Business registers are currently organised at national, regional or local level, and lack the capacity to share information in an efficient and transparent manner. The proposal will now pass to the Member States and the European Parliament for consideration.