WSJ By The Numbers - Top 10 for Nov.9
A
compendium of revealing stats and the key leading economic indicators and
business metrics based on today's Wall Street Journal article and
reports:>
MasterCard Wins Admission To Sam's Club: Visa-branded cards represented 55% of the $1.77 trillion in electronic consumer transactions last year compared with nearly 29% at MasterCard, according to the Nilson Report. Discover has a 4.7% share of the same market. Sam's Club logged U.S. sales of nearly $10.5 billion from its 488 clubs for its second quarter ended July 31. Sam's club has 47 million customers who pay annual dues of $35 to shop at the club.
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What Business Should Expect In Next Congress: Mrs. Pelosi has promised to bring legislation to the floor within the first 24 hours of the new Congress to boost the minimum wage to $7.25 an hour from the current $5.15. Democratic control of the House also will end the Republican Party's drive to lower taxes and could stall the extension of the reduced 15% tax rates on capital gains and dividends, which expire in 2010. Easing the burden of the AMT, which has begun to ensnare many middle-class families, could cost the government $1 trillion over 10 years. |
$7.25 Minimum Wage! |
| Vote Is a Blow to Republican Pursuit of Hispanics: Exit polls found that 69% of Hispanic voters cast ballots for Democratic congressional candidates while 29% voted for Republicans. The number of Hispanics registered to vote made up only 9.3 million of the 142.1 million registered voters in 2004, or 6.5%, according to the Census Bureau. But it has been growing fast: up 23% between 2000 and 2004 while the total number of voters rose less than 10%.Among Hispanics, 37% support withdrawing troops from Iraq now, compared with 29% of overall voters; 45% said their votes were cast partly to oppose Mr. Bush, compared with 36% of all voters. | 142.1M Registered Voters |
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Microsoft's Zune Challenges iPod: Zune has only around 100 accessories at launch, versus 3,000 or more for the iPod. Zune Marketplace has over 2 million songs for download vs. 3.5 million for iPod at iTunes. |
3.5M iTunes Songs |
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The Oil Industry Calls on an Image Expert: The milk industry spends more than $100 million a year on marketing. A decade ago the dairy industry launched its ad campaign showing celebrities with a "milk mustache", and then added the tagline, "Got Milk?". Research says women bought more than twice as much milk because of a 2005 television ad than they did in response to a 2004 ad that didn't use the emotional approach. |
$100M Got Milk Ads |
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China's Trade Surplus Swells, Posing Policy Test: China's trade surplus for October ballooned to a monthly record of $23.83 billion. China's shipments of merchandise overseas jumped 29.6% in October from a year earlier. The trade surplus inflows helped push China's foreign-exchange reserves, already the world's largest, past the $1 trillion mark this week. |
$1T China Forex Reserves |
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'This Is the Car We Want, Mommy': According to a May report from Packaged Facts, about 37% of parents of kids ages 3 to 11 say their children have a significant impact on the brands they choose. Child-marketing consulting firm McNeal & Kids estimates children under 14 last year influenced about 47% of household purchases. About 62% of parents now say their children "actively participate" in car-buying decisions, according to J.D. Power & Associates for the Nickelodeon network. A study done this year for Disney ABC Kids Networks by Strottman International found that 28% of moms of 6-year-olds to 14-year-olds say they listen to their children's wishes regarding vehicle purchases. |
37% Kids Power in Brand Selection |
| Tech Sector May Yield More Buyouts: Private-equity investors have been on a buying spree lately, and about $45 billion of technology buyouts have taken place in the last two years, according to Fitch. That includes a $17.6 billion Freescale Semiconductor deal and in September, and an $11.4 billion takeover of software company SunGard Data Systems last year. | $45B Tech Buyouts |
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Money-Fund Assets Increase: Investors added $23.94 billion to money-market funds in the week ended Tuesday, bringing total net assets to $2.233 trillion, according to the Money Fund Report newsletter, published by iMoneyNet. Institutional investors added $7.33 billion, while individual, or "retail," investors added $16.62 billion. |
$2.23T Money-Fund Assets |
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WSJ By The Numbers - Metrics 2.0 |
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