L ooking into the economic crystal ball, the vast majority of private sector and institution forecasts agree that the scary global recession of last year is past and that normal times are just around the corner. It could still go horribly wrong. Forecasters caution that the degree of uncertainty and doubt about their baseline forecasts — or most likely scenarios — has seldom been higher.

If you’re a financial adviser in the Southeast who brings in at least $300,000 a year, Mary Kennemur at JHS Capital Advisors is looking for you. Ms. Kennemur, the new head of wealth management at JHS — John Sykes’s new firm which just launched this week — said in an interview Wednesday that she plans to hire 500 financial advisers over the next five years, starting first in the JHS Tampa headquarters, and then growing into the Southeast and nationally.

The Labor Department is planning to expand its definition of fiduciary under ERISA — a move that would have implications for all financial advisers that work on retirement plans. According to an agenda item posted on the Employee Benefit Security Administration’s website on Dec.

The bad blood between St. Louis crosstown rivals Stifel Nicolaus & Co. Inc.

M any banks, including JPMorgan Chase JPM-N , Wells Fargo WFC-N , PNC Financial PNC-N , and U.S. Bancorp USB-N have snapped up failed institutions with the help of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. in the past year, but it’s hard to find one that’s benefited as much as East West Bancorp EWBC-Q , a Pasadena, Calif.-based bank serving a largely Chinese American clientele

T oday’s top stories from Report on Business : Economic growth modest Canada’s economy expanded at a modest pace of 0.2 per cent in October, but it marked the second consecutive month of growth as the country pulled further away from recession. The growth was largely driven by auto sales and the hot real estate market, which in turn helped boost consumer spending. Strong existing home sales led to a 7.2-per-cent spike in activity for real estate agents and brokers, Statistics Canada said today

C onvicted swindler Bernard Madoff was moved last week to the medical centre within a federal prison for undisclosed reasons, a spokeswoman for the Federal Bureau of Prisons said Wednesday. Spokeswoman Traci Billingsley said he had been transferred on Dec.