The Dow and Nasdaq were moderately lower at midsession after economic reports suggested the U.S. is closer to a recession. A rise in commodity prices is lifting shares of mining and energy companies.

NY Advices Financial Experts on Going Back to School, Gaining Technical Expertise, and Applying Transferable Job Skills.

Australian banks are now seeing hope to recover from its recent lose, as customers are starting to save their money in banks, report said. On the other hand, Australian dollar has a worst record for the third day as it declined in a recent tradings. The slide of dollar was attributed to the countries low price of exports commodities such as metal.

After he finished shooting a commercial promoting Microsoft’s new MSN Search service, infomercial star, Matthew Lesko said, “I can’t believe that Microsoft’s MSN gave me “free money” to dress up as a middle-aged woman, a grandma and a goofy teenager.” You can see how much fun Lesko had and sign up for over $45,000 worth of prizes at www.infomercialmadness.com.

Over the past few weeks, the Federal Reserve added to its alphabet soup of new facilities to deal with ongoing strains in financial markets. Taken together, these programs represent a clever gamble to provide large institutions some time to get their financial houses in order. Fed officials have effectively rewritten the rules on the role of a central bank in a market economy.

Dr. James B. Bullard has been appointed president and chief executive officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis by the Bank’s board of directors. Board Chairman Irl F. Engelhardt said the appointment occurred yesterday after an extensive search by the board and was approved by the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System.

Unclaimed refunds totaling approximately $1.2 billion are awaiting about 1.3 million people who failed to file a federal income tax return for 2004, the Internal Revenue Service announced today. However, to collect the money, a return for 2004 must be filed with an IRS office no later than Tuesday, April 15, 2008.

Researchers at the University of British Columbia and the Harvard Business School have found that it’s possible to buy happiness after all: when you spend money on others.

The IRS has posted a schedule indicating when tax payers, if eligible, will receive their tax payments. Keep in mind that these are estimates and the IRS could very well not meet this schedule. The schedule is based on the final two digits of your Social Security number. If you file jointly, use the last two digits of the primary filer’s Social Security number.

Economists usually treat time like money – as another scarce resource that people spend to achieve certain ends. Money is used to pay for things like furniture and plane tickets; time is spent assembling the do-it-yourself bookshelf or searching for cheap flights on the Internet.

One ticket on PA Lottery matched all six winning numbers, 02-10-32-36-37-48, in the March 11 MATCH 6 lotto drawing. Tuesday night’s winning jackpot is worth $750,000 cash, less 25 percent federal withholding. It is the 42nd MATCH 6 jackpot won since the game’s inception.

After the meltdown on Monday, the benchmark Sensex dropped another 338 points, stretching the downward trend for the fourth day in a row, with banking stocks sliding on reports of ICICI Bank reporting a market to market loss of 264.34 million dollar.