| Canadian Stocks Fall a 2nd Day on Concern US Growth Will Slow
March 14 (Bloomberg) -- Canadian stocks fell for a second day on concern that rising mortgage loan delinquencies will curb growth in the U.S., reducing demand for commodities in the world's biggest economy. Shares of materials and industrial companies including Teck Cominco Ltd. and Canadian National Railway Co. paced declines in Canada, which sends the bulk of its exports to the U.S. Falling prices for gold also weighed on the market, while some energy shares advanced along with crude oil prices. The Standard & Poor's/TSX Composite Index fell 24.99, or 0.2 percent, to 12,784.61 as of 3:09 p.m. in Toronto. The benchmark has erased much of the gains from a five-day rally that followed an extended slide earlier this month on growth concerns, and has declined 0.9 percent in 2007.
`Brokery' by day, something else by night
His Web site, which touts the advantages of owning a home in the middle of Tennessee, refers obliquely to his former profession. "Any real estate agent can sell a house ... I sell homes that rock!" it says.
Stories from his years of touring help him connect with clients, but with a wife and three children, Gary said, "going back on the road and living out of a suitcase everyday just isn't as appealing as it once was."
Laboccetta, on the other hand, could imagine nothing better, although it would be hard to walk away from his success at Best Apartments.
Five weeks into 2007, he has already rented nine apartments, including a two-bedroom to Nicole Schapira, 24, a return client who came back to Laboccetta because of his rocker looks.
"He's a chilled-out guy with a pony tail," she said.
Subprime defaults shuts mortgage firm
Bergen County mortgage banker David Sadek was riding high a year and a half ago, serving sushi and shish kebab to investment-banking clients aboard his yacht A Loan at Sea. His firm, founded in 1991, was on track to achieve a company record of $1 billion in annual loan sales. Home prices were rising, and the investment bankers who bundle loans together and resell them as securities to spread the risk were eager to buy loans and provide First Financial Equities and other companies like it with a steady stream of funds to make more loans, even to people with shaky credit histories and high debt levels. It was "a good time to be in the mortgage business," he told The Record in an interview. But in the second half of 2006, the business went quickly downhill.
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