The Good
We begin with a new record being set in the art world with the sale of Pablo Picasso's "Les femmes d'Alger" for $179 million but that wasn't all for the art world with Christie's reportedly selling over $1 billion worth of art work in just 3 days. It wasn't just the art world shaken by new revelations as it seems streaming music services have now outpaced downloaded music for the first time signaling a new era. The highs continued with the CEO of Chinese conglomerate Tiens Group taking 6400 of his best salespeople on holiday to France.
The Bad
There were lawsuits a plenty as Goldman Sachs was ordered to pay $80 million plus interest due to breaches associated with the sale of mortgage-linked securities and Duke Energy was ordered to pay $102 million after pleading guilty to criminal violations of the federal Clean Water Act. There was still more to come with 5 Big banks expected to plead guilty for rigging the price of foreign currencies and the GM ignition death toll continued to climb hitting 100 after GM claimed only 13 known cases. The bad news continued when it was revealed this week that the Baltimore riots had cost as much as $9 million with over 30 businesses suffering and things only got worse after an Amtrak crash killed 7 people two of whom where high up in the business world.
The Ugly
When it came to the world of politics things got ugly with President Obama's trade deal running into drama with the senate blocking the initial version but later agreeing on a revised version while elsewhere in the world Greece made progress with their financial bailout but warned of future problems.
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