By grabbing $26 billion in private pension money last month, Argentina may have put itself on track for its second debt default in a decade – ironically, the very situation that country’s government had hoped its bit of leisure-fund larceny had hoped to avoid.

Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) set a U.S. profit record today (Thursday) when it announced its third quarter profit topped $14.8 billion on record-high oil prices.

Short-sellers scrambling for cover sent shares of Volkswagen AG (OTC ADR: VLKAY) rocketing up more than $1,000 each Tuesday, to briefly give the German automaker the most valuable market capitalization in the world.

Las Vegas Sands Corp. (LVS) shares more than doubled yesterday (Wednesday) after Singapore’s government pledged support for the completion of a local $4 billion casino project.

U.S. equities rallied yesterday (Tuesday) as the U.S. Federal Reserve convened for the first day of a two-day meeting of its monetary policy committee.

In the depths of a bear market that has carved between $500 billion and $2 trillion from U.S. retirement accounts so far this year, as many as two-thirds of all Americans have stopped contributing to their retirement plans, a new study shows.

And that’s precisely the wrong decision to make at the wrong time. No matter how poorly the financial markets are performing, saving for retirement has to remain a top priority.

“It’s not a time for people to stop contributing,” Diane Young, director of retirement and goal planning at TD Ameritrade Holding Corp. (AMTD), the Omaha, Neb.-based brokerage firm that conducted the retirement study, said in an interview with Bloomberg News. “Because time is money, it’s important to stay on track.”

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Tighter credit for farmers could worsen a global food crisis as smaller crop sizes cause prices to soar. Many farmers have traditionally bought pre-season supplies such as seeds and fertilizer on credit and then paid off the debt with the proceeds from the year’s harvest. But with a growing number of farmers unable to obtain the credit they need, crop yields will suffer.

Fear of a global recession is quickly becoming reality as world markets have lost $10 trillion in value in the month of October and the U.S. economy almost certainly contracted in the third quarter.

U.S. markets tumbled Friday as a global sell-off spread from Asia and Europe, as fears of a worldwide recession intensified.