Retail sales rose in September for the first time in 13 months, fueling hopes that the worst is behind retailers that head into the holiday season better prepared for a tough economic environment.

Naturally, at the focus of renewed market pessimism is a struggling financial: CIT Group. (NYSE:CIT) The company — a hundred-year-old staple of small/medium business lending — is no stranger to walking the credit tightrope. They narrowly averted fiscal meltdown late last year with $2.3 billion in TARP bucks… then again in July by goosing bondholders with a $3 billion a debt-to-equity deal. Back then we joked, “Look for this crisis to repeat in a couple weeks.” We were wrong… it took a couple months.

H.J. Heinz Co. (NYSE: HNZ) dominates in the ketchup market.  There is no second.  And Heinz has taken advantage of its revered ketchup brand over the years to develop organically and acquire other brands.

Kenneth D. Lewis There are many ways to view Kenneth Lewis’ eight-year reign as Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) chief executive, but two seem to hold the most landscape.

Investment banks have gotten fat off the land since 1982, when the great U.S. bull market got its start. Their business has multiplied many-fold, and their earnings have soared into the stratosphere, to a level far higher than any other sector.

There’s no question that the big “winner” in the global financial crisis has been China. While for the past two years developed economies have been scrambling to keep afloat China has taken a nuanced approach to achieving its economic and political goals.

Asian economies are recovering faster than previously thought and will lead the charge out of the worst global downturn since the 1930s, according to new forecasts by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) – a Manila-based institution that promotes economic and social progress in the Asia-Pacific region.

It was more than a year ago – Sept. 14, 2008 – that Lehman Bros. Holding Co. (OTC: LEHMQ) finally collapsed under the weight of its own bad investments.

The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) said yesterday (Thursday) that it would keep production quotas at 24.845 million bpd and urge members to adhere to targets, as global demand has yet to return in full.

Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) Chief Executive Officer John Mack will step down and be replaced by Co-President James Gorman, who has been running the company’s brokerage and overseeing its merger with Citigroup Inc.’s (NYSE: C) Smith Barney unit.