“In the old days … the Fed controlled the federal funds rate with open market operations,” Antulio Bomfim, a former Fed economist now with Macroeconomic Advisors LLC in Washington told Reuters. “Now, at least in this period when reserves are over-abundant, the way the Fed hopes to raise the federal funds rate will be primarily by raising the interest rate it pays on reserves.”

On Monday, $24.8 billion worth of takeovers were announced. It was the third busiest Merger Monday on record in 2009. Yet most investors remain unimpressed…. They’re convinced it’s nothing more than a short-lived Darwinian event. Weak and unfit companies, exposed by a nasty recession, are simply being forced into the arms of the strong.