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Mishcon de Reya has today announced the expansion of its US capability with the appointment of Family Partner Michael Stutman, who joined the Firm’s New York office on 18 November 2011 from Mayerson Stutman Abramowitz LLP, the Family practice he founded in 1998.

Michael, who has over thirty years of Family law experience, is a Fellow of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers; Vice President and on the Board of Governors of the New York Chapter; and author of ‘How to Divorce in New York’, first published in 1993 by St Martin’s Press.

An expert in helping clients settle disputes commercially and creatively; Michael was recently lead counsel in Desilva v. Desilva, in which a wife received 100% of marital property.

Commenting on his appointment, Michael said: “Mishcon de Reya has an outstanding reputation for its Family work in the UK and I feel privileged to have the opportunity to build and expand upon that here in New York.

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To get rich on Wall Street, it may help to be white and male.

A new study confirms what many have suspected about the financial industry: Its still largely an old boys club. While financial firms in the New York area increasingly hired members of racial minorities and women over the last decade, the biggest paychecks went to white males, concludes the study by the City University of New Yorks Center for Urban Research.

Were looking at a lot of people who you would think belong to the top 1 percent, said Richard D. Alba, a distinguished professor of sociology at CUNY, who is the lead author of the study. But it really seems like there is a pretty clear stratification within this group, that favors the group that historically has been dominant.

The median compensation for a white man in the financial industry between 2005 and 2009 was $154,500, 55 percent percent more than that for a white woman, according to the study, which used United States Census data.

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Bankaholic, a Blackshore Properties Inc. company and emerging leader in online financial publishing, announces the launch of a credit card comparison marketplace that allows consumers to apply for credit cards that are the best fit for their financial situation.

Our goal is to become the leading comparison site for credit cards, said Johns Wu, CEO of Blackshore Properties, Inc. Credit card advertisements are oftentimes misleading, obfuscating unfavorable terms and conditions in the fine print of applications. By allowing readers to provide their own ratings of credit cards in a fully transparent infrastructure, we hope to make it easier for consumers to quickly identify the best credit card deals.

The terms, conditions, and features of over 100 credit cards from leading financial institutions are tracked. Furthermore, cards are sorted in categories ranging from low interest credit cards to business credit cards, making it easy for online consumers to quickly drill-down to offers that they would be interested in.

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Today will have a significant amount of data on the economic calendar. European PMI data will likely show the euro zone slipping towards a recession. The BoE meeting minutes could hint at additional easing of UK monetary policy. EU industrial data is expected to drop and will cap out the morning which is coming off of a volatile Asian trading session.

US data later today will have weekly unemployment claims and durable goods orders before the Thanksgiving holiday.

Earlier today the release of a surprise drop in the Chinese manufacturing PMI had risky assets trading sharply lower with the EUR/USD trading as low as 1.3440 and the AUD/USD down to 0.9760. A break of 1.3440 may open the door to the September low of 1.3360 and 0.9700 from the March low.

With increasing tensions in Europe and liquidity expected to fall off due to the holiday, volatility could begin to pick up in the FX markets.

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Simon Johnson, former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund, is the co-author of “13 Bankers.”

In an interview with The New York Times in July, Sheila Bair, the departing chairwoman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, said of her experience over the last few years: “They would say, ‘You have to do this, or the system will go down.’ If I heard that once, I heard it a thousand times.”

No responsible official wants the entire financial system to crash; this would be incredibly disruptive to all Americans and potentially lead to a worldwide depression. Knowing this, many people who want bailouts on generous terms use “contagion fear” as part of their sales pitch.

How are we to know if a particular event, like deciding not to bail out a big bank, will lead to contagion that spreads to other financial markets?

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Merchants beware: credit card companies are raising their rewards programs for the coming shopping season in an effort to recoup projected losses from debit purchases, trying to take more money out of your profits.

Credit card rewards can offer customers all sorts of bonuses, from airline miles to gift cards, often times enticing users to charge many purchases in hopes of obtaining these perks, but cost you more as the vendor.

The Durbin amendment to the Dodd-Frank Act limited swipe fees at 24 cents per transaction, which is estimated to cut profits for banks by the billions, effectively making debit card transactions significantly less profitable.

The amendment was created by Sen. Dick Durbin as a means for businesses to keep more of their profits but has sparked a flurry within banks to recoup their projected losses.

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