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New-vehicle retail sales rebounded in the first half of June, as consumers, despite mixed economic signals, returned to dealerships, according to J.D. Power and Associates, which gathers real-time transaction data from more than 8,900 retail franchisees throughout the United States.

Banking executives are more intently considering merger and acquisition (M&A) strategies and re-examining their business models to address growth challenges raised by regulatory reform, according to a recent survey by KPMG LLP, the audit, tax, and advisory firm.

Despite a skittish U.S. economy, most commercial real estate investors remain upbeat and cautiously optimistic about the industry's future, with very few being dissuaded from eagerly acquiring assets and seeking opportunities across all commercial real estate sectors. In fact, many investors are aggressively pursuing deals as they continue to see signs that the industry's overall fundamentals are stabilizing and even improving in certain sectors and regions, according to the second quarter 2011 findings of the PwC Real Estate Investor Survey.

A study released by Bankrate.com found that only 24% of Americans have a six-month emergency savings cushion and 24% have no emergency savings whatsoever. These are especially sobering statistics because 6.2 million Americans have currently been out of work for six months or more.

For the second year in a row, about two-thirds, or 65% of Americans say that civility is a major problem, according to the annual Civility in America poll released by Weber Shandwick and Powell Tate in partnership with KRC Research. Among the many aspects of American life impacted by incivility – such as politics, sports, schools, workplaces, among others – is American business, considered by 48% of respondents to be uncivil. At a dramatically increased pace from 2010, Americans are voting out incivility with their wallets by severing their patronage to companies (69%), redefining their perceptions of brands (69%), and spreading negative word-of-mouth about companies (58%).

PriceGrabber®, a part of Experian, has released the results of its Local Deals Survey, revealing that the daily deal industry is still an emerging sector that is growing in popularity, with 44 percent of respondents saying they use or search daily deal Websites. However, of these respondents, 52 percent expressed feeling overwhelmed by the number of bargain-boasting emails they receive on a daily basis. The survey includes responses from 2,088 U.S. online consumers and was conducted from May 20 to 25, 2011.

Metro areas will be slow to regain their pre-recession employment levels – many of them into the next decade – according to forecasts in a report released by the U.S. Conference of Mayors (USCM) at its annual meeting where the nation's mayors are discussing the tough economic challenges facing cities and their suburbs.

The Conference Board Leading Economic Index® (LEI) for the U.S. increased 0.8 percent in May to 114.7 (2004 = 100), following a 0.4 percent decline in April, and a 0.7 percent increase in March. The largest contributions came from the interest rate spread, consumer expectations, and housing permits.

Regional and state unemployment rates were little changed in May. Twenty-four states recorded unemployment rate decreases, 13 states and the District of Columbia registered rate increases, and 13 states had no rate change, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported. Forty-three states and the District of Columbia posted unemployment rate decreases from a year earlier, four states reported increases, and three states had no change. The national jobless rate was essentially unchanged at 9.1 percent, but was 0.5 percentage point lower than a year earlier.

comScore, Inc., a leader in measuring the digital world, released data from the comScore Video Metrix service showing that 176 million U.S. Internet users watched online video content in May for an average of 15.9 hours per viewer. The total U.S. Internet audience engaged in more than 5.6 billion viewing sessions during the course of the month.