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A bipartisan compromise in the U.S. Senate provides for a 30 day review of the Iran nuclear deal by Congress. The White House accepted this after enough Democrats favored the idea for the 67 votes to override a presidential veto.

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Amazon's employee count more than triples in 3 years to 109,800, with 31,200 employees added in 2010. This outpaces growth in employees at Microsoft with 99,000 employees, Apple with 80,300, and Google with 46,400 employees. Amazon uses a highly structured process in which the perspectives on cultural fit of hundreds of "skilled evaluators" throughout the company are taken into account.

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Georgia Tech's online open courses for a masters degree in computer science is a first and is likely to change the way higher education takes place in the U.S. and globally. This degree will cost $6600 compared to $45,000 on campus. It is part of a collaboration between Udacity founder, Sebastian Thurn and Zvi Galil, dean of Georgia Tech's college of computing.

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Wal-Mart promotes Doug McMillon, head of the expanding international operations since 2005, to the CEO position. He started as buyer trainee in sporting goods in 1991. He is a native of Jonesboro, Arkansas, and was mentored by Chairman Rob Walton of Wal-Mart. The current CEO Mr. Duke took the position in 2009. He will stay on as advisor to McMillon for one year, a practice followed by Wal-Mart, with the prior CEO Mr Scott staying on for 2 years when Mr. Duke took the position. Under Mr McMillon international operations in Mexico, China, India, Japan and other countries now make up 29% of sales of $135 billion for the year ending in Jan 31, 2013.

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The House of Representatives passed the Jan 1, 2013 fiscal deal that passed the Senate with only 5 Republicans opposed. Yet 151 Republican Congressmen in the House opposed the fiscal deal because of the lack of spending cuts even though the deal ensures Bush tax cuts are now law for 98% of Americans.

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Hilsenrath points out that Japan's central bank, the Bank of Japan's holdings of securities and loans has increased by 35% in 2008-2013 compared to an increase of 2, 3 and 5 times respectively in the assets of the ECB, the U.S. Federal Reserve and the Bank of England. Experts in Japan say what was considered commonsense by Bank of Japan chief Shirakawa and others, that aggressive monetary policy doesnt work, is considered nonsense in other parts of the world. They say aggressive monetary policy was never tried and Shirakawa diluted its impact by saying he did not think it would make much of a difference. Communicating the right message to financial markets was part of the approach taken by Draghi at the ECB, Bernanke at the U.S. Fed and King at the Bank of England. Anil Kashyap of the University of Chicago agrees. He says the Bank of Japan missed its inflation target for 15 years. BOJ also bought shorter term bonds in its bond buying efforts, with maturities of three years compared to the average maturity of nine years for bonds being purchased by the U.S. Fed. This reduces the effect. The Abe administration is careful to present the approach as similiar to that in other countries, and intended to spur growth in Japan, which in turn should spur global growth. U.S. Fed chairman Bernanke has supported this effort. Prime minister Abe was on a visit to the U.S. communicating Japan's approach and winning support, something never done before....

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The discount for Canadian crude oil prices, because of higher shale oil output in the U.S. midwest and lack of enough pipeline capacity to get Canadian crude to Gulf Coast refineries, is affecting the Canadian economy. The lower price for Canadian crude was at about $20 per barrel lower than the U.S. benchmark price in April 2013. This discount has reduced Canada's GDP growth for the second half of 2012 by 0.4%, according to the Canadian central bank. The discount was as high as $40 to U.S. benchmark price for Canadian heavy crude in January and Febuary 2013. Continued discount is expected till enough pipeline capacity is created for Alberta's heavy crude to get to Gulf Coast refineries in the U.S.