Today’s Number of the Day is $36.7 million.

That’s at least what mortgage giant Fannie Mae has apparently paid to keep 75,000 lawns tidy on the foreclosed homes that it owns.

I say “apparently” because, as it is with so many numbers involving big money these days, no one really knows the final tally.  But NPR estimated that as of March 31, half of Fannie Mae’s 153,000 foreclosed homes must have lawns, and if mowers came twice a month during a six-month clipping season, and they were paid $40 a visit—that’s more than $36 million on lawn care alone.

Fannie Mae has explained that foreclosed properties must look nice to entice first-time homebuyers into signing. 

Fair enough.  But with many taxpayers cringing at their own financial straits, it may disturb some to know that since Sept. 2008, when Fannie Mae was taken into government conservatorship, Fannie Mae has cost U.S. taxpayers some $86 billion. 

I’m not sure if that includes edging or fertilizer, but it’s still a lot of money no matter how you cut it.  FULL POST

The Number of the Day is 63.

That’s the number of votes South Korea received on Wednesday out of 95 cast.

Therefore, the International Olympic Committee announced that the 2018 Winter Olympics will be held in the city of Pyeongchang.  It was South Korea’s third try—they failed in 2010 and 2014–and this time around, they beat bids from Munich, Germany, and Annecy, France.

South Korea has never hosted Winter Games and Pyeongchang's slogan for the games is "New Horizons".

Talking about horizons, what's amazing about this decision, to me at least, is that I didn’t even realize there was mountainous terrain in South Korea sufficient to have world-class ski resorts and host the winter Olympics.

Time for me to take another look at the topographic maps of the world. FULL POST

Today’s Number of the Day is 4.

A seven-woman, five-man jury deliberated for less than 11 hours in a trial that lasted more than six weeks. They found Casey Anthony guilty on four counts of providing false information to a law enforcement officer. That’s all.

The jury acquitted her Tuesday of first-degree murder, the most serious charge against the 25-year-old Orlando woman in the 2008 death of her 2-year-old daughter, Caylee. The jury also found Casey not guilty of aggravated child abuse and aggravated manslaughter.

We may never find out who killed Caylee, how she disappeared, who hid her body.

But we do know that Casey Anthony will not be put to death for what happened to her daughter.

And we are reminded that it is virtually impossible to know how a jury will rule, even in the most-publicized and sensational of cases.

Virtually every TV pundit and talking head thought she was guilty.

 They were wrong. FULL POST

Today's Number of the Day is One.

Novak Djokovic, the 24-year-old Serb phenom, is now the #1 men's tennis player in the world, having finished off Rafael Nadal of Spain at Wimbledon on Sunday, 6-4, 6-1, 1-6, 6-3.

It was an amazing year for Djokovic, whose 2011 record is 48 – 1, including 8 titles. His only loss was against Roger Federer at the French Open semi-finals. And Sunday's match was the fifth time Djokovic had beaten Nadal this year.

After two hours, 28 minutes with Nadal in the Centre Court, Djokovic pulled up a blade of Wimbledon grass, swallowed it, and threw his used tennis racquets into the stands.

"This is the best day of my tennis career," Djokovic said. "This is what I'm born for."

"I can imagine how Novak feels today," said Nadal. "Today, one player played better than me."

After the match, Djokovic told the great John McEnroe on NBC, "Can't wait to come to New York."

That will be in September at the U.S. Open. We can hardly wait. FULL POST

The Number of the Day is $300 million.

That’s how much the National Basketball Association claims it is losing every year because, according to the 22 team owners, the players just make too much money. This is chapter two in the billionaires vs. millionaires battle being fought in the sports world. Chapter one, of course, is the NFL lockout that continues as we speak.

So the NBA on Thursday, after months of threats, locked-out its professional athletes. Teams can’t contact players, and players can’t take part in anything to do with their teams. What will happen to the 2011-12 season remains, of course, to be seen.

Just to keep this in perspective, according to the website hoopshype.com, Kobe Bryant of the LA Lakers earns $25,244,000.  Miami’s LeBron James makes $16,022,500.  The New York Knicks’ Carmelo Anthony takes home $18,520,000. And the Dolans, who own the Knicks, are worth as a family, about - well, a few years ago, they held at least $1.5 billion of Cablevision stock.

So this is not a fight among low-wage earners. Rather, it just shows how fights over money sure don't bring out the best in people.   

I just hope, for sake of all those folks who scrounge enough to buy tickets to the games - NBA or NFL – that the owners and the players manage to work this out - without boosting ticket prices to the outrageous levels we now see at Yankee Stadium.  A day at the ballpark or the arena should still be something within the reach of folks who work at real jobs. 

Not just on Wall Street. FULL POST

Today’s Number of the Day is 38%.

That’s the percentage that Arizona State University—the nation’s largest public university—raised its tuition between the 2007-08 school year and this year. From $4,971 to $6,844.

As states are increasingly financially stressed, raising tuition at public universities is becoming more and more common. While still a bargain compared to pricate universities, public higher ed is no longer the cost-free avenue to education it once was. 

By law, colleges and universities that raise their tuitions the most will have some explaining to do—why the costs have gone up so high and what they are going to do about it? Some 530 colleges will now have to submit special reports.

This will provide an intersting window into one of the great mysteries that many payers of tuition - especialy parents - have wanted an answer to: where does all the money go?

And Thursday, for the first time, the Department of Education released a list of the country’s top tuition offenders—and they’ll all be listed on a new website. CLICK HERE to go to collegecost.ed.gov.

One of the most expensive places to send your kids—Bates College in Maine at $51,300 a year. On the school’s website President Elaine Tuttle Hansen makes this promise: “You will be changed by Bates forever.”  

Change can mean many things - being deeply in debt to being one of many well-educated-but still-unemployed college grads searching for that good entry-level job.  It is tough out there these days for recent college grads, especially those with big debts to pay off. FULL POST

Today’s Number of the Day is $8.5 billion.

That’s what Bank of America may pay to settle nearly all of the lawsuits filed against it by investors who claim that Countrywide Financial Corporation lied to them about the value of the mortgage-backed securities they purchased - leading to humongous losses for those investors. BofA purchased Countrywide in 2008.

The 22 major investors include Wall Street players such as PIMCO, BlackRock, and Goldman Sachs and institutional investors like TIAA–the Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association of America–and Thrivent Financial for Lutherans.

The BofA deal must still be approved by a judge and the settlement amount represents only 4% of the principal still outstanding on those loans or $221 billion.  

One take on all this: the big players manage to figure out how to give each other back the money they have lost, but small folks who have suffered and been lied to - like so many homeowers who were not told the truth about the mortgages they took out - are still twisting in the wind.  The problem is not just that there is no equity in this; it is that until the mortgage crisis is resolved, the housing market is not likely to bounce back. And that is not good news for the economy.

Is 8.5 billion the right number? Hard to know without taking a hard look at a load of documents I haven't delved into, but it begins to give us a sense of the scale of the fraud that was committed here.

But don't fear–the executives at Bof A are still in line to get their big bonuses next year.

For the rest of us - let them at cake. FULL POST

Today’s Number of the Day is -0.1 percent.

In real dollars-meaning adjusted for inflation—that’s how much consumer spending dropped in the month of May.

Not good news for the economy.

With 70 percent of GDP driven by consumer spending, it’s going to be hard to see the economy growing at any meaningful number, with consumer spending flat to slightly negative.

Since personal income went up a little bit last month—savings must be increasing a bit—which means consumers are paying down debt—or “deleveraging” as economists would call it—which is a good thing long-term.

But it is harder every day to see where the engine is going to come from to get business hiring again. If consumers aren’t spending, and the government’s fiscal policy has run out of steam, and interest rates are already at a historic low, what is left to get us firing on all cylinders again?

That is the policy problem nobody has really been able to answer.

 *   *   *

Editor’s note: GOP Presidential candidate Herman Cain is the former CEO of Godfather’s Pizza - (“A Pizza You Can’t Refuse.”)  See his economic answers In The Arena at 8 pm ET Tuesday.) FULL POST

Today's Number of the Day is more than 400 million.

According to the British publisher Bloomsbury, that's the number of Harry Potter books that have been sold worldwide.

If we were to publish the figure that author J.K. Rowling has made from her books (and films, and toys, and pajamas) involving the boy wizard, the figure would be so high that certain political types might mistake it for the debt ceiling, and then another debate would start about how many teachers needed to be cut from Hogwarts before the ceiling could be raised.

On Thursday, Rowling announced the launching of an interactive e-book series. The website - Pottermore.com – will offer an additional 18,000 new words about the novels' characters, places and objects, and the opportunity for fans to lose themselves when the world of muggles just gets too oppressive or bland. 

Pottermore, run in partnership with Sony, will also have an online shop where people can purchase the Potter e-books.

J.K. Rowling began the first adventure with these words:

"Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drivet, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much. They were the last people you'd expect to be involved in anything strange or mysterious, because they just didn't hold with such nonsense."

Back in 1990–when the idea "fell into her head," how did Rowling know we would want spend so much time invested in her world of glorious nonsense? FULL POST

Today’s Number of the Day is 30 million.

The U.S. Department of Energy announced it’s releasing 30 million barrels of oil from the Strategic National Reserve. This is to address the disruption due to the civil war in Libya, where U.S. and NATO forces are trying to keep the Libyan people and rebel forces safe from the regime of Moammar Gadhafi. Libya used to export some 1.3 million barrels of oil a day.

The U.S. is one of 28 members in the International Energy Agency and that agency is releasing an additional 30 million barrels from strategic reserves, hoping to drive down oil prices.

According to The Los Angeles Times, “It is the third time the IEA has coordinated the use of emergency stockpiles since the agency was founded in 1974. The first was during the 1991 Persian Gulf War and the second when Hurricane Katrina damaged oil rigs and refineries in the Gulf of Mexico in 2005.”

So what does that mean for the price of gas at the pump? FULL POST