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LONDON (MarketWatch) — The IntercontinentalExchange is probing trades in U.S. dollar index futures that briefly showed a massive 9% jump on Friday morning.
The lead contract surged as high as 82.18, up from a 75.38 close on Thursday. Such a move was improbable given that in spot markets, the dollar’s moves against major […]

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TOKYO — The Bank of Japan upgraded its assessment of the nation’s economy Friday, setting itself up for a confrontation with government officials who are worried about a possible return to recession and are pressing for a policy response to deflation.
The Japanese government published a report Friday that pronounced the economy officially in deflation for […]

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MOSCOW — A 37-year-old Russian lawyer for an international investment fund, Hermitage Capital Management, died in a pretrial detention center on Monday, nearly a year after he was arrested in an escalating feud between the Russian authorities and the company, Russia’s Interior Ministry announced on Tuesday.
The lawyer, Sergei L. Magnitsky, who was in charge […]

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Singapore PM Lee Hsien Loong, back to camera, gives welcome address to APEC leaders, in Singapore, 14 Nov 2009Leaders of Pacific Rim nations have agreed to work toward a new pattern of regional growth.
In a statement released Sunday, Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation leaders meeting in Singapore acknowledged the leading role Asia Pacific nations have taken […]

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Two computer programmers who worked for Bernard L. Madoff’s investment firm were accused Friday of helping to cover-up the giant Ponzi scheme for more than for more than 15 years.
In a statement, the United States attorney’s office in Manhattan said the two programmers — Jerome O’Hara, 46, of Malverne, N.Y., and George Perez, 43, of […]

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Obama administration's pay czar said on Thursday his compensation rulings will allow General Motors Co and Chrysler Group to retain talent but is willing to consider "lateral" offers to hire new executives.
Kenneth Feinberg, the U.S. Treasury's special master for executive pay at seven companies with massive taxpayer bailouts, told a […]

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(Reuters) – Unhappy over constraints imposed by U.S. government overseers, American International Group Inc (AIG.N) Chief Executive Robert Benmosche told the company's board last week that he is considering stepping down, the Wall Street Journal said, citing people familiar with the matter.
The giant insurer's chief executive is particularly unhappy over a recent compensation review […]

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BEIJING — It could almost be a snippet from a World of Warcraft game session — two competing titans, plotting against each other, swapping punches, embarked on a quest for a single prize that only the stronger of them will claim.
But this is not virtual reality. The titans are two agencies of the Chinese government. […]

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Stocks showed modest gains on the first day of trading since the market took one of its steepest plunges in months. Signs that manufacturing in the United States was on a path to recovery helped buoy shares.
At the close of the markets on Monday, the skittishness of investors over the health of the economy, […]

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In the latest of the great newspaper wars of London, two lions of Fleet Street, Rupert Murdoch and Jonathan Harmsworth (the fourth Viscount Rothermere), have been outflanked by a former Soviet K.G.B. officer, Aleksandr Lebedev.
London Lite, a free newspaper published by Mr. Harmsworth’s Daily Mail & General Trust, signaled its intention last week to shut […]

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NEW YORK – The following stocks were among those that moved substantially or traded heavily Friday on the New York Stock Exchange:
NYSE:
Alcatel-Lucent, down 48 cents at $3.69
The telecommunications equipment maker saw its net loss widen in the third quarter as European phone companies cut back on spending.
Harman International Industries Inc., up $4.61 at $37.61
The company […]

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WASHINGTON (AP) — The number of newly laid-off workers filing claims for jobless benefits rose more than expected last week, after falling in five of the last six weeks, as employers remained reluctant to hire even with the economy showing signs of recovery.
The Labor Department saidThursday that new jobless claims rose to a […]

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HONG KONG — American International Group, the U.S. insurance giant that received a massive government bailout to avert a collapse last year, announced on Tuesday that it had agreed to sell its Taiwan life insurance unit to a Hong Kong investor group for $2.15 billion.
The sale of Nan Shan is the largest so far […]

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WASHINGTON — The inspector general who oversees the government’s bailout of the banking system is criticizing the Treasury Department for some misleading public statements last fall and raising the possibility that it had unfairly disbursed money to the biggest banks.
A Treasury official made incorrect statements about the health of the nation’s biggest banks even as […]

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LAW enforcement policy in the United States rests implicitly on the “rational actor” model of traditional economics, which holds that people take only those actions whose benefits exceed their costs.
This model says that crime will be deterred if the expected punishment is strong enough — a prediction that has not been borne out in […]

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LONDON (AFP) – Tidjane Thiam began his role as head of insurance group Prudential on Thursday, becoming the first black chief executive of a company listed on London's benchmark FTSE 100 index.
Frenchman Thiam, who was handed the job in March, replaced Mark Tucker. Born in the Ivory Coast, but with French nationality, Thiam was […]

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NEW YORK (Reuters) – Stocks fell on Wednesday after a surprising contraction in an index of Midwest business activity, but buying of technology bellwethers like Cisco Systems Inc at the end of a strong quarter limited losses.
The top drags in Wednesday's session were some of the quarter's best performers, including industrials, materials and banks.
[…]

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Orders for manufactured goods like airplanes and machinery fell unexpectedly in August, the government reported on Friday, providing another sign that the recovery could be long and uneven.
New orders of durable goods slid by a seasonally adjusted 2.4 percent from July, reflecting a 40 percent monthly decrease in orders of civilian aircraft. Orders of computers, […]

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WASHINGTON — As a senior House Democrat announced an ambitious schedule to complete legislation overhauling the nation’s financial system, the Obama administration on Wednesday abandoned a symbolically significant provision in the face of widespread political and industry opposition.
At a hearing before the House Financial Services Committee, Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner announced that the […]

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NEW YORK/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Bank of America Corp (BAC.N) failed to meet a Monday midday deadline to hand over further details about its acquisition of Merrill Lynch to a congressional investigative committee, a panel spokeswoman said.
Bank of America "did not comply with the deadline," said the spokeswoman for House Oversight and Government Reform Committee […]

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