S&P

Standard & Poor's is expected to announce later on Monday that it may downgrade the credit ratings of all 17 euro zone countries, two EU officials told Reuters.

The aforementioned designation suggests a 50 percent chance of a downgrade within 90 days.

Shares of Hewlett-Packard, the world’s biggest computer company, rose slightly Thursday, a day after Standard & Poor’s downgraded the company’s credit two notches.

Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) and Citigroup (NYSE:C) are among a group of 37 large financial institutions that were downgraded today by Standard & Poor's, according to Bloomberg News. The downgrades were somewhat expected, as S&P had announced earlier in the year it would be revising its methodology for rating banks in order to give more weight to those institutions' capital ratios.

At mid-day Tuesday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 65.47 points to 11,588.48, up 0.57 percent from the previous session's close. The benchmark S&P 500 Index was at 1,198.66 points, up 6.11, or 0.51 percent. The NASDAQ index was down 0.28 percent, or 7.10 points, to 2,520.24.

At more than 25 miles long, the newest offshore discovery is roughly the length of the Houston city metroplex, and at 662 feet deep, it contains an estimated 30 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.

Credit rating agency Standard & Poor's could change the outlook for France's triple-A rating to negative within the next 10 days, a French newspaper reported on Monday, citing several sources. Such a move would signal a possible downgrade.

S&P cut the credit rating of the Los Gatos, Calif.-based company to BB- from BB. Its outlook remains stable.

The Austrian banking system is on fire: getting singed not only by the heat of the Eurozone sovereign debt crisis, but also by the immolation of an Eastern European asset bubble the banks had been underwriting for a decade. Stumbling, contradictory guidance from the management of several banks has not helped either. And a stalling Austrian economy is only likely to make things worse

Stocks were little changed on Friday, but easing European sovereign debt yields kept the S&P 500 above a key technical level.

Wall Street stocks were set to bounce back on Friday after Europe's debt crisis drove heavy market losses this week, with the S&P 500 falling through important technical levels and possibly facing another key test of strength.

Stocks fell sharply in early afternoon on Thursday as nervous investors bailed out of the market, after the S&P 500 broke a key technical level.

The ratings agency Standard & Poor's said Friday that its erroneous downgrade of France arose when an automatic email was sent out after an old Web page on French banks was changed. France reacted with outrage and has ordered an investigation into this shocking error.

Giorgio Armani, the renowned Italian fashion designer and founder of the eponymously named luxury fashion brand, launched his second hotel in Milan.

S&P added that it is “investigating the cause of the error.”

The major European bourses are down anywhere from 2.0 percent to 2.6 percent.

Gold prices slipped Wednesday as skyrocketing Italian government bond yields signaled the beginning of a possibly terminal phase in that nation's economy.

We are now well into third quarter earnings season, with the vast majority of companies reported both bottom- and top-line results that met or beat expectations. Here's a summary of who met, and who missed, analyst estimates.

Gold prices rose Thursday amid widespread uncertainty over whether Greece will leave the Eurozone or remain in the debt-plagued federation.

Stock index futures rose sharply on Thursday after European leaders agreed to boost the region's bailout fund and struck a deal with private banks and insurers to accept 50 percent losses on Greek bonds.

Gold prices surged to their highest level in more than a month Wednesday as the precious metal's fourth consecutive daily gain took it to the brink of a decisive upswing.