COMPANIES

Nissan Motor Co. said on Monday it would launch a diesel version of its X-Trail sport utility vehicle in Japan next year, a move that could revive the all-but-dead diesel passenger car segment in the world's third-biggest auto market.

Bear Stearns Cos co-president and co-chief operating officer Warren Spector resigned on Sunday, becoming a casualty of a credit risk crisis at the investment bank. Bear Stearns said that, effective immediately, Alan Schwartz has been named the company's sole president.

China expects auto exports to grow by 48.5 percent in this year compared to 2006, according to a government forecast.

India's leading biotechnology enterprise, Biocon, has inked an agreement with Abu Dhabi-based Neopharma to establish a joint venture company NeoBiocon to develop specialty bio-pharmaceutical products and provide biotherapeutics for the United Arab Emirates (UAE) market.

'A number of executives just below board level' and not covered by a plea deal announced last week are to be identified.

India's top car maker, Maruti Udyog Ltd., is offering discounts of up to $743 on many of its vehicles to shore up sales, newspaper advertisements at the weekend showed.

Investment bank JPMorgan's India unit has lost four senior executives, the latest in a series of moves in the country's financial sector, where salaries have soared on the back of a booming stock market.

Exxon Mobil, ConocoPhillips and Chevron Corp. will likely participate in India's seventh round of auctions under the New Exploration Licensing Policy (NELP), the Business Standard said on Sunday.

The head of Freddie Mac, one of the biggest U.S. mortgage finance companies, dismissed suggestions that his company should step in to bolster sagging financial markets by buying distressed loans, the New York Times reported on Saturday.

Bear Stearns Cos., whose shares slumped on Friday, is preparing to oust Warren Spector, one of its two presidents and its co-chief operating officer, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday.

International Bank of Qatar said on Sunday talks to buy a stake in Bahrain's Ahli United Bank had stalled, spelling a possible end to what would be the biggest cross border takeover of a Gulf Arab firm.

Private equity firm CVC said on Sunday that Hong Kong financier Francis Leung has joined the company as senior adviser focusing on developing investment opportunities in Greater China.

A Delaware court will wait for a U.S. regulatory review to be completed before it decides what economic rights Chicago Board of Trade exercise right holders have in the Chicago Board Options Exchange, the parties involved in the case said on Saturday.

Italy's Edison plans to invest more than 4.5 billion euros ($6.17 billion) by 2013 mostly in gas, foreign activities and renewable energies, the utility's Chief Executive told a newspaper on Sunday.

Barclays' offer period for Dutch bank ABN AMRO will run until October 4 and the British bank's bid will be declared unconditional if at least 80 percent of ABN shares have been tendered, a filing showed.

Dubai-based private equity firm Istithmar raised its offer to acquire Barneys New York Inc. from Jones Apparel Group Inc. to $900 million on Sunday, matching a bid by Japan's Fast Retailing Co. Ltd.

DaimlerChrysler AG said on Friday it had completed the sale of an 80 percent stake in its U.S. unit, Chrysler Group, to private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management.

Beer-breaths beware. A new concept car with breathalyzer-like detection systems may provide even greater traction for Japanese efforts to keep impaired drivers off the road.

Is this the start of the latte recession? The company implies that customers may be cutting back on that extra Frappucino.

Buyout firms will start to use a higher percentage of equity and seek smaller deals at lower prices as they face an end to the easy money which fuelled an unprecedented wave of takeovers.

Citigroup Chief Executive Charles Prince said the recent market pullback feels sharp, but he is bullish on the bank's growth, the New York Times reported on its Web site on Friday.

American Home Mortgage Investment Corp. plans to close most operations on Friday and said nearly 7,000 employees will lose their jobs as the lender becomes one of the biggest casualties of the U.S. housing downturn.

Procter & Gamble Co. posted a higher quarterly profit on Friday, driven by cost controls, and also announced an acceleration of its share repurchase plans.

British Airways beat forecasts with a 28 percent rise in quarterly operating profit on Friday but warned that a weak dollar and soaring fuel prices would slow full-year revenue growth and raise costs.

Allianz, Europe's biggest insurer, beat forecasts with net profit of 2.140 billion euros ($2.9 billion) in the second quarter, down 6 percent from a year earlier when the result was boosted by asset sales.

Royal Bank of Scotland, Britain's second biggest bank that is locked in a takeover battle for ABN AMRO, beat expectations with an 11 percent rise in profit and lifted its dividend by 25 percent.

Toyota Motor Corp.'s quarterly operating profit rose by a better-than-expected 32 percent as brisk overseas sales combined with a softer yen to make up for chronic weakness in domestic demand. Toyota, the world's biggest and most profitable automaker, left its cautious annual forecasts unchanged, as expected.

Media mogul and owner of News Corporation Rupert Murdoch has come a step closer to clinching ownership of the Wall Street Journal's publisher, Dow Jones, after key members of the controlling Bancroft family switched sides to back his $5 billion takeover bid.

U.S. and Canadian banks face limited exposure to subprime mortgage losses and future rating downgrades, bond rating company DBRS said on Thursday. The U.S. mortgage market has been hit by rising delinquencies and defaults on subprime loans made to risky borrowers, setting off a wave of rating downgrades of related securities in July. Healthy earnings should insulate financial institutions, DBRS analysts said on a conference call.