JAPAN

Commodities trader Glencore International posted a 50 percent rise in headline first-half profit and said it saw opportunities emerging from turbulence in its key markets as commodity demand remains strong.

For Eriko Ebina, standing outside a downtown Tokyo medical equipment store that has a side business buying gold, the recent surge in prices for the precious metal was just too tempting.

Commodities trader Glencore International Plc posted a 50 percent rise in headline first-half profit and said it saw opportunities emerging from turbulence in its key markets as commodity demand remains strong.

Apple’s Steve Jobs resigned as the company’s CEO on Wednesday.

Stock futures pointed to a mixed open on Wall Street on Thursday, with futures for both the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones rising 0.3 percent and Nasdaq 100 futures down 0.3 percent on news Steve Jobs had stepped down as Apple CEO.

Asian shares rose on Thursday, pointing to a positive open in Europe, but caution prevailed as investors awaited the outcome of a central bank symposium in Jackson Hole on Friday.

An unmanned Russian spacecraft carrying three tons of food, fuel and water for the International Space Station crashed about five minutes after it was launched, NASA officials said Wednesday.

Samsung Electronics shares rose sharply on Thursday, amid a rally in South Korean large cap stocks and analysts said it received a boost from a Dutch patent ruling and the decision by Apple's Steve Jobs to step down.

A Russian spacecraft carrying three tons of food, fuel and water for the International Space Station broke down about five minutes after it blasted off on Wednesday.

A Russian rocket carrying three tons of supplies to the International Space Station didn't achieve orbit and instead crashed in the Siberian forest.

Despite the entire hullabaloo surrounding the historic East Coast earthquake, the 5.8 magnitude quake didn't create that much economic damage.

As it prepares to launch its tablet, could Amazon buy Sony Ericsson to ease its path?

Welcome to the Camry Chronology -- everything you've ever wanted to know about one of the world's most popular cars.

Joe Berlinger's and Bruce Sinofsky's Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory, the third of the filmmakers' documentaries about the case of the West Memphis Three, will premiere at the 49th New York Film Festival with a new ending incorporating the recent release of the three from prison.

On Tuesday, the day the earthquake struck the east coast of the U.S., there were at least 30 seismic actions around the world of at least magnitude-2.5.

The Virginia earthquake sends a warning as many as 10 U.S. nuclear plants need to be checked

Gold prices dropped sharply Wednesday after a strong U.S. durable goods report, profit-taking by investors and encouraging news from the Congressional Budget Office about the deficit.

Whether the Federal Reserve likes it or not, its unprecedented monetary polices over the last few years have conditioned the financial markets to expect a helping hand when the going gets tough.

New orders for long-lasting U.S. manufactured goods surged in July on strong demand for transportation equipment, government data showed on Wednesday, but a gauge of business spending fell.

Investors are agonizing over the prospect of another round of quantitative easing that could come from the Fed chairman Ben Bernanke’s Jackson Hole summit later this week.

A strong durable goods report Wednesday helped reverse a short-lived rebound in precious metals, which had been gaining early in the day on a downgrade of Japan and worries that economic growth in both the U.S. and Europe was tepid at best.