UNITED STATES

Applications for U.S. home mortgages dropped last week, erasing the gains of the week before as demand for refinancing evaporated, an industry group said on Wednesday.

Newt Gingrich is the latest of the anti-Romneys: the constantly churning field of candidates who, for a few days or weeks, are trumpeted as the definitive conservative challenger to Mitt Romney before falling back into the abyss. But can he maintain his lead where others didn't?

The European Central Bank stepped in to stem an accelerating selloff of euro zone government bonds on Wednesday, traders said, after the United States called for more decisive action to halt the spreading sovereign debt crisis.

Xun Wang, the ex-managing director of a U.S. company's Chinese subsidiary, pleaded guilty to conspiring to export material to Pakistan for use in a nuclear reactor.

Stock index futures pointed to a higher open on Wall Street Wednesday, with futures for the S&P 500 up 0.4 percent, Dow Jones futures up 0.3 percent and Nasdaq 100 futures up 0.4 percent at 1007 GMT.

Ilya Zhitomirskiy, one of the four co-founders of open source social networking start-up Diaspora, died at his home in San Francisco over the weekend. An officer from the San Francisco Police Department said Zhitomirskiy's death appeared to be a suicide, adding that the final decision would have to wait until after the medical examination procedures.

President Barack Obama and Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard Wednesday unveiled plans for a deepening of the U.S. military presence in the Asia-Pacific, starting with thousands of U.S. Marines operating out of a de facto military base in the Australian port of Darwin.

Kotex Tampons Recalled from Major Stores Over Risk of ‘Life Threatening’ Bacterial Infection

Asian stock markets ended lower on Wednesday, as concerns about Europe’s debt crisis offset better-than-expected reports on U.S. economy Tuesday.

The top after market NYSE Losers on Tuesday were: Och-Ziff Capital Management, GMAC LLC, Symetra Financial, Cenveo, LSI Logic, McGraw-Hill Companies, Agilent Technologies, Dycom Industries, HyperDynamics and IDT Corp.

Japan's disgraced Olympus Corp is preparing to take legal action, including possible criminal complaints, against any executives found responsible for the accounting scandal engulfing the firm, according to an internal staff email.

Japan's disgraced Olympus Corp is preparing to take legal action, including possible criminal complaints, against any executives found responsible for the accounting scandal engulfing the firm, according to an internal staff email.

A Suffolk University law professor has issued an email calling plans to collect care packages for U.S. troops shameful.

Foreign direct investment into China climbed nearly 16 percent in the first 10 months of 2011 from a year earlier as foreign investors continued to flock to the world's fastest-growing major economy despite the global economic malaise.

Foreign direct investment into China climbed nearly 16 percent in the first 10 months of 2011 from a year earlier as foreign investors continued to flock to the world's fastest-growing major economy despite the global economic malaise.

Adult women who have difficulty either in falling asleep or staying asleep have increased risk of developing the medical disorder called fibromyalgia.

The United States reserves the right to retaliate with military force against a cyber attack and is working to sharpen its ability to track down the source of any breach, the Pentagon said in a report made public on Tuesday.

A new PETA-sponsored billboard is asking Utah students, If you wouldn't eat your dog, why eat a turkey?

Police at the University of California, Berkeley, shot and wounded a man on Tuesday they said brandished a gun in a computer lab .

Citigroup In c is planning to cut as many as 900 jobs from its securities and banking division as it grapples with turmoil in equity and debt markets, the Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.

Citigroup In c is planning to cut as many as 900 jobs from its securities and banking division as it grapples with turmoil in equity and debt markets, the Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.