UNITED STATES

Ending perhaps one of the strangest trials in recent years, which could go down in history as another example of why one does not represent himself in court, a Texas jury on Thursday found the leader of the largest polygamous religious sect in the U.S. guilty of two counts of sexual assault on a child.

Stocks closed out its worst week in more than two years on Friday in a volatile session that saw major averages whip back and forth before the S&P 500 settled with a slim loss.

On "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno," Roseanne Barr said Thursday she plans to run for president in the 2012 election -- under her own party ticket, of course -- called "America's Green Tea Party."

Chinese electric motor maker Harbin Electric on Friday denied any Securities and Exchange commission investigation against it, while responding to an allegation made by Citron Research in a recent blog post.

Top Morgan Stanley officials purchased thousands of shares this week as the U.S. investment bank's stock price fell to new two-year lows, according to regulatory filings.

Wells Fargo & Co may have to buy back an additional $1.8 billion in toxic mortgages from outside investors on top of claims it already received, the fourth-largest U.S. bank by assets said in a securities filing on Friday.

Stocks slipped back into the red late on Friday after fluctuating between big gains and losses in a wildly volatile session with trading volume in equities and options on track to set another record.

Investors scrambling for cover during the U.S. deficit and debt ceiling talks and Europe's ongoing sovereign debt crisis sold stock funds and bought emerging market debt and commodities, data from EPFR showed on Friday.

Gold jumped more than 1 percent and metals market plunged on Friday as investors sought safe havens and fled riskier assets on worries over slowing global economic growth.

Gold held firm after upbeat U.S. labor market data soothed immediate fears of a recession, but longer-term uncertainty about economic growth and concerns about the euro zone debt crisis supported demand for the precious metal.

U.S. consumer credit borrowing in June jumped to highest numbers since August 2007, the Federal Reserve announced today.

In the states, oil has been the stuff of riches and the glamour energy form. The reality is, however, in the 21st century the preferred and superior U.S. energy form could very well be domestic natural gas.

Boeing said that two of its employees will act as crew members in the first manned mission of its new astronaut capsule. The company confirmed that it will use the Atlas 5 rocket to test on three flights in 2015.

Wall Street's advice to investors battered by plunging markets: Keep buying stocks.

U.S. bank stocks declined on Friday as investors sold off shares of some of the largest U.S. lenders amid new fears surrounding the European debt crisis and a U.S. economy showing little new growth.

The Dow Jones endured several severe ups and downs on Friday after the announcement of a relatively positive jobs and unemployment rate reports.

U.S. stocks got a break on news that Italy has struck a deal with the European Central Bank (ECB) for the latter to buy Italian government bonds in the open market.

Nearly 15 percent of the U.S. population relied on food stamps in May, according to the United States Department of Agriculture.

Honda recalls three popular models to update software glitch.

Allianz and Generali followed rivals in aggressively writing down holdings of Greek government bonds on Friday, fuelling investor concerns about the possible impact on global insurers of a worsening sovereign debt crisis.

The attacks ? the only time nuclear weapons have ever been used in world history to date ? killed tens of thousands of people and shocked the planet with the scale of their destruction.