UNITED STATES

Stock index futures pointed to a higher open on Wall Street on Tuesday, with futures for the S&P 500 up 0.36 percent, Dow Jones futures up 0.32 percent and Nasdaq 100 futures up 0.27 percent at 0928 GMT (4:28 a.m. EDT).

The euro pared gains on Tuesday after Moody's put Portugal on review for a possible downgrade, while world stocks rose, driven by bargain-hunting investors betting on stronger global growth next year.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has begun a probe into Chinese companies listing on U.S. stock exchanges through reverse takeovers, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people with knowledge of the probe.

Toronto-Dominion Bank is close to an agreement to buy Chrysler Financial from private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management for $6.3 billion, a source familiar with the matter said on Monday.

Top U.S. automaker General Motors expects exports of its China-made Chevrolet Sail to jump 300 percent or more next year, a senior executive said.

The Bank of Japan kept monetary policy on hold on Tuesday but warned of weakening factory output and business sentiment, assuring markets that it was focusing on downside risks to growth that may trigger further easing ahead.

Japan's Nikkei share index <.N225> rises 0.7 percent as investors pick up bargains after recent price falls, but volume is low on absence of foreign buyers.

Revenue from Toshiba Corp's <6502.T> nuclear power plant business may reach 1 trillion yen ($12 billion) in the next three years, ahead of schedule, the Japanese industrial conglomerate said on Tuesday.

(Corrects third paragraph to state that the source of the information in the paragraph is the Nikkei newspaper, not the company spokesman; moves company spokesman's name to second paragraph)

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released a report today that shows 15 years of successful results from EPA’s nationwide effort to address acid rain.

The lifeblood of retail expansion is same store sales. If same store sales do not increase, any store count expansion becomes a death march. But the big retailers keep expanding out of touch with reality.

Renowned Wall Street analyst Meredith Whitney has warned that the U.S. may witness between 50 to 200 “sizeable defaults” amounting to “hundreds of billions of dollars” among municipal and state governments next year, which could derail the recovery.

Ben Bernanke and his friends on the Federal Reserve have a PR machine to help sell their lies. Let's assess whether Ben and his Federal Reserve have helped or hurt the average American.

Members of the U.S. Congress are convening on Monday in rare secret meeting closed to the public and media to deliberate on the START nuclear treaty presented to them by President Barack Obama.

The results of the 2010 U.S. Census will be made public tomorrow.

Toshiba Corp <6502.T> may log 1 trillion yen ($11.94 billion) in sales from its nuclear power business by fiscal 2013, instead of fiscal 2015, due to a growing demand in emerging markets and the United States, its President Norio Sasaki told The Nikkei in an interview.

An Obama administration task force examining allegations of fraud in the mortgage foreclosure process will deliver its findings next month, two top officials said on Monday.

Genzyme Corp held its second investor meeting in two months to argue that its most promising experimental drug will capture five times the sales that Sanofi-Aventis has assumed in a hostile $18.5 billion takeover bid.

A judge said on Monday she needs more time to rule on Washington Mutual's $10 billion deal aimed at bringing the company out of bankruptcy, and asked the parties to extend a key deadline, according to court documents.

Web commerce company eBay Inc said it would buy brands4friends, Germany's largest online shopping club, for about $200 million in cash to strengthen its European business.

The Federal Reserve does not believe any one hedge fund can topple the financial system and therefore the private pools of capital may escape direct supervision by the central bank, an industry source familiar with the Fed's position said.