UNITED STATES

The federal judge handling scores of lawsuits against Toyota Motor Corp over cars that raced out of control has set the first court hearing on the combined litigation for next month.

NEW YORK (Reuters Life!) - After idling for decades, train travel in the United States, while not quite out of the station, is beginning to work up a healthy head of steam.

No. 1 toy company Mattel Inc surprised Wall Street with a quarterly profit on strong demand for its classic brands and newer product lines, and its shares rose more than 3 percent.

(Reuters) - President Barack Obama issued a memo on Thursday that would require hospitals accepting Medicare or Medicaid funds to allow visitation rights to gay and lesbian partners.

General Electric Co reported a sharply higher profit than Wall Street had expected and sees potential for upside to its earlier forecast of flat 2010 results.

Bank of America Corp trounced expectations with its first quarterly profit since the summer of 2009 as it generated outsized bond trading revenue and set aside less money to cover bad loans.

Wall Street was poised for a lower on Friday after earnings from Google failed to meet heightened expectations as GE and Bank of America reported quarterly results.

No. 1 toy company Mattel Inc surprised Wall Street with a quarterly profit on strong demand for its classic brands and newer product lines, in yet another sign of a revival in consumer demand.

Global shares edged off 16-month highs on Friday as an unexpected jump in U.S. jobless claims and persistent uncertainty over a solution to Greece's debt crisis tempered optimism over the global economic recovery.

Credit Suisse is hiring Vedika Bhandarkar, a veteran investment banker at rival JPMorgan , to beef up its investment banking business in India.

U.S. stock index futures edged lower on Friday after Google earnings failed to meet lofty expectations, but strong results from GE and Bank of America stemmed declines.

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Stock index futures pointed to a lower open on Wall Street on Friday, with equities poised to reverse recent strong gains after Google's results, and ahead of General Electric and Bank of America earnings.

Global shares softened from 16-month highs on Friday after an unexpected jump in U.S. jobless claims tempered optimism over the global economic recovery.

by Vikram S SubhedarAsian stocks retreated from 22-month highs, and higher-yielding currencies fell, as investors booked profits after risky assets ran up in recent sessions on the back of good economic data.

Top Federal Reserve officials on Thursday showed little urgency about softening the central bank's commitment to hold rates low for a long time, suggesting the Fed will repeat the pledge when it meets late this month.

Kyrgyzstan's mass anti-government protests last week were essentially the culmination of more than a decade of disillusionment and dissatisfaction that accumulated in the nation's political, economic and social spheres from the period of Akayev to his successor Kurmanbek Bakiyev, with virtually every Kyrgyz concerned about rising prices and falling standards of living, both issues of little concern and dimly understood in Washington.

Google Inc posted a 23 percent jump in quarterly revenue on a rebound in Web advertising, but its stock fell 5 percent as the company disappointed some investors accustomed to blowout results.

The Australian dollar has opened relatively unchanged from yesterday following a mixed session offshore overnight.

The Australian Dollar opens steady on Friday at 0.9340 and was underpinned throughout yesterday's domestic session by stronger commodity prices and a solid start on local equities.

Continental Airlines Inc has restarted merger talks with UAL Corp's United Airlines, two years after walking away from almost sealing a deal, a source briefed on the matter said on Thursday.