A Nicaraguan judge has embargoed assets of U.S. oil company Esso Standard Oil in a tax payment dispute between the government of leftist President Daniel Ortega and the unit of giant ExxonMobil Corp, a government aide said on Tuesday.
Investors sought to gauge on Wednesday the prospects of a near-term U.S. rate cut to calm a financial storm stemming from America's faltering home loan market, as some experts said the world economy would take a hit.
Experts are reassuring investors that U.S. money market mutual funds, which have gathered about $165 billion in new assets over an eight-week period, are safe from the subprime mortgage problems that have caused steep losses at several hedge funds.
A confluence of negative factors struck a blow to the confidence of American consumers in the latest week, with a weekly survey registering its biggest decline ever.
German banks face a critical situation because foreign banks are reluctant to lend to them after the joint rescue of small-company lender IKB, state-backed lender WestLB's chief executive said.
China raised interest rates on Tuesday for the fourth time this year, aiming to counter expectations of accelerating inflation after consumer prices rose in July at the fastest pace in more than a decade.
China, the world's top emitter of sulphur dioxide, has managed to cut emissions of the acid-rain causing pollutant in first half of 2007, but the government said on Tuesday that meeting national targets would be tough.
Canada's annual inflation rate held unchanged at 2.2 percent in July and the core rate fell to 2.3 percent from 2.5 percent in June, a steady performance that analysts said makes an interest rate rise in September highly unlikely.
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd on Tuesday said he asked the Bush administration to lift the portfolio caps on housing finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, but Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson expressed reluctance to do so.
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said on Tuesday the global economy is strong and liquidity will return to normal in financial markets once investors reprice risk.
Home foreclosures rose 9 percent in July from June and soared 93 percent from a year ago as states that once enjoyed a white-hot housing market are now seeing the greatest number of loan failures, a real estate survey reported on Tuesday.
Hurricane Dean slammed into Mexico's Caribbean coast on Tuesday, flooding streets, blowing the roofs off houses and battering resorts where tens of thousands of tourists and residents huddled in shelters.
The cut is meant to stabilize inflation after consumer prices rose in July at the fastest pace in more than a decade.
Finance chiefs from the world's three biggest economies sought on Tuesday to keep a lid on global market jitters as banks at the sharp end of a global financial storm said they faced serious trouble. Japanese Finance Minister Koji Omi and U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson agreed to keep a close eye on markets while German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck said there was no sign of the turmoil hitting the wider economy.
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's government is struggling to weather a crisis as communist allies threaten to end support over a nuclear energy deal with the United States.
Zimbabwe's parliament meets for a new session on Tuesday that will consider two major pieces of legislation, one to give the president considerable sway in appointing a successor and another to nationalize foreign firms.
India is committed to developing its nuclear energy capability and other sources of power as its oil bill will impose an unbearable burden as growth continues, the prime minister said on Monday.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy returned from his summer break on Monday to a sluggish economy, a court decision to scrap a tax break he promised and a scandal over a pedophile who says a prison doctor gave him Viagra.
Plants that can be grown for fuel are often touted as a vast, clean energy source -- except by those who say precious food is being diverted into gas tanks, and that biofuel crops are using up dwindling land and water.
They've become as much a symbol of Africa's landscape as the stereotypical lions and plains
Policymakers and investors breathed a sigh of relief on Monday as Federal Reserve action brought calm to shaken financial markets, but experts said it was too soon to discount a global credit crisis.
Asian companies will have a tough time raising funds and face weaker export demand if the global credit squeeze persists and a deteriorating U.S. housing market crimps consumer spending.
Just 10 days after reiterating that inflation was its main concern, the U.S. Federal Reserve's policy-setting panel made a 180-degree turn on Friday, laying the groundwork for an interest rate cut as early as next month.
Darthmouth tops a list of 50 schools, but can you find better value elsewhere?
The stock market is swinging but there are no signs the rich are buckling their Pradas.
U.S. consumer sentiment deteriorated in August to its weakest in a year as more expensive oil, declining home prices and turmoil in financial markets all hurt confidence.
The stock market is swinging like a pendulum and the credit market is getting tighter than a drum but there are no signs the rich are buckling their Pradas to hold onto their bucks.
U.S. stocks rose on Friday after the Federal Reserve cut the discount rate at which it lends to banks in a surprise move to keep worsening credit conditions from hurting the economy.
The U.S. Federal Reserve sought to bring order to volatile financial markets experiencing tighter credit conditions on Friday by lowering the rate at which it makes short-term loans to commercial banks and other institutions.
The United States cannot renegotiate a historic nuclear energy deal with India which has drawn strong criticism from politicians in New Delhi, the main U.S. negotiator said in remarks published on Friday.
