IBT Staff Reporter

Global supermarket chains welcomed a long-awaited invitation from India to invest in the country's $450 billion retail market, but they fear the small print may keep a lid on investment in the short term.

Mitt Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts and a front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination, has been accused of flip-flopping on a number of issues. So what are his political positions?

Euro zone member states are discussing dropping private sector involvement from the permanent bailout mechanism that is due to come into force in 2013, four EU officials said on Friday.

Unnerved by a second profit warning in a month, investors sent HTC Corp shares tumbling for a second straight day on Friday on concern the world's No.4 smartphone maker may be running out of ideas in an increasingly competitive market.

Stock index futures pointed to a seventh straight session of losses on Friday, their longest losing streak in four months, as fears about the euro zone's debt crisis overshadowed what appeared to be a buoyant start to the holiday shopping season.

The British ex-CEO of Japan's Olympus Corp emerged from a frosty meeting of directors on Friday convinced its board would eventually quit over an accounting scandal engulfing the firm, but he said he wasn't begging to return and clean up the mess.

AT&T said it would take a $4 billion charge in case its takeover of T-Mobile USA fails, a tacit recognition of the dwindling chances that the deal will get through U.S. regulators who say it would destroy jobs and curb competition.

A global accounting rule that was rehashed under pressure from policymakers in the financial crisis has to be revised, sparking industry fears it could make standard setters vulnerable again to political influence.

Stock index futures fell on Friday with equities eyeing a seventh straight session of losses, their longest losing streak in four months, as investor fret about global growth and the euro zone's debt crisis.

Fund managers keen to cash in on the cult of celebrity are being warned high-profile, pricey marketing campaigns in today's tough economic times could lose them more business than they win.

The British ex-CEO of Japan's Olympus Corp emerged from a frosty meeting of directors on Friday convinced its board would eventually quit over an accounting scandal engulfing the firm, but he said he wasn't begging to return and clean up the mess.

Japan's core consumer prices fell for the first time in four months in the year to October after a cigarette tax hike a year ago dropped out from calculations revealing persistent deflation caused by chronically weak domestic demand.

European shares fell and the euro hit a seven-week low on Friday, as a spiraling debt crisis and the lack of a comprehensive policy to contain the damage sapped investor confidence.

Olympus Corp said on Friday a Japanese investor expanded the scope of a shareholder lawsuit against former and current executives at the scandal-ridden company, whose shares have slumped 60 percent in six weeks.

France and Germany agreed on Thursday to stop arguing in public over whether the European Central Bank should do more to rescue the euro zone from a deepening sovereign debt crisis.

Bargain hunters flocked to U.S. stores late Thursday and overnight Friday, searching for deals while fretting about their own shaky economic well-being.

Asian shares and the euro fell to seven-week lows on Friday as European officials failed to soothe investor fears that the euro zone's debt crisis could trigger a damaging credit crunch if funding costs run out of control.

One of the worst cash crunches in decades is hitting Chinese companies, but for Pan Zhengqiang, borrowing money recently has been as smooth as the well-oiled machines at his widget factory in the farmlands surrounding Suzhou.

Harry Potter author JK Rowling told a public inquiry into British media standards on Thursday she was forced to move house because of tabloid harassment and had been made to feel like a hostage in her home after she gave birth.

U.S. lawmakers plan to look into the relationship between bankrupt mid-size brokerage firm MF Global Holdings Ltd's former CEO Jon Corzine and the major credit-rating agencies, The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday, citing a person familiar with the matter.

The ex-CEO of Japan's disgraced Olympus Corp arrived on Friday for a boardroom showdown with the directors who had sacked him, as the firm's share price leapt on hopes he could play a role in putting a huge accounting scandal behind it.

You don't have to endure the current onslaught of Republican presidential debates to appreciate the appeal of silence. The movies, in their first several decades of existence, had no soundtrack at all, and millions of people still flocked to see them.

Singer and rapper Nicki Minaj was named Billboard's 2011 Rising Star on Wednesday, following her international success this year with her album, Pink Friday.

Apple is well ahead of rivals in building brand loyalty among its users in a mobile market where the key brands are rushing to build as large a foothold as possible, a study by research firm GfK showed.

From Alice in Wonderland to Cars, hundreds of Disney movies are now available for rent on YouTube, the Google-owned site announced on Wednesday.

Viggo Mortensen doesn't expect to reprise his Aragorn character in the next installments of Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings series, the actor revealed to Movies.com.

A multi-million-dollar class action lawsuit against Netflix and Walmart that alleged the two companies had conspired to carve up the DVD rental and sales market between them has been dismissed.

David Letterman told Justin Bieber he could smell a weasel when the pop star was accused of fathering a fan's baby.

Woody Harrelson thinks cops are cool. Well, at least, some of them.