IBT Staff Reporter

Ireland's stress tests on Thursday will reveal an additional 20-25 billion euro ($28-35 billion) hole in its banks capital and will be followed by a radical restructuring of the sector, the Irish Independent newspaper reported.

The 68-year-old Judge Judy told TMZ she felt that she just needed a day to chill, raising questions if she was overworked.

World stocks climbed to a new three-week high on Thursday and the euro inched higher ahead of the publication of Irish bank stress tests aimed at capping one of the major risks in Europe's debt crisis.

With the +1 button on its search engine, besides adding a social tinge, Google continues long-drawn war against Facebook.

Tokyo Electric Power Co could face compensation claims topping $130 billion if Japan's worst nuclear crisis drags on, Bank of America-Merrill Lynch estimated, fuelling expectations Japan's government will step in to save Asia's largest utility.

China pushed back on Thursday against pressure from Paris and Washington for swift reform of a global monetary system that French President Nicolas Sarkozy said is so unstable that it could tip the world economy back into crisis.

Brent crude rose 0.8 percent to $116 on Thursday, heading for its biggest quarterly gain in almost two years as war, revolutions, and unrest across the Middle East and North Africa thrust supply constraints to the forefront of investor concerns.

Tightly controlled exchange rate regimes are the main flaw in the international monetary system and the solution is simple, U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told a G20 meeting on Thursday.

Most Asian shares edged up on Thursday, heading for a quarterly gain despite a sharp sell-off earlier this month after disaster struck Japan, while the yen was poised for a quarterly loss on expectations Tokyo will have to maintain super-loose monetary policy far longer than Europe and the United States.

A U.S. federal judge dismissed a lawsuit filed by a group of pension funds against Freddie Mac that claimed the mortgage finance giant had materially misrepresented its exposure to risky mortgage products, leading to investment losses.

Opposing views about how to reform the global monetary system were laid bare at a meeting of the top 20 economies on Thursday, with France setting out a bold agenda, China warning that change must be gradual and the United States saying the solution was simple.

The rare earth minerals company Molycorp Inc has announced that it has entered into a cooperative research and development agreement with the U.S. Department of Energy's Ames Laboratory.

Shares in Taiwan's AU Optronics Corp jumped as much as 6 percent on Thursday after a report that the world's No.4 LCD maker has won an order to provide flat panel screens for Apple Inc's hot-selling iPad 2 tablet.

Soccer great Zinedine Zidane showed he still has it in a recently uploaded YouTube video at a training camp.

The FDA found small amounts of radiation in a sample batch of milk from Spokane, Washington. The level, however, was 5,000 times lower than the Derived Intervention Level set by the FDA.

In a press release that has the air of a deposition, Warren Buffett explained on Wednesday about a top aide's resignation and a stock purchase. They are facts that he has vowed not to answer more questions about.

The man widely seen as the leading successor to Warren Buffett at Berkshire Hathaway has resigned after buying shares in chemical company Lubrizol Corp before pushing Buffett to acquire it.

The man widely seen as the leading successor to Warren Buffett at Berkshire Hathaway has resigned after buying shares in chemical company Lubrizol Corp before pushing Buffett to acquire it.

U.S. government remedies to free up more U.S. airwaves for wireless services are not coming fast enough and were an important driver behind AT&T Inc's $39 billion bid to buy Deutsche Telekom AG's T-Mobile USA, an AT&T executive said on Wednesday.

Proposed changes to European rules on product returns could cost online retailers 10 billion euros ($14 billion) a year, denting growth and leading to higher prices for consumers, an industry body warned on Thursday.

Bank of America Corp won the dismissal of a bias lawsuit by black financial advisers at the former Merrill Lynch & Co who said they were paid lower bonuses than white counterparts to stay on when the companies merged.

David Sokol, long seen as a contender to take over as CEO of Berkshire Hathaway when Warren Buffett retires, resigned unexpectedly on Wednesday.

U.S. stocks ended higher on Wednesday with activity dominated by money managers buying recent winners, including energy and small-caps, as the quarter nears its end.

General Motors Co said on Wednesday its Chevrolet Cruze small car was on track to exceed 50,000 U.S. sales in the first quarter, aided by demand in markets usually dominated by imports.

Berkshire Hathaway Chairman Warren Buffett said Wednesday that one of the top executives at his company, David Sokol, has resigned from the company, soon after learning that Sokol bought stock in a company he recommended to Buffett.

A U.S. jury rejected GlaxoSmithKline's antitrust claims against Abbott Laboratories over allegations of unfair HIV drug pricing, after Britain's biggest drugmaker had asked for hundreds of millions in damages.

Any old cobra can hiss, but the one that tweets on Wednesday had more than 150,000 people following Twitter posts about her escape from New York City's Bronx Zoo, including top politicians and celebrities.

Jamie Dimon, chief executive of Wall Street giant JPMorgan Chase, lashed out at efforts by U.S. regulators to police the $600 trillion swaps market, in which his bank is a big player.

News Corp has promoted James Murdoch to the role of deputy chief operating officer in a move that will be seen to mark him as eventual successor to his 80-year-old father, Rupert.