IBT Staff Reporter

As Europe's car market weans itself off the rush of government subsidies, carmakers at the Geneva auto show are finding cause for optimism on a continent overshadowed by heady growth in emerging Asia.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc could lose up to $3.4 billion from lawsuits and other disputes over the securities it sold and underwrote, the investment bank said in its annual filing with regulators on Tuesday.

OK! Magazine reported that instead of gifts, the Canadian sensation asked his fans to donate to a charity on his behalf.

As the United States moves military ships toward the Mediterranean Sea and officials discuss the possibility of imposing a no-fly zone over Libya, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said it was irresponsible to consider all options to resolve the situation there, including an invasion.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke offered a fairly upbeat assessment of the U.S. economy on Tuesday, saying the recent surge in oil prices is unlikely to have a major effect on either growth or inflation, as long as higher prices do not become sustained.

It's been a dismal stretch for critics of Netflix Inc , the movie delivery company that boasts a superstar chief executive, a stratospheric stock price and some 20 million subscribers.

Anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks, the Internet and a Russian human rights activist are among a record 241 nominations for the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize.

A YouTube musical clip mocking embattled Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi has become a hot hit in the Arab world, its Israeli creator said on Tuesday.

New computers from Lenovo show off a possible future of computer interfaces.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said on Tuesday that future mortgage costs likely will be modestly higher after reforms are completed to the national housing finance system.

NFL star Tom Brady has finally sold his Time Warner Center condo in New York City this week after two-and-a-half years of being on the market.

General Motors Co and Nissan Motor Co sales surged in February as incentives drove shoppers to dealerships and outweighed concerns about higher oil prices.

Stocks dropped on Tuesday as investors worried that rising oil prices could choke off the economic recovery, with equities looking to keep taking their lead from oil prices in the near term.

Samsung will announce the device at this month's CTIA Wireless conference.

Some Gmail users were on the wrong side of a misguided software update from Google, causing their accounts to reset.

Charlie Sheen made an unexpected live appearance on CNN's Piers Morgan Tonight, and discussed his recent controversies.

U.S. construction spending fell more than expected in January to its lowest level in five months, a government report showed on Tuesday, pulled down by weak private construction outlays.

Egypt's military leaders will hold a referendum on constitutional change on March 19, a parliamentary election in June and a presidential poll six weeks later, a youth activist said on Monday after meeting them.

South Africa's new energy resource plan, which will determine the country's electricity mix over the next 20 years, will be passed into law by the start of April, a government official said on Tuesday.

ICE cocoa prices hit a fresh 32-year high of $3,706 a tonne in early trading on Tuesday, as fighting intensified in top producer Ivory Coast.

Boosted by the soccer World Cup, South Africa saw a record 15.1 percent increase in tourist arrivals in 2010 although the total of more than 8 million was not an all time-high, the tourism minister said on Tuesday.

Tanzania needs to invest $10 billion a year to improve its infrastructure network and create a healthy climate for the county's economic growth, a continental investment body said on Tuesday.

Morgan Stanley experienced a very sensitive break-in to its network by the same China-based hackers who attacked Google Inc's computers more than a year ago, Bloomberg reported, citing leaked emails from an Internet security company.

Mauritius' trade deficit widened 17.2 percent in 2010 as rising imports outstripped growth in exports, the statistics office said on Tuesday.

Brewer SABMiller is to spend over $100 million to build a new brewery in Africa's second largest beer market Nigeria to take on the country's brewing heavyweights Heineken and Diageo.

Madagascar has detained a dozen suspected Somali pirates after a vessel they hijacked off Tanzania in November ran out of fuel and supplies, a maritime official from the Indian Ocean island said.

An Egyptian judicial panel ruled on Tuesday that a state land sale to Palm Hills Development, Egypt's second biggest listed developer, was illegal and should be scrapped.

Libya's oil installations are undamaged and a cut in the country's oil output was caused by the departure of oil workers, the chairman of Libya's National Oil Corporation said on Tuesday.

Libya could descend into civil war if Muammar Gaddafi refuses to quit, the United States said on Tuesday, its demand for an end to his rule carrying new weight after word of unspecified Western military preparations.