IBT Staff Reporter

U.S. consumer confidence dropped in June after rising for three months, adding to the view the economic recovery is slowing, while home prices unexpectedly climbed in April.

Standard & Poor's on Tuesday said it may cut its ratings on rival rating agency Moody's Investors Corp, saying U.S. financial reforms may lower margins and increase litigation costs at credit rating agencies.

The U.S. Treasury Department lacks the manpower to properly monitor how big companies that got billions of taxpayers' money use it, a critical report on Tuesday from an oversight agency said.

Investors fled the U.S. stock market on Tuesday and the S&P 500 tumbled to its lowest level in eight months in a sell-off triggered by a wave of increasing alarm over the global economic outlook.

Employees in company retirement plans know they should set money aside but still fall short with their savings -- and employers could help them save more without increasing company costs, a study has found.

Goldman Sachs and bailed out insurer American International Group face a rough two days of questioning about the destructive relationship that contributed to the 2008 financial crisis.

The Aussie sold off in Asia yesterday following some weaker than expected Japanese data and general risk aversion.

Free video website Hulu is trying its hand at a paid subscription model, unveiling a monthly payment plan called Hulu Plus that will give users access to full seasons of everything from Glee to The Office.

General Motors has revamped the way it operates, with sharply lower costs, stronger brands and gains in key emerging markets like China, Chief Executive Ed Whitacre said in a pitch for the company's planned IPO.

A group of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc's creditors, including the largest U.S. pension fund and a prominent hedge fund, said they object to the investment bank's Chapter 11 bankruptcy plan.

Investors fled the U.S. stock market on Tuesday and the S&P 500 tumbled to its lowest level in eight months in a sell-off triggered by a wave of increasing alarm over the global economic outlook.

(Corrects paragraph 2 to delete reference to worst day since May 6)

Democrats on Tuesday planned to strip out a controversial tax from their landmark financial reform bill in order to win the swing votes needed to pass it through Congress.

Cisco Systems Inc is launching a tablet computing device aimed at business customers, becoming the latest company to wade into the red-hot tablet market.

A U.S. commission is planning to focus on the ties between Goldman Sachs Group Inc and American International Group Inc, and how derivatives transactions between the two financial giants may have contributed to the financial crisis.

Democrats on Tuesday considered stripping out a controversial tax from their landmark financial-reform bill in order to win the swing votes needed to pass it in Congress.

Greek police fired teargas at rioters shouting burn parliament in Athens on Tuesday but fewer ordinary Greeks turned out for rallies in a sign of weariness with anti-austerity protests.

Investors fled the U.S. stock market on Tuesday and the S&P 500 tumbled to nearly an eight-month low in a sell-off triggered by a wave of increasing alarm over the global economic outlook.

Stocks extended losses on Tuesday and the S&P 500 index broke a key technical resistance as it fell below 1,040.78, its previous low point for 2010.

General Motors , in the year since emerging from bankruptcy, has revamped the way it operates, with sharply lower costs, stronger brands and gains in key emerging markets like China, Chief Executive Ed Whitacre told potential investors on Tuesday.

Consumer confidence dropped in June after rising for three months, adding to the view the economic recovery is slowing, while single-family home prices unexpectedly climbed in April.

Sprint Nextel Corp has been seeing shortages of its EVO high-speed phone from HTC Corp in some places due to better-than-expected demand, the company's chief executive, Dan Hesse, said on Tuesday.

U.S. software company Versata filed a complaint with European Union antitrust regulators accusing German software company SAP AG of shutting it out of the market.

Google Inc is expected to close a $3 billion, three-year revolving credit facility this week, marking its first visit to the syndicated loan market, Jacqueline Poh of Thomson Reuters LPC reports.

Shares of electric carmaker Tesla Motors Inc opened nearly 12 percent above their initial public offering price on Tuesday as investors bet that electric cars would define the future of transportation.

Google Inc is tweaking its China website in a last-ditch effort to save its search business in the world's largest Internet market after butting heads with Beijing over Web censorship.

Barnes & Noble Inc shares hit their lowest level in more than a year even as its chief executive said on Tuesday that the bookseller could dominate a quarter of the growing e-books market within a few years and generate billions of dollars in new sales.

Elon Musk, the chief executive and major investor behind Tesla Motors Inc, has sometimes taunted U.S. automakers, painting his fledgling company as everything Detroit would like to be if it could start over: cooler, greener and ensconced in a much better neighborhood.

Shares of electric carmaker Tesla Motors Inc opened nearly 12 percent above their initial public offering price on Tuesday as investors bet that electric cars would define the future of transportation.