IBT Staff Reporter

Switzerland will accept a detainee from the U.S. prison camp at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba after the United States requested the Alpine country and other states to house prisoners.

McDonald's restaurant chain announced Wednesday that from January 2010, it will begin offering free Wi-Fi in its stores in the U.S. and Canada.

This diary is updated daily. New listings or amendments are marked *. All events/times provisional and in GMT (local time is GMT +2 for Egypt and Sudan).

Facet Biotech Corp (FACT.O) said on Wednesday it agreed to allow The Baupost Group LLC, a big investor, to increase its stake in the company to as much as 20 percent, in a bid to fight off a hostile bid from Biogen Idec Inc (BIIB.O).

Almost one in five European companies is likely to make a major acquisition next year, a survey showed, adding weight to claims that European mergers and acquisitions (M&A) are set to rebound from their 2009 trough.

Dress Barn Inc (DBRN.O) raised its profit view for the fiscal 2010 as its stores have performed better than expected till date, the company said on Wednesday.

Richard Branson's Virgin Group has launched a company to help consumers with technical problems such as PCs crashing, wireless networks not connecting and games consoles refusing to link up with other gear.

Stocks rose on Wednesday after data showed consumer prices did not overheat in November, quelling inflation worries, while housing data pointed to sustained recovery ahead of a Federal Reserve statement on the condition of the U.S. economy.

Global regulators will give banks a grace period before forcing them to implement stricter capital rules, three people said on Wednesday, easing concerns that lenders might need to issue massive amounts of shares in the near future.

British technical plastic products supplier Carclo Plc (C1Y.L) said it would raise 3.7 million pounds ($6.01 million) from a placing of shares to accelerate projects in its technology business.

American Airlines said that it, private equity firm TPG and Oneworld alliance partners could increase their $1.1 billion investment offer to Japan Airlines (9205.T), depending on the struggling carrier's restructuring plan.

French stock market regulator AMF will announce on Thursday the outcome of a more than three year investigation into suspected insider trading and misleading communications at Airbus parent EADS

Mining equipment maker Joy Global Inc (JOYG.O) posted a 5 percent rise in quarterly profit, helped by tighter cost controls, and said order rates would improve in 2010, sending its shares up 3 percent.

(Corrects figure for November housing starts to 574,000 units in paragraph 8)

Titanic director James Cameron releases his first dramatic feature in 12 years this weekend, and there's almost as much buzz about its costs as the film's groundbreaking motion-capture animation.

Heavy metal's Big Four -- Metallica, Slayer, Megadeth and Anthrax -- will ride together in 2010. In Europe, at least.

They were joking about it on the set of The Adjustment Bureau, where freshly minted Globes nominee Emily Blunt was working with Matt Damon, who scored a double whammy Tuesday with nominations for the comedy The Informant! and the drama Invictus.

As with most mainstream comedies, you get nearly all of the story line and most of the best jokes in Did You Hear About the Morgans? from its trailer.

European Union regulators accepted Microsoft Corp's pledge to give European consumers better access to rival Internet browsers in Windows, ending a long antitrust dispute with the U.S. software maker.

Churchill Downs Inc's recent cash and stock deal for online wagering site Youbet.com Inc has the company best known for the Kentucky Derby betting on a faster growth track.

A neo-noir romance and a sweeping historical look at a Sicilian village were among the foreign language films earning Golden Globe nominations on Tuesday, hoping to boost recognition in the United States.

NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen asked Russia on Wednesday to give the Western military alliance more help in Afghanistan but failed to get an immediate pledge of assistance from the Kremlin.

Britain said on Wednesday it would set up a new military air safety body after a probe into a Royal Air Force plane crash in Afghanistan that killed 14 people found serious faults in safety procedures.

The Treasury is working on a number of fronts to use the government's $700 billion bailout fund to boost lending to small businesses, a senior Treasury official said on Wednesday, adding that tax incentives to boost hiring should be considered.

The U.S. government filed suit against Intel Corp on Wednesday, alleging that the chip giant illegally used its dominance of the market for a decade to stifle competition and strengthen its monopoly.

The U.S. government filed suit against Intel Corp on Wednesday, accusing the chip giant of illegally using its market dominance to stifle competition for a decade.

Emcore Corp (EMKR.O), a maker of compound semiconductor-based components and subsystems, posted fourth-quarter results above estimates, helped by a steep fall in operating expenses, and forecast first-quarter revenue above market expectations.

Dow Chemical Co's buyout of Rohm & Haas earlier this year could help transform its small water business into an economic river, though the recession and enormity of sifting through thousands of potential products could slow its ambitious plans.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper is likely to ignore pressure to adopt tougher emissions targets this week, preferring instead to let the United States craft a North American climate change policy.