IBT Staff Reporter

To all extents and purposes, 2009 is over for investors and the coming week will be dominated by the issues of 2010.

Fed at Its Limits; Closing the Climate Deal Gap; D-Day for Dubai

Japanese business confidence edged up more than expected in the three months to December but remained negative for the sixth quarter in a row, a Bank of Japan survey showed, as the economy slowly recovers from its worst postwar recession.

Warehouses holding everything from beer kegs to frozen chickens crowd the roadside along Highway 146 south of Houston, and a ferocious building boom is adding acres more, thanks to an even bigger project 1,800 miles away in Panama.

Bank of New York Mellon Corp Chief Executive Robert Kelly is the front-runner to succeed retiring Bank of America Corp CEO Kenneth Lewis, but compensation issues could get in the way of a deal, the Wall Street Journal said on Sunday, citing people familiar with the situation.

Citigroup is nearing a deal with the U.S. government that would allow it to pay back some of its bailout money, The Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday, citing people familiar with the matter.

Michael Widenius, creator of MySQL database, which could become the stumbling block for Oracle in its Sun takeover, has launched an Internet campaign trying to line up MySQL users to stop the deal.

The Aussie dollar was unable to hold onto momentum gained by Thursday's stellar employment report peaking near 92 cents during Friday's European session.

The Federal Reserve has done all it can do to reduce unemployment and needs to worry more about the risk of inflation from the stimulus it poured into the economy, former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan said on Sunday.

Power company AES Corp on Sunday said it agreed to sell its entire interests in its Oman and Pakistan businesses for about $200 million.

Sports-car maker Spyker is still in talks to buy Saab, the Dutch company's top executive said on Sunday after a report China's BAIC had agreed with General Motors to buy some of the Swedish company's assets.

The Federal Reserve, at a meeting this week, will likely close out the year by repeating a pledge to keep interest rates extraordinarily low for an extended period even as it nods to signs of economic healing.

A Photo of the Google phone Nexus One - which Google employees are currently testing out and will be available for customers next year - has been released on Twitter.

Cadbury and U.S. rival Hershey have held talks over a possible friendly bid by the American firm, the Sunday Telegraph reported, citing market sources.

North Korea and the United States have agreed to resume suspended four-way talks to replace the tattered Korean War armistice with a permanent peace accord, South Korea's Yonhap news agency said on Sunday.

India successfully tested a nuclear-capable ship-based ballistic missile on Sunday off its eastern coast, a defence official said.

Environment ministers tried to overcome rifts between rich and developing nations in Copenhagen on Sunday just days before a deadline for reaching a global pact on tackling climate change.

Tribal gunmen freed dozens of hostages in the southern Philippines on Sunday after authorities transferred murder cases against them to a tribal court and disarmed both them and a rival group.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Afghan President Hamid Karzai met at an Afghan air base on Sunday, aiming to fix a relationship that has grown bitter as the Afghan war grows deadlier and more unpopular.

Gulf Arab oil exporters will move closer to a unified currency when their rulers meet on Monday in Kuwait, which promised to seek the return of the United Arab Emirates and Oman to the monetary union plan.

Saab can still find a buyer for the whole firm, a spokesman for the loss-making auto maker said on Sunday after The Wall Street Journal reported China's BAIC had agreed with General Motors to buy some of the Swedish company's assets.

Heavy rain pounded Dubai on Sunday adding to the gloom of the emirate's debt woes a day before the deadline of the $3.52 billion bond by state-owned developer Nakheel, with no word on how it will be handled.

Kuwait's sale of its stake in Citigroup earlier this month was not due to a dispute with the U.S. bank, the Gulf Arab state's finance minister said in published remarks on Sunday.

Critics said the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq said was driven by oil, but United States oil majors were largely absent from an Iraqi auction of oil deals snapped up instead by Russian, Chinese and other firms.

(Corrects Dec. 12 story, paragraph 8, to show one U.S. company bid in the second Iraq oil auction)

Cuba and Venezuela signed cooperation deals worth nearly $3 billion on Saturday, underscoring Caracas' role as the communist-run island's closest political and commercial ally.

The rumored Google phone may be coming sooner than expected, following a blog post from a Google executive on Saturday which said the company released its own Google Android phone to some of its employees.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc played a bigger role in fueling the mortgage bets that crippled American Insurance Group Inc than has been publicly disclosed, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday.

Cuba and Venezuela are set to sign cooperation deals worth about $3 billion later on Saturday, underscoring Caracas' role as the communist-run island's closest political and commercial ally.