IBT Staff Reporter

U.S. President Barack Obama's top economic adviser said on Monday the United States is on the path toward economic recovery, conditions in financial markets are steadier and there have been initial signs of stabilization in the housing market.

Philips Electronics reported better than expected third-quarter results on Monday, boosting its share price as the benefits of its cost-cutting program took effect, but the company said it had still not seen a recovery in most of its markets.

European shares followed Wall Street higher on Monday on optimism about the third-quarter earnings season, while the dollar gained for the second session in a row.

Dutch conglomerate Philips Electronics' reported a better than expected third-quarter operating profit on Monday as a result of cost reductions but the company remained cautious, seeing no recovery in many of its markets.

Oil topped $72 a barrel on Monday, extending last week's gains, thanks to growing optimism about the pace of the global economic recovery and a positive demand forecast from the International Energy Agency.

The dollar edged further away from 14-month lows on Monday as investors trimmed bets against the beleaguered U.S. currency, while South Korean stocks dragged down other Asian markets on worries third-quarter earnings may not live up to expectations.

Several U.S. companies have awarded stock options to top executives while engaged in merger negotiations, the Wall Street Journal said, citing an academic research paper and its own review of company filings.

The Philippines ordered imports of 250,000 tonnes of rice on Monday as officials said two typhoons over the past 15 days had badly damaged farmlands and roads in the north and killed over 650 people.

South Korea proposed on Monday holding talks with the North on preventing flooding from a river flowing across their border that killed six South Koreans last month when the communist state released a surge of water without warning.

Pakistani aircraft attacked Taliban militants in their South Waziristan stronghold near the Afghan border as the government said a ground offensive against the al Qaeda-linked fighters was imminent.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown plans to detail a sale of government assets on Monday aimed at raising 3 billion pounds, a draft of a speech provided by his office showed on Sunday.

Venezuela's socialist leader Hugo Chavez said on Sunday that U.S. President Barack Obama had done nothing beyond wishful thinking to earn the Nobel Peace Prize.

A man wanted in connection with the hijacking of a Pan Am flight to Cuba nearly 41 years ago was arrested in New York on Sunday, a Justice Department official said.

Tengzhong, a little-known Chinese machinery maker that has agreed to buy GM's Hummer brand, aims to close the deal by early 2010 and has begun to seek regulatory approval for the purchase.

Oracle and Sun SPARC SOLARIS world record TPC-CpPerformance beats IBM's best results on DB2 with power 595 server, both companies announced during the opening keynote on Monday night at Oracle OpenWorld 2009 in San Francisco.

Sometimes, much weirder things happen at the MTV Video Music Awards than Kanye West interrupting an acceptance speech.

Investment bank Lazard Ltd said on Sunday that Chairman and Chief Executive Bruce Wasserstein, a legendary dealmaker, had been hospitalized for an irregular heartbeat.

The critically maligned Vince Vaughn comedy Couples Retreat easily took the top spot at the weekend box office in North America on Sunday, helped by the absence of any other new releases.

Director Roman Polanski is feeling depressed two weeks after his arrest in Switzerland to face U.S. extradition for a 1977 case involving the rape of a 13-year-old girl, his lawyer was quoted as saying on Sunday.

Luis Armando Pena Soltren, a man wanted for the hijack of flight 281 of Pan American in the 1960's was arrested on Sunday in a New York City airport.

Boyzone singer Stephen Gately, 33, who caused a sensation in the pop world 10 years ago by announcing he was gay, died while on holiday in Mallorca, Spain, the Irish pop group's official website said on Sunday.

Teen star Miley Cyrus used a rap video on Friday to tell a curious world just why she had abruptly deleted her popular Twitter account.

Private equity firm Blackstone Group LP is planning to list up to eight companies it owns and sell at least five others, the Financial Times said on Monday.

Credit Tight for Small Biz; Inflation Underestimation; Citi's Tax Charge?

Citigroup Inc is expected to be fined $600,000 by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority over derivatives transactions that helped foreign clients avoid taxes on dividends, a source familiar with the matter said on Sunday.

Small companies create more than half of America's jobs, but the entrepreneurs who drive this part of the economy continue to complain that access to credit two years into the recession remains scarce.

Research has highlighted a number of barriers faced by Melbourne parents when providing healthy lunchboxes for their children including poor knowledge about basic nutrition.

Comments by U.S Federal Reserve Bank Chairman Ben Bernanke relating to interest rates and inflation kept a lid on the Aussie dollar heading into the weekend and it opens this morning relatively unchanged from Friday''s Asian close at 0.9035.

There may not be as much slack in the U.S. economy as many forecasters believe, which means medium-term inflation risks could be higher, a Federal Reserve official said on Sunday.