IBT Staff Reporter

Bank of America Corp Chief Executive Kenneth Lewis may be forced to give up his role as chairman but is set to win re-election to the bank's board by a wide margin, the Wall Street Journal said.

Stock index futures pointed to a higher start for Wall Street on Wednesday, ahead of GDP data.

World stocks rose on Wednesday and government bonds and the low-yielding yen fell as forecast-beating earnings from European companies spurred share buying ahead of key U.S. growth data.

Asia stocks and the Australian dollar bounced back on Wednesday from a two-day slide, with investors taking heart from data showing the U.S. economy slowly healing while keeping an eye on the spread of swine flu around the world.

Daniel Bouton, the chairman of Societe Generale whose reputation was hit by a trading scandal at the bank, said on Wednesday he would resign in the wake of repeated criticism over his performance.

Citigroup Inc may have to raise more capital after preliminary results of its stress test from U.S. regulators, people familiar with the matter said, and Bank of America Corp may need billions more, the Wall Street Journal reported.

With signs the deep U.S. economic swoon may be easing, Federal Reserve policy makers appear ready to hold off new measures to flood the economy with money while keeping interest rates steady near zero on the final day of a two-day meeting on Wednesday.

Citigroup Inc has asked the U.S. Treasury for permission to pay special bonuses and is looking for ways to free an energy-trading unit from government restrictions, the Wall Street Journal reported on its website on Tuesday.

Asian stocks dropped for a second day on Tuesday and Japanese shares hit a one-month low, with investors fretting about the potential economic fallout if the swine virus outbreak becomes a full-fledged pandemic and the results of U.S. bank stress tests.

Citigroup is asking the U.S. Treasury for permission to pay out bonuses to some employees, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

Anheuser-Busch InBev NV has told General Electric Co's NBC that it will spend only about half as much on its coming Olympic advertising package as it did on the previous one, the Wall Street Journal said.

California financier Danny Pang was arrested by FBI agents on Tuesday on federal charges that he allegedly structured cash transactions to keep them below $10,000, a sum which triggers a report to the federal government, U.S. prosecutors said today.

The U.S. Treasury announced its plans to help homeowners lower payments on their second mortgages, helping them avoid foreclosures while also incentivizing loan servicers.

Hewlett-Packard on Tuesday introduced a line of inexpensive small business notebooks, called ProBooks which offer a choice between Windows or Linux operating systems.

The California Public Employees’ Retirement System, which is the largest U.S. public pension fund, announced on Tuesday that it will vote against the re-election of the entire Bank of America board of Directors, including Chief Executive Officer and Chairman Ken Lewis.

The wind energy industry installed 2,836 megawatts of new generating capacity from January to March 2009, double the amount of the same period a year ago, said the American Wind Energy Association on Tuesday.

E*Trade Financial Corp, a U.S. retail brokerage, said it is facing regulatory pressure to boost capital as it posted its seventh straight quarterly loss, and its shares fell 25 percent in after-hours trade.

Tesla's Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk and the all-electric Model S are scheduled to appear on The Late Show with David Letterman on April 29.

The Food and Drug Administration issued a final rule Tuesday that requires manufactures of over-the-counter (OTC) products to revise their labeling including warnings about potential safety risks, such as internal bleeding and liver damage to help the consumers use products safely.

The U.S. Justice Department is making inquiries about a class action deal that Google Inc struck giving it the right to digitize and sell entire libraries, two experts on digitization told Reuters on Tuesday.

A group of authors who are considering whether to opt out of a settlement with Google Inc that gives it the right to distribute books online were granted a delay by a federal judge on Tuesday.

Websites displaying child pornography fell by almost 10 percent in 2008, but most of those images were still being peddled by commercial sites, an Internet watchdog said on Wednesday.

The U.S. Treasury has reached a tentative deal with banks representing most of Chrysler LLC's first-lien debt but the agreement needs approval from more than 40 other lenders holding the automaker's debt, people familiar with the talks said on Tuesday.

A Russian warship captured a suspected pirate vessel with 29 people on board off the coast of Somalia, Russian news agencies reported on Wednesday, citing defense ministry sources.

Airline shares around the world largely took another hit on Tuesday on fears of steep falls in business and leisure traffic because of the swine flu outbreak.

A group of authors who are considering whether to opt out of a settlement with Google Inc that gives it the right to distribute books online were granted a delay by a federal judge on Tuesday.

E*Trade Financial Corp said on Tuesday its loss in the first quarter deepened missing Wall Streets expectations and that it would have to raise new capital. Its were down 23 percent in after-hours trade.

Wells Fargo's CEO is feeling optimistic about the economy and believes the recession is near the end.

Computer server maker Sun Microsystems Inc reported a wider quarterly loss as sales fell because of lower technology spending and uncertainty over the company's future.