IBT Staff Reporter

Bank of America Corp CEO Kenneth Lewis was pressured by senior federal officials Henry Paulson and Ben Bernanke to accept a merger with troubled Merrill Lynch & Co or lose his job, New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo said on Thursday.

Records show the assets of Stanford International Bank were vastly overstated, leaving only a fraction to pay investor claims, the receiver in charge of Stanford's operations and assets said in a court filing on Thursday.

Microsoft Corp reported a sharp dip in quarterly profit on Thursday, but met Wall Street's lowered forecasts, hurt by a decline in technology spending in a global economic downturn.

President Barack Obama came under strong criticism from Republicans on Wednesday for leaving the door open to the prosecution of former Bush officials who authorized severe interrogations by the CIA.

(Corrects to show profit comparable to analysts' estimates was 39 cents per share, not 33 cents)

President Barack Obama urged U.S. credit card company executives on Thursday to stop unfair rate increases and be more transparent and accountable, tapping into popular outrage over abusive lending.

Microsoft Corp reported a sharp dip in quarterly profit on Thursday, missing Wall Street's lowered forecasts, hurt by a decline in technology spending in a global economic downturn.

EU Development Commissioner Louis Michel said Thursday that international donors pledged more than $250 million to boost security for Somalia and try to stop the rampant attacks by pirates in recent months.

The number of newly laid off U.S. workers filing claims for unemployment aid rose last week and sales of previously owned homes fell in March, according to data on Thursday that showed the economy still sliding downward.

Echelon Corp and T-Mobile USA, Inc. will partner to accelerate the adoption of the smart grid in the U.S. by using T-Mobile's wireless network to communicate data from meters to utilities, the companies said on Thursday.

The Google Street View program can continue its service in Britain if the company make sure that faces and addresses are blurred.

Preparations are underway by the Treasury department for the bankruptcy filing of Chrysler which could come as early as next week if Chrysler can swing a deal with its lenders, the New York Times reported.

Hartford Financial Services Group Inc is trying to sell its property and casualty business, sources familiar with the matter said on Thursday, as the U.S. insurer reels from massive losses.

The Treasury is preparing a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing for Chrysler LLC that could come as soon as next week, The New York Times reported on Thursday, citing people with direct knowledge of the matter.

The Treasury is preparing a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing for Chrysler LLC that could come as soon as next week, The New York Times reported on Thursday, citing people with direct knowledge of the matter.

EMC Corp. Chief Executive Joseph Tucci said Tuesday that Oracle Corp.’s deal to buy Sun Microsystems Inc. raises the stakes in the competition for control of corporate data center markets.

Oil rose on Thursday as a fall in the dollar and stock market gains outweighed rising U.S. inventories.

Hartford Financial Services Group Inc is trying to sell its property and casualty business, sources familiar with the matter said on Thursday, as the U.S. insurer reels from massive losses.

California Attorney General Edmund Brown on Thursday sued Wells Fargo for $1.5 billion over alleged false statements made to investors about the liquidity of auction-rate securities, court documents showed.

IBM plans to launch several cloud computing services this year, taking on companies such as Amazon.com Inc, Google Inc, Microsoft Corp and Salesforce.com Inc.

Exelon Corp. and solar panel maker SunPower Corp. plan to build a solar power plant in an urban area in Chicago with the capacity to produce the electricity required by up to 1,500 homes in one year.

Stocks rose on Thursday as a climb in bank shares helped offset disappointing economic data and outlooks from economic bellwethers, including UPS.

German music authors' society GEMA said on Thursday it was in talks with Google Inc's YouTube to resolve a dispute over royalty payments and the conditions under which music videos are made available online.

Yahoo Inc is shutting down GeoCities, a free service that hosts personal home pages for consumers, which it acquired for more than $4 billion 10 years ago during the heyday of the dotcom boom.

United Parcel Service Inc reported Tuesday that its first quarter profit plunged 56 percent, with results coming in below the average of analysts’ estimates.

A U.S. House of Representatives bill aimed at fighting global warming will allow some polluters access to free permits to emit greenhouse gas emissions in its cap-and-trade system, Democratic Representative Edward Markey said on Thursday.

The chief executive and co-founder of social networking site MySpace is reportedly leaving the company due to termination.

Deflation has arrived but inflation could be flaring up in a couple years. The latest March consumer price index showed the first decline over a 12 month period since the Eisenhower administration. With rising unemployment and excess factory capacity there is virtually no pressure for wages or prices to rise.

Millions of Americans at this very moment are on online, scrolling, reading and typing at their computers.