IBT Staff Reporter

Johnson & Johnson has decided to drop plans for now to start a separate wellness and disease-prevention unit, its chief financial officer Dominic Caruso told the Wall Street Journal in an interview.

South Korea's LG Display Co Ltd posted on Thursday a steeper-than-expected quarterly operating loss due to weak LCD panel prices, but forecast improvements in prices and shipments as the sector slowly recovers.

Loss-making General Motors unit Saab Automobile said on Thursday it had signed confidentiality agreements with 27 potential suitors in its efforts to find a new owner to help it survive the downturn.

Sun Microsystems Inc would be willing to resume takeover talks with International Business Machines Corp if IBM made a stronger commitment to closing a deal, Bloomberg said, citing two people familiar with the matter.

Thursday, Fitch Ratings downgraded Thailand's long-term foreign currency Issuer Default Rating or IDR to 'BBB' from 'BBB+', and the long-term local currency IDR to 'A minus' from 'A'. The firm however revised the outlook on the ratings to stable from negative.

South Korean flat-screen maker LG Display Co Ltd , posted on Thursday a second straight quarter of losses due to weak panel prices and depressed demand for electronics.

First-quarter sales at Roche Holding AG , the Swiss drugmaker that recently bought Genentech for $46.8 billion, rose 8 percent and met forecasts thanks to the strong growth of blockbuster cancer drug Avastin.

General Motors Corp has told U.S. dealers it is accelerating its timetable for closing about 1,700 dealerships as it rushes to meet a June 1 deadline to restructure under U.S. government oversight, people with knowledge of the discussions said.

First-quarter sales at Roche Holding AG , the Swiss drugmaker that recently bought Genentech for $46.8 billion, rose 8 percent due to strong sales of cancer medicines, in line with forecasts.

First-quarter sales at Roche Holding AG , the Swiss drugmaker that recently bought Genentech for $46.8 billion, rose 8 percent due to strong sales of cancer medicines, in line with forecasts.

Rosetta Stone Inc shares priced at $18 in the company's initial public offering, above the estimate range, a source with direct knowledge of the deal said on Wednesday, making it the fourth IPO on a U.S. exchange in 2009 as equities markets struggle to stabilize.

Oil fell back below $50 a barrel on Thursday, after surging more than 2 percent as equity markets rallied on signs the U.S. recession was easing, boosting hopes of a demand recovery in world's top energy consumer.

China's economy slowed in the first quarter to its weakest pace on record, but an improvement in data for March offered tentative signs that the worst may be over for the world's third-largest economy.

Money manager J. Ezra Merkin has provided regulators with information as they investigate the $65 billion Ponzi fraud perpetrated by Bernard Madoff, a New York judge said ruling released on Wednesday.

One of the nation’s largest public pension funds says it is looking to buy assets which are a part of the U.S. government’s $700 billion program to help banks sell off the illiquid investments.

British hedge fund manager Crispin Odey of Odey Asset Management said on Wednesday that he believes the current U.S. stock market rally could be lasting.

The U.S. will release the methods it used to measure the health of the nation’s 19 largest banks ahead of the release of the results of the so-called “stress tests” which would indicate which banks were in need of further government help, according to a report.

U.S. Energy trader SemGroup LP spiraled into bankruptcy last year after its top executives lied about its liquidity problems and mismanaged a speculative trading strategy, according to a report released by the company's court-appointed examiner on Wednesday.

China's economy slowed in the first quarter to its weakest pace on record, but an improvement in data for March offers tentative signs that the worst may be over for the world's third-largest economy.

China's annual gross domestic product growth slowed in the first quarter to 6.1 percent from 6.8 percent in the fourth quarter of 2008, the National Bureau of Statistics said on Thursday.

General Motors Corp has told U.S. dealers it is accelerating its timetable for closing about 1,700 dealerships as it rushes to meet a June 1 deadline to restructure under U.S. government oversight, people with knowledge of the discussions said.

General Motors Corp has told U.S. dealers it is accelerating its timetable for closing about 1,700 dealerships as it rushes to meet a June 1 deadline to restructure under U.S. government oversight, people with knowledge of the discussions said.

Australia’s Largest airline, Qantas Airways, said Tuesday it would cut 1750 job due to the current in the economic crisis, as S&P cuts its rating from BBB+ to BBB.

New York Governor David Paterson will introduce legislation on Thursday to make gay marriage legal, but the move faces an uncertain vote in the state's Senate.

Microsoft released a beta version of Exchange Server 2010 enabling users to familiarize themselves with new features and capability, while also helping the company find problems.

The U.S. economy continued to weaken in March and early April but the speed of contraction was fading amid scattered signs the country's recession may be nearing an end, the Federal Reserve said on Wednesday.

Fiat SpA Chief Executive Sergio Marchionne turned up the heat on talks with struggling U.S. automaker Chrysler on Wednesday as General Motors Corp confirmed a possible buyer for its Saturn network.

Real money investors sat out the March stock market rally and are probably waiting for a second one around June or July, the head of the world's biggest stock exchange, NYSE Euronext , said in a newspaper interview.

Global shipments of personal computers slid 7.1 percent in the first quarter, industry tracker IDC said on Wednesday, although falling prices and the increasing popularity of netbooks helped keep sales from slipping even further.