IBT Staff Reporter

Countrywide Financial Corp Chief Executive Angelo Mozilo should give up his role as chairman, and the largest U.S. mortgage lender should overhaul its practices for granting stock options, a union-affiliated pension plan urged on Monday.

The Dow and S&P 500 declined on Monday as energy company shares fell on lower oil prices and investors worried about the economy, but Nasdaq rose, lifted by Apple Inc. Oil dropped 2 percent amid economic concerns, sending Exxon Mobil Corp down 2.1 percent at $90.15. The stock weighed on the Dow and S&P 500.

Turkey said on Monday it will exhaust diplomatic channels before launching any military strike into northern Iraq to root out Kurdish rebels, who killed at least a dozen Turkish soldiers in fighting over the weekend.

IBM and Taiwan's top chip design firm Mediatek Inc said on Monday they are jointly launching a research and development project to develop ultra-fast chipsets to tap into growth in the consumer market.

AT&T Inc, the biggest U.S. mobile service, said on Monday it would offer wireless song downloads from Napster Inc's digital music service, expanding an existing agreement.

Barclays and Royal Bank of Scotland have lined up emergency funds of up to $30 billion from the U.S. Federal Reserve to bail out American clients caught up in the global credit crunch, a paper said.

Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis President William Poole said on Friday that interest rates are about right and if the Fed decides to cut again, it ought be confident it will not have to quickly reverse course.

British insurer Resolution hit six-year highs in a weaker market on Monday, lifted by hopes of a 5 billion pound ($10.2 billion) bid from rival Standard Life, backed by giant Swiss Re.

Multinational retailers are waiting for India's chaotic industry to settle down.

Microsoft Corp ended three years of resistance on Monday and finally agreed to comply with a landmark 2004 antitrust decision by the European Commission.

Bear Stearns Cos, the U.S. investment bank battered by slumping mortgage markets, and China's CITIC Securities Co have agreed to swap stakes in each other and form a broad alliance, the firms said on Monday. The deal would bolster access to business in booming China for Bear, which lags bigger Wall Street rivals in expanding its business beyond the United States.

Electrolux undershot forecasts with flat quarterly earnings on Monday as new product launches cost more than expected, and said its outlook for higher full-year earnings had grown more uncertain.

Third quarter U.S. corporate earnings are expected to show a lower increase next week, weighed down by consumer and financial sectors, Reuters Estimates said on Monday.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc will spend up to 100 billion yen ($878 million) to buy out minority shareholders in Japanese supermarket unit Seiyu Ltd in an effort to turn around the money-losing chain.

Stock futures declined on Monday, suggesting a lower opening for Wall Street, hit by weakness in global markets and concern that credit problems may be having a wider impact on earnings.

Gold shrugged off a tumbling U.S. dollar to fall more than 1 percent on Monday as investors cashed in on the metal's rally to a near three-decade high.

The dollar hit a record low against the euro on Monday as traders seized on Group of Seven finance officials' apparent indifference toward dollar weakness as a cue to dump the ailing greenback.

David Beckham doesn't have anything to fear from robot players -- for now. At an indoor field in Tokyo, dozens of robots played soccer while others danced to samba music to cheer them on.

A change in Iran's top nuclear negotiator indicates President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and those who oppose any compromise in an atomic standoff with the West are winning the policy argument in the Islamic Republic.

When the annual trade show once known simply as E3 kicks off this week, attendees will discover a distinctly downsized event.

Bridgestone Corp aims to boost annual profit by 80 percent and sales by a fifth over the next five years as it steps up its quest to be the world's biggest tire maker.

Financial market turbulence should have only a limited impact on euro-zone growth, European Central Bank policymakers said at weekend meetings of global financial officials in Washington.

Worries about the world-leading U.S. economy and fears over bank credit rippled across financial markets on Monday, sending stocks sharply lower and dragging the dollar to a record low against the euro.

China's ruling Communist Party unveiled a new leadership line-up on Monday, including two men positioned to eventually succeed President Hu Jintao and government head Premier Wen Jiabao.

Oil prices fell on Monday, extending the previous session's decline on profit taking from record highs, but clung to $88 on violence between Turkish soldiers and Kurdish guerrillas and a record-low dollar.

Fiscal policy makers from the Group of Seven meeting this week in Washington this week did not specifically address the issue of the dollar trading near all-time lows versus the euro in recent weeks.

So much for predictions that the Web would crush the book publishing industry.

Affordable art sounds like a contradiction in terms these days, but there are some cheap alternatives.

Startup companies are confident that the Internet still has room for new ideas.