IBT Staff Reporter

Standard & Poor's, under fire for its role in the U.S. housing market meltdown, is taking steps to ensure its ratings are sound and is reviewing its rated transactions more frequently, the credit rating agency told a Senate panel on Wednesday.

Kazakhstan passed a law on Wednesday allowing the government to break contracts with foreign companies, alarming investors and raising the stakes in its row with an Italian-led group developing a huge oilfield.

French-Dutch airline Air France KLM is planning to team up with two Spanish firms to bid for Spain's Iberia against a group led by private equity group TPG, Expansion newspaper said on Wednesday.

The European Union said on Wednesday U.S. subsidies for Boeing Co. had caused Airbus billions of dollars of damage in recent years and described the U.S. response to the charges as weak.

Vilified as a Holocaust denier, a supporter of terrorism and a backer of Iraqi insurgents, the president of Iran was actually able to make New Yorkers burst into laughter but not at a joke.

Toshiba Corp, Canon Inc and 30 to 40 other Japanese firms will team up to develop biochips, seeking new revenues in a market currently dominated by U.S. firms.

Sharp Corp said it would launch a Blu-ray high-definition DVD recorder with a 1-terabyte hard disk drive (HDD), the world's largest storage capacity on any Blu-ray recorder, as it competes with the HD DVD camp. Sharp, along with Sony Corp and Panasonic maker Matsushita Electric Industrial Co, promotes Blu-ray optical disc technology, while Toshiba Corp and Microsoft Corp back the rival HD DVD format.

When a Western bank suddenly suspended the account of her family freight firm, Nazila Noebashari revived a financial practice she thought long gone: she sent staff to the Afghan border to collect $50,000 by hand.

Microsoft Corp is offering to replace damaged discs of its just-launched Halo 3 game for the Xbox amid reports that special limited-edition packaging is scratching them.

Bank of America Corp said it will lay off about 2,500 workers in Illinois and 1,500 in Michigan over the next two years in connection with its $21 billion purchase of LaSalle Bank Corp from Dutch bank ABN AMRO Holding NV.

The weak dollar's leading role in oil's ascent to record highs is partly due to a tide of financial flows into commodity investments but also reflects a shift in the greenback's relationship with crude.

Russia unveiled its first all-new airliner since the fall of the Soviet Union on Wednesday, hoping to curb dependence on oil and gas exports and restore pride in its teetering aviation industry.

Nasdaq and Borse Dubai, aiming to muscle out potential rival bidders, boosted an offer for OMX to $4.9 billion on Wednesday and pushed close to a majority stake in the Nordic exchange group.

Japan's new prime minister, Yasuo Fukuda, won nearly 60 percent support in the first public opinion poll published since the seasoned moderate took office, double that of his predecessor.

Work is likely the last place an employee might go to seek help for depression, but employees who took part in a workplace intervention program had fewer symptoms and were far more productive, U.S. researchers said on Tuesday.

The dollar bounced off record lows versus the euro and moved away from 15-year troughs against a basket of currencies on Wednesday, after recent losses attracted buyers even though overall sentiment remained bearish.

Stock futures rose on Wednesday as news of a tentative deal ending a strike at General Motors Corp raised hopes that Detroit's automakers would soon slash their health-care costs.

Oil rose back above $80 on Wednesday, after three days of losses, with investors expecting weekly U.S. data to show crude stocks declining further in the world's top consumer.

The United Auto Workers union and General Motors Corp reached a tentative contract on Wednesday to end a national strike by 73,000 workers with a deal that includes a groundbreaking health-care trust fund. Production will resume on Wednesday, ending the first national UAW strike against GM since 1970 after two days.

Taxpayers who lose their homes to foreclosure would no longer face an untimely tax bill from the Internal Revenue Service on the unpaid mortgage debt under a bill approved by a U.S. House of Representatives panel on Wednesday.

India's Unichem Laboratories is in talks with a few Brazilian drug firms for a $20-25 million acquisition, after it failed to seal a takeover deal there, a top official said, forecasting a faster revenue growth for FY08.

Malaysian property developer UEM Land has roped in U.S. firm General Electric as a strategic partner in plans it is spearheading to build a new Asian boomtown in the country's southern region of Johor.

Indonesia and Exxon Mobil Corp. have halted negotiations on the disputed Natuna D-Alpha gas block, which is now controlled by the U.S. company, an official at energy watchdog BPMIGAS told Reuters on Tuesday.

The asset manager of Belgian-Dutch financial group Fortis said on Tuesday it would buy a Tokyo-based asset managing firm wholly owned by Germany's Commerzbank to expand its operations in Japan.

Armed with pruning clippers, a worker in a white lab coat snips a plastic Hello Kitty play set into lentil-sized bits that will be bathed in chemicals simulating gastric acid.

The trial of an Alaska politician found guilty of taking bribes from the oil industry has offered a glimpse into more widespread corruption in the state's government.

China's huge Three Gorges Dam hydro-power project could spark "catastrophe" unless accumulating environmental threats are quickly defused, senior officials and experts have warned, according to state media.

World leaders signaled on Tuesday that a long-awaited global trade deal could soon be within reach, reviving some hopes that the Doha trade talks may finally move beyond years of deadlock and discord.

A majority of hedge fund managers say a U.S. recession is very likely in 2008, but fewer than one in five said an economic slowdown would be bad for their funds, a survey of several-hundred hedge fund managers released on Tuesday found.