IBT Staff Reporter

St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank President William Poole said on Friday that inflation must be kept under wraps, but if both growth and price pressures were sufficiently weak, he would back a reduction in U.S. interest rates. He said policy should be disciplined but not more than warranted.

The World Trade Organization swore in David Unterhalter from South Africa as a member of the Appellate Body by the Body's Chairman, A.V. Ganesan, at a ceremony on Thursday.

New research released by the RAC has revealed that half of young drivers are unable to read a map. Whilst 84% of drivers claim to have good map reading skills, research from RAC Direct Insurance has revealed that actual number of skilled map readers to be far lower.

Permanent tsb today announced that the slow down of growth in house prices in Ireland could have been aided by the recent rise in interest rates by the European Central Bank.

Yesterday, Microsoft announced pricing and release dates for its anticipated Zune portable media player. Once thought to be the greatest threat to Apple's dominant iPod lines, some experts now contend that the device will do more damage to Microsoft partners instead.

Ryaniar today raised it’s Net Profit guidance to approxiamately 335m Euros, an increase of 10%. Previously the guidance was an increase of 5%.

Standard Chartered Plc today announced that 48,500,000 Placing Shares have been placed at 1375p per share.

Following it’s AGM today, Filtronic Plc’s Chairman John Poulter announced in a statement to shareholders, that the AGM had witnessed a resolution dealing with the disposal of the wireless infrastructure business being passed.

Scottish & Southern Energy Plc has confirmed that 2007 will see it raise its prices for domestic electricity and gas by 9.4% (average) and 12.2% respectively.

Toshiba Corp. and Fujitsu Ltd. joined a growing list of computer makers recalling Sony Corp. batteries in the latest blow to consumer confidence in Sony's reputation as a manufacturer. Toshiba announced a recall of 830,000 laptop batteries prone to short-circuiting and even catching fire.

Advances in the Indian automotive sector, especially in engine technologies, are key drivers to the Indian automotive electronics market, potentially pushing growth over 21 percent in the next five years a new report indicates.

Asian carmakers aim to churn out higher profits in Europe by moving up-market now that they have established a solid foothold in the region, while their local rivals struggle with excess inventories and restructuring costs.

Lumber prices have lost a third of their value since January amid a cooling U.S. housing sector, and a softwood trade deal between the United States and Canada won't stem the slide soon because implementation may be delayed.

IBM and Xing Inc., a subsidiary of Brother Industries, announced a partnership to design and develop wireless karaoke controllers, allowing users to search for songs and order food or drinks from their tables.

On Thursday, HP Inc. announced the acquisition of PC manufacturer VoodooPC, maker of specialized gaming desktops and notebooks, however some experts contend the purchase will have little affect on HP's revenues.

Dell announced on Friday that an additional 200 thousand batteries need to be recalled, expanding the initial recall the firm placed in August.

British Airways, Europe's third largest airline, said on Friday its pension deficit had risen to 2.1 billion pounds following a new actuarial valuation.

China is quietly adjusting its policy on the yuan, letting it appreciate a little faster and setting the stage for a possibly wider trading band, traders and analysts said after a recent surge in the currency's value.

The founder of craigslist, the free social networking and classifieds Web site, said on Thursday he is not interested in selling out, a few hours after social networking site MySpace was valued at $15 billion.

Korean social networking Cyworld's recently launched U.S. unit said on Thursday it signed with a Hollywood talent agency to help it win licensing deals with media properties that appeal to young Web users.

Billionaire investor and dot-com veteran Mark Cuban had harsh words on Thursday for YouTube, the online site that lets people share video clips, saying only a moron would purchase the wildly popular start-up.

Hong Kong's foreign-exchange market can leverage its strengths to become an international centre, Monetary Authority Chief Executive Joseph Yam says.

Auto giant DaimlerChrysler AG is in detailed discussions with China's Chery Automobile to make cars for sale in the United States and other markets and could finalize the deal soon, sources said on Friday. Most funding would be from DaimlerChrysler with U.S. models labeled as Chrysler.

Oil steadied above $62 on Friday as burgeoning U.S. inventories and slower-than-expected economic growth balanced possible action from some OPEC producers to trim output to halt the decline in prices.

BlackBerry maker Research In Motion Ltd. breezed past investor and analyst expectations in delivering its second-quarter results on Thursday and forecast strong growth in subscribers for the future......

Lenovo Group Ltd, the 3rd largest personal computer maker in the world, become a new member of pc makers annoyed by the problem......

Miners are 'staggeringly cheap' after share prices dropped while metals prices stayed strong, and some of their earnings may beat expectations

Soft drinks company Britvic said on Friday its full year results would be towards the top end of market expectations after favourable summer trading aided by hot weather and the World Cup.

The government hopes legislation banning age discrimination in the workplace from this weekend will also change cultural attitudes