Wall Street rises after Alcoa reports earnings

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. stocks rose on Wednesday, rebounding from two days of losses, as investors turned their focus to the first prominent results of the earnings season.Stocks had retreated at the start of the week from the S&P 500's highest point in five years, hit last Friday, on worries about possible earnings weakness.Shares of Alcoa Inc were down 0.5 percent to $9.08 after early gains,...

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News Summary: Report says SEC probes Herbalife

SEC SEEKERS: The Wall Street Journal reports that the Securities and Exchange Commission has launched a probe into Herbalife Ltd. The newspaper cited an unnamed person close to the inquiry.TIP OF THE PYRAMID? Herbalife has been facing investor questions about its business model. Last month, Pershing Square Capital Management's William Ackman said he was shorting the stock for several months after...

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Asia stocks rise on positive start to US earnings

BANGKOK (AP) — A positive start to U.S. corporate earnings season helped boost Asian stock markets Thursday.Major regional benchmarks rose on the heels of a handful of better-than-expected results that also lifted Wall Street.Consumer products maker Helen of Troy, whose brands include Dr. Scholl's and Vidal Sassoon, reported a 15 percent profit increase. Electronic payments processor Global Payments...

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ING Bank may cut more costs as bad loans weigh

Dutch banking and insurance group ING said it may need to cut more costs to cope with new regulations and high provisions for bad loans, highlighting the pressures on banks to shrink their businesses.Banks globally are facing higher capital requirements to satisfy regulators at a time when a weak economy is reducing demand for investment banking and credit services, forcing them to reduce costs by...

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Japan to compile 12 trillion yen extra budget: sources

TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's government will compile a 12 trillion yen ($136.30 billion) extra budget with up to 10 trillion yen set aside for economic stimulus, several sources told Reuters on Monday.The government will sell more than 5 trillion in new bonds to fund the budget, the sources said. The remaining funds will come from unspent money from last fiscal year's budget and money originally allocated...

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Canada leading indicator edges up 0.1 percent in November

OTTAWA (Reuters) - The composite leading indicator for Canada rose 0.1 percent in November, slowing down from October on a housing market downturn and weak manufacturing as the economy hits a soft patch.The index rose 0.2 percent in October and was up every month in 2012 except July, said a report on Monday by the Macdonald-Laurier Institute. The think tank developed the modified indicator last year...

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Private equity pours money into India primary healthcare

MUMBAI (Reuters) - Private equity funds quadrupled their investment in India's primary healthcare, betting the sick and ailing will stop seeing family doctors in often cramped and dingy quarters and check into modern chains sprouting up across Asia's No.3 economy.Goldman Sachs Group Inc, Warburg Pincus LLC, Sequoia Capital and the Government of Singapore Investment Corp are among investors that pumped...

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Fed's Plosser sees lasting blow to potential growth rate

SAN DIEGO (Reuters) - The United States economy likely suffered a lasting decline in its trend potential growth rate as a result of the severe 2007-2009 U.S. recession, a top official of the Federal Reserve said on Friday."Any of you who have looked at the data of the most recent ... recession, it certainly looks like we've had a permanent shock," Charles Plosser, president of the Philadelphia Federal...

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U.S. public schools cut 11,000 jobs in December

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Local U.S. governments cut jobs for the fourth straight month in December, including 11,000 in public schools, dragging down the nation's fragile economic recovery, jobs data showed on Friday. Local government jobs are now at their lowest level since October 2005, with the bulk of the decline coming from layoffs of teachers and other school employees, according...

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Lunch meat maker Hormel orders up Skippy sandwich

 Hormel Foods apparently has a hankering for a peanut butter and bacon sandwich. The company primarily known for Spam and other cured, smoked and deli meats said Thursday that it's buying Skippy, the country's No. 2 peanut butter brand, in its biggest-ever acquisition.Skippy, which was introduced in 1932 and is a staple in American pantries, is intended to increase Hormel's presence in the center...

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Economy, year-end sales help auto industry in 2012

DETROIT (AP) — A steadily improving economy and strong December sales lifted the American auto industry to its best performance in five years in 2012, especially for Volkswagen and Japanese-brand vehicles, and experts say the next year should be even better.Carmakers on Thursday announced their final figures, which totaled 14.5 million — 13 percent better than 2011.More than three years after the...

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IMF's economist: budget cuts may hurt growth less now

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Belt-tightening in advanced economies may not be as harmful to growth now as it was during the height of the financial crisis, but governments should still be careful about drastic cuts, an International Monetary Fund research paper found on Thursday.The IMF came under heavy criticism in October when it conceded that austerity programs it recommended during the global economic...

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Transocean to pay $1.4 billion for role in BP oil spill

 Transocean Ltd agreed to pay $1.4 billion to settle U.S. government charges over BP Plc's massive Gulf of Mexico oil spill in 2010 and the rig contractor admitted that its crew on the Deepwater Horizon was partly responsible.Transocean, which employed nine of the 11 workers killed in the accident, had set aside $1.5 billion for the U.S. Department of Justice out of a $1.95 billion Macondo loss...

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U.S. ends long Google probe with only mild reprimand

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - In a major victory for Google Inc, U.S. regulators on Thursday ended their investigation into the giant Internet company and concluded that it had not manipulated its Web search results to hurt rivals.The Federal Trade Commission did, however, win promises from Google that it would end the practice of "scraping" reviews and other data from rivals' websites for its own products,...

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China official factory PMI points to steady growth revival

 China's official manufacturing purchasing managers' index held steady in December at 50.6, matching November's seven-month high, as growth in new orders was unchanged and the pace of output softened marginally.With the main index above 50 for three straight months, the survey indicates that China's vast factory sector is expanding. The official PMI was released a day after a similar survey by...

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FDA approves 1st new tuberculosis drug in 40 years

The Food and Drug Administration on Monday approved a Johnson & Johnson tuberculosis drug that is the first new medicine to fight the deadly infection in more than four decades.The agency approved J&J's pill, Sirturo, for use with older drugs to fight a hard-to-treat strain of tuberculosis that has not responded to other medications. However, the agency cautioned that the drug carries risks...

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US hits borrowing limit, moves to avoid default

The U.S. government is running up against its $16.4 trillion borrowing limit and is taking steps to avoid default.Reaching the limit Monday sets up another dispute between the White House and Congress over taxes and spending in the new year.Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner says the government will take a series of accounting measures to avoid defaulting on its debt. On Monday, it suspended the...

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Deal will prevent spike in milk prices

A potential doubling of milk prices will be averted as part of the compromise that White House and congressional bargainers reached on wide-ranging legislation to avert the "fiscal cliff," a leading senator said late Monday.Senate Agriculture Committee Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., told reporters that negotiators had agreed to extend portions of the expired 2008 farm bill through September....

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Insight: How Colombian drug traffickers used HSBC to launder money

 When several Colombian men were indicted in January 2010 on money-laundering charges, the case in Brooklyn federal court drew little attention.It looked like a bust of another nexus of drug traffickers and money launderers, with mainly small-time operatives paying the price for their crimes.One of the men was Julio Chaparro, a 48-year-old father of four who owned three factories that made children's...

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Analysis: Japan's yen offensive may give Toyota an edge over Hyundai

TOKYO (Reuters) - When Toyota Motor Corp President Akio Toyoda visited northern Japan in July last year and announced a $24 million engine plant expansion, some analysts saw it as evidence of a flawed strategy that put patriotism above profitability.At the time, Toyota was struggling to rebuild its supply base after the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami and the yen was climbing toward a post-war record...

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