World stocks and oil ticked higher on Tuesday as Japan and Australia stepped up efforts to boost ailing economies, helping calm fears about deteriorating corporate profits. Australia slashed interest rates by a full percentage point to a record low of 3.25 percent and unveiled a $26 billion stimulus. The Bank of Japan said it would
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Scandinavian airline SAS said on Tuesday it would make a rights issue of 6 billion Swedish crowns ($720 million) as it posted a pretax loss of 403 million crowns in the fourth quarter and announced 3,000 job cuts. In addition, 5,600 employees will leave the group as part of divestments or outsourcing. Following are details
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BP Plc missed analysts' forecasts with a 24 percent drop in fourth-quarter replacement cost net profit to $2.59 billion, due to a collapse in oil prices and a big loss at its Russian unit. Chief Executive Tony Hayward said the oil major was responding to weaker crude prices by intensifying his efforts to cut costs
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U.S. auto sales for January are expected to drop to a 27-year low, extending a 15-month downturn and adding weight to the view that the hard-hit sector will remain a drag on the economy in the current quarter. Major automakers are scheduled to announce January sales results on Tuesday. The releases by General Motors Corp,
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European shares moved higher in early trade on Tuesday, with Vodafone leading the gainers after it reported better-than-expected revenues, while BP fell after disappointing numbers. By 0929 GMT, the pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 index of top shares was 0.3 percent higher at 779.95 points. "It's a bear market rally but I think any recovery is going
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Panasonic Corp said it would launch in April in Japan plasma TVs that are a quarter of the thickness and consume half as much electricity as conventional models, in a bid to stir up demand amid a spreading recession. Panasonic, the world's largest plasma TV maker ahead of Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, aims to boost
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Seven months after IBM delivered the world's fastest supercomputer, it has announced an even speedier one with the computing power of 2 million laptops. IBM said on Tuesday it is developing the technology for its new Sequoia computer, with delivery scheduled in 2011 to the Department of Energy for use at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.
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Stock index futures pointed to a higher opening on Wall Street on Tuesday, bouncing back from recent weakness as investors braced for a flurry of corporate results, as well as for U.S. auto sales data for January. At 0922 GMT futures for the S&P 500 were up 0.4 percent, Dow Jones futures were up 0.4
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Australia slashed rates and unveiled a $26 bln stimulus on Tuesday as authorities stepped up efforts to revive foundering economies. The government more than doubled its initial stimulus, bringing the total package to more than $49 bln or nearly 8 percent of the economy's annual output to stave off a recession already engulfing much of
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The Bank of Japan on Tuesday pledged to spend $11 billion to buy shares held by Japanese banks to ease the pain from the global financial crisis, reviving a scheme launched earlier this decade to head off a domestic banking crisis. The move came as a Japanese newspaper report said Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, Japan's
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