By Scott Malone Wed Nov 28, 2012 7:57am EST (Reuters) - General Electric Co (GE.N) plans to unveil on Thursday a new push into service businesses, with a series of programs to help airlines, railroads and hospitals that use its heavy equipment operate more efficiently. The drive is part of the largest U.S. conglomerate's effort to boost its margins and ma...

By Angela Moon NEW YORK | Wed Nov 28, 2012 7:55am EST NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stock futures fell on Wednesday as investors grew more concerned about the lack of progress in U.S. budget talks to avoid looming spending cuts and tax hikes, setting the S&P 500 up for a third consecutive day of decline this week. * Chief executives from top U.S. corp...

By Stanley Carvalho ABU DHABI | Wed Nov 28, 2012 7:11am EST ABU DHABI (Reuters) - Abu Dhabi National Energy Co (TAQA) TAQA.AD will buy a number of BP's (BP.L) North Sea assets for over $1.3 billion in a sign relations between Britain and the Gulf emirate are on the mend. The deal comes weeks after a visit by Prime Minister David Cameron to the em...

FRANKFURT | Tue Nov 27, 2012 7:02pm EST FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Deutsche Bank's (DBKGn.DE) compliance chief Stephan Leithner and former board member Hugo Baenziger face skeptical German lawmakers on Wednesday as parliamentarians seek answers about how banks manipulated global benchmark interest rates. Birgit Reinemund, a lawmaker with the Free Democrats (F...

By Valerie Volcovici WASHINGTON | Tue Nov 27, 2012 6:56pm EST WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama signed a bill on Tuesday shielding U.S. airlines from paying for each ton of carbon their planes emit flying into and out of Europe, despite a recent move by Europe to suspend its proposed measure for one year. The carbon fee bill was the f...

By Rodrigo Campos NEW YORK | Tue Nov 27, 2012 6:55pm EST NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks slid on Tuesday in a choppy session, losing ground in the last hour before the close after Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid expressed disappointment that there has been "little progress" in dealing with the "fiscal cliff." The market was flat for most of the ses...

By Richard Cowan and Jeff Mason WASHINGTON | Tue Nov 27, 2012 6:31pm EST WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama on Tuesday launched a public relations push for his bid to raise taxes on wealthy Americans, but U.S. lawmakers remained deadlocked over dramatic, year-end tax increases and spending cuts known as the "fiscal cliff." At the White...

We have commented in the past about reasons for the poor state of streets and highways in this country. Yes, lack of maintenance, poor materials, climate and lack of drainage play their part. But the tendency of truckers to overload their vehicles until the frame sags under the weight plays a big part in beating to death of innocent stretches of local pavement. The highway people, Conavi, have ...

By Angela Moon NEW YORK | Tue Nov 27, 2012 8:17am EST NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stock futures were little changed on Tuesday despite news that international lenders agreed to reduce Greece's debt, as the market's focus turned back to the "fiscal cliff". * Market sentiment had improved after Euro zone finance ministers and the International Monetary Fu...

Tue Nov 27, 2012 8:08am EST (Reuters) - Long-time suitor ConAgra Foods Inc (CAG.N) finally sealed a deal to buy Ralcorp Holdings Inc (RAH.N) for $5 billion to become the biggest private label food company in North America. Ralcorp shareholders will receive $90 per share in cash, representing a premium of 28.2 percent to the stock's Monday close, ConAgra said.Ralc...

By Rodrigo Campos NEW YORK | Mon Nov 26, 2012 4:27pm EST NEW YORK (Reuters) - Wall Street slipped on Monday, pulling back from last week's gains, as retailers fell on concerns about heavy discounts at the start of the U.S. holiday shopping season and the overhang of the "fiscal cliff" kept investors wary of making big bets. The Nasdaq outperforme...

So-called "Black Friday," an import from the United States in the offering of bargains after the Thanksgiving holiday, brought out hordes of shoppers who exhibited none of the rudeness and ill-temper of U.S. counterparts recorded on CNN and other international media. Local shoppers appear less territorial and desperate than up north. Still, the national newspaper La Nacion recorded some complai...

NEW YORK | Mon Nov 26, 2012 9:35am EST NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks opened lower on Monday as investors focused on the meeting of euro zone finance ministers on Greece and negotiations over the U.S. "fiscal cliff" after last week's rally. The Dow Jones industrial average .DJI dropped 56.59 points, or 0.43 percent, to 12,953.09. The Standard & Poor's 5...

BERLIN | Sun Nov 25, 2012 11:06am EST BERLIN (Reuters) - A write-down on Greek debt should not be part of the country's next rescue package, European Central Bank board member Joerg Asmussen told Germany's Bild newspaper ahead of Monday's euro zone group meeting. "We need a package of measures to close the financial gap that will include a substantial re...

ZURICH | Sun Nov 25, 2012 10:13am EST ZURICH (Reuters) - Swiss private bank Pictet is under investigation by the U.S. authorities, the bank said on Sunday, making it the latest Swiss bank to come under scrutiny in a U.S. probe into the use of foreign banks by wealthy Americans seeking to avoid paying tax. Pictet said in a statement the U.S. Department of...

BUENOS AIRES | Sun Nov 25, 2012 10:11am EST BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) - Argentina will to go an appeals court in New York on Monday to challenge the ruling of a U.S. judge who last week issued a decision that raised the specter of a technical default by the South American country, a newspaper said. A decade after committing the biggest sovereign default in ...

By Patrick Temple-West WASHINGTON | Sun Nov 25, 2012 10:09am EST WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States is undefeated in the nearly two years since it began settling corporate tax disputes with Canada through a winner-takes-all process popularly known as baseball arbitration. Tax lawyers and accountants in both countries said the U.S. Internal ...

LONDON | Sun Nov 25, 2012 9:47am EST LONDON (Reuters) - British defense contractor BAE Systems (BAES.L) may close one of its major shipyards in Britain as it looks to balance capacity with future workloads, a top executive has told a newspaper in an interview published on Sunday. Nigel Whitehead, who is group managing director, programs and support, told...

LONDON | Sun Nov 25, 2012 9:11am EST LONDON (Reuters) - Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS.L) is facing the increasing likelihood of having to settle separately with the UK and U.S. authorities investigating its involvement in the global interest rate-setting scandal, the Sunday Telegraph said. The British newspaper said RBS is concerned it could receive a "dou...

By Jessica Wohl and Alistair Barr CHICAGO/SAN FRANCISCO | Sat Nov 24, 2012 7:32pm EST CHICAGO/SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Online shopping has grown sharply so far this holiday shopping season after U.S. retailers pushed out a slew of mobile and Internet deals that lured consumers before Cyber Monday, traditionally the biggest day for e-commerce in ...

By Margaret Chadbourn WASHINGTON | Sat Nov 24, 2012 3:44pm EST WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama, in a bid to show support for small businesses, took his daughters on an early Christmas shopping trip on Saturday as the U.S. retail sector swings into high gear this holiday season. Promoting "Small Business Saturday," the third annual e...

By Andrew Torchia DUBAI | Sat Nov 24, 2012 2:34pm EST DUBAI (Reuters) - Dubai announced plans for a huge tourism and retail development including the largest shopping mall in the world, a fresh sign that the glitzy emirate has recovered its commercial ambitions after a crippling corporate debt crisis three years ago. The development, on the outsk...

Sat Nov 24, 2012 1:49pm EST (Reuters) - Knight Capital Group Inc (KCG.N) is in talks about possibly selling its market-making operation, its largest and most profitable business, but it is not known if a deal will happen, a source said on Saturday. The securities firm has been approached by at least two rivals about its market-making operation, which uses complic...

Yesterday The Costa Rica Star reported on $1 million destined for poverty housing in Costa Rica disappearing. As prosecutors open bank accounts of the Arias Foundtion for Peace in search of a missing million dollar donation from Taiwan, the Central American Bank for Economic Development issued a statement Thursday that may clear up the mystery. The Bank says the money, the second half of a d...

FRANKFURT | Sat Nov 24, 2012 10:07am EST FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Germany's Deutsche Telekom AG (DTEGn.DE) expects the merger of its T-Mobile USA with MetroPCS Communications Inc (PCS.N) will reap "several billions of euros" in synergies, Telekom chairman Ulrich Lehner told a German weekly magazine. "The position of Deutsche Telekom in the USA will improve ...

PARIS | Sat Nov 24, 2012 10:05am EST PARIS (Reuters) - French mobile operator SFR is planning to announce lower-than-expected job cuts on Wednesday, French daily Le Figaro reported on Saturday, citing an unidentified source close to the matter. The French daily said that instead of the 2,000-job cuts expected by unions in the summer the number would be "...

By Giselda Vagnoni GUBBIO, Italy | Sat Nov 24, 2012 10:02am EST GUBBIO, Italy (Reuters) - European banks have asked the European Commission to postpone the introduction of tougher global bank capital rules by a year to 2014 after U.S. regulators delayed application of the new requirements. The new rules, known as Basel III, are the world's regula...

FRANKFURT | Sat Nov 24, 2012 8:42am EST FRANKFURT (Reuters) - German business software maker Software AG (SOWG.DE) has the financial flexibility to make any acquisition worth up to 1 billion euros ($1.30 billion), a German weekly said on Saturday, citing finance director Arnd Zinnhardt. "We are so well positioned in terms of our operating activities and ...

By Andrew Longstreth NEW YORK | Fri Nov 23, 2012 7:28pm EST NEW YORK (Reuters) - Not all manslaughter charges are created equal. If they were, the U.S. Justice Department might have filed just 11 charges when it brought a criminal case against two BP Plc employees last week, one for each of the 11 deaths in the Deepwater Horizon disaster. Instead...

By Phil Wahba and Dhanya Skariachan NEW YORK/BLOOMINGTON, Minnesota | Fri Nov 23, 2012 7:07pm EST NEW YORK/BLOOMINGTON, Minnesota (Reuters) - Retailers declared their experiment with earlier store openings to kick off the holiday shopping season a success on Friday, with those new hours expected to be a Thanksgiving night staple for more retailer...

By Rodrigo Campos NEW YORK | Fri Nov 23, 2012 6:59pm EST NEW YORK (Reuters) - Volatility is the name of this game. With the S&P 500 above 1,400 following five days of gains, traders will be hard pressed not to cash in on the advance at the first sign of trouble during negotiations over tax hikes and spending cuts that resume next week in Wash...

By Phil Wahba and Beth Pinsker Gladstone VALLEY STREAM, N.Y./BROOKLYN, New York | Fri Nov 23, 2012 6:58pm EST VALLEY STREAM, N.Y./BROOKLYN, New York (Reuters) - Malls across the United States teemed with shoppers looking for Black Friday bargains, but many in the New York area sat out the madness, too busy coping with the lingering effects of Sup...

By Jessica Wohl CHICAGO | Fri Nov 23, 2012 6:54pm EST CHICAGO (Reuters) - Nine people were arrested near a Walmart store in California on Friday as part of national protests for the rights of hourly workers, even as the world's largest retailer enjoyed what it said was its best ever start to the holiday shopping rush. Hundreds of protesters, incl...

By Phil Wahba and Jessica Wohl NEW YORK/CHICAGO | Fri Nov 23, 2012 12:47pm EST NEW YORK/CHICAGO (Reuters) - An early start to the holiday shopping season boosted retailers as customers came with their families and loaded up carts Thursday night, while later shoppers seemed more focused on sale items. In a departure from the norm, stores like Targ...

By Jessica Wohl CHICAGO | Fri Nov 23, 2012 2:31pm EST CHICAGO (Reuters) - Protesters demanding higher wages and better healthcare for Walmart hourly workers converged on the retailer's stores across the United States, though there was no evidence they disrupted operations for the start of the crucial holiday shopping season. OUR Walmart, an organ...

By Ben Berkowitz, Michelle Conlin and Jonathan Allen Fri Nov 23, 2012 2:12pm EST (Reuters) - After another day of pumping out their swampy, moldy houses, neighbors in Breezy Point in New York City huddled at the quaint generator-powered firehouse Wednesday night, stamping their feet to stay warm. Neighbors picked at food from tin cans and sipped soups fro...

By Charlie Dunmore and Luke Baker BRUSSELS | Fri Nov 23, 2012 2:00pm EST BRUSSELS (Reuters) - European Union leaders failed to reach agreement on Friday on a new seven-year budget for their troubled bloc, calling off talks in less than two days after most countries balked at far deeper spending cuts demanded by Britain and its allies. European Co...

By Leah Schnurr NEW YORK | Fri Nov 23, 2012 1:52pm EST NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks rose for a fifth day during a holiday-shortened, thinly traded session on Friday as investors picked up recently beaten-down shares of large technology companies. Market participants were also encouraged by signs of progress in talks about releasing aid to debt-sad...

By Maria Sheahan FRANKFURT | Fri Nov 23, 2012 1:50pm EST FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Volkswagen AG (VOWG_p.DE) has earmarked 50.2 billion euros ($64.7 billion) of investments over the coming three years as it accelerates plans designed to help it become the world's largest car maker by the end of the decade. As the company strives to replace Toyota Mot...

The privatization of telecommunications in Costa Rica is still hampered by bureaucracy and lack of agreements in favor of consumers. They are still 13 Costa Rican municipalities who are not authorizing the installation of “so called” cell towers because of lack of regulations in this respect, or because the regulations, where they do exist, contains disproportionate demands which make it "virtu...