Oracle won't divest Sun's hardware business

Oracle won't divest Sun's hardware business

Oracle Corp Chief Executive Larry Ellison said he won't sell off Sun Microsystems Inc's hardware business, dispelling speculation that he only wanted the company for its software units.

Oracle's steadily rising profit margins have impressed Wall Street in recent years, and analysts say it is a risky move for it to buy Sun, which has lost $2 billion in the first three quarters of its current fiscal year.

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BoE announces surprising initiative to buy more bonds

BoE announces surprising initiative to buy more bonds

The Bank of England surprised the City by ordering a £50 billion expansion of its scheme for buying corporate and government bonds. The move is part of the bank's aggressive campaign to bolster the economy and stabilize the financial sector. The move came as the BoE's Monetary Policy Committee kept interest rates at 0.5% for the second straight month.

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Oil price hits 5-month high on cheerier economic news

Oil price hits 5-month high on cheerier economic news

Rising optimism about the U.S. economy, the world's biggest energy user, drove the price of oil to more than $56 a barrel Wednesday for the first time this year. The price for New York's benchmark futures contract peaked at $56.07 a barrel, then later settled to $55.90 in New York trading

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China's central bank vows to keep pouring money into economy

China's central bank vows to keep pouring money into economy

The People's Bank of China said it is committed to providing an "ample" supply of money to stimulate economic growth, pointing to a 600% expansion of new lending in March. Experts said the central bank's efforts will likely succeed. "The momentum is gathering for quite a strong recovery in growth in the second half of the year," said Peng Wensheng, an economist at Barclays Capital.

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IMF sees shaky recovery for most Asian economies

IMF sees shaky recovery for most Asian economies

Asia's economies, excluding China and India, are expected to decline 2.9% this year and expand 1.6% next year, the International Monetary Fund said. When China and India are put back into the equation, the figures come to a 1.3% expansion this year and 4.3% growth in 2010. The IMF is encouraging Asian policymakers to continue their stimulus programs into next year.

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Australia's central bank holds benchmark rate at 3%

Australia's central bank holds benchmark rate at 3%

After six months of aggressive interest-rate cuts aimed at boosting economic growth, the Reserve Bank of Australia left its key interest rate at 3%, the lowest in 50 years. The decision followed the release of data showing that approvals for construction projects increased by 3.5% in March

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First truly actively managed ETF makes debut

First truly actively managed ETF makes debut

The first exchange-traded fund whose managers pick its stocks is making its debut Monday.
Unlike other ETFs, which mainly track indexes, the "actively managed" Grail American Beacon Large Cap Value ETF will be comprised of names that the ETF's managers choose based on research aimed at finding good, cheap stocks.
A few other ETFs bill their portfolios as "actively managed," meaning the stocks aren't bought simply because they mirror those in an index such as the Standard & Poor's 500-stock index. But in those actively managed ETFs, offered by Invesco Ltd.'s PowerShares Capital Management LLC, managers buy stocks based on computer models

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American Export analysis

American Export analysis( data)

Eurozone unemployment spikes to 8.9%

Eurozone unemployment spikes to 8.9%

Despite growing optimism from businesses and consumers, unemployment in the 16-nation eurozone surged to 8.9% in March, the highest rate in almost five years, according to the EU's statistics office. Across all 27 EU countries, joblessness edged up from February's 8.1% to 8.3% in March.

Eurostat's first estimate for inflation was the same as March and well below the European Central Bank target of just under 2 percent. It won't give details for each nation until May 15.
EU officials forecast that some 3.5 million jobs will be lost in the EU this year — although employers say that will likely be far higher at around 4.5 million.
Spain, hit hard by a collapsing housing boom and lower tourist numbers, now has the highest jobless rate in the EU at 17.4 percent. More than a third of Spanish workers under the age of 25 are out of a job.

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Asian export decline & South Korea's exports plummet 19%

Asian export decline & South Korea's exports plummet 19%

Marking six straight months of decline, South Korea's export volume dropped 19% in April. Although the nation's export-driven economy has been hit hard by the recession, it has not suffered the spectacular downturns seen in Taiwan and Japan, largely because of the pricing advantage it gets from the weakness of the South Korean currency, the won.

India, Indonesia and South Korea reported significant year-on-year declines in exports on Friday.However, a growing gap in trade performance was underlined by India’s latest figures, with exports tumbling 33 per cent in March to $11.5bn (€8.7bn, £7.7bn) from a year earlier – the biggest drop on record.

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