Business News

Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Tuesday, March 9, 2010.(AP Photo/Mark Lennihan)AP - World stock markets were little changed Wednesday even as surging Chinese exports pointed to a pickup in global trade.



AP - British Prime Minister Gordon Brown warns that the U.K. may suffer another economic downturn, including a possible dip back into recession.

US President Barack Obama speaks on healthcare and health insurance reform at Arcadia University in Glenside, Pennsylvania. Obama has launched a populist assault on price-gouging American insurance firms, escalating his last-ditch bid to pass a historic health reform bill.(AFP/Saul Loeb)AP - President Barack Obama has chosen a suburban St. Louis high school to make his closing argument for a health care overhaul, pushing a new anti-fraud plan as he cranks up the pressure on skittish Democratic lawmakers to act fast.



Job seekers during a career fair in San Diego, California, in January 2010. The United States lost fewer jobs than expected in February and the unemployment rate held at 9.7 percent, the government said Friday, cautioning the data may be skewed by winter storms.(AFP/Getty Images/File/Sandy Huffaker)AP - Legislation blending help for the jobless with popular tax breaks for businesses and individuals is slated to pass the Senate Wednesday over protests from conservatives who say it adds too much to the $12.5 trillion national debt.



AP - Highlights of Senate legislation extending unemployment insurance and expired tax breaks:

In this photo taken Friday, March 5, 2010, a truck runs at Yangshan deep-water port is seen in Shanghai, China. China's exports rose in February in a new sign of growing global demand that could help persuade officials to let the Chinese currency rise. Exports were up 45.7 percent in February over a year earlier, the Chinese customs agency reported Wednesday, beating analysts' forecasts of 35 to 40 percent growth. Imports surged 44.7 percent, the agency said, reflecting growing demand in China as it emerges from the global crisis. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)AP - China's exports rose in February in a new sign of growing global demand that could help persuade officials to let the Chinese currency rise.



The FTSE 100 stock exchange slipped fractionally on Tuesday after a bout of cautious trading due to uncertainty over Europe's economic outlook and poor earnings reports, analysts said.(AFP/File/Shaun Curry)AFP - The FTSE 100 stock exchange slipped fractionally on Tuesday after a bout of cautious trading due to uncertainty over Europe's economic outlook and poor earnings reports, analysts said.



Cisco chairman and chief executive John Chambers, pictured in in San Francisco, California, in 2009. Cisco Systems on Tuesday unveiled a new generation of superfast Internet routers, saying they would AFP - Cisco Systems on Tuesday unveiled super-fast Internet hardware that promises to boost US competitiveness and bolster economic recovery by moving mountains of data at astounding speeds.



AP - Nationalized mortgage lender Northern Rock said Wednesday that it returned to profit in the second half of 2009 as interest income rose and losses on loans fell.

A man looks at a poster showing the Slovak edition of the euro. Talk of a European version of the International Monetary Fund to rescue errant EU states is little more than a distracting sideshow, analysts and a key central banker say.(AFP/File/Samuel Kubani)AFP - Talk of a European version of the International Monetary Fund to rescue errant EU states is little more than a distracting sideshow, analysts and a key central banker say.



The Motley Fool - The first Friday of every month brings the all-important employment report. February's numbers were better than anticipated. The United States lost only 36,000 jobs, versus the 68,000 that experts expected. This compares with 651,000 jobs lost in February 2009. Still, the unemployment rate held steady at 9.7%, with the unofficial rate stuck around a whopping 16%.

Kris Gopalakrishnan, CEO and Managing Director of Infosys Technologies Ltd., speaks during the Reuters - Infosys Technologies, India's No. 2 software services exporter, is seeing a rise in outsourcing deal flows due to a recovery in the global economy, a top official said on Wednesday.



AP - Dollar General Corp. has filed a federal lawsuit against rival discount chain Fred's Inc., claiming the smaller company is using its trademark yellow and black colors.
AP - Commercial mortgages were among the best-performing loans and leases held by banks and thrifts in the fourth quarter of last year, the Mortgage Bankers Association said Tuesday.

In this image released by Nord Stream on Tuesday March 9, 2010 shows the wheel of a 18th or 19th century sailing ship seen in the waters of the Baltic Sea. A dozen centuries-old shipwrecks some of them unusually well-preserved have been found in the Baltic sea by a gas company building an underwater pipeline between Russia and Germany, Swedish experts said Tuesday. The oldest wreck probably dates back to medieval times and could be up to 800 years old, while the others are likely from the 17th to 19th centuries, said Peter Norman, of Sweden's National Heritage Board. (AP Photo/Nord Stream, Ho)AP - Oil prices drifted down to near $81 a barrel Wednesday in Asia after a report showed mixed evidence about U.S. crude demand.



GM vehicles are lined up ready for export at Incheon port in South Korea. GM Daewoo, the South Korean unit of struggling US auto giant General Motors, has said it intends to return to profit this year and currently needs no further financial support from creditors.(AFP/HO/GM Daewoo/File)AFP - GM Daewoo, the South Korean unit of struggling US auto giant General Motors, said Wednesday it intends to return to profit this year and currently needs no further financial support from creditors.



BusinessWeek - Notre Dame's Mendoza College of Business (Mendoza Undergraduate Profile) took the top spot in the Bloomberg BusinessWeek ranking of undergraduate business programs for the first time this year. Students praised the program for its values and strong alumni network. And there were many other surprises for undergraduate business programs in 2010. Bloomberg BusinessWeek editors Louis Lavelle and Geoff Gloeckler recently revealed the top 50 programs and answered questions about the ranking from reporter Francesca Di Meglio (FrancescaBW) and readers during a live chat event.