Business News

Japan's top leaders are defending the economic strategies championed by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe , though the central bank chief acknowledged a need for better communication with financial markets, a day after Tokyo shares suffered their worst loss since the 2011 tsunami disaster.

The protesters said Thursday they want Wendy's to sign an agreement to safeguard working conditions for Florida tomato pickers.

Gap Inc. , which owns The Gap, Old Navy and Banana Republic clothing chains, on Thursday reported a 43 percent jump in its fiscal first-quarter net income, as the company continues to reap benefits from the turnaround plan that it began early last year.

Ally Financial Inc. said Thursday it will pay $2.1 billion to its mortgage subsidiary Residential Capital and the unit's creditors under an agreement reached last week that could move the Detroit-based lender closer to repaying its government bailout.

The Dow Jones industrial average was down 50 points at 15,256 as of 10:28 a.m., a decline of 0.3 percent.

Sales of new homes rose in April to the second highest level since the summer of 2008 while the median price for a new home hit a record high, further signs that housing is recovering.

The devastating tornado that killed at least 24 people and damaged as many as 13,000 homes in Oklahoma on Monday appears to have been in the path of only five real-estate investment trust properties, while almost 20 other properties narrowly avoided the storm track, according to a new analysis released on Thursday.

Dow Jones industrial futures are down 102 points to 15,218. S&P futures have lost 13.2 points to 1,642.40. Nasdaq futures are down 23.25 points to 2,977.75. U.S. stocks began selling off late Wednesday when minutes from the Federal Reserve left some doubts about the level of the government's bond-buying commitment.

The 2008 arbitrage deal handed about 400 million euros to magnate Bernard Tapie to settle a dispute with state-owned bank Credit Lyonnais over the botched sale of Adidas in the 1990s.

A survey shows China's manufacturing contracted this month, adding to signs a fragile recovery in the world's No.

Dish Network Corp is ramping up its Washington-centric campaign to thwart Japanese firm SoftBank Corp's bid for Sprint Nextel Corp, hoping to convince lawmakers and government reviewers that it poses national security risks.

The head of a typical large public company made $9.7 million in 2012, a 6.5 percent increase from a year earlier that was aided by a rising stock market, according to an analysis by The Associated Press using data from Equilar, an executive pay research firm.

A tent is erected near the scene of an attack in Woolwich southeast London Wednesday, May, 22, 2013.

Some are concerned there will not be enough federal resources avaiable to meet a surge in demand from tornado-struck areas of Oklahoma.

Sen. Orrin Hatch and the high-tech community scored a victory in the ongoing immigration tug-of-war on Tuesday.

Japan has posted its tenth straight monthly trade deficit as a weaker yen increased the cost of imports more than it helped boost exports.

The release of minutes of the April 30-May 1 meeting reversed a surge earlier in the day on hopes that the Fed was a long way from stopping its stimulus efforts.

When America's Founding Fathers included in the Constitution the goal to "promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts," they could not have predicted that the same document one day would be at the center of a $100 million battle over whether a former pro wrestler's sex tape should be taken off the Internet.

One day after being found guilty of falsely imprisoning three women in his Bel Air home, the Girls Gone Wild founder in an exclusive interview railed against "mentally f--king retarded" jurors, "piece of sh-t" Steve Wynn and his legions of "jealous" critics: "Look at their penis and tell me if it's small." "I want that jury to know that each and ... (more)

Rescue workers are searching the rubble of collapsed buildings after a mile-wide tornado flattened a suburb south of Oklahoma City.