UNITED STATES

CVS Caremark Corp posted a bigger-than-expected rise in quarterly profit, helped by dispensing more profitable generic drugs, and the company raised the low end of its 2010 earnings forecast.

Silver Lake and Warburg Pincus are to buy financial data provider Interactive Data for $3.4 billion in cash, including a $2 billion payment to majority owner Pearson which it will use to expand.

Toyota Motor Corp is extending heavy discounts to boost U.S. auto sales for a third month, U.S. Toyota executives said on Monday, as the automaker tries to recover from a series of damaging safety recalls.

U.S. drugmakers Pfizer Inc and Merck & Co posted better-than-expected first-quarter profit and revenue on Tuesday, but Merck gave a 2010 earnings forecast that could fall short of Wall Street's target.

Pending sales of previously owned U.S. homes rose more than expected to a five-month high in March as buyers rushed to sign contracts before a popular tax credit expired, a survey showed on Tuesday.

Pending sales of previously owned U.S. homes rose more than expected to a five-month high in March as buyers rushed to sign contracts before a popular tax credit expired, a survey showed on Tuesday.

(Reuters) - Mammograms detect few cancers in women under the age of 40 but cause expense and anxiety because women frequently get false positives that require follow-up to rule out cancer, researchers reported on Monday.

Nissan Motor Co recalled Infiniti G35 sedans and coupes affecting as many as 134,000 cars due to a connector that could cause airbags not deploy during a crash, U.S. regulators said on Tuesday.

Regulators are considering an inquiry into whether Apple Inc violates antitrust law by requiring that its programing tools be used to write applications for the iPad and iPhone, a source familiar with the matter said on Monday.

Auto sales rose about 20 percent in April from recession-stunted results a year earlier, reflecting a still-gradual recovery in the economy.

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - The childhood obesity epidemic is hitting some states much harder than others, threatening to further worsen geographic disparities in health, new research shows.

U.S. stocks were set for a sharply lower open on Tuesday as Greece's debt problems continued to rattle investors and after a broad rally in the previous session that took the S&P 500 to its biggest day in two months.

BP Plc struggled to stop oil gushing unchecked from a ruptured undersea well in the Gulf of Mexico on Tuesday and calmer weather raised hopes of reducing the massive oil slick and limiting its impact on the U.S. shoreline.

U.S. stock index futures sank on Tuesday on continued worries over Greece's financial state and after a broad rally in the previous session that took the S&P 500 to its biggest day in two months.

Russia's Energy ministry said country's oil and gas production saw a favorable increase year-on-year in the first four months this year. In a report, the ministry said, From January to April, the country's oil output reached 165.3 million tons, which was a 3.1-percent growth over the same period of last year; while the gas production soared 20.4 percent year-on-year to 237.9 billion cubic meters.

U.S. stock index futures fell on Tuesday after a broad rally in the previous that took the S&P 500 to its best day in two months as investors fretted over whether Greece could make deep spending cuts.

Fortress Investment , one of the world's largest publicly traded alternative asset managers, plans to rebuild its Asian operations and is in the process of setting up an office in Singapore, sources said.

Futures for the Dow Jones industrial average, the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq 100 were down 0.3 to 0.4 percent, pointing to a weaker start on Wall Street on Tuesday.

UBS boss Oswald Gruebel predicted moderate asset withdrawals in the short term as the Swiss bank's forecast-beating quarterly results gradually start to boost client confidence and wealth advisors' morale.

Massive oil spill on the other side of the mainland prompted actor governor Arnold Schwarzenegger of US state California to withdrew his support of a plan to expand oil drilling off the state's coast. The governor had earlier proposed expanding oil drilling off the coast of Santa Barbara County to help close the state's $20 billion budget deficit.

NYSE Euronext reported a 26 percent increase in quarterly profit as its growing derivatives operation offset sluggish stock trading.