UNITED STATES

President Barack Obama said on Friday the jump in the unemployment rate to 10.2 percent in October was a sobering figure that underscored the economic challenges ahead.

Harvard Business School is sending 28 percent of its 2009 graduating class onto careers in finance, a mildly bullish sign for the economy, said Ray Soifer, an independent bank consultant.

he U.S. unemployment rate, which rose more than expected in October to 10.2 percent, confirms a deeper and more protracted problem in the labor market, Mohamed El-Erian, chief executive of bond giant Pacific Investment Management Co (PIMCO), said in an interview on Friday.

U.S. stocks barely budged in a choppy trading session on Friday, lifted by several broker upgrades that offset disappointing data showing the unemployment rate rose to its highest in more than 26 years.

French nuclear reactor builder Areva is to decide the buyer for its transmission and distribution (T&D) business mid-November, with bidders sending in final offers this Monday.

South Korea must do more to open its market to U.S. cars before President Barack Obama will send a free trade agreement signed in June 2007 to Congress for a vote, the chief U.S. trade negotiator said on Thursday.

About 40 world leaders plan to go to Copenhagen next month to boost the chances of clinching a U.N. climate deal, the United Nations said Friday as preparatory talks wound down with scant progress.

A U.N. climate deal due to be agreed in Copenhagen at talks from December 7-18 may fall short of a legally binding treaty, according to the United Nations.

H1N1 swine flu is on the rise in China and Japan after triggering an unusually early start to the winter influenza season in Europe, Central Asia and North America, the World Health Organization said on Friday.

Renewable energy firm Ocean Power Technologies has won a A$66.5 million ($61 million) grant from the Australian government for a project set to be one of the first to generate power from waves on a utility scale.

Private equity firm Blackstone Group LP posted a forecast-beating quarterly profit and said it is gearing up for more deals and IPOs as the lending and equity markets recover.

Democratic leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives scrambled on Friday to allay lingering concerns about a broad healthcare overhaul and raised the possibility a vote planned for Saturday could slip into next week.

After much anticipation and buzz over it being the next iPhone Killer, Verizon officially launched its Motorola Droid in the US on Friday.

The U.S. jobless rate unexpectedly jumped to a 26-1/2-year high of 10.2 percent last month, adding to pressure on the Obama administration to do more to tackle unemployment even as signs of recovery mount.

A U.S. trade panel on Friday approved two new investigations into charges of unfair trade practices by China, but rejected another one week ahead of President Barack Obama's trip to Asia.

Solar company STR Holdings Inc priced its initial public offering of 12.3 million shares at $10 a share on Friday, below the target range and a day later than expected.

Shares of Magna International Inc were up more than 12 percent on Friday, a day after it posted a surprise quarterly profit and said it would focus on its core auto-parts business after the collapse of its deal to buy a stake in General Motors Co's Opel unit.

The International Monetary Fund warned global financial leaders on Friday not to repeat the mistakes of the Great Depression and choke off emergency support for their economies too quickly.

A founder of part of payments processing business RBS WorldPay is interested in buying all of the business back from Royal Bank of Scotland after the UK bank was told to sell it by European competition authorities.

U.S. stocks were little changed in choppy trading on Friday as brokerage upgrades offset data showing the unemployment rate soared to 10.2 percent last month, its highest in more than 26 years.

London-based record label EMI has won an injunction against music website BlueBeat.com which it said was selling Beatles songs without its permission.