Daily Wrap Up - August 3

Bank of America to Pay

Bank of America Corp has agreed to pay $33 million to settle charges that it made false and misleading statements to investors about bonuses at Merrill Lynch & Co, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission said on Monday.

Citigroup's energy unit Phibro may separate

Phibro LLC the energy trading unit of Citigroup may separate from its parent company, according to a report from the New York Times which said Andrew Hall, a senior trader at Phibro has had preliminary talks to other parties about the separation.

Eric Schmidt leaves Apple board on 'potential conflicts'

Eric Schmidt, chief executive officer of Google, announced his resignation from Apple's Board of Directors due to potential conflicts as the two tech giants compete in similar markets. Schmidt has served as a member of Apple's board since August 2009. Read Full Article here.

U.S. energy sector surges

The U.S. energy sector started the month of August with gains with optimism about the economy. Crude oil jumped to the $71 per barrel mark and main indexes climbed, including the New York Stock Exchange's Arca Oil Index which climbed 1.8 percent to 978. The NYSE Arca Natural Gas Index surged 2.9 percent to 461 and the Philadelphia Oil Service Index advanced 3.2 percent to 176, Dow Jones reports.

Ford reports a 2.3 percent increase in monthly sales, the first since 2007
Ford Motor Co. on Monday reported an increase of 2.3 percent to 165,279 vehicles in July monthly sales, its first monthly gain since 2007. The automaker said that it benefitted from the federal Cash for Clunkers new-car incentive program.

Benmosche named AIG's new CEO
Robert Benmosche, the former chairman and chief executive of MetLife Inc., has been selected to be the new CEO of American International Group Inc., according to people familiar with the matter, the Wall Street Journal reported. According to the report, the selection was approved on Monday morning and Benmosche would succeed outgoing CEO Edward Liddy.

About 6,000 GM hourly workers leave automaker
More than 6,000 U.S. hourly workers have left General Motors Co on August 1 under the automaker's latest buyout program in a bid to trim costs. The departing workers will receive cash payments of $20,000 to $115,000 as well as $25,000 vehicle vouchers.

FTC to press on with Apple-Google board probe

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission said it will continue to investigate the relationship between the boards of Apple Inc and Google Inc, after Google's chief quit Apple's board on Monday. Read Full Article here.

Microsoft's Bing gains another 1 percent of U.S. search

Microsoft increased its share of the U.S. Internet search market by another 1 percentage point in July, taking its combined share with new search partner Yahoo to 20.36 percent, according to data released on Monday. Read Full Article here.

Yahoo to focus on display ad, content businesses: report

Yahoo Inc , which last week announced a Web search deal with Microsoft Corp , will invest money from reduced marketing and infrastructure costs into its display ad, content and mobile services technology, its chief executive Carol Bartz told the New York Times in an interview. Read Full Article here.

Enel, EDF agree to develop nuclear reactors

Italian company Enel SpA and French utility Electricite de France SA signed a jiont venture agreement to develop nuclear reactors in Italy on Monday. Each company will keep a 50 percent stake of the project.