MARKETS / FINANCE

The U.S. government expects its debt to be downgraded by credit ratings agency Standard & Poor's from its current triple-A rating and is preparing for the event, ABC News said on Friday.

Italy buckled to world pressure in a bid to halt a market rout endangering the global economy, pledging to speed up austerity measures and social reforms in return for European Central Bank help with funding.

Warren Buffett's conglomerate Berkshire Hathaway reported a larger second-quarter profit on Friday, as favorable investment results and strength in the rail and manufacturing businesses offset another underwriting loss in insurance.

U.S. sales of Blu-ray movie and television discs rose this year as overall spending on home entertainment dropped and viewing habits shifted, new figures from an industry group showed.

The Dow and S&P 500 dipped into negative territory late on Friday in a volatile session that saw large swings in the indexes, as worries about the economy caused investor skittishness.

The European Central Bank is demanding that Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi commit to fast-track specific welfare reforms and a constitutional amendment enshrining a fiscal rule before it will buy Italian bonds, sources close to the matter said on Friday.

Italy buckled to world pressure in a bid to halt a market rout endangering the global economy, pledging to speed up austerity measures and social reforms in return for European Central Bank help with funding.

U.S. job growth accelerated more than expected in July, tamping down fears the economy was sliding into a fresh recession and easing pressure on the Federal Reserve to provide more support for the weak economy.

Top Morgan Stanley officials purchased thousands of shares this week as the U.S. investment bank's stock price fell to new two-year lows, according to regulatory filings.

Stocks slipped back into the red late on Friday after fluctuating between big gains and losses in a wildly volatile session with trading volume in equities and options on track to set another record.

In the states, oil has been the stuff of riches and the glamour energy form. The reality is, however, in the 21st century the preferred and superior U.S. energy form could very well be domestic natural gas.

Wall Street's advice to investors battered by plunging markets: Keep buying stocks.

U.S. bank stocks declined on Friday as investors sold off shares of some of the largest U.S. lenders amid new fears surrounding the European debt crisis and a U.S. economy showing little new growth.

Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi pledged on Friday to bring forward austerity measures and bring Italy's budget into balance by 2013, a year ahead of the original plan, in a bid to stem rising turmoil on world markets.

Allianz and Generali followed rivals in aggressively writing down holdings of Greek government bonds on Friday, fuelling investor concerns about the possible impact on global insurers of a worsening sovereign debt crisis.

U.S. stocks rose in volatile trade on Friday as investors saw a buying opportunity following the sharp sell-off that took the S&P 500 down 10 percent over the last 10 sessions.

Guidewire Software Inc, which sells software to the insurance industry, is gearing up to go public and has selected JPMorgan Chase & Co and Deutsche Bank to underwrite the deal, people close to the matter said.

A sequel to the Great Recession in the United States just two years after the downturn is not likely because demand for temporary workers, a leading indicator of both upturns and downturns, remains steady, staffing industry executives say.

One of the world's leading economists says don't get giddy over the July jobs report, which indicated the U.S. economy created a better-than-expected 117,000 jobs. NYU Professor Nouriel "Dr. Doom" Roubini, who accurately predicted the housing crisis four years ago, says U.S. GDP will be sub-par in 2011 and the risk of a recession is real.

Bailed-out insurer American International Group plans to hold on to its mortgage insurance business even as the rest of that industry struggles with rising claims, AIG's chief executive said on Friday.

The U.S. Postal Service posted a net loss of $3.1 billion in its third quarter and warned again it would default on payments to the federal government if Congress did not step in.

Allianz and Generali followed rivals in aggressively writing down holdings of Greek government bonds on Friday, fuelling investor concerns about the possible impact on insurers of a worsening sovereign debt crisis.

European leaders faced a chorus of calls for more decisive action to stem an escalating debt crisis on Friday while robust U.S. jobs data brought limited relief to battered world markets.

U.S. job growth accelerated more than expected in July, tamping down fears the economy was sliding into a fresh recession and giving the Federal Reserve some breathing room.

U.S. job growth accelerated more than expected in July as private employers stepped up hiring, a development that could ease fears the economy was sliding into a fresh recession.

Royal Bank of Scotland slid to a pretax loss of 678 million pounds ($1.1 billion) in the second quarter, bruised by writedowns on Greek government bonds and Irish customers struggling to repay loans.

A little over a year after spinning off from Citigroup , Primerica is considering a first share buy-back program, as one of the biggest U.S. term life insurers wants to put its excess capital to use, executives said.

Wells Fargo cut its rating on the U.S. bank sector to marketweight on weaker-than-expected economic growth and persistently low interest rates.

Big-name hedge funds such as Brevan Howard, Man Group's AHL and Winton are making money for investors despite Europe's deepening debt crisis which has plunged global financial markets into turmoil.