MARKETS / FINANCE

It seems certain the IMF will not pay its share of an aid tranche to Greece at the end of the month but the global lender is likely take part in any new program, a German newspaper reported on Wednesday.

Shares were set to open slightly lower on Wednesday, after strong gains in the previous session, and as investors awaited further economic data to gauge the strength of recovery in the world's biggest economy At 5:03 a.m. ET, futures for the Dow Jones, S&P 500 and Nasdaq were all down 0.1 percent.

AXA , Europe's second-largest insurer, launched a new five-year plan to boost profits and cut debt on Wednesday, kicking off with the cash sale of its Canadian unit for US$2.7 billion.

Greece and a team of EU/IMF/ECB inspectors are set to conclude talks by Thursday on a medium-term fiscal plan including the government's progress toward meeting budget targets, a Greek newspaper reported on Wednesday.

Analysts who cover initial public offerings had little enthusiasm for first-quarter deals for debt-laden companies like hospital chain HCA Holdings Inc and pipeline operator Kinder Morgan Inc .

China's third-largest online game operator Shanda Games is in acquisition talks with some social and mobile gaming firms in the United States and Asia, its chief executive said on Wednesday.

Yahoo Inc has resolved a dispute with partner Alibaba Group over the Chinese company's transfer of its prized online payments unit to its CEO Jack Ma, two sources close to the matter said.

Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz is known as a strong-willed and straight-talking leader, but some top money managers are betting she can mend fences and compromise with crucial partners in China.

The House of Representatives on Tuesday defeated a bill to raise the debt limit in a vote staged by Republicans to strengthen their push for deep spending cuts in negotiations with the White House.

Twitter has acquired the team behind a small Internet company whose tools helped manage advertising campaigns on Google Inc, stepping up the microblogging site's effort to generate revenue.

Yahoo Inc has resolved a dispute with Alibaba Group over the Chinese company's transfer of its online payment system, Alipay, to Chief Executive Jack Ma, two sources close to the matter said.

A double-dip in home prices, pessimistic consumers and a slowdown in regional manufacturing raised concerns on Tuesday that the economy's soft patch could become protracted.

Sprint Nextel has formally asked U.S. regulators to block AT&T Inc's proposed $39 billion purchase of T-Mobile USA, saying the deal has no public interest benefit and would harm competition even if it comes with conditions.

Viadeo, the world's second-biggest online networking site for professionals behind LinkedIn, plans to double its users in Africa within a year, its chief operating officer for the continent said on Tuesday.

A U.S. judge approved a class action settlement over Google's Buzz social network, and awarded $500,000 to an Internet privacy group that had previously been left out of the proposed deal.

Wealthy U.S. individuals have already pulled most of their money from Swiss private banks and could exit altogether as a global clampdown on tax evasion and banking secrecy benefits onshore rivals, a report showed.

Wall Street bulls took the upper hand with a 1 percent rally on Tuesday as hopes for a new plan to deal with Greece's debt crisis relieved some investor worry, but grim economic data suggested more hurdles ahead as the S&P 500 closed out its worst month since August.

Three trillion dollars is a lot of cash to hoard up in barely 10 years. It's a lot of cash to unleash on the world's commodity markets, too. And peak oil or not, we monetary maniacs might just have a point. Real returns to cash do matter.

As much of a quarter of the recent decline in the U.S. jobless rate is due to long-term unemployment benefits running out, according to research from the Chicago Federal Reserve Bank published on Tuesday.

Wall Street bulls took the upper hand on Tuesday as hopes for a new plan to deal with Greece's debt crisis soothed some investor worry, but more grim economic data suggested there were more hurdles ahead.

Ally Financial Inc, the United States' largest maker of car loans, hopes that people have forgotten the time when subprime became a synonym for disaster.

Greece appears to have agreed a tax cut with its international lenders, aimed at forging a broad consensus for more austerity to avoid a debt default, but the opposition said on Tuesday this would still not win its support.

The rising tide of stocks last year further erased the damage of the 2008 financial crisis and buoyed worldwide personal wealth to a new record high.

Consumer confidence slid in May as consumers turned more pessimistic on the outlook for the labor market and inflation worries rose, according to a private sector report released on Tuesday.

Hopes of more financial aid for debt-stricken Greece lifted Wall Street on Tuesday, but a sharp bounce at the open was largely eroded as more weak economic data brought investors back to earth.

Data showing a double-dip in home prices, pessimistic consumers and a slowdown in regional manufacturing raised concerns on Tuesday that the economy's soft patch could become protracted.

The European Central Bank will not let Lorenzo Bini Smaghi be forced off its executive board and expects him to leave only if he is asked to head the Bank of Italy when Mario Draghi becomes ECB president in November, ECB sources have told Reuters.

The European Commission plans to call Britain and Denmark to account for dragging their feet on enforcing a controversial new law to protect people's privacy on-line, a spokesman said.

Pension funds and endowments are sending hedge fund managers a friendly message -- let us sit in the front seat with you, please.