IBT Staff Reporter

Stocks, bucking a trend of late-day selloffs, ended higher on Thursday as economic bellwether FedEx offered a bullish profit outlook that augured well for broad growth.

U.S. stocks were modestly higher on Thursday after bellwether FedEx offered a bullish forecast, while trade was tight as investors continued to adjust toward year-end.

Chevron Corp said it would spend $4 billion to develop its Big Foot project in the Gulf of Mexico, even as tougher rules and higher costs loom for deepwater operators.

The long running round of Doha world trade talks could finally run out of steam in 2011 if no deal is reached, the European Union's top trade official said on Thursday.

Scientists at the University of Wisconsin have found the genes that control alcohol tolerance in yeast, opening the way to engineer better yeast strains and make biofuels more competitive.

The chief U.S. derivatives regulator proposed on Thursday that swaps could be traded on venues as transparent as stock markets, a second attempt at rules to establish where big swap transactions will be brokered.

The U.S. Commerce Department should open a privacy office and work to develop voluntary but enforceable codes of conduct for data companies and advertisers tracking consumers on the Internet, said a report by the department's Internet Policy Task Force.

Motorola Inc's planned split into two may provide a windfall for investors who are brave enough to make a risky bet and patient enough to wait months for benefits from the transaction to materialize.

The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago has ruled that lawyers cannot resign to avoid the embarrassment of disbarment.

London's High Court, on Thursday, upheld a decision to free WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who has earned the ire of the U.S. government for releasing secret diplomatic cables, on bail.

The International Monetary Fund approved a 22.5 billion euros loan for Ireland on Thursday and said it was open to re-negotiating parts of the bailout package with a new Irish government provided the overall targets were adhered to.

The U.S. Senate opens debate on the START Treaty this morning, with the Democrats needing one more vote to ensure passage.

House of Representatives Democrats demanding a chance to blast the tax cut deal President Barack Obama struck with Republicans delayed a vote on the massive tax measure on Thursday, but House leaders said they still expected to pass the bill.

Norwegian electric carmaker Think has started production of its City urban runabout car at an assembly plant in Elkhart, Indiana.

Manufacturing conditions in Philadelphia continued to improve for the third consecutive month and input prices increased, according to a survey report on Thursday

Nokia, the world's top cellphone maker by volume, has opened new fronts in Europe in its patent war with iPhone maker Apple, launching lawsuits in Germany and the Netherlands.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) has filed a lawsuit against Berkeley School District, Illinois, for refusing to grant unpaid leave to a Muslim teacher who wished to make a pilgrimage to Mecca.

U.S. stocks rose on Thursday after bellwether FedEx offered a bullish forecast, while investors continued to pour money into shares that have done well this year.

Nokia has filed fresh patent infringement claims against Apple in the UK, Germany and the Netherlands, alleging that Apple infringed its patents in many of its products sold in these countries, including iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch.

Three pharmaceutical companies have agreed to collectively pay a fine of $421 million to settle charges of inflating drug prices, according to the Department of Justice (DOJ).

Wholesale-market Gold Investment bullion-bar prices slipped back to an overnight low beneath $1380 per ounce Thursday lunchtime in London, trading 0.5% down for the week as world equities crept higher and the US Dollar eased back on the forex market.

Judges in Ohio can be a social media friend to lawyers appearing in their courtrooms but should be careful not to violate ethics rules, the state's apex court has opined.

Former senior U.S. District Judge Jack Camp's judicial decision-making process could have been impaired by drugs or racial bias and aggrieved defendants could request re-sentencing, federal prosecutors have suggested.

Sharp Corp will spend about 100 billion yen ($1.2 billion) to build production lines for small and midsize LCDs, with Apple Inc slated to purchase bulk of the output for its iPhone, the Nikkei business daily said.

Charles Manson, who is serving a life sentence for his conspiracy role in the killing of seven people in the Tate-LaBianca murders in Los Angeles, 1969, has been handed down an extra 30 days on his life term after being found in possession of a contraband cellphone within jail premises.

Construction of new homes in the U.S. rose during November but permits fell surprisingly, according to a report by the U.S. Commerce Department, indicating that the housing market might face some weakness in the coming months.

UK high court has upheld the lower court's decision to grant bail to Wikileaks founder Julian Assange. The Swedish prosecutors, who urged the court to revoke the bail, lost their appeal. The court is currently giving out the details of the bail conditions. Assange is likely to be freed on late Thursday.

Microblogging site Twitter has raised $200 million at a $3.7 billion valuation in a funding led by venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins.

Technological advances enabling companies to significantly cut costs have led to strong global growth in start-up activity, an American venture capital pioneer told Reuters.