IBT Staff Reporter

District 9, a gritty, low-budget space alien movie set in South Africa with a cast of unknowns, opened as Hollywood's No. 1 film, grossing more at the box office its first weekend than it cost to make.

Comcast Corp has been hoarding cash to better manage its balance sheet but investors worry that it could be building a war chest for a splashy acquisition similar to its failed 2004 bid for Walt Disney Co.

The deal initialed last week between the United States and Switzerland over UBS will involve the disclosure of around 5,000 holders of secret Swiss accounts, weekly newspaper NZZ am Sonntag said on Sunday.

The Australian Dollar opens the new week lower at 0.8283. The Aussie hit an eleven-month high of 0.8475 last Friday after the Reserve Bank of Australia governor Mr Glenn Stevens said a normal cash rate is noticeably higher than the current level of 3 per cent.

The Peter Jackson produced sci-fi thriller

Usain Bolt of Jamaica shattered his own world record in the 100 meters dash on Sunday with a time of 9.58 seconds at the World Championships in Berlin.

U.S. stocks could extend last week's retreat after a four-week advance as the earnings season winds down and investors search for signs that consumer spending will help sustain an economic recovery.

U.S. President Barack Obama reignited his criticism of health insurance companies on Saturday, promising reforms that would prevent firms from capping coverage or charging outrageous fees.

U.S. senator Jim Webb said on Sunday he had asked Myanmar to free opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi and let her take part in politics during talks that secured the release of an American jailed for visiting her.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Sunday he would propose at least three female ministers in his new cabinet following Iran's disputed election, an unprecedented move in the conservative Islamic state.

The deal initialed last week between the United States and Switzerland over UBS will involve the disclosure of around 5,000 holders of secret Swiss accounts, weekly newspaper NZZ am Sonntag said on Sunday.

Opel labor leader Klaus Franz branded Volkswagen's renewed threat to pull business from Canadian auto parts supplier Magna if it acquires VW's closest German rival as tantamount to blackmail.

A successful Doha round trade deal could boost the global economy by $300-700 billion a year, a study by the Peterson Institute for International Economics said.

Comedian Jerry Seinfeld will be the first guest on Jay Leno's new primetime TV show in September, NBC said on Friday.

The British government is prepared to tighten the laws on bankers' pay and bonuses if companies continue to reward excessive risk-taking, finance minister Alistair Darling told the Sunday Times newspaper.

Indian Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan said he felt angry and humiliated after he was detained and questioned at a U.S. airport, sparking an uproar in India among his fans.

There is speculation that Radiohead will issue a new digital EP as early as Monday, after the leak of a track online assumed to be a new song by the band.

A Massachusetts judge has issued an arrest warrant for Grammy Award-winning R&B singer Bobby Brown for failure to pay child support, local media reported on Friday.

Singer Kelly Clarkson and basketball superstar LeBron James are teaming up with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and broadcaster Viacom for a TV special to encourage America's youth to

MC Hammer doesn't want to hurt 'em. Again.

Quick sales of companies are replacing traditional, lengthy U.S. bankruptcy reorganizations, and a lack of affordable credit and a recent appeals court opinion is expected to intensify the trend.

Citigroup Inc says two of its traders are exempt from a government review of the bank's top executive pay packages, The New York Times reported on Saturday.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for a suicide car bomb that killed seven people on Saturday in the heart of the Afghan capital's most secure district five days before an election the Islamist group has vowed to disrupt.

South Korea's president on Saturday called on North Korea to reach a deal to cut conventional arms amassed on their heavily fortified border and renewed a pledge to provide aid if the impoverished North ends its atomic ambitions.

A ransom demand has been made for the lost merchant ship Arctic Sea, Finnish media said on Saturday, but the whereabouts of the vessel were still unknown in a saga looking increasingly like the plot of a spy thriller.

Taiwan leaders, already under fire over the response to a typhoon that likely killed hundreds, have accepted foreign aid after earlier refusing the offers, officials said on Saturday, as the president apologized.

Palestinian Islamists Hamas struck back at an al-Qaeda challenge to their grip on the Gaza Strip by storming a mosque in overnight battles that left the leader of the Warriors of God splinter group among up to 28 dead.

Opel labor leader Klaus Franz branded Volkswagen's renewed threat to pull business from Canadian auto parts supplier Magna if it acquires VW's closest German rival as tantamount to blackmail.

Scrutiny of an air traffic controller's actions, including whether a phone call may have distracted him, intensified on Friday as investigators released new details about the deadly collision of a small plane and a tourist helicopter over New York's Hudson River last week.