IBT Staff Reporter

California financier Danny Pang was arrested by FBI agents on Tuesday on federal charges that he allegedly structured cash transactions to keep them below $10,000, a sum which triggers a report to the federal government, U.S. prosecutors said today.

The U.S. Treasury announced its plans to help homeowners lower payments on their second mortgages, helping them avoid foreclosures while also incentivizing loan servicers.

Hewlett-Packard on Tuesday introduced a line of inexpensive small business notebooks, called ProBooks which offer a choice between Windows or Linux operating systems.

The California Public Employees’ Retirement System, which is the largest U.S. public pension fund, announced on Tuesday that it will vote against the re-election of the entire Bank of America board of Directors, including Chief Executive Officer and Chairman Ken Lewis.

The wind energy industry installed 2,836 megawatts of new generating capacity from January to March 2009, double the amount of the same period a year ago, said the American Wind Energy Association on Tuesday.

E*Trade Financial Corp, a U.S. retail brokerage, said it is facing regulatory pressure to boost capital as it posted its seventh straight quarterly loss, and its shares fell 25 percent in after-hours trade.

Tesla's Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk and the all-electric Model S are scheduled to appear on The Late Show with David Letterman on April 29.

The Food and Drug Administration issued a final rule Tuesday that requires manufactures of over-the-counter (OTC) products to revise their labeling including warnings about potential safety risks, such as internal bleeding and liver damage to help the consumers use products safely.

The U.S. Justice Department is making inquiries about a class action deal that Google Inc struck giving it the right to digitize and sell entire libraries, two experts on digitization told Reuters on Tuesday.

A group of authors who are considering whether to opt out of a settlement with Google Inc that gives it the right to distribute books online were granted a delay by a federal judge on Tuesday.

Websites displaying child pornography fell by almost 10 percent in 2008, but most of those images were still being peddled by commercial sites, an Internet watchdog said on Wednesday.

The U.S. Treasury has reached a tentative deal with banks representing most of Chrysler LLC's first-lien debt but the agreement needs approval from more than 40 other lenders holding the automaker's debt, people familiar with the talks said on Tuesday.

A Russian warship captured a suspected pirate vessel with 29 people on board off the coast of Somalia, Russian news agencies reported on Wednesday, citing defense ministry sources.

Airline shares around the world largely took another hit on Tuesday on fears of steep falls in business and leisure traffic because of the swine flu outbreak.

A group of authors who are considering whether to opt out of a settlement with Google Inc that gives it the right to distribute books online were granted a delay by a federal judge on Tuesday.

E*Trade Financial Corp said on Tuesday its loss in the first quarter deepened missing Wall Streets expectations and that it would have to raise new capital. Its were down 23 percent in after-hours trade.

Wells Fargo's CEO is feeling optimistic about the economy and believes the recession is near the end.

Computer server maker Sun Microsystems Inc reported a wider quarterly loss as sales fell because of lower technology spending and uncertainty over the company's future.

The number of confirmed Swine Flu cases in the U.S. has risen to 64 leading the government to declare a state of emergency; doctors fear this may cause a pandemic as the number of infected continues to rise.

During the SARS outbreak, which began in China, airline traffic in Asia halved, and airline stocks tumbled 25 percent or more.

Global airlines could face an even bumpier landing than during the 2003 SARS crisis if a new swine flu outbreak becomes a pandemic, hitting an industry that is already reeling from the global economic downturn.

The U.S. swine flu caseload rose to 65 in six states on Tuesday as lawmakers launched emergency hearings to evaluate the government's response to what doctors warn could become a pandemic.

New swine flu infections were found around the world on Tuesday and the specter of a pandemic began to hit the travel industry as governments warned people to stay away from Mexico where 149 people have died.

Google rolled out a new search tool on Tuesday that is designed to help Web users more easily find public data that is often hidden in hard-to-navigate government Web sites.

The British Foreign & Commonwealth Office has upgraded its warning relating to Thailand. The FCO now advises against all but essential travel to all parts of the country.

Another hole in Adobe Reader that could allow attackers to remotely execute malicious code on end-users' machines was discovered on Tuesday.

U.S. stocks fell on Tuesday as fresh worries that major banks may need to raise more money offset more reassuring economic data that suggested the worst may be over and a big dividend boost from IBM.

California Governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, on Tuesday declared a state of emergency to tackle the swine flu outbreak in the most populous U.S. state.

The World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) said in a statement later Monday that it proposed to refer to the new virus 'swine influenza' as 'North American influenza'.